In December, 2005, Frank DeMarco began several months of regular altered-state "conversations" with a man named Joseph Smallwood, who had lived in 19th century America, had gone west to Oregon in the 1840s, had lived with the Indians in Minnesota, and had fought as a Union officer in the Civil War. At least, those are the facts of his.
This book is a record of those conversations. As the author says: Quite possibly this is a mixture of fact, distorted fact, and unconscious intervention, jumbled together. Yet Joseph Smallwood is there, and you will see for yourself that he has a lot to offer us. I started out simply thinking to talk to Joseph about his life. Before you know it there we were, hearing that our time has a huge task ahead of it and that what we are and what we do is important to the other side.
Chasing Smallwood has four interlocking themes:
- How to communicate with the dead.
- The life of Joseph Smallwood, a particular 19th-century American who loved in the West and fought in the Civil War
- How and why the physical world is important to the non-physical world
- The challenge of our times that we are not yet facing