From: rpattree2@gmail.com   
      
       
   By Clyde Lewis    
      
   What's in a number?   
   23 seems to be an odds and ends number filled with mystery, chaos, and new   
   beginnings.   
      
   When Ground Zero first aired it's Divine 23 investigation the interest was   
   overwhelming. While some laughed at it and others didn't understand it, there   
   were others who demanded to know if there is any truth to the 23 Enigma. To be   
   completely honest I do    
   not know. I can tell you that my expierience in synchronicity tells me that   
   perhaps there is something to it. There is an old saying called a Catch 22. It   
   is a nice way of saying that you are stuck. You can't progress to 23. Why?   
   perhaps the 23 number    
   means something entirely mysterious. Maybe it is an evil number. Perhaps it is   
   a number of the paranormal and complex happenings . My expierience with the   
   number is accidental. I never would have known or paid attention to it but it   
   all started with an    
   informal meeting.   
      
   There was a beautiful talk show host whom I knew, that had a syndicated   
   program about health and fitness. I had an opportunity to produce a commercial   
   for her and after a long recording session we took a break and she started   
   talking numbers. After    
   figuring in my birthday she said "Oh my!" I asked her if there was a problem   
   and she said "No not exactly." I asked her to explain. She told me that my   
   birthday numbers 2/22 were symbolic. That three two's mean that I have power.   
   Power to draw spiritual    
   strength either from the light or from the darkness. She took the initials of   
   my birth name and gave them numeric value. They added up to 23. She explained   
   that the 23 is a mysterious number. She asked if I was familiar with   
   synchronicity. I told her no.    
   She said that things happen for a reason and then went on to tell me that our   
   meeting was supposed to happen. I began to see where this was leading. dinner   
   later, a bottle of wine and a wonderful evening. I was right. Good line. But   
   it wasn't all that. I    
   realized She was trying to tell me something.   
      
   I asked around about the number 23 and it's significance and no one close to   
   me had heard of it. My program director at the time, knew about it and said he   
   did not want to talk about it Another friend of mine who fronts a rock band   
   told me that he lived    
   his 23 obsession in California. He said that if you go looking for life in 23   
   land, the 23's will find you. They did, unfortunately. I already had a   
   terrible fear of numbers. I remember when I was a kid a Chuck Jones cartoon   
   about a day dreaming kid who    
   is sent to figure a Math problem. As he stands at the blackboard the numbers   
   break out into laughter. I always felt it was because that he couldn't do math   
   problems on demand. I certainly can't, and was a poor Math student in school.   
   I borrowed a book    
   from our computer graphics expert at the radio station I worked for. It was a   
   book by Robert Anton Wilson. Wilson wrote about Timothy Leary and William   
   Burroughs. I met Leary in 1992 at a club in Salt Lake City, and I thought this   
   could be interesting. I    
   read a part of the book that was marked with blue marker called Enigma 23.    
      
   It was author Robert Anton Wilson who first introduced the modern world to the   
   weirdness and mystery that surrounds the 23 Enigma. In His book, The   
   Illuminatus Trilogy he claims that there are many coincidences that involve   
   the number 23. In his    
   autobiography, Cosmic Trigger, Wilson explains how the late William S.   
   Burroughs first made him aware of the fact that the number 23 figures in so   
   many coincidences and oddities of synchronicity. Burroughs, while living in   
   Tangiers. knew a guy by the    
   name of Captain Clark who ran a ferry from Tangiers to Spain. One day, in   
   passing conversation, Captain Clark said to Burroughs that he had been making   
   his ferryboat trips for 23 years without a single accident.. Burroughs was   
   listening to the radio    
   later in the day and heard some distressing news. The report said that the   
   ferry sank, killing everyone on board, including Clark. The irony is that   
   while Burroughs was listening to the news report, he heard about another   
   accident. An Eastern Airlines    
   jet flying from New York to Miami crashed. The pilot of the plane was another   
   Captain Clark . This captain Clark coincidentally was the pilot of flight 23.    
      
   After this incident, Burroughs began to keep records of oddities and   
   coincidences that somehow linked to 23. He later mentioned this to Robert   
   Anton Wilson, who also began to record 23 coincidences. In the book Cosmic   
   Trigger ,Wilson writes that his wife    
   Arlen was annoyed with his obsession with the number 23 claiming what a few   
   people who have called Ground Zero have claimed. That it's a silly study   
   because you choose to see the number 23 while ignoring all the rest. However   
   you learn That you can't    
   escape the weirdness. Wilson's wife had two daughters from a previous   
   marriage, one born on February 23 and the other on August 23.    
      
   I thought it was an interesting read. I obsessed somewhat and laughed about   
   it. Then I left it alone. Sometimes things should be left alone. Now it won't   
   leave me alone.   
      
   After I did the 23 skidoo show on Ground Zero there were 23's that were   
   popping up everywhere. People would point them out. Just when I was to the   
   point of forgetting about the numbers, the numbers would haunt me. Even my   
   phone number added up to 23. I    
   hosted a horror film festival in Salt Lake with Lloyd Kauffman of Troma   
   pictures and Forrest J. Ackerman. I thought it was time to update my wardrobe   
   and wear some interesting shirts that were bizzarre enough for the Halloween   
   crowd. I happened to find    
   an old Misfits shirt with the Crimson Ghost emblazened on the front and a few   
   other shirts. I thought it would be my style to sport a black shirt with the   
   number 23 on the breast pocket and on the back. It had to be custom made. I   
   asked a woman to make    
   the shirt at a mall store and she asked me what the significance was with the   
   number 23. I explained it to her and she wasn't really paying attention. She   
   took notice however when she rang up the price of the shirt and the iron on   
   decals. The total with    
   sales tax came to $23.32. To this day I carry the sales slip in my wallet.    
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)