In the summer of 1940, at the height of the Battle of Britain, John was working alongside other children in a potato field near Portsmouth when a Luftwaffe Dornier 217 bomber flew low over the treetops, spotted the figures in the field, and machine-gunned them as it flew past. None of the children were hit, but they ran back to the farmhouse screaming and crying in fear. From then on it was almost as if John set out to find the greatest fun, squeeze the maximum enjoyment and adventure, out of whatever situation he was in. And he would suck you in. Whether at the Kalapa Court in Boulder or at encampment in the Rockies, he imbued every task or project with high spirits and a sense of play, your full-hearted participation assumed – how, after all, could one miss some Brilliant Fun and Grand Adventure? – and any reluctance on your part simply deprived of oxygen, frozen out. In many ways a born leader, John came from a long line of servants to the English aristocracy. His very name apparently born of some lord or lady’s whim, the original Perkins abbreviated for convenience or perhaps a kind of aristo affection. And he knew his business from bottom to top, from scrubbing floors to all the social skills and knowledge of a valet or butler, a gentleman’s gentleman. He not only infused Rinpoche’s Court with British service, style and decorum, he knew exactly which ancient tailors on London’s Savile Row to visit for Rinpoche’s elegant Gieves & Hawkes uniforms or exquisite Aquascutum suits. When high spirits and the prospect of sparkling fun didn’t work with others, John was up to the game. In 1979 in Boston he invited me for a chat, beginning by saying that he’d heard that I’d been in the Army and asked “British Army?” – knowing, I’m sure, that a colonial would take that as a compliment. Then he said he wanted to invite me to Encampment and act as Sergeant-Major to the Kusung, Rinpoche’s attendants, who he felt were desperately in need of military discipline. I was aghast and said “The only Sergeants-Major I’ve known were big and nasty.” Without missing a step John said “Well, just come along and be small and mean.” Irresistible. When in later years John began exploring what he called Celtic Buddhism, he adopted the title of Seonaidh and worked students studying the dharma. From that and the outlandish garb he sometimes wore in his Celtic capacity, I assumed that he’d drawn the title from some pre-Roman mystic and chieftain now wreathed in the hallowed mists of British history. One day I did some research: Seonaidh can mean either a water spirit or, in its Scottish Gaelic form just ‘Johnny.’