Chapter 1

"Abandonment is always justifiable by men," said a tearful and angry Natty, her words spoken only a few hours before in the middle of a sleepless night were haunting Joseph's thoughts as the terrain of Minnesota north of the Twin Cities rolled by rapidly near the bus like the rapidity of life's journey of transforming the future into the past and more languidly as the distant subtle hills and the green rows of plants midway through their growth in mid-summer and the calm blue tables of ponds and lakes and the quiet flow of creeks and streams disrupted and frothing white where rocks interrupted, pastoral pleasant scenes of rural life appearing ahead, lingering beside, then disappearing behind the bus were hardly noticed though they helped to calm the regrets and salve the unexpectedly painful rupture caused by his departure, the beginning of his first monk's quest.

Leaving his home had been his plan for a year, ever since he began to investigate and then to document and then to create his philosophy of orgiastic orgasmic enlightenment, and as he began to plan out his monk's journey of heading north to Canada, a truly foreign place albeit similar to the United States, to create new orgies with strangers and to hopefully teach them ways to achieve cosmic orgasms, he grew more excited the more the plan developed and became more concrete and doable. However, unlike any other moment in his life when his family changed locations as effortlessly as changing hairstyles, Joseph having been guarded in his accumulation of friends, making peers little more than acquaintances, thus never feeling torn away, never really giving up all that much, this time he was leaving behind not just good friends, but lovers, and several of them.

Ironically, the ones he wouldn't miss and would enjoy the separation from were the ones who had loved him by far longer than anyone else. His parents, especially his father, weren't so much concerned about him leaving the nest, though that played into the troubles, but the fact that Joseph never applied to any college or university, had no interest in continuing his education via institutions, but wanted to make his continuing education a quest, for what his parents didn't understand, Joseph never going into specifics with them, only describing his lack of interest in institutional learning and his passionate interest in learning through the vagaries of experience like a wandering monk with a sense of purpose and mental and spiritual structure in which to view experience and gain from it, adding to the source of his being, a pilgrim educating himself and advancing himself through his movement through the world and never to proselytize, only to absorb and respond and perhaps add to the world as it added to him and his knowledge and spiritual strength; this post high school choice was discouraging to his parents who saw a young man with great potential to become a brilliant student and through brilliance achieve success at whatever field he chose to pursue, one which would bring him financial comfort along with enjoyment of doing great work. It wasn't so much that they didn't know this young man, which was basically true especially for his father, Joseph being guarded around him as he was around everyone except his mother until Carol and her friends and then the Trio and then Natty opened him up to other people, enabling him to socialize and finding his enjoyment of it, which happened much too late to change his relationship with his father, and while he and his mother had a close relationship, he never related to her any of his personal struggles or discussed with her his traumas or his deeper successes, the shallow successes such as grades and doing well in sports when he was younger were easily displayed, instead they talked about current events or politics or anything they both might find interesting or he picked her brain about meditation and yoga and Tai Chi and more recently the particulars of her own journey through life, her history with his father, her way of making and sustaining friendships, but as far as letting her into his life, of being specific about who he was and what his passions were, he was guarded with her as well, and that lack of communication made his choice seem odd and arbitrary and worst of all immature to his parents, and their struggle with it and arguments against it were from doubt and distrust of their young son's ability to be mature, to see ramifications of his choice to not enter the path they wished for him to make his life a good life, that of training and becoming a successful professional.

Youthful illusions were unequivocally present in Joseph's mind; he was embarking on a quest whose basis was a self-made and utterly unconventional philosophy borne of passion, obsession, and madness, after all he was as Sarah often called him, the bad mad monk, Joseph the Love Monk, and if couldn't even tell Carol, the woman he had been fucking in a discrete hidden manner neither sets of parents were allowed to know about even if they guessed, about his nascent philosophy of orgasmic enlightenment until she had experienced it herself, there was no way he could imagine sitting down with his parents and discussing it with them, therefore what he was embarking on was clear to him to be fundamentally immoral, at least to the conventional adult world, and he knew that it would be difficult, there was no illusion that like monks throughout history he had to embrace poverty and, though he had been able to put together a substantial stash of money, it would only last so long and he would be left to live hand to mouth, and he didn't relish that moment, he had no romantic religious notions about finding god through starvation, he had found god through sensory overload already, nor did he think the next orgy would be waiting for him around the corner; he knew it would take skill and luck and human's innate horniness to make it happen, but where the illusion was truly manifested was his absolute need to share his philosophy, to give total strangers the gift of cosmic orgiastic enlightenment, to travel the world spreading his seed of thought like Johnny Appleseed, only it was spermatozoa he was spreading along with his ideas and experiences, wonderful moments inserted into strangers' minds to grow and spread like a great fecund tree which in turn would sprout fruit and seeds to encourage further spreading. The illusion was he had invented something new and fantastic and he was the one who needed to spread the news. But the fact that it was youthful illusion was what made it possible. He had the strength and vitality and resiliency and youthful beauty at this moment in his life to succeed in his quest if the quest was ever to succeed.

