Introduction

He was soon to reach his 22nd birthday and we lost him - lost our son. The world altered 26 days before a certain calendar mark. We fought for our child’s life, but at one actual slip of a moment, unique in all the universes of time, a switch clicked “OFF.” Breath, bright color, warmth dropped out.
“Forever” - “never” - these had been words in a paper dictionary before. Now, we felt ourselves to be the papery ones. Grief would write on us. Loved ones came to our assistance, both in life visible and life invisible. We walked through our despair on a journey toward reunion. Our son was up ahead. But he makes known to us that he walks beside us too - especially when we need to touch that reality again.
These journaled entries: accounts of dreams, chains of seemingly coincidental and synchronistic events, and visits with our son through the services of gifted mediums, affirm there is an afterlife. However “afterlife” may be a misnomer for a spiritual existence that is more than a just a continuum, but rather a coexistence simultaneously occurring with this life.
We wanted to include all the messages, all the hellos, all the signs, but we found this was just not possible. This is a brief summary not an all inclusive account of the many times that our spiritual family has buoyed and supported us, reminding us how they love us and are helping us.
Although we continue to miss and long for our physical son, our faith has been strengthened by the gift of knowing, he is alive; he continues to love us; he continues to learn and grow; he is not alone - but rather with our loved ones who have gone before us. He is still connected to us and visits us in various ways. Our relationship with him is not over.
Nothing is really lost. Material things pass away including the physical body, but spiritual things are eternal. All that really matters and continues into the next dimension are things of the spirit.
I Corinthians 4:18: "We look not to the things which are seen but to the things which are unseen; for the things which are seen are transient, but the things which are unseen are eternal."

Contents

Chapter 1: Be Happy ……………5
Chapter 2: 2001, Year of Losses (Chinese "Year of the Snake") ……………15
Chapter 3: Precognition …………18
Chapter 4: Last Days ………………21
Chapter 5: First Visits …………..26
Chapter 6: Losses ……………….30
Chapter 7: Saying Goodbye …………….38
Chapter 8: Mediums …………………….41
Chapter 9: "Move On" ……………….………49
Chapter 10: Winter Butterfly ………………...58
Chapter 11: Clock Stops, Michael and Marti ….62
Chapter 12: Tree Trunk ……………………...….74
Chapter 13: Bahamas, Michael and Marti ……..…77
Chapter 14: Wake Up - It’s 2:24! ……………....88
Chapter 15: Telephone Session, Michael and Marti………93
Chapter 16: “Proud of Me,” Michael and Marti …………....109
Chapter 17: Hawk Soaring …………………….113
Chapter 18: The Gift of Life ……………..121
Appendix: The Tree by Austin O’Neal ……………..124
Addendum …………………...125

 


Chapter 1
Be Happy, Michael and Marti, Session 1, March 10, 2004
Uprooted and still tumbling, blinded by emotional currents, black with cold and power unimagined, a tether – ring, ring, its Bridgette calling me from school:
Mom, I was meditating in my car during break. I was looking out the front window toward the horizon when in the rear view mirror I saw a figure in the back seat. I turned to get a better look, but he was gone. I know it was Austin. He is letting me know that he is coming today.
Anxiously anticipating this afternoon’s session with the mediums, Michael and Marti Parry and stirred by her affirmation I reply, “I have been asking him to come, telling him when and where. We just don’t know. I can hardly concentrate. Just a little longer now.”
Willing to risk crushing disappointment, yet driven by desire for contact with our son, we arrive early at Pathways book store. Calmed by the colorful ambience - the sweet incense - the books, my husband Tighe, our daughter Bridgette, and myself wander around the little book and candle shop waiting for our turn. Unable to discern what is being said, we hear music mixed with the soft voices of Michael and Marti emanating from a corner partitioned off by a folding screen in the back of the store. At last, appearing quite “down to earth” considering what they were about to do for us, they greet us warmly. We had heard about them from the mother of one of Bridgette’s friends.
