Biography and History

         I was born on Armistice Day 1944 in Butler, Pennsylvania, in the United States of America, the firstborn child of Alta Noreign Donaldson and Clyde Alvin Rice, the first grandchild of my maternal grandparents, Anna Marie Christie and Elliott Donaldson. Until I was two years of age, my father served in the U.S. Army and thus was gone much of the time. My mother and I lived with Grandma and Grandpa Donaldson "down home" in RFD Chicora, which was a wonderful place to be a child.
         Even though it was said to be a rough time in our nation's history, my grandparents owned their land, which provided well for us. They kept chickens, so we had eggs and an occasional chicken dinner. Neighbors a mile away had cows, so we had milk and butter. At the top of the hill, there was an orchard of peach, apples, plum and pear trees and another handy yellow apple tree in the front corner of the yard and at the other end of the property, toward the east, was a prolific crabapple tree. Along the road toward the neighbor and the mailbox, a black cherry tree and a sour cherry tree produced abundantly. And far to the back of the property was a big black walnut tree, in the shade of which grew patches of blackberries and groves of elderberry bushes.
         Below the orchard, on the hill, there was a vineyard, and although I don't remember any winemaking, we had jelly and preserves in abundance. In addition, a concord grapevine, which grew on a fence alongside the house, climbed up into the big pine tree in the front corner of the front yard. I amused myself as a child, by climbing up into the pine tree (getting pine tar all over me in the process) to eat grapes. Behind the house, beyond the rhubarb patch, on the way down to the woods and the natural spring, there were red raspberry bushes and wild strawberries. Grandpa fished and hunted. Grandma made a garden every year, then canned fruits and vegetables and stored them in the fruit cellar. She made pies, bread, and noodles "from scratch." In addition to the abundance of nature, I was very fortunate to enjoy the affections of my many doting aunts and uncles.

Shoe and Sock
My Invisible Friends

         I was also supremely blessed to have the companionship of Shoe and Sock, who were my invisible friends. I don't know when they came or where they came from, but they were my constant companions for as far back as I can remember. They didn't designate their gender, but I suppose I would say that Shoe was the male and Sock was the female. They were always with me and they loved me unconditionally.
         For years I talked to them. I was confident of Shoe and Sock's reality, even though my human associates could not see or hear them. My invisible friends were so integrated into my social paradigm, it became a natural thing for Mom, and later for Dad, to ask, "What do Shoe and Sock think?" and so I would ask them for their council and if they responded, it was to my mind, of course, and not my parents.
         One of the most vivid memories I have of our relationship is when one day we were down by the spring in the woods beyond the red raspberry bushes just behind the house. We often went there to play, to drink water from the tin cup, to feel the mossy rocks, smell the skunk cabbage, and pick violets. On this one particular sunny afternoon, the wood was dappled with sunlight coming through the young treetops when suddenly Shoe and Sock bade me to be very still. I obeyed, not knowing why I was to be very still until I saw a beautiful young deer, not 15 feet away, just standing there looking at us. We all stood there, not making a sound, not wanting to frighten the deer, until at last the deer lost interest and wandered away. When it was gone, Shoe and Sock and I rejoiced in the shared experience.
         I was not permitted to go too close to the spring lest I fall in and drown, but there was an accessible little shallow pool with a rock on which to step, where we always, almost religiously when we came to the spring, had a sip of cold water from the tin cup that was kept there. This pool overflowed naturally and caused a gentle trickle of water to meander into the woods. One day as Shoe and Sock and I were amusing ourselves in the woods, I crouched by this little trickle of water, admiring the slick green moss that grew on the wet rocks, and watching for toads that sometimes jumped into the water, water which could not have been more than an inch or three deep for I could see the ground and the grass growing in the water and the dead leaves of seasons past. Shoe and Sock were nearby, amusing themselves.
         I got to thinking about this stream of water, of which the spring was its source. Somehow I perceived at that tender age that, like the stream, I would wander gently away from my source and follow a path into the woods that would lead me through to the meadows beyond and I would merge with other streams in other faraway counties until we became a river. And I would follow the course, like a river, until it passed through the countryside and beyond, eventually coming to a great body of water, the ocean, and I would become one with the ocean and one with it all. That was a big thought for a little girl, but I never forgot it, for it was the promise of a destiny that I received that day.
         When my dad came home from the service, things began to change. He made me stop sucking my thumb but he brought some excitement into my serene life. In spite of my mother cautioning him against such things, he would lift me up, especially if we had company, and I would stand on his hands, perching there precariously for a long moment until he would toss me into the air, grabbing my ankles as I plunged down to swing beneath his legs such that the top of my head nearly grazed the floor. No matter how many times he did it, people would gasp and then clap when he set me down to take a bow, grinning from ear to ear. I completely trusted my daddy because he adored me.
         About the time I got too big for him to do that anymore, he sat me down for a little chat. He said we were going to move away from Grandma and Grandpa's house. We needed to find our own house because I was going to become a big sister. He told me I would have to learn to be responsible so that I could help my mom with the new baby. And he said that soon I would need to go to school and learn how to play with other children, but that, in order to do all this, I would have to give up Shoe and Sock.
         While I was glad of the new adventures to come, I was very anxious about giving up my invisible friends and frankly did not see why I should have to. He tried to explain the difference between "the real world" and the world of imagination, but I was unable to assure him that Shoe and Sock were not imaginary, they were real. Finally he explained, "Because people will laugh at you if you take them to school with you. You don't want people to laugh at you, do you?" If I knew then what I know now, I might have said, "Let them laugh!" but I was an obedient child and allowed destiny to take its course. I accepted that it was time for me to leave Shoe and Sock behind.
         But I did not want to leave them in the woods. I reasoned that by now they were accustomed to my company and they would be lonely in the woods without other children to companion. To my mind, they would be better off in the undergrowth that grew in the culvert about a quarter of a mile down the road from the house, near the crabapple tree. It was not as pretty there as it was in the woods, in spite of some hardy saplings, some wildflowers among the many weeds, and even water, when it rained. Yes, I regretted there was also a lot of road dust, but at least from here, Shoe and Sock could wave at the other children riding by in their parents' car or in the school bus, and they would not be lonely.
         It was a big sacrifice for a little girl to make! Shoe and Sock were nearer and dearer to me than just about anything. So it was with heavy heart that we walked to the culvert, Daddy and me, hand in hand, and there I left them, telling them I would never forget them, and crying all the way home. I was nearly 40 years of age before I realized that leaving Shoe and Sock behind was my first big mistake.

