Spring Fever and Fear.

I love spring and summer. I look forward to it all winter long. It's a time when I feel the most alive and I can actually get outside and do things. If it weren't for my family and job being here I would be somewhere warm that I could do that all year round. There is nothing quiet like a spring day with a slight breeze and sitting out on your patio or porch. Yet the past three of four years either a family member, friend of beloved pet (sometimes one of each) have died. I guess it comes with the fact that most of my family is at "that age". You know the one where they start dying off one by one. I'm not ready for it though. I already know about as many dead people as I do living and I don't really think that is a good thing considering I'll be only Forty-two years of age on June 27Th. For now though I will count my blessings for my wonderful family and my many great friends. I am very blessed on so many levels that I can't count them. I suppose having known so many people who have died has given me some perspective. I mean I don't have a tendency to take life for granted. I don't put work and a job above my family and friends and I know somewhere in the future when I die I hope God calls me home. I really don't like the other option too much. Spring is here though and I am hoping you will pray for me and I will pray that I finally have four years of not, will make it through this spring and summer and fall without another person or beloved friend of pet leaving my life.

Dreaming of Tomorrow

Where do you go when you dream? Do you remember your dreams or do you often wake up believing you didn't dream at all. Research shows that everyone dreams every night whether we remember them or not. There has been a great deal of research that also shows that if we learn to remember our dreams and even write them down they can often give us insightful information into our own lives. Why you might ask? Simply because the subconscious mind is free to explore when we are sleeping. When you are asleep you are not held back by your inhibitions. In our sleep we can fly like eagles. We have the answers to all our problems. It's
an idea world, unless your mind has a struggle to over come. This is where nightmares come into play. Our dreams are often going to make the situation out to be a hundred times more worse than any real life scenario we could possibly come up with. There are multiple theories on this. I believe it is so that when it plays out, if it plays out, in real life we are more able to handle and cope with what actually occurs. There is sort of a ah ha moment in our mind where it remembers the dream and what might have been even if we don't. There are also those that believe we receive spirit visits in our dream. I'm not sure how I feel about that one. The theory is that it's easier for others on the other side to talk to us asleep because of the fact that our subconscious is the part of us they are speaking with. Part of me believes this. When I was younger I had a fight with a family member and it had been a few weeks since that family member had spoken to me. In my dream my moms mother came to me and we sat down and at McDonald's hamburgers in an airport of all things together. Remember I didn't say they were always exciting dreams. Anyway she said she realized I was worried because this family member had not spoken to me in a while, but not to worry in a couple of more weeks they would. Thing is she was right, or my mind was right. Approximately two weeks after that dream that person and I were back to talking like we always had. I've also had dreams about my other grandmother where I actually say to her in the dream: "You're dead, you can't be here." She always answers: "You needed to see me, so I am here.". So part of it could be desire, and it could be our subconscious mind is just really good at figuring things out. I believe a part of me believes they actually do visit us in our dreams though. Something speaks to us and reaches out to us. Why couldn't it be our deceased loved ones.
The third type of dream is what I would call a prophetic dream. In these types of dreams we seem to see things and hear things that we couldn't possibly have anyway of seeing or knowing. These dreams are easy to distinguish between other dreams because when we wake up we are often confused because we expect to be where we were in the dream. They are so real we could almost touch them. I have had several of these unexplainable dreams in my life. I have actually been in a group of people, some of whom I've never met, except for in my dream a few nights before I met them, and I can tell you exactly what everyone in that group is going to say. It always freaks me out just a little. In my case my dreams that are prophetic really seem to want me to know that this is what they are. I always have them over and over night after night until I either pass on a message to whomever they are intended for or the event registers in my mind or occurs. An example of this, I have several. In the fall of 1984 I started having a dream about my mom's mother. In this dream I would go to the hospital and take her a red rose. In the dream I knew somehow it was summer and I knew my grandmother was dying. My aunt was due to have a baby in late May. In my dream I also visited her in the hospital on these stops. My grandmother would always smile and me and tell me: "It's OK, really I'm ready." I had these over and over and over until one day it dawned on me. One day in November I told my dad. "My grandmother is going to die on my birthday. (June 27Th). I told him of my dreams and he asked me not to tell my mom. On June 26Th, 1985 I took the early morning call saying my grandmother had passed away. An orderly in a hospital thinking my grandmother was small enough for him to handle on his own had dropped her. This caused a blood clot which went to her heart and killed her. So I was one day off. I turned 18 the day after she died. The red roses. I had visited her 3 days in a row in my dream. A week after she died one of her brothers died and a week after that a 2ND brother of hers died. So was it prophecy or coincidence? Another story for you. Shortly after starting high school I had a dream that upon my next year at the start of the year I went to school expecting to see my best friend Chris. She normally walked with me, but hadn't showed up and I just figured she went to school. When I got to school no one knew where she was or could find her. I worried around and called everyone. No one knew where she was. I told my friend Chris about this story. At that time she wasn't a believer in what she probably thought was stupid stuff a teenager would make up. That next year though I lived out my dream. Circumstances at home had driven her away to live with her brother. It all played out just as I had said. I wonder if she believes it was real or coincidence? Either way... You can believe or you can not, but for me I listen to my dreams when they speak. They are a wonderful way to travel and if you keep a pad of paper by your bed to write them down upon first awaking they might even be a wonderful way for you to learn a few things about yourself. Keep dreaming!