Michael Parry receives messages from the dimension of spirit through clairvoyance - sight, clairaudience - hearing, and clairsentience - touch or feeling. Marti Baker (after 13 years of marriage, she recently changed her name to Parry) is an artist who uses her talent to sketch spirit portraits relayed to her by her guides and other artists now in the spirit dimension. We are invited to sit with them at a small table. Marti instructs us to resist giving them information. Michael briefly meditates while listening to ethereal music from a tape player. Placing headphones over softly flowing luminous hair, Marti pulls out her sketch pad. The music she listens to aids her meditation and prevents her from hearing what Michael is saying.
Then in a warm British accent Michael says to our daughter, Bridgette, “Your brother is here.” A wave of solace washes over me. The wondering, the separation, the long-timeness is over. We had never met Michael or Marti before. When we booked the session at Pathways bookstore in Reno we never told the store owner/managers who it was that we wanted to contact. There seemed to be no earthly way that Michael and Marti could have known that we had come to hear from Bridgette’s brother, Austin - our son.
MICHAEL: I feel a brother here, who is coming to say hello to you. There is a sudden crossing with him, with the brother. Something about going over quickly. He’s older than you. He’s in a car. He goes like this, "Bam, and that's how I went," he said. Is he in his twenties? "Hi, Dad and Mum," he says. "I’m the one. I’m the one you’ve come to see. I’m the dude! I’m the guy!"
Did he like being the center of attention? Because I feel he likes to take center stage. . . .
"Hi Sis. Hi!" he says. You are coping surprisingly well. Are you keeping these guys going? Because you are the one who’s like keeping them up, keeping them going. Do you pray or something? You do prayers for him. You burn incense and stuff in your room. Because he likes coming in to see you and he is thanking you for like "the energy, for making the energy," he says.
Lighting candles and incense while she meditated and prayed in her room was Bridgette’s way of bridging the chasm between her brother and herself.
MICHAEL: Does he have a mustaa-- or like a goatee or something, your son?
Stroking his own face as if he had a beard similar to how Austin wore his Fu Manchu and goatee, Michael confirms:
MICHAEL: Is it here? Sometimes he would have this, wouldn’t he? He has a truck, doesn’t he? He's talking about his truck. There is a black vehicle or a black truck. That's his, isn’t it? It's his toy. This is his baby! This is his baby! It's new, isn’t it? It looks nice and new and shiny to me. So who has the truck, the brother?
BRIDGETTE: The older brother.
MICHAEL: Okay, so "he's taking care of my truck," right? I don’t think he really cares about the truck, but he's glad his brother has the truck and he ought to let you drive it sometimes. ‘Cause he doesn’t let you drive it, does he?
Only weeks before his accident, I helped Austin buy this “shiny black” pickup truck, now in the possession of our eldest son, Denny who was three years older than Austin. Cautiously protective, he never let Bridgette drive it.
MICHAEL: He says one of you saw him after he was gone. "Mom saw me after I was gone." Did he smile at you? He says he smiled at you.
I had seen Austin twice by this time. Not too many days after his passing, while driving down Mount Rose Highway, just a short distance from the scene of his accident, in my mind's eye, I saw a beautiful, radiant, healthy Austin with sun touched skin and hair. Smiling at me, he appeared to be in awe of the changes he was experiencing. Later I read that spirit contact is often made while driving because thoughts become meditative in quality while the body is occupied performing this smooth, automatic activity.
Another time while picking Christopher up from school, I saw a boy who looked exactly like Austin when he was 13-years-old. For that few seconds, it seemed time had stopped and we had another chance at keeping Austin with us.
MICHAEL: Oh, you're a book worm, you're the reader. [Gesturing to Judith] Because he's going on about the books, reading the books. Have you been reading about this stuff or something? He says, "Good, good, because it's real, Mom."
Treading water, searching for the life raft, I was reading every book I could find on near death experience and the afterlife, my therapy.
