A Song from Beyond

I have posted strange experiences mostly as a way to get them off my chest, so I haven't bothered to check back on this blog. But now I've had a new experience and it's another weird mystery. I'm sort of shocked to be adding to this blog.

A couple of months ago I was driving home after dealing with a problem having to do with a mentally ill sibling. I had an impulse to turn down a street I hadn't been on in years; the street my grandmother used to live on. She passed away years ago, but my mentally ill sibling lived with her a year or two.

As I drove by, a song popped into my head. It felt barely familiar, as if I'd heard it very long ago. I sang the chorus out loud as I drove. It crossed my mind that it was a really old song, maybe from the WWII era. I started to wonder if it had something to do with my grandmother.

This idea unsettled me and doesn't make much sense. My grandmother, like all my grandparents, rarely used English. The song was entirely in English. Also, I had very little contact with any of my grandparents because of family feuds that began before I was born.

Anyway, I was trying to focus on the lyrics, but the only words I can remember now are "people" and "everybody". I forgot the song within 15 minutes.

I don't remember ever learning the song. I don't know what the title is. I can't remember the tune. It just faded out of my memory the way a dream does after you wake up.

Maybe that song was put in my head as encouragement. I hear some deceased relations are concerned with our doings. But I'd rather deal with life without mysterious messages, thanks!

The Voice From I Don't Know Where

This is the biggie, compared to my other experiences. I saved it for last because I've kept it to myself for so long, I wasn't sure I should share it. But here it is. It's easy to say I imagined it, but I know I didn't. There was nothing uncertain or indistinct about it.

It actually happened twice. Basically, I heard a silent voice. I'll never forget what it said, even though the messages were, I thought, unhelpful and even unwelcome.

The first time I was maybe 15 years old. I grew up in a family that was dysfunctional, to say the least. I cried and prayed a lot. This one night I felt a need to get up out of bed to pray. I waited until everyone was asleep and went into the living room.

I knelt and was praying. I was also crying. When I was all cried out, I felt exhausted. I was just about to stand up and go to bed when I heard silent words. I froze. The words were, "Be good and be happy."

This did not make me feel better. In fact, I was very confused and resentful. Here I was, asking for help, and I was told to "be happy". How can you be happy when your home, your life, is miserable? It took many years for me to decide this meant I had to learn to be happy. It's been a huge struggle, but now I usually manage it. I am fairly happy, most of the time.

I had a similar reaction to the "be good" part of the message. I've never felt I had a special problem being "good". At least, no more than most people. I do mess up, but I make a real effort. So it was hard not to feel that the whole message was condescending and unfair. Now, decades later, I think it was helpful, but with minimal interference. [Sort of like Star Trek's Prime Directive.] I guess that's how it was intended.

The second message came about five years later. I had been married maybe a year. I was just settling into bed and feeling cozy. Then, in the dark, I heard another silent message, coming out of nowhere; "You won't get to keep this one." I knew right away it meant my husband, and that the marriage would end. I went from being cheerful to almost crying, but I never let on and I never told him or anyone about that message.

The funny thing is, I think the intent was to make it easier to end the marriage. The marriage lasted another six years or so, but it was not happy. I believe I would have stayed with it if I hadn't gotten that message. I believe the marriage was meant to end. I only suspect why, but I'd rather not share my thoughts on that.

And if you think the phrase "this one" meant there would be another husband; nope. I thought so, too, but it never happened. After so many years, I doubt it will.

As for the silent voice, God, Angel, whomever; I haven't heard from it again. I don't think I want to.

Angel

This is what happened. One night, around 10PM, I was driving home on a quiet avenue. I stopped at a red light. When it turned green, I didn't go. What was very strange was that I couldn't seem to make myself go; I just sat there wondering why I wasn't putting my foot on the accelerator.

There was nothing stopping me. I looked at the car facing me. It didn't have a turn signal going, and it didn't pull out, either. I was very confused. After maybe 10 seconds altogether, a car ran the red light in a blur. It must have been going 70 or 80 miles an hour.

I was shocked. There was no sound, but it was scary. I wondered if it would be safe to go through the still-green light, now. As I was thinking this, a police car also ran the red light at a high speed. I heard the siren as it went by, but I hadn't heard it before. I waited a little longer to make sure there were no more in pursuit before I finally went on.

Now, I finally talked about this with a couple of people [it happened over twenty years ago] and they said the same things I have thought, myself. Maybe I hesitated because that other car didn't move. But I only looked at it because I was trying to figure out why I didn't go. It was as if I had no will in the matter.

I'm only going to call this an angel experience because I don't know what else to call it. I didn't see an angel. I didn't have an intuition. There was no feeling of anxiety or fear. There was also no decision involved. I just couldn't move my foot onto the accelerator in the normal, automatic way you respond to a light turning green. It's never happened before, or since. Whatever the reason, it may have saved my life.

Telepathy

Here's another Very Strange Incident from my life. Do all people have these? Well, believe it or not, this one involves telepathy.

I was a teenager when this happened. I had fallen asleep, on my bed, after school. I was just waking up, or was awakened, when I was suddenly seeing and hearing something in my head. I heard, as silently as any thought, "twenty-seven." Then I saw the number 27 being traced, behind my closed eyelids as though I were purposely imagining it. But I was just watching. Then the thought pronounced again, slowly and carefully, "twenty-seven."

My eyes still closed, I became aware that I could hear voices in the hall outside the bedroom. My younger sister and her friend, who lived across the street, were calling out numbers and my older sister was answering each time, "No."