0802 AB
Secondary Midwayer "JACK"

         The next twenty years were turbulent. I will not here and now trouble you with my tales of woe, but suffice it to say I had my fair share of love and loss, work and play, drama and trauma. I was not contacted again by the celestial realms until I was 24 years of age. A little background is in order here, to set the stage for the scene that became a turning point in my life.
         Some time after my parents' divorce in my early teens, with Mom getting custody of my new baby sister and Dad gaining custody of my little brother, I left home and migrated to Seal Beach, California, where I served as a live-in babysitter until a neighboring group of students talked me into attending college. After two years at Cal State Long Beach I became disillusioned with academia, I "dropped out," eventually becoming part of the counter-culture of the 60's. "God's Country Tribe" was the hippie commune that served as my surrogate family until we all eventually migrated to Oahu to be near one of our members who had been drafted into the Vietnam War and who enjoyed an occasional R&R in Hawaii. I was the last to migrate, arriving there early in 1968.
         The commune having disbanded, I carved out a niche for myself in the little town of Hauula, Hawaii, on the north shore of Oahu, where I landed a job paying $1.65 an hour at Dodi's Department Store in a tiny little strip mall nearly a mile down the beach from my little bungalow in the former military officers' camp of Sacred Falls Resort, which I rented for $45 a month.
         As I walked to work one morning along the beach side of Kamehameha Highway, I observed two "haolis" (white men) standing along the road ahead of me, enjoying the early morning vista. As I approached, I recognized one fellow as Kipper, who had occasionally visited our former South Laguna commune. We exchanged pleasantries and he introduced me to Alan, whose houseguest he was.
         Several days later, Kipper knocked on my door and invited me to go for a walk with him. He carried with him a large machete; his body was muscular and healthy. He walked with such a powerful stride as he led me into the sugar cane fields of Sacred Falls, it was hard to keep up with him. As he whacked at the sugar cane with the machete, as if for emphasis, he talked intently about somebody named Machiventa Melchizedek, the teacher of Abraham, father of the Jewish race.
         Sweating with the effort, his words filled with energy and power, he abruptly stopped still. I looked up and saw the sky roiling and churning with energy such as I had never seen before. It may well have been endorphins, but for me it was tantamount to a religious experience. I felt as if I had been taken up into the celestial realms! Whoever he was, I would never ever forget the name of Machiventa Melchizedek! Kipper had been turning me onto The Urantia Book, the fifth epochal revelation to humankind.
         He also told me about my neighbors on Pokiwai Way whom he had also just introduced to The Urantia Book. They were Alan, the tall, attractive man of about 40 whom I had met earlier, and Alan's witty, worldly partner, Bill, who together comprised the Las Vegas show business company of Turner & Smith Productions, Inc. They had relocated to Hauula, Oahu, after falling under the spell of Bali Hai during the production of an ice skating "extravaganza" at the Waikiki Shell a year or two previously.
         When we parted company that day, Kipper suggested that I visit my neighbors to learn more about Machiventa Melchizedek and about The Urantia Book, adding that if I showed up around suppertime, I could probably get something to eat as well, and so I became "a regular" at Pokiwai Way, along with a number of others. It was two years before I heard the story told that when Alan saw me that first day, coming down the coast highway, a voice in his head instructed him: "That is the woman you are going to marry."
         To make a very long and interesting story short for the purpose of this narrative, Alan's story is that he had been a materialist, living as a hedonist, thinking like a cynic in the "sin city" of Las Vegas, Nevada. The social circle of those who made their home and their livelihood there was often quite "colorful," and for amusement, several of them investigated various paranormal activities. One day in 1955, Alan and some of his friends were working the Quiji Board when it spelled out the word U-R-A-N-T-I-A. They opted to not bother to look it up or find out more about what it meant but the word was indelibly burned in Alan's brain. There followed a series of unlikely contacts, such as the card table levitating, items falling unprovoked off the shelf, and books flying across the room of their own accord, but Alan staunchly refused to deal with a "poltergeist." He would not acknowledge the credibility of any entity that tried to get his attention by such unorthodox and immature methods.