Bee's Really Be Gone?

Just a quick not to let you know that my dad decided to play exterminator last night and get rid of the bees. That scared me half to death that he would try it on his own. I worried myself sick at work thinking all kinds of scary thoughts. He waited for it to get dark because bees are less active at night. He went in and cut a whole in my ceiling. Mom said they started pouring out of the ceiling by the hundreds so he ran out and closed the bathroom door, shutting the light off as he went. He then waited a bit and went back in with the lights still off and started spraying them with bug killer. Amazingly he only got 1 sting. I guess my bathtub had thousands of dead bees in it. They said it was a mess to clean up. They got the nest and it was filled with a bunch of baby bees ready to be born. So my thousands were about to grow. Hopefully though this time the bee's really are gone. I owe my cat Basil a big thanks for the heads up. Also I thank God for the heads up on the bee's. My dad could have been hurt seriously if he had gone in there to repair the roof and didn't know they were there. Again here's hoping they are gone!.

Bee's Be Gone ----- NOT!

OK, so everyone I'm sure remembers my blog about the bees in my bathroom. I thought I had gotten rid of them. I suppose this is natures way of saying... think again. Also to tell this story, you are going to think I've totally lost my mind; however, this is what happened and I swear it's a true story. Believe me or not here we go.
Remember my twenty year old cat Basil that died on June 21st? Well, for the past couple of weeks I thought I was losing my mind. My cat use to sit on the edge of the tub and purr so loud it would sound like it could vibrate the house every time I was in the bathroom doing anything. I remember he wanted to be in there with me whether I was folding clothes or washing my face. He didn't care. This purring was something I missed after he was gone. A couple of weeks ago at night I started hearing that sound. The first night it sounded like he was right there on the bath tub. I even put my ear to the tub and it sounded like he was right beside me. After a little bit the sound would stop. I only heard it at night and I seriously thought I was just losing it. Well today, in broad daylight after I got up I was getting ready to get in the shower and I thought I heard it again. -- Now for those of you that know me you know I have a cat named Prissy. Trust me I checked. She was out on the screen porch asleep. Now today it sounded like it was at my feet and like the noise jumped up to the bath tub. I walked over to the tub and it sounded like it went into the tub. I got in the tub and the noise was as if it walked up the wall right to the spot where I had put the tape on the ceiling where the bees had come in. The noise was gone, but my eye caught a glimpse of something under the tape. I tapped on the tape and the sound scared me half to death. It sounded like thousands upon thousands of bee's buzzing and hitting that tape like they were trying to attack it. I showed my dad because he was planning to replace that part of the ceiling and it's a good thing I did. Can you imagine opening that up to thousands of bees? He could have been seriously hurt or even killed.