MICHAEL: Ha, ha, ha! He is a fun kid! He is not going to let you guys get upset or depressed about this, absolutely not! He says: "It is in the plan, I had to go." I know it is hard for you to understand this, but it is real. Everyone picks a time when they are going to leave. Alright? Okay. . . .
At last someone is talking about our son in the present tense, alive, communion, now.
MICHAEL: He is thanking you guys for being his parents. And he wants you to know that you did the best for him. And he is thanking you for everything you did for him while he was here. Because he doesn’t want any of this "guilt trip stuff," he doesn’t want any of that, like maybe we should have done this or done that. He wants you to be happy and know he is alright. . . .
One of you got a big sign "today," that he was going to show up. He said, "Today." I said, "Today?" He said, "Yeah!" I said, "What about today?" He said, "One of ‘em got a big sign that I was going to show up, and one of ‘em said to the other one that I know he is going to come today." Who said that? Was it you? [Bridgette nods.] Did you say it to her? [We both nod.] Okay, that's it. You said, “I just had this [thing] happen and I know he is going to be here, ‘Cause he did this.” I don’t know what it is, but he did this, he did this thing to let you know that he was going to be here.
There are six years between you and him. Are there six years between you? This is what he tells me. [Austin was almost six-years-old when Bridgette was born.] Were you like that [holding two fingers together] with him when he was here? Were you like this?
BRIDGETTE: Not really, he was older.
MICHAEL: I feel like he wants to include you more now he is over there, he is “going to connect to the others through you," he says.
Did he suffer head injuries? He is putting this thing around my head. I said "What in the hell is this? It feels like a band, a thing around my head." I feel this band around my head. I was almost going to say, “Was he an ex-hippie or something?” And he said, "No, no, no, it was a bandage." Was he comatose for awhile or something? He said, "I was gone. I wasn’t going to come back.” You had to turn off the machine. Okay, Okay. [Acknowledging pools of tears in my eyes.] Oh, don’t cry. You’ll get me upset. He is so close to me, I can totally feel him. He is standing right here. He is looking at you guys and he wants you to know that this was the right decision. Did you have to make the decision? [Looking at Tighe.] He wants to put the onus on you. Or you didn’t want it to happen or something?
TIGHE: We kind of had to fight for it.
MICHAEL: Why is he pointing to you specifically about this? Did he have the hardest time about it? Maybe he wants to say more to you. You are beating yourself up about it. Okay, maybe there is something else he wants to say. You thought he was going to come out of the coma. There was a little reprieve thing where they thought he was going to pull through. Because I feel like the monitors and stuff show like he is going to pick up, like he is going to make it, then he goes thuoop, then it just drops off. This is what he shows me. Because a decision was made over there, he talked with other people - guides and things and they said, okay, you’ve got a choice, you can come back in, you can carry on, but this is how it is going to be. "I had to make a choice." Okay? And he said, "No, I ain’t going to be like that." Okay? As tough as it was for him and you, but you would not have-- "It wouldn’t have been the same because I wouldn’t have been me," he said. You understand?
Very outgoing guy. Very outgoing, likes life, having a fun time, he does not want to be like that. You know he’ll shoot from the hip, this guy, he will tell you what he thinks.
Knowing Austin would not want to be trapped in a body he could no longer direct and how he loved the outdoors, hiking, camping, being active with friends, turning off life support seemed to be the only choice we had - yet still there are times when we cannot help but question our decision.
MICHAEL: Why is he taking me out of state, someone close to him? The guy that was driving is still here, right? [We nod.] "Will you tell him it is not his fault? Please, tell him it was not his fault." Was there blame attached to him? Somebody was trying to blame him. "It's not his fault," he is telling me, and “sorry about that." He says, “sorry about the people blaming him." Okay? "But it is not his fault."
