Seven Moments of Ross

Photo & Text CC 2012 by MJ Vilardi, Creative Commons – May be shared with attribution

7. A Universe

by MJ Vilardi

I first met Ross McConnell at Antioch College in the '70's; I was recovering from a long night of partying; laid out in my room in decrepit North Hall, my head was spinning, as college students' heads will do. BANG BANG BANG! The quiet of my darkened chamber was shattered by a noise too loud to be real. Someone was slamming my door with a hammer! That can't be. Through the peephole I spied a bearded shaman-looking guy with a fox's head in one hand, and a hammer in the other. I opened the door and asked what the hell he was doing. When he explained that he was trying to nail a foxface to the door I offered to help, and we quickly had the job done. We became fast friends, with similar interests, and taught a couple of classes together.

One warm night, hanging around in the common room in North Hall, I heard a scream. A girl ran by, pursued by the weirdest bug I've ever seen. Its body was long and thin, about three inches long, and it had big gossamer wings, like a dragonfly's wings. But its most shocking feature was the eight-inch red wire-like protuberance hanging from its rear end. This was some bug from hell! I sprang into action, heroically swinging at it with the magazine I'd been reading.

"MJ! Stop!" It was Ross. I hesitated. "That's a Universe," he said. We found a plastic bag and caught the strange creature, then took him outside and let him fly back to the Mountains of Madness or wherever he came from.

Years later, Ross and I heard that a good friend of ours, Jay Shepard, who'd been in the class we taught, and had joined us on the long trek to San Francisco for the class field trip, had died. Stabbed by a mugger in Pittsburgh. Jay was a great guy, and we'd had many of those late night dorm room conversations, speculating about the nature of life and death and reality.

"Just think MJ," Ross said, "Now Jay knows. He knows what it's like."