Abe M Frankel (who began Circle of the Earth)

I asked John Kennedy a question at a press conference in the summer of 1960. I don't know what the question was but I'm sure he answered with vigor, clarity and forthrightness. Teddy was there, just a kid then, running around with a bunch of cameras around his neck. Then Gordie and I went out for a beer with Larry O'Brien.

Kennedy won in the Fall, and I felt confident of the part I had played in shaping this energy. Then they–that ubiquitous, all encompassing "they"–killed him and I began to learn that there are larger forces working here that we humans know little about.

But that's O.K. Here's how to be psychic: Think of, imagine, this country (the world) to be one gigantic brain, a single mind, which I call the Collective Societal Consciousness. And this Consciousness changes over time. Now "see" the energy right now. Now "see" the energy in 1960. Lots and lots of young people had sent their souls into JFK and, when he was no more, that energy, traveling itself in a new suit, sent them to Berkeley, California.

When I was twelve or ten, my parents put me on the train in Cincinnati–few planes then–to visit some relatives in Chicago. It was the first time I left home on my own. I walked down the aisle of the coach car looking for a seat. Finally I came to an empty one and I said to the elderly man next to the train's window, "Is this seat taken?" He said, "Are you going to be a good boy?" I said "Yes," as resentfully as I could.

It turned out thus. The questioning one was the ex-Governor of Ohio, Meyers Cooper, who was on his way to Iowa to Herbert Hoover's 80th birthday party. We had a good talk, I remember–and I learned something: that in this lifetime of mine I was intended to encounter in various ways many interesting and/or important people. For example, I went to the current Governor of Oregon's Inaugural Ball, and through circumstances just as unlikely as my meet-up with Cooper, I met and danced at the Ball with the Governor's daughter. Which again, I feel at least, had a role in determining the energy and thus the success of his first term and his re-election. Dancing can be a transformation as well as a celebration.

But these kinds of thoughts are not uncommon to me. For example, this is from one of my books:

A few years ago, I was at a Cincinnati Reds ball game in late April. I was sitting in the 11 th row just behind the Red's batting circle. Junior Griffey was taking his warmup swings. Junior was in his second year after his trade from Seattle and was in a horrible slump. Had only one or two homers for the year. I watched his swing and then yelled out sing-songy-like: "Junyah, Junyah! Git in your groove Junyah!" When he got up to the plate, he watched the first two pitches and then lined the third pitch over the wall. Then he hit a second home run in that game.

What had I done? What did I do? I saw by his swing that he had forgotten "who he was." And, when I said that to him, he remembered – and knew once again. It was a coming together of energy for an instant moment in time.

It wasn't as though I knew or wanted to associate on a regular or familiar basis with any of these people. Rather, we came in contact for some reason that was needed or beneficial to both of us, and then we were gone, back to the separate life-stories we were in the process living out.

I grew up believing in the American political process. Lima, Ohio was the site of the first oil boom in the east and, in the 1890s, my grandfather went up there and opened a saloon. He also promoted prize fights and was the head of what might be called Lima's Democratic party. My father, Herb, was named after Herbert Campbell who published the Lima newspaper. My father was always a staunch Democrat which was not the normal way in Republican, home of the Tafts and House UnAmerican Activities Committee Chairman Gordon Shear, 1950s Cincinnati. In fact, in Cincinnati, in the 1950s, there was no Democratic party. There were only the Republicans and the more liberally-minded Charterites. Like Charles Taft who later became the Governor as a Republican. In one councilmanic election, when McCarthyism was real popular, the Republican party of Cincinnati ran a full page ad in the Cincinnati Enquirer accusing the Charterites of "socialist" connections.

But my father had been taught by his father and his mother, Rachael, to be a Democrat, to associate with the common people. And I grew up believing in the American political process because it was a part of the history of my family. I grew up hearing, and believing, my father's family stories. My heroes were simple: Jefferson, Lincoln, Twain. Solid American guys.

