"Here, Kitty Kitty. Mwwaaaa haaaaaa haaaaaaaaaaa....."

Halloween: what we in the west know as a fun holiday, where kids get dressed up and beg for candy from their neighbors, actually began approximately 2,000 years ago in the Celtic cultures of northern Europe and the British Isles.  The Celts believed that on this day, which they referred to as Samhain (pronounced sow’ in), the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead thinned, and those on the other side could easily cross through to this one (and vice versa).  In order to honor, and sometimes appease, the dead, people would dress in costume and perform various rituals.  These included setting a plate for passed loved ones at the table, wandering through the village with lanterns that cast protective light, and practicing the divination arts.  The dead would be asked for help with such issues as successful crops and hunting in the following year, protection from disease, and healthy births.

Many people today continue to believe in this parting of the veils, and easy connection with spirits, on this day.  In fact, All Soul’s Day, practiced by certain Christian denominations, is November 1st … which many believe to be an extension of the Pagan celebration of Samhain.

Despite what some might consider dark origins, however, Halloween in our western societies has become a holiday for fun.  Many people cite it as their favorite, some even choosing Halloween over Christmas.  It is a time of warm childhood memories, social gatherings, harmless (hopefully) mischief and the ability to take imagination to a new level and, quite literally, parade it up and down the street.  It is a time when we normally reserved humans let go and allow fear to be fun.  If one examines the popularity of haunted house events, the increase in horror movie rentals, and the over all rise in the fascination with the macabre at this time of year, there is no doubt that people enjoy the adrenaline rush of being scared.  Halloween is the day many people take that thrill to the heights of scary celebration.

Occasionally we will find the hoodlums who use the excuse to celebrate fear as one of harmful mischief.  Parents today don’t let their kids eat Halloween candy until it’s been thoroughly inspected.  However, even these necessary precautions don’t spoil the fun of the event for most of us.

And for some, though they may be in the minority, Halloween is a time of  respectful contemplation, and still, after two millennia, a day for honoring the dead.  It seems the older we get, the more dead we have to honor on this day, and the quieter our Halloweens become.

However you celebrate your Halloween, I wish you joyful memories, I wish you safe travels, and I wish you fun.

Sites of Interest:

• Halloween, Ancient Origins
• All Soul’s Day
• Happy, Happy, Happy Halloween at Positively Present
• Some Delightful Halloween Images from Ricka

Related Posts

• Challenge Game #3, Here Kitty Kitty

About the photo: This is not a scraggly, scary black cat.  It’s my Dad’s beautiful kitty, Missy.  I just happened to catch her in a head-shake.  Never thought I’d get the chance to use this photo, till today….

Related posts:

1. The Valentine’s Day Mystery
2. A Quiet Christmas Eve
3. Happy Birthday, Pree

It turned out (it usually does, doesn’t it?) that I was letting myself grow anxious for nothing.  Oh, I suppose, when my leg and health are considered, the concerns were somewhat valid, but the leg held up, I never did have to return to the wheelchair (other than that I parked it at my reading table to sit in), and my hubby even bought me a good four-footed cane to help me keep my balance.  Today, I’m sore, but not terribly so, and still walking.

Check-mark in the “success” column!

We had a really nice day at the Community Spiritualist Chapel and Spirit-Path Center.  We didn’t have the huge crowds we thought we might, but people came through in spurts, enough to keep the readers busy a good portion of the day.  I did a nice sized handful of animal communication readings, and got to know some new animal friends and their humans.  I also had a couple of long time clients come to visit, so was able to renew old connections as well.

In addition to the five psychic readers who participated in the fair, we also had two skilled spiritual healers.  Reverend Shirley is one of our regulars, and a wonderful healer.  It was such a pleasure to be able to “sit in her chair” again.  I also received a healing session from Allegre, a new acquaintance and friend, who does a very interesting healing modality using crystals and a hologram structure.  I found it fascinating … not to mention so relaxing I thought for a moment that I might fall asleep!  Very nice, and I’m sure that healing energy is all still working its wonder on my physical and spiritual self.

