‘John is here on Earth speaking through a friend of mine.’ : Voices From Beyond

I am in a quiet living room listening to a man with his eyes closed tell me that he lived 75,000 years ago in a South American jungle where there were horses two feet high.

The man’s name is Gerry Bowman. That is to say, the man’s name is Gerry Bowman in this life. There were 349 other lives in which he was not Gerry Bowman.

Two thousand years ago, for instance, he was the Apostle John and used to pal around with Jesus Christ.

John, in fact, is what he prefers being called today, which is all right with me.

If I am willing to talk to a man with his eyes closed who claims to have lived in a wooden hut before the appearance on Earth of Cro-Magnon man, I am willing to accept anything.

Our conversation is taking place in Bowman’s home.

He is a slim man of 37 with an eagle tattooed on his right forearm above the words USAF, which represents a more contemporary existence as a grunt in the Air Force.

Bowman’s head is thrown back slightly and John is speaking through him in an accent that is a screechy blend of Scottish and Australian, although it varies from time to time, a natural consequence of having lived 350 lives.

John is telling me how Jesus was a terrific guy, how he has met people from other planets and how he was a woman in one of his past lives, when it hits me that I am actually sitting there taking notes on all this.

I feel suddenly like one of those nuts who hears voices in his head that tell him to take off his clothes in the Northridge Mall. Why else would I be interviewing a guy who says he is the Apostle John?

I don’t know.

Perhaps the 75,000-year-old man summons fools through an irresistible form of psychic energy that reels us in like catfish.

More than likely, however, I was simply in need of a column the day I was contacted through more conventional means, which is to say a telephone, and asked if I were interested in talking to the author of the Book of Revelation.

The caller was Joe Albiani of Canoga Park, a 300-pound talk show host for radio station KIEV.

I replied that I stopped doing talk-show gimmicks after interviewing Oakland’s famed singing dog, which used to appear on the local station.

“No gimmick,” Joe said. “John is here on Earth speaking through a friend of mine named Gerry Bowman. He also speaks through a friend of Shirley MacLaine.” Of course.

Gerry, as it turns out, is what he calls a trance-medium on Joe’s radio show, offering the wisdom of the ages to anyone who calls in seeking advice.

The show is a success because, as you might imagine, there are enough people living in Los Angeles who not only believe that Bowman lived 75,000 years ago, but who are convinced that they dined together on miniature horse in his jungle hut.

Joe is a very persuasive man, and the next thing I know I am sitting in Bowman’s living room watching him twitch himself into a trance.

I don’t know whether Bowman actually believes that he is a conductor for John’s voice or not, but he plays the part as though he is doing “Death of a Salesman.”

“When Gerry’s thumb and forefingers join,” Joe says, “John is here.”

There are three of us in the room. Well, actually, four, counting John.

Bowman’s mouth drops open and he begins to wheeze and grimace, and then suddenly his thumb and forefingers snap together.

I have the feeling I am expected to rise and shout “hallelujah,” but it is John who speaks first.

“And now my friends,” he says, sounding a little like the guy on the visit-Australia commercials, “we will say g’day to you.”

Normally I cannot abide anyone who uses the editorial we, but since John has lived 350 lives, and is at the moment representing both himself and Gerry, I guess he has as much right as the Pope of Rome or the Queen of England to pluralize self-reference.

I begin asking John questions, most of which he side-steps, although he does manifest a flash of talk-show wisdom when I ask about the appearance of unidentified flying objects over the centuries.

“UFOs are un -identified,” he says grandly, “only until they are identified.”

The kind of people who call KIEV regard that as sheer brilliance.

I am not a man of immense patience to begin with and, since I am feeling like a damned fool anyhow, I bear in harder with my questions, wanting to know, among other things, precisely who in the hell this spook is.

He responds by saying, “Who is Al Martinez? What is an Al Martinez?”

“Wait a minute,” I say, “ I ask the questions,” and that is when it occurs to me that I am debating the right of cross-examination with a minor radio personality who is sitting with his eyes closed and his fingers locked in little circles talking in an accent that is faintly reminiscent of Donald Duck.

“I think,” I say, “that will do it for today,” but what I mean is that will do it for all eternity, I don’t care where or how or in which life John and I happen to meet again.

The Book of Revelation is a nice piece, all right, but I don’t do authors anymore. The jury is still out on singing dogs.