And yet, while my childhood created a familial allegiance to the history and current reenacting of our form of government, another part of me knew I never fit-in in Cincinnati. When my father died, his obituary was on the front page of the morning newspaper which, I would say, was not usual for someone who's job description was "Orthodontist." I was never one to adapt as my father had done to become a big success there. Like he had. No, I didn't really care what people in Cincinnati thought of me. So, I began feeling this split. And, in 1964, I followed the others of my generation and went to Berkeley, California. Where all of us, who thought the American Political Process did not work and needed to be replaced, got together.

Many of you know what the ‘60s was about–our media caretakers now portray it as being solely about the Vietnam War and Civil Rights. For many of us young people who went to that place, we were going to change the world. But that didn't come about as we dreamt it would. And we did manage to bring on some energies that our country, and the world, must deal with now. We revolted against the now unimaginable constraints and rules of the 1950s and the nuclear family, but we too made way for a new and now totally unfettered individual freedom to do whatever one pleases. Which, since most of us don't have the self-knowledge or depth of experience to make ourselves up, became a new conformity: provided by television marketers and programming-decisionists, mass movie dumb-‘em-downers and the conglomerate holders and consumption-addict-makers who own them. And, secondly, we caused a backlash in the scared-shitless middle class of that era, allowing Ronald Reagan to take control of the country. Who's "Reaganism" turned total control over to "business", unrestrained and unencumbered by regulations, with only loving regulators, and to the many "Sopranos" in our midst who will develop and rape anything. And who've never, never got enough moola and will do anything to get more.

And here we are! Oh, by the way, did I say that the folks in Cincinnati re-christened their Cross County Highway. So as not to forget his political legacy, their always welcoming, time-shrinking corridor of cement and human semi-permanency now immortalizes "President Ronnie."

Abe Frankel was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and grew up there. Attended a college preparatory school, Oberlin College and received a doctorate from Ohio State. Later he got an MA in Creative Arts at San Francisco State, trained at the Jungian Institut in Zurich, the San Francisco Gestalt Institute. Later he taught for the University of California.

Statement
"There are those who just don't get it. There are those that do.

There are those who think things are super-keen and getting better all the time. And there are those who say : 'Are you kidding? Look at what's going on all around you--and always has gone on here. This isn't right.'

So, I'm one of the "get its." What happens here makes no sense, never has. Are we on the wrong planet? Was this species a mistake or just the experiment that was supposed to be locked away in a sealed cabinet forever? (Personally, I think the club-footed laboratory eunuch dropped the test tube.) If this is evolution in progress, we have a long, long way to evolve before our societal collective consciousness--and what passes for our personal identities and behavior--catches up to the true intelligence of our minds. This is dumb. We need to change this stuff, and now is the time to do it."

Other encounters:

Abe acquired his original knowledge of dance from Martha Nastich and Anna Halprin at the San Francisco Dancer's Workshop; certified in Feldenkrais movement with Ruthy Alon of Israel; met Indian healer M. Bedoe. Then, in Costa Rica and Chiapas, stayed in two Indian villages experiencing directly their spiritual life. From there, he began spending much time in the desert and had the spiritual experiences and developed the trance (Religious Feeling State) techniques of "seeing" that became CircleoftheEarth. While in the desert, too, at a power spot, he received the "Tmeirafodu" (Earth Calendar) from Posidonius, a Greek Stoic philosopher who lived about 100 B.C., and Samuel Settingsun. Went to Wales and found the original Celtic texts of the "Tmeirafodu"(Calendar Prayers). Finally, he has been blessed over the years with an untold myriad of synchronistic events, of which many, many are positive.

Recently, due to his clear and "high-energy" understanding of music, chanting and dance, his "dancin'-image-in-motion" was featured on the cover of a CD of African marimba music.

		WHEN ABE WAS 5
WHAT OTHERS HAVE SAID ABOUT ABE'S WRITINGS		MORE CIRCLE OF THE EARTH-O-PHILES
		ABE DANCiN' on album cover

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