I found it very interesting that, at this event, I did more sessions with crossed-over pets than living.  I wonder if it was “the nature of the crowd”.  Many people who come in to CSC have been to their séances, etc, after all … perhaps people go to psychic fairs hoping to hear from their departed loved ones, and therefore have the same expectations for their non-human friends and family as well.

This was actually a good thing.  This might sound odd, but I think, of all the ways I’m able to help animals and their humans, connecting with the departed is the most fulfilling thing I do.  There is something very special about seeing the relief, the easing of grief, and the gratitude in the eyes of a person who is deeply missing their departed pet.  I find that the ability to ease someone’s pain, if even just a little bit, in such an immediate manner, is a true blessing to my life, and an affirmation of what I do.

After the Psychic Fair proper, we had a séance in the evening.  There was quite a crowd there; we had to bring extra chairs into the séance room, and the circle pressed right up to the circumference limits of the room.  It was a very nice event,  and everyone there received a message.  I hope everybody went home having heard from someone who touched their hearts, and brought them a smile to carry forth into the upcoming week.

It’s been such a long time since I sat in on a circle like that, but I guess it’s kind of like riding a bike.  Even though I only received two messages, they seemed to bring happiness, and wisdom, through from the other side for the intended.  Helping … that is what it’s all about, isn’t it?

I guess some people may not look at the work of a psychic as being a helping, and even a healing, service.  It is, though … and it was a privilege to have helped quite a few people, and their animal friends, yesterday.

All told, a really nice day, and I survived it quite well!

Visit Spirit-Path Center and the Community Spirtualist Chapel at http://www.spirit-path.com.

Related posts:

1. New Challenge Game Coming, and Psychic Fair
2. Creature Thoughts: July 2010

Ghost Adventures

I’ve seen this show, which is fairly new on the Travel Channel, mentioned on Facebook.  They have a sidebar ad, and I visited their page, saw many positive comments.  There are quite a few followers.  Ergo, on Friday night, after things were sort of tucked in for the night, I hit the den sofa and turned on the tube.

I know that a lot of people like this show, and I’m not at all arguing with anyone’s taste.  For me, however, what I found was pretty much “Blair Witch Meets Scooby Doo” — without the cute Great Dane.  Grown men, and buff ones at that, guys that would intimidate me if I met them in a dark alley, for sure, were screaming like girls, yelling and shouting, and making a major scene at every little shadow.

The site was an excellent one, the scene of major Civil War era activity, where slaves were treated and mistreated, and Voodoo practiced on a regular basis.  There were some very cool moments where they consulted with experts about archaeological digs and traditions of the era and area.  Then, they would ruin the reason by playing up the dark side — talk of evil and curses, really over-doing the “spooky” aspects of a haunting.

The crew did bring scientific equipment with them, but instead of using it scientifically, they would assume they were dealing with something sinister and play their findings into their opinions, rather than the other way around.  They “caught” several EVPs, for example … none of which sounded anything like what they were saying they heard.  In fact, but for one, I could not make out anything that sounded like a human voice at all.  There was one where some music was captured — which was interesting, but hardly conclusive.

The thing that really bugged me was the shouting, though.  What ever happened to “Ghosts Were People, Too”?  They showed very little respect for the spirits that might have been there, taunting and challenging, and then yelling in fright each time anything responded.  They assumed “evil” at every shadow, and truly left me with a sense of dismay over how they treated the people who might have been there in the spirit realm.

Participating in a voodoo ritual, too, was major “only for television” overkill.  I mean, just the thought of Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson dancing around a voodoo fire … well, let’s not go there.  It just wouldn’t happen.

These gentlemen are probably perfectly decent investigators, and all of the drama and hype was simply played up for the camera, at the will of some producer who cares more for ratings than reasonable ghost-hunting.  I won’t be tuning in again, though.  I’ll stick with Ghost Hunters and Ghost Hunters International, with a bit of Paranormal State tossed in.  The latter, mostly because I think Chip Coffey’s very cool.