Derrick, one of Austin's closest friends and driver the night of the accident had recently moved to Arizona to go to school. Derrick was grilled by the police investigating the accident. Later we gave Derrick a tape of the session and told him that Austin said it wasn’t his fault and that Austin said he was sorry that Derrick had taken so much heat over the accident. Derrick replied, "Austin always was a tender hearted guy."
Is your brother tall? [Austin was 5"11", with a large frame.] I feel quite tall and he wants to bring up this. [Pointing to Bridgette's pendant.] Where did you get it?
BRIDGETTE: Shop-Mart.
MICHAEL: He is trying to bring gold-- eh chain-- Hold on a second; he is trying to bring up something here, what is this thing you are trying to bring up? He wasn’t in the military was he, your brother? Hush, don’t talk too quick. Someone was in the military your brother wants to say hello to here. I feel like a dog tag here. Yeah, that's it! It is a good friend of his. Okay. ‘Cause I says, "What the hell is this thing?" He says, "It's like this," and gave me this whole thing like the military or something.
Michael begins to slide his finger across the map on the table in front of him.
MICHAEL: Is he in Iraq? Is he, right now? You're going to get in touch with him and tell him he said hello. And tell him, "I’m looking out for him while he is out there. Tell him I’m going to be his guardian angel. Tell him, I’m going to sit on his ass and make sure he doesn’t get it." Okay? This is what he says.
JUDITH: Brock. It's Brock!
Brock, who stayed with and comforted Austin immediately after his accident while the other boys went for help, was now in the Army in Iraq. After the reading, we contacted Brock's parents and asked them to relay this information from Austin to Brock, who was soon to be home on leave from Iraq.
MICHAEL: You were off work, not working. Did you not work after this happened? ‘Cause he shows me - just sitting around kind of stunned. And he was in the house for some time trying to make you realize that he is alright. You're like buddies aren’t you? [Directed toward Tighe.] Yeah, ‘Cause he said, "Dad's my buddy. We're buddies." Is he mechanically inclined then? I feel like he fixes your car. He does, doesn’t he? He says, "Yeah Dad, I’ll take care of it" and he's in your car and he fixes it.
Austin had been taking diesel mechanics and welding in school. He fixed all our cars. In particular I remember how he had worked on the aging ‘87 Safari van that Bridgette had since inherited.
I think you need to change the oil or something, like, "I’m on it, Dad." Go on, now. [Tighe had the oil changed the day before this session.]
Are you like a tomboy? [Directed toward Bridgette.] She doesn’t wear dresses and stuff. I think this is a joke. Someone dressed up like a woman or something. I don’t think he is gay, this is a joke, like a party or something, and "I dress up like a woman to see if anyone can recognize me." He's funny. [Laughter] He's funny isn’t he? He wore a wig and the whole nine yards. Because he "wanted to be a blonde," he says. Ah, ha, ha, ha!
When Austin was 17 he dressed up as Marilyn Monroe for Halloween. He wore a dress and a blonde wig. It was very funny because he was so big and solid - a football player trying to pass as Marilyn Monroe.
MICHAEL: Uhm. And there is a "T" name he wants to bring up, like Tighe. A "T” name. You are Tighe.
TIGHE: I am Tighe.
MICHAEL: Okay. Tighe, he wants you “to be happy." He doesn’t want you guys to be sad. I know it's tough. Okay, I could quite easily lose it if he came too close to me. We could all be a bawling mess, quite easily. But I don’t want to go there and he doesn’t want to go there. And he wants you to be happy and to realize that he is still in your life. Still here. Nothing's changed. Like he is on holiday or something. Like you are going to get a postcard or something. So look out. Pay attention. And he will let you know in his own way that he is around. Now. See he is showing me this dress thing. And I’m like, "What the hell?" He-He is going on about this dress thing and I thought, "What the heck is this?" And that's when he let me know. . . .
He had “too much to drink.” He said he "didn’t realize." You see? I know his friend feels terrible about it. He really does. So you let him know now. Okay?