I realized immediately they were guessing, so I called out, "Is it 27?"

"Yes!" So I got up and told them what I had "seen". My older sister said, "I could feel when you got it. I was trying to send it."

We tried for a while, but never managed to do anything like this again. I'm sure now that it was only because I was in such a relaxed state that it happened to "get through." I am not the relaxed type; I'm resistant to hypnosis, for instance. In college a group of us got on a stage to be hypnotized for the entertainment of our dorm. I was the one person the hypnotist quickly asked to go back to my seat. I guess he could see it wasn't working.

I was trying to cooperate; I was interested in the experience. But I've read that you have to be willing to trust for hypnosis to work. I know that's not me, which sounds funny for someone interested in mysterious, unexplained subjects. But I'm interested - not unafraid.

Ghost

This is my only ghost experience. My mother and sister have more experiences, but you never completely believe unless you have one yourself.

I was staying at my mother's house during the holidays, perhaps six or seven years ago. My mother and sister had the bedrooms; I decided to sleep in the living room. But I decided to sleep on sofa cushions on the floor so I could stretch out.

I was disturbed by sounds that brought me out of a doze. I usually sleep like a log so it must have been very soon after I closed my eyes. I was very annoyed, until I realized what the sounds were. They were footsteps, and they were circling me. The sound was very distinct because they passed so close to my face, probably less than arm's length. And remember, I was on the floor.

Not only did I hear that rhythm of a slow step-step-step creaking on the floor, but even the friction sound on the carpet. The steps walked by my face and around behind me.

It wasn't dark. My mother leaves nightlights on when we stay over. I looked, but I knew there wasn't anyone there. The funny thing is, I really just wanted to sleep. I went from annoyed to scared to just frustrated in about half a minute.. I remember wondering if I should get up and tell someone. But I thought, " Oh, I'm going to SLEEP!" and turned over and did just that.

The next day I remembered what happened and told the family. My mother said, "Finally! Somebody else heard them!" She had been telling us stories about knocking, footsteps, and other possible ghostly sounds, but I had only half-listened. It was too easy to think they were normal sounds. In fact, I still don't think believe all the incidents she describes are ghostly. But I know you have to be there to judge.

So I later wondered about the footsteps crunching in the gravel around her house. Twice I heard someone walking, but couldn't see anyone through the windows. I even jumped up to look, but there was no one there.

And it may make sense for these things to happen at my mother's house. She lives in a senior community. People pass away there all the time. Her second husband did. And her home has had many owners before.

I now know that many, many people have real ghost stories. Firsthand, secondhand, and stories told within the family, these stories will come out if you just bring the subject up.

That's what I did one Halloween, and the group was sharing ghost experiences for the next hour or two. [Except a True Nonbeliever who kept silently shaking his head.]

I am amazed at how common these experiences are. I accidentally discovered (looking up ghost stories online to tell on Halloween) that there are websites full of personal stories, questions, and even requests for help with ghosts.

The last is especially frightening. Most ghost experiences are pretty harmless. But some involve dark shadow-shapes that seem to threaten members of the family. I hope I never have any experience with those. They scare the hell out of me.

Some People Try Not To Think About These Things

I've had some Really Strange Experiences in my life that I've told no one about. And others I've shared, but which were not entirely believed. No matter. It's about time I got some of this stuff off my chest. I feel certain other people have had similar experiences; there must be.

Here's the first and least strange experience. When I was five years old, I lost my memory. I woke up one morning, the sun was shining, the birds were singing, but I knew right away something was wrong.

I couldn't remember the night before, the day before; I couldn't remember anything that had happened to me before that morning. I knew who I was and where I was. I was only missing "experiential" memory. That term is interesting - I'll explain in a moment.

I could hear my family in the kitchen. I could smell breakfast cooking. I was the last up. I got up to go join them, but never told them about the memory loss. Not for about forty years.

That probably seems odd, but I had an odd upbringing. My father was emotionally abusive. He bullied and belittled all of us, including my mother. He frightened us into keeping our heads down and our mouths shut. So keeping thoughts to myself became second nature.

I never got those memories back. Okay, there wasn't much to recall, anyway, I know. But it's sad that something made me block out my memories like that. I don't want to know what it was. It's probably more unpleasant than the memory loss, so I'd rather not know.

But I did have a flash of memory in a dream when I was a teenager. My mother was able to confirm it was probably a true memory. I saw two boys, African American, about 8 and 12 years old. They were just standing together and looking at me. There was a wall behind them; the side of a house. I could see a residential street to the side. It's an odd memory because there was nothing happening and I didn't feel anything special about it. But what was interesting was that I had to look UP at those boys. I was very small. My mother confirmed there were brothers like that living next to us when I was little. And the street looked like those I remember in South Central Los Angeles, where we lived until I was three.

The reason I said this experiential memory loss was interesting is that I read that term in a book and only much later realized it applied to me. I had read it without making the connection. In fact, I thought the term was made up and probably just an idea some writer came up with as a plot device.

The book I'm talking about is Leonard Nimoy's autobiographical "I Am Spock". He mentions that Spock lost his "experiential" memory after dying in Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan. It was strange recognizing that this silly-sounding "plot device" described what happened to me.

One other thing. I did try to mention this when I was six years old. It had been on my mind a lot. So when my first-grade teacher asked the class, "Why is the number five odd?" my mind went right to it. I raised my hand and started to say that when I was five years old, I felt very odd. Of course, the teacher was trying to explain odd and even numbers, so she interrupted me and I never brought it up again. But I kept wondering about it. It's too bad no one listens to little kids.