         It was not until Kipper brought the Urantia Book to Pokiwai Way that Alan learned about the invisible creatures that live midway between men and angels. Only then did he begin to take those "spirits" seriously. He learned that the "midwayers" were able to attain varying degrees of contact with the Thought Adjusters of certain "favorably constituted mortals through the skillful penetration of the minds of the latter's indwelling." (P.1258 - §1) Thus began the liaison between Alan and the celestial realms, notably the secondary midwayer designated 0802-AB a/k/a "Jack." Jack became our personal tour guide to the cosmos and a constant prodder of our spiritual nature. Pictured here is the green glow of midwayer Jack, standing next to contact personality Alan Frederick Smith in Waikiki, Hawaii, on our wedding day, June 27, 1971.
         At that time, and on that remote outpost in the Pacific, we were quite convinced that the number of people who had ever heard of The Urantia Book was so miniscule as to warrant our banding together to keep the light of its truth burning. So, odd couple that we were, in 1971 Alan and I conjoined together in holy matrimony in order to foster the Urantia revelation, and throughout our marriage we were constantly companioned by our friend and associate Jack, the loyal secondary midwayer who was determined to train our deep minds for planetary service. Jack also introduced me to celestial artisan Athena, who over the next twenty years taught me to write.
         Incredibly, and regrettably, all of the hundreds of pages of transcripts that were collected from our association with Jack from the beginning of our association in 1968 until we left the Islands on July 4, 1974, save one, were lost in the move. We continued our liaison with Jack as we ventured through San Diego into Las Vegas and on into Albuquerque where we settled. When we there learned that many Urantia Book Study Groups existed, even organized Urantia Societies, we no longer felt compelled to stay together on behalf of the revelation. That, coupled with our own increasing marital discord, led to our amicable divorce in 1981.
         Before the dissolution of our long-standing liaison, Jack made certain to impress upon us two things: (1) the unimagined benefits to the celestials of having a Urantia Book-based couple with whom they could work; and (2) while he was not at liberty to tell us what it would be, there was something afoot, something about to happen "just around the corner" and we would recognize it when it came about.
         Too late I realized that in losing the marriage, I also lost my connection with Jack! What a vital part of our marriage Jack had been! I did not realize that losing contact with Jack would leave me as bereft of spirit companionship and thus as vulnerable as when I lost the companionship of Shoe and Sock, but what they say is true: "You don't miss your water 'til your well runs dry!" and Jack had been the bucket by which the living water was served to me fresh and cold, as from the spring down in the woods where I used to go with Shoe and Sock as a child. Even though I landed a great job and bought an adorable little house in the valley, without Jack and without the structure of marriage, I spiritually floundered. Fortunately, I did have something to which I could look forward that was "just around the corner."
         In 1983, I met with Alan to facilitate the process of introducing Jack to his traveling companion, whom I have identified as "Tom" for confidentiality purposes, and I got to keep some of those transcripts. They are hardly profound, nor do they show us in particularly good light, but they do reveal how cleverly and effectively the celestials lure otherwise egocentric mortals into higher realms of consciousness.
         Not long thereafter, Alan and Tom began their adventures and we lost contact. They did indeed invest in real estate and, with their profits, sojourned to Lake Van in Turkey as well as Alexandria, Egypt, where they visited the Taj Mahal at Agra, India, which inspired them to take up residency in the Far East. They spent two years in India, where, through the auspices of the Urantia Foundation, they were able to place upwards of 100 Urantia Books in libraries, institutions, and the homes of certain well-situated citizens. At the end of two years, they ventured on to Singapore and ultimately to Thailand, where Alan was laid to rest in 2003.

Transmitting/Receiving

         For all the years I lived with Alan, during all the hours I spent asking questions of Jack, it never occurred to me that I might be able to transmit and receive messages. As is often the case, we look to others to do for us what we could do for ourselves if we but had faith.
         The same summer I finally finished the novel I had written under Athena's tutelage, I learned of the Teaching Mission through Dr. John Wormeck ("Jeremiah"), a Urantia Book reader and physicist who had been involved in the Salt Lake City Urantia Book Study Group. His career brought him to live and work in Albuquerque where I lived and hosted a Urantia Book study group. As soon as he confided to me that the reason he drove back and forth to SLC every weekend was to listen to a celestial transmit spiritual messages through a mortal receiver, I knew my Dark Ages were over.

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