So I guess we are back to Chance or Divine intervention. You may think I"m crazy, heck I may be, but I honestly think my cat Basil knew there was danger there and came back to warn me. Trust me when I say the sound of bees buzzing and purring are not the same. I'm sure plenty of people will make up their own theories, but I'm pretty sure Basil dropped in to let me know, Bee's Be Gone - NOT.

John Edward

OK, so I have received a couple of very interesting emails as of late regarding my choice of authors as my favorite author. I chose John Edward because he is my favorite author. I get great comfort from reading his books and have read a couple of them several times. I thought today I would just take a moment and clarify which John Edward I am talking about. I am not referring to the one who is known for his political association with the democratic party. I don't even know if he's written any books. I am referring to the one that has a television show and is revered as a "psychic-medium".

Now, to also clarify things I am not really sure if I believe or do not believe John Edward can really talk to the dead. I have not really come to a conclusion on that. I think for me to believe I would have to have my own reading and he would have to tell me something awfully convincing that no one else should know. I'm skeptical by nature even though I have had a few of my own dealings with the supernatural or unexplainable as it may be. What I do know though is I do not have to be a believer in what he professes to do to enjoy the words written in his books. His books make me want to review my own life and they somehow give me comfort when otherwise I might not have any. I love the idea of what he writes about and about how it does make me think long and hard about what may or may not be in my future.

Also to clarify. I believe in God and all power of everything belongs to God and is with God and should be glorified with God. I am not, nor do I see how I could take anything away from Him by reading these books. I just feel every one's relationship with God is their own. We all have to find our own peace with Him.

That being said. I would like to recommend that if you have some time and want to read something that will make you examine the way you think. You might pick up one of his non-fiction books. He does have fiction books that do that as well though. My favorite book by him that I have read several times is "What if God Were the Sun". I highly recommend this book. Every page kept me wanting for more and the ending was totally something I didn't see coming.

Keep the emails coming. I'm always happy to answer questions.

"Ghost Rider?"

I've always thought of myself as fairly open minded; however, I as of yet to convince myself ghosts do or do not exist. I've had my share of run ins with the totally unexplainable up to and including seeing a woman in white at the end of a driveway that was there one minute and gone the next. I also had a music box that would play with no one near it and stop if I asked it to. So for me to say that ghost don't exist is something I can't do. I do believe that seeing is believing though and as a fellow member of human kind it's a hard concept to grasp without seeing someone I know and know to be deceased. So with this in mind let me tell you of my most recent encounter.

A couple of nights ago while driving home down I69, around 12:30 A.M. actually, I was the only car around with the exception of a few cars that were so far ahead of me I could barely make out their tail lights. I had the radio on and was listening to a late night talk radio program. All of a sudden I heard what sounded like a motorcycle when someone is gunning the motor. I looked behind me to see where the motorcycle was but try as I might I could not see one. I turned the radio off thinking it might be on the radio, but the noise continued. It appeared to be coming from right beside my car; however, I still saw no motorcycle. The noise stopped around the Illinois road turn off so I assumed I must just not have seen the motorcycle and it must have turned off, but shortly after I heard the noise again. I looked in vain to see the motorcycle. I rolled down my window and I swear I heard someone laugh and the motorcylcle sounded as if someone reved the motor and took off ahead of me. The noise had the same noise as if someone on a motorcycle was taking off. It got fainter and fainter like they were leaving me behind. I never saw a rider, nor a cycle; but I'm thinking it really was there somehow, someway. Ghost rider having a little fun perhaps? Maybe or maybe not... I'll leave you to your own conclusions.

Feel free to share your supernatural experience. I'd love to hear about them.