If you like out-there entertainment strictly for entertainment’s sake, you’ll probably enjoy Ghost Adventures.  If you’re looking for real paranormal investigation, though, you might want to skip this one.

Am I Haunted?

I’m far from a skeptic, don’t get me wrong.  As an animal communicator, I speak to the dead frequently.  I am also a psychic/medium, and have sat in on many séances, seeing some pretty phenomenal results.  I’ve done psychic readings for clients, often helping them contact their loved ones on the other side.

When things are happening to me, however, I tend to hold off on any opinions, and for some reason am very reluctant to surmise that there are paranormal reasons behind events.

I found myself, yesterday, once again asking, “What are the odds of that happening?” It then occurred to me that perhaps I should just blog about the evidence, and see what visitors to my site might think.  Do we have a ghost?  Or is all of this just odd coincidence?

I’ve mentioned some of this here on gazehound.com before, but will start at the beginning, even if some of it is redundant.

My parents live(d) right next door, though the “doors” are a good seven hundred feet apart, I’d guess.  Mom passed away in November of 2006, on All Soul’s Day.  Since then, I’ve been close to Dad, always right next door if needed.  Currently, however, he is facing some health situations which necessitate my being closer and more available, and therefore I moved in to his house, on the 2nd of June, the day he was released from the hospital.  I’m still here, taking it one day at a time.

Emotionally, things have been charged and stressful.  Not due to Dad, he’s a great guy.  It’s just that, after the way life has tossed challenges at me the past few years, including the mess with my own health, it’s very hard not to be homesick, worried, miss my family, miss my pets….  Even though they’re all next door, it’s just not the same, and adds impact to my worries over my father’s health.

That wasn’t a whine.  It was just brief background to say that I recognize that one potential source of the “symptoms” may be my own psychic/emotional energy.

Even before moving to Dad’s, things were happening.  After he fell and broke his ribs, I leaned forward from a seated position (wheel chair) to pick up the dog’s bowl and cracked a floater rib of my own.  All I did was bend over.  Not long before that, I took quite a fall while on crutches, landing in the middle of the kitchen floor … again, with very little provocation.  I think I caught the tip of a crutch on the edge of the carpet, and that was the excuse I gave, but to be honest, I really don’t know for sure.  I stopped myself short of spouting the cliché, “It was like I was pushed”, and even typing it out now feels … hokey.

Since being here, bizarre events continue.

Dad has a coffee maker which, rather than a glass carafe, has one that is plastic and thermal in nature.  I set it into the sink to clean it, ran warm water in it (it had already completely cooled), and as I stuck the brush in the water, the entire inside of the carafe exploded.  Some glass flew out but, thankfully, no one was injured, and most of it stayed inside the pot.

The other day, I was cleaning his water filter container … it was one of the large, rectangular ones with the spigot.  The way the kitchen is arranged, the main space to set it after washing it was on the counter behind me.  It was some distance away, set firmly on the counter, and I was washing the inner portion of the unit.  Suddenly, the clear container crashed to the floor behind me, breaking.  I thought at the time that I may have bumped my wheel chair, which was behind where I stood, and the handle had knocked it off the counter.  Later, though, I realized that the wheelchair handles don’t even reach the counter.  Nothing touched it … it just fell.

Yesterday, and this was the event that finally set my head-scratching into motion, I went out on the front deck.  I sat into a lawn chair, leaning my crutches against the railing beside me.  They are taller than the railing and were set firmly against it.  There was no wind blowing.  Suddenly, the crutches were moving … and had fallen through the railing.  The spaces between the spindles are about three inches, the heads of the crutches, which were parallel to the rail, about seven in length.  Both crutches, despite the laws of physics being against them, wound up on the ground below the deck, a three foot drop, having moved downward, turned themselves sideways, and passed through the gap between the uprights.  One had fallen all the way to the ground, the other was still standing on its head, the tip where I could reach it.  I manged to use that one to hook the other and retrieve both of them … a good thing, since I couldn’t have gotten off the deck without the crutches!