"Abandonment is always justifiable by men," said Natty, her vehemence tempered by the month old child suckling at her breast, her tears unrestrained dampened her cheeks, making them shine in the dimmed light of Joseph's study as she lay on the daybed early that morning, her long slim hand gently holding the baby, keeping it from any unexpected and potentially dangerous movement, unlikely at the moment as it greedily took in nourishment from her mother. Joseph and Natty had made love for the first time in a couple months, a leisurely, loving fuck that lasted for over an hour after they had coaxed quick orgasms via hands and mouths, alleviating a desperate need building during the time of her long necessary chastity and the flirting and anticipation of being alone earlier in the evening at Candice's goodbye/birthday party for Joseph. Luckily, Devi Candi Solomon-Fredericks waited until their breathtaking monumental simultaneous orgasm subsided before she made her needy wail. Natty's sobs had begun during that subsiding, and the baby's vocalizations only intensified them. Once Devi had latched onto her mother's teat, Joseph asked Natty what was wrong.

"But you insisted on raising the child yourself, and you knew my plans the day you told me you were pregnant with Devi," said Joseph.

"I was being brave then. I don't feel so brave now," said Natty. "I'm feeling more and more like my mother, forced into a life lorded over by an unexpected child and a lack of support in raising her, and she had my grandmother to help. When I look into my mother's eyes, when she tells me she'll help, all I see is disappointment and reluctance. Even my grandmother, who raised me as much as my mother did, is getting too old to take a large part of the burden. She looks at Devi with true love, she makes her happy, and I know if she had the energy she would be willing to help, but she doesn't. And then there's Candy..."

"I thought she was moving in with you," said Joseph.

"She wants to go to New York, and wants me to come along, but I can't. I have my work here helping artists get grants and developing my theater company you helped me create and working with the Children's Theater finishing the play they commissioned and workshopping it and my soul is planted here and I want my daughter to feel like she is from somewhere, even if that concept isn't very American. Oh Joseph, what can I say? I love you desperately and I need your strong male shoulders to support me and to give Devi a male presence even if I didn't have one and I turned out alright."

"I don't know what to say. Maybe you're right. Maybe I'm too much of a male to stick around. But you knew this was going to happen. You knew I wasn't monogamous, even if, when all is said and done, when the Order and the orgies and the love I have for Carol and Candy and Sarah and Jordan and Nina are set in front of me and examined with my heart, you stand out front and center. I've never missed anyone when I moved around growing up, and I know I will miss my friends and lovers and I don't even know what that will feel like, but leaving you will hurt me, tear something fundamental out of my heart that may never be returned or repaired until I am back with you and Devi and maybe not even then. I wish there was something I could do or say to make you feel better, but what? I have to do this. My whole being demands me to take this journey."

"I know goddamnit. My father had the same problem."

"I wonder if he felt the same way I feel."

"He's a deep soul, a loving person, but I'm afraid he doesn't feel the same way as you feel; not the way you connect with your lovers and especially with me. The old man is a womanizer, and I may be the only woman in his life who he regrets leaving or wants to see."

"Is he coming here?"

"He is," said Natty with sudden brightness.

"When he sees Devi, maybe he'll stay and help. How could he not?"

"Because he's a man, Joseph. Because he's a man."

Devi had quieted down and stopped feeding. After burping her Natty set her carefully into the cushioned sink basin Joseph's mother had helped them rig up as a cradle. The purity of innocence of those blue/gray eyes, her father's eyes, and the smile, her mother's smile, finished Joseph's heartbreak Natty had begun. As Devi blinked her way to sleep, Joseph began to cry. Natty led him back into his bed where they spent the rest of the night continuing their slow lovemaking, each only climaxing one more time before the light of day slipped into his basement room and birds began chirping and it was time to clean and dress and haul his duffel bag to the bus station, Natty as driver, his parents left at home with only a hug.

Whatever his fellow bus passengers thought of the prolonged and hearty hugs and kisses Joseph gave to each of the five young women and one young man, especially the young man and the youngest of the women, and their various reactions were pretty clear, from disgust to envy, the Order didn't care. Carol, Sarah, Candice, and after a pause Natty, along with Nina, the newest member, the recently turned sixteen year old who had her first involvement in an orgy on her birthday a week before although she had been begging for it for months, the gifted and precocious viola player from Jordan's after school production the previous fall, and finally and the most aware of the critical audience, Jordan all said goodbye with all their might and all their heart to their lover and their leader. Just as Joseph stepped onto the bus, Sarah handed him a wrapped present, obviously a book, making him pause at the step and turn to her. He was the last of the passengers, so the disruption was minimal. Sarah smiled sadly up at him. "We love you," she mouthed silently. He glanced at the sidewalk filled with his Order, nodded to them, mouthed "Thanks. I love you too," before the impatient bus driver nearly took his arm off closing the door.