Starry, starry night

Starry, starry night.

Paint your palette blue and grey,

Look out on a summer's day,

With eyes that know the darkness in my soul.

Shadows on the hills,

Sketch the trees and the daffodils,

Catch the breeze and the winter chills,

In colors on the snowy linen land.

Now I understand what you tried to say to me,

How you suffered for your sanity,

How you tried to set them free.

They would not listen, they did not know how.

Perhaps they'll listen now.

Colors changing hue, morning field of amber grain,

Weathered faces lined in pain,

Are soothed beneath the artist's loving hand.

Now I understand what you tried to say to me,

How you suffered for your sanity,

How you tried to set them free.

They would not listen, they did not know how.

Perhaps they'll listen now.
Starry, starry night.

Portraits hung in empty halls,

Frameless head on nameless walls,

With eyes that watch the world and can't forget.
Like the strangers that you've met,

The ragged men in the ragged clothes,

The silver thorn of bloody rose,

Lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow.

~ Don McLean

This song is about Vincent Van Gogh, a wonderful tormented artist, who is amongst my favorite and when I was in Netherlands, I went to the Van Gogh museum at least three times.

This was also amongst my favorite songs when I was an undergraduate student in Wisconsin a few decades ago.

But this is not a story of Vincent Van Gogh but a story of another Vincent.

Vincent and I met in the Catskill Mountains. Vincent was an elderly man, likely even older than my father.

He seemed like any other nice old man and yet he was there in this camp for the mentally challenged. He lived in a home of mentally challenged.

He was a normal old man but I would learn later that through his choice, he got himself admitted to this home because he was having visions, he felt he was becoming schizophrenic. He felt like he was becoming a psycho.

One night, as I was sitting by the camp grounds on night duty, Vincent and I started to talk under the starry starry nights of the Catskill Mountains.

He told me of his tale, as a blue collar worker, a husband a father. About how his wife died, how his children did not have time for him. And how as he got older, he began having visions of his dead wife, visions of Jesus, visions of God and visions of a "Black" President of United States.

This was 1990. Barack Obama was 29 years old, going to Harvard Law School and in the same summer I was in camp, Obama was a summer associate in a Chicago based law firm  Hopkins & Sutter. I certainly had not heard of Barack Obama at that time, nor would I have ever thought in 1990 that USA would have him as the first colored President.

As I was writing my miracle blogs, the conversation with Vincent on that one starry starry night triggered my oft forgetful memory and the conversation we had under the stars by the lake in a camp up on the mountains.

Vincent said his wife would appear in his visions, giving him guidance. And sometimes when he read the Bible, he saw Jesus in front of him preaching and he had visions of God, a great white light who also spoke to him.

And he had visions of a tall, fit, handsome looking African American man who he described as the President of United States of America.

He said this guy was very charismatic and a wonderful orator, one who cared for the country and people and was as passionate as he talked.

At that time, being a "all too smart" Psychology student, I was not surprised that Vincent, like my favorite painter, had gone a little schizophrenic.

Sometimes, God's miracles and visions work in weird ways. In retrospect, Vincent was not at all "mad" or "psycho".

I truly believed he had these visions and guidance to be a better person. And he was a wonderful person, caring, thoughtful, intelligent.

I believe he had his guardian looking out for him and I hope that he is in a better place now. I know Vincent is no longer around in this world, but I will meet him again in my afterlife.

It is a miracle that he could see and communicate with his guardians.

All of us have guardian angels looking after us, waiting patiently for us to activate them for them to give us guidance from God which is intended for us. I have activated my guardian angel to help me in this life, to live a passionate life, to love completely, to learn humbly.

Sometimes I still let my super-ego men i.e. monkey chatters to take over. I let laziness or busyness of the rat race take over. So to my guardian, I am sorry, Please forgive me, I love you and I thank you.

Thank you Vincent for reminding me of you and I'll see you sometime, but not too soon yeah.

Take care and be well.