I blogged not long about about having seen a Shadow Apparition, and that I hoped and trusted that it was my Mom finally showing herself.  To my knowledge, she is the only human spirit who might be hanging around here.  But why would Mom be so mischievous?

I have, several times, though, seen a cat.  Yes, Dad has a cat, quite alive, but this “other” cat definitely wasn’t Missie, as I’ve seen it when Missie was in plain sight elsewhere.  It’s a corner-of-the-eye cat, and I usually catch tail its end disappearing down the hallway or around a corner.  Several days after my Mom died, a little cat showed up on our back porch, and Monkey wound up living with Dad for two years.  She, however, disappeared one day.  Evidence as relayed by neighbors was backed up what three different animal communicators/psychics indicated — that she had been the victim of coyotes.  I searched, ran ads, and looked for her for a long time, anyway, but Monkey never came home.

Or has she?

But why would a cat toss my crutches off the deck?  Is she upset that Missie has moved in?  Or that I have?  If so, she’s not talking (not to me, anyway).

Anyway, I post these events for your entertainment, and to see what readers might think.  I haven’t come to any conclusions, other than that they are curiosities.  I’m not normally the clumsy sort — though confess that it’s possible that my health situation may have changed that.  And yet, it was not my own contact with any of the target objects which caused these manifestations.

What do you think?  And, do you have any similar experiences you’d like to share about?  Feel free to comment!

Related posts:

1. Apple Blossom Time
2. Shadow Apparition — Hi, Mom!
3. Psychic Fair

Okay, maybe the doll’s only scary to “some people”.  ::cough::

I really haven’t seen Mom, though, or felt her very close.  Occasionally there will be a wisp of thought that startles me, makes me think she’s there, but when I try to congeal the mists, nothing happens.  With my dad being ill, I expected her presence to be strong and ever-present.

It made me sad.

Then last night, I was gifted with a smile that, even though things this morning feel the same as they did yesterday, brought me comfort.

I’m sleeping, due to my own rib injury making it impossible to get comfortable on Mom’s hard mattress (no, it has nothing to do with the doll), on the den couch.  This gives me a direct line of sight all the way through the kitchen, dining room, and to the wall beside the front entry door.  Pop likes some light at night, so we leave the hood light of the stove on, which illuminates that entire vision pathway enough that I can see, even in the dead of night, the solid forms of the side table, lamp, and wall sconce on that entry wall.

I’m not sure what time it was. It was definitely before four a.m. when my dad got up to give the cat some food.  Missie is demanding, to put it politely, and if she decides she wants a snack, she’ll pester him till he gives in.  (If I called the shots, she’d have been broken of the habit long ago, but what can ya do, she’s not my cat.  ::smile::)  I know it was earlier, because when I saw Dad come out to the kitchen, I thought, “Now that is really Pop this time”.  Earlier, I was very aware that Pop was still asleep in his room.

Anyway.  I digress.  (I do that a lot.)

I woke in the middle of the night, sometime, facing across the line of sight, and could see that wall.  A shadow passed from the direction of the door, moving toward the living room.  It moved just past the side table and wall sconce … it was dense enough to obscure part of the sconce and all of the objects on the table from view … and disappeared.

It was over five feet tall, as it was tall enough to block out a portion of the sconce, which reaches maybe six feet at the tip.  Mom was about five-three when she died (and would have argued that she was still five-five and a half if asked), so the size match was there.

In the split second that the shadow registered, I wondered what Pop was doing wandering in that direction, but immediately realized that he was asleep in his bed.  There was no sound involved, and the shadow was too short and moving too quickly for him.

Just as my mind really registered what I was seeing, it was gone.

I went back to sleep with a big smile on my face.  Mom’s been here all along.  It was her nature to deal with life quietly … why should things be any different now that her life is pure spirit form?

Things feel the same as ever this morning, but I’m no longer disappointed.  Mom let me know she was here, and I had a visual, “physical” experience to confirm the fact.

All is well.

Love you, Mom.

Related posts:

1. An Assortment of Hauntings
2. Apple Blossom Time
3. The Little People (or maybe not)