Whew! Now. [Directed toward Bridgette.] You are with a new boyfriend. Since he is gone - a new boyfriend. You really like him. And he really likes you. Yeah? “Good!” He is “happy about that.” He "might have had a hand in this," he says.
Bridgette had just started going out with Nate, Austin's friend, Luke's brother. Austin probably did have a hand in it.
MICHAEL: You are going to college. So is that soon? The college thing. Because he wants you to do well there. Good at math? Is he good at math? Your son? Oh, the younger brother. That is one of his better subjects.
JUDITH: Yes, the younger one.
Christopher, the youngest brother, was 13 almost 14 when Austin passed. Now in high school, he was taking advanced math classes; the daily math homework ate up most of his time.
MICHAEL: He's going on about that. And history, someone likes history too. Someone likes archaeology or something. That's it! That's it! I have a whole historical archaeological feeling going on. Right? Like I am digging out the past. Okay? Is that his other brother? Okay. He is going to say, "Hi!" to his other brothers. Right? Okay. But in his own way, he is trying to let them know he is alright. He is letting them know. Okay?
JUDITH: The oldest one.
Denny, in college and majoring in history, was taking a course on ancient Egypt. During the past week he had been sitting in a lawn chair in the yard hour after hour reading the historical fiction, The Egyptian.
MICHAEL: And uhm. Who is the one that wears the garish shirts? The bright shirts. That is one of the brothers. The one that plays basketball, he is changing a team. He said something about he is changing his team. I get the feeling I’m playing for someone else now. Is there a bright colored-- bright colors, like-- to bright colors? And he plays this, since he's been gone. Tell him "I know about this and the change of shirts, change of teams." Alright?
JUDITH: Oh, I know. Denny plays basketball and [just this year] he took up touch football.
MICHAEL: See, I’m not a football fan, I don’t know sports - so he is doing well to get this across. Alright?
Denny played basketball all through high school and during college, but he had recently taken up touch football and the team's shirts were a garish orange and blue color. The color of the shirts was something we did not know during the reading, but verified with Denny later that evening.
MICHAEL: Uhm. Whew. I don’t know wha-- I couldn’t tell you why this happened. Uh, there must be some sort of karmic reason for this. I don’t know if this goes back to another life or why he chose to go this way, but there is a reason for this. Believe there is a perfect reason for this. God is perfect, absolutely perfect. And everything is perfect and that is all that you need to know. And sometimes it shakes your faith when something like this happens. You know? It does shake your faith. But he has absolute faith, he knows. Okay? Alright. So don’t let this shake your faith, and you will one day know the reason for it. Alright? Why he is not here with you, well, physically. But he will let you know he is around. Okay?
MICHAEL: Sharon, Susan, S name, he may be wanting to say hello to someone else, like the military guy. There is someone with the initials, S.L.
Michael was doing automatic writing during the session and had drawn the letters, "S L."
BRIDGETTE: Sadie Lisamon, my best friend.
MICHAEL: That's it! That's it. It is S.L. Why would he be saying hello to her? Did he like her?
BRIDGETTE: Sadie had dreams about him [after he passed].
MICHAEL: See, she isn’t as close as you guys so he is visiting her. So believe her. Okay? Tell her "it is real" and he is coming to her to let you guys know. Not because you are not connected, but because sometimes when you are sad and upset you cannot hear them. Okay? So try to be a little more upbeat and know that he is around and he is trying to let you know.
Now let's see the picture. It's him, I feel like it is him. [We confirm.] I knew it was him, that she had drawn him. That's why I wanted to pick it up. He is a very strong energy! Uhm. Does he look better than this? He reckons he is better looking than this! Alright?
MARTI: He thought he was a lady killer.
MICHAEL: He says, "Not a bad picture, but I am better looking than this!" Okay? Ha, ha, ha!
Marti had drawn a spirit portrait of Austin, just as he looked when he was in Hawaii with his friends in 1998 - only in Marti's sketch Austin looked a little more mature. This sketch is displayed next to the 1998 Hawaii photo on Michael and Marti's website spiritart.com. [See photos 17-19.]
