Enrolling in the University of Life

It was a crazy time. One of those brief pauses in the path of life occurring between the end of one formal chapter and the beginning of the next. I had completed my internship and was soon to commence my two years of obligatory military National Service (after postponing to study medicine). In the days of apartheid South Africa, every able-bodied eighteen year old white male was conscripted into the military for two years. This included three months of basic training and then invariably a tour of duty in the Operational Area (war zone – the border between what was then Southwest Africa and Angola) for several months. And so I had six months to play with. A young doctor, driven by a hormonal mix of testosterone and some lesser important ones and seeking much dopamine gratification, I decided to take up a temporary medical position at a hospital in Durban. This is a large city on South Africa’s east coast. My list of priorities for that short period were firstly, young nurses, then surf-skiing and then possibly some research into a subject that intrigued me – the body electric field.

And so began a crazy, multi-faceted dopamine binge. My first day set the scene for what was to come. I was a junior resident in a medical ward, senior to three interns, two of whom on our first ward round of the first day of the year, were still somewhat inebriated from the all-night New Year’s party! And then there was that awe-inspiring view of the Indian Ocean as seen from our ward, since the hospital was situated across from one of the main beaches. We soon settled into the ‘new normal’. When our unit was not on emergency intake (intake of urgent patients for admission), we would get our ward work done as soon as possible so that we could get into the sea by the latest, at 3.30 pm and surf for about 2 hours. My car was always parked in the hospital parking with the ski’s on the roof-racks, ready for immediate action! This was before the days of mobile phones. So if we were needed to attend to a problem in the ward, the ward sister waved a towel out of the window, with our individual pre-selected colors!

And then there were the nights. These were centered around the watering hole, the pub in the Doctor’s Quarter’s (DQ) where much fluid passed and was shared … especially in the surrounding rooms. For this is where we met those lovely ladies of the wards, the nurses. There were several hundred young nurses living in the nurses’ residence. And if you didn’t get lucky with any of the young nurses, there was another building where ‘old’ nurses lived (late twenties) which was referred to as ‘Menopause Mansions’. This was the back-stop where one of the ladies would always oblige to take up the slack! And so we indulged. It became a delicious blur of medicine, women, alcohol, surf and the many barbeques on the beach. It was at this point that I introduced a new component – the weirdest period of research in my life.

I had become familiar with a lot of the work done in the sphere of Kirlian Photography. These were pictures apparently depicting the body aura and captured on photographic film. I decided to try and isolate the electric field, measure it and then see if it correlated with identifiable mind states. So I began searching for an oscilloscope and other required apparatus. But to no avail. At this point, one of the technicians suggested that I get in touch with Frank McGee.

Frank was a legend. A former ‘Hell’s Angel’, he ran the electronic diagnostics division situated in the out-patients department of the hospital. He had left school at the age of fifteen to go out and work. But Frank was a true genius, as I was to find out. I was directed to his office. Several medical personnel were seated around a large desk. They included residents, interns, nurses and technicians. Like real ‘groupies’ they were drinking up the energy of the master. For sitting behind the desk was a giant. Easily six foot six in all directions, with a flowing black beard, steely blue eyes and a scar diagonally across the forehead, he peered at me and enquired ‘yes?’ I responded, ‘I’m looking for Frank McGee’. To which he answered, ‘Who wants to know?’ I introduced myself and indicated that I was interested in analyzing the body electric field and correlating it with mind states. Frank stared at me for a while and then turned to the groupies and said, ’All of you, fuck off out of here!’ . Obediently they all rose and left.

And so began the studies. We worked after hours to keep away from prying eyes. The technology for those years was state-of-the-art. The subjects were wired up and lay in a Faraday cage (complete metal-lined room and door) to shield against electromagnetic interference. We recorded the wave forms on a paper strip recorder, magnetic tape and through an audio channel. We were in fact LISTENING to the body electric field. We also had two-way audio communication with the subjects in real time which was referenced with changes seen on the recordings.

We eventually isolated a wave-form which appeared authentic and not due to any interference. This was confirmed on Fourier analysis. Thence began the correlations. I found subjects and paid them ten bucks for an hour on the machine and also to complete a questionnaire. And so we discovered low amplitude, low frequencies in the depressed and hopeless-helpless, high frequencies in the exuberant, the meditators and those in pain. And in the high frequency fields we often detected ‘streamers’ – high frequencies that could be sensed more than 12 inches off the surface of the body.

One Sunday morning, heavily hungover, Frank and I decided to put in some extra monitoring time. I chose one of the ladies from ‘Menopause Mansions’. We adopted our usual postures in the control room – slumped in our chairs, talking crap and listening to the audio of the field in the background. Suddenly we started detecting streamer after streamer which threatened to wreck our strip-recorder. I immediately buzzed the subject and asked if all was well. No response. I then opened the heavy door to find a blushing young lady. I asked if she could elaborate on what had just happened, in mind or body. Adding that all was confidential and ‘trust me, I’m a doctor!’ (even though I looked more like a hungover junkie at that moment.) Reluctantly she indicated that she was reliving the previous night’s passion! Wow we had just recorded erotic passion in the body electric field! On witnessing my jubilation, Frank became a little concerned that we might morph into a Masters and Johnson-type laboratory.

We needed to monitor a child’s field. The charge sister in my ward was happy for her child to be a subject. So we wired him up, allayed anxiety and ran the recording for an hour. Then something strange happened. The child had departed already and we wanted to play back the recording, but we couldn’t clear the machine of the child’s wave form. Even with a full re-boot, the wave-form appeared again. This continued until exactly 6.00pm on the control room clock. Then it cleared to a flat-line and we were able to continue. The next day mom asked what we had picked up on her child’s field. I told her what we had encountered, with the activity that wouldn’t clear. Mom went pale. She indicated that the child wouldn’t let her remove one of the stick-on electrodes, on his forehead, until he had his bath at 6.00 pm…. Co-incidence?

At the end of each period of study, usually about nine at night, I would drive Frank home. He couldn’t drive due to a gummy leg resulting from crashing his Harley. We took a route through the university, often stopping in the campus and discussing our day’s research. There was something about the empty campus at night which was conducive to inspired discussion. Frank and I, from such different backgrounds, became so aware of the multi-faceted nature of the human being and indeed of life. Frank was very well read in the classics and the insights that he shared with me in that strange space became the foundation for a much broader inquiry into life.

Soon the six months came to an end. It had spontaneously formed, developed its own momentum and left me forever changed. I was only to see Frank once again ten years later, very briefly. The research was not completed and in fact was never adequately refined for peer-reviewed publication. But its value for me at any rate, was in the doing.

Before I knew it I was conscripted into the military. And shortly after basic training, found myself in a forward operational base in the midst of a war in the jungle of Africa. It was our ‘forgotten war’ our Vietnam and many died, including two of my medical colleagues from my medical school class, who died in the line of duty. I grew up … fast!