MARTI: He is saying something about braces. Did you wear braces or did he wear braces?
Michael began to rub is right leg.
MICHAEL: Somebody had a knee brace. Who has the knee brace?
JUDITH: We have a picture of him with an ace wrap on his knee.
Austin had gone to Hawaii twice with his friend Luke and his family. Luke’s mother, Sharon, whom Austin called his “second mom,” gave us a photo of Austin in Hawaii. He is standing on a path, smiling, wearing the ace wrap on his right knee - injured while jumping off a 50 foot high cliff into the water. After Austin passed we enlarged the photo and hung it in our living room where we gather every evening. I place flowers and light candles on the table below it. [See photo 22.]
MICHAEL: Okay. You see Marti - here, hears things, but nowhere near as clear as I do.
MARTI: Not as much either.
MICHAEL: I said, “They don’t understand this! They don’t understand this.” So I said, "What kind of brace are you talking about? I don’t think it is a tooth brace, is it?" And he said, "No!" And he made me feel something on my leg. So I said, "This a knee brace." And he showed me one and he said, "Yeah." So this is what he is talking about. OK? Ummm.
Did he ever have a thing in his hair? Like a design or something, a bit missing or something, like a -- He said "There was--like there was a bit shaved off my head.” So he had like a bald patch there. And this thing sticking out. This is what he is talking about, "I saw all that."
The surgical site on the right side of Austin’s head had been shaved - “a bit missing” . . . “bald patch” for the surgery and insertion of a probe to measure intracranial pressure. Through Michael, Austin said that he “saw all that” confirming that he had left his body while he was in the coma or that although he had already passed into spirit, he stayed nearby. We start talking excitedly.
MICHAEL: Now listen guys. Now listen guys, we're not done. He is still here. Geez! It's like-- it's like, "Wait a minute, I haven’t gone. Q-u-i-t." The-- uh, uh, he wants to explain what this was. ‘Cause I felt like a bald patch, where my hair is missing or something. And I said, "What is this? Is this like a design in your head?" And he said, "No” uhm, “this thing.” He is telling you this to let you know that he was present when you were there. Yeah. And he saw you and he heard you talking about him. And he heard all that. Okay? And one of you said something, and I think it might have been you. [Directed toward me, Judith.] Because he said that you said, "If you don’t make it - we love you." One of you expressed this sentiment. Okay? And he heard this. "It's alright if you don’t make it, we still love you." Now like that. Okay? ‘Cause you had the feeling he wasn’t going to pull through. Was that you? [I nod.]
Yeah. Now. Cleaning up a party. So is there a birthday or celebration coming up soon? Yours? [Directed toward me.] Is it like in a couple of weeks?
JUDITH: Yes.
The reading was March 10th and my birthday was March 29th.
MICHAEL: Yeah? Okay. He wants you to have a good party, okay? Okay. Don’t get as drunk as he was, but he wants you to have a good party. Alright. Okay. . . . It is getting a bit late. I’m a bit tired. But-- uhm. Yeah, I’m good when I’m tired. Like my brain just doesn’t function right so they will just take full advantage. They're like in there going, "Yeah! Ha, ha! Way to go! ‘Cause I’m not at home. See? So actually you came at the best time because I’m the clearest. I have people say, “Uhm, maybe you are tired!” Yeah, maybe I’m tired. But I’m not-- I’m way good when I’m tired. And I-- go on. Your brother's a way good communicator. Very clear.
MARTI: It is not very usual that he [Michael] communicates with the same person that I draw.
MICHAEL: Did you know how many times we have done that? Not a lot. If that person she's drawing is the one I’m talking to, man they have to have energy like up the ying yang! Or all these people are assisting so well, for that to happen. Okay? ‘Cause he is like doing two things at once. Let's see. Okay. That's why I feel very energetic, very bright, with him. You understand?
Is there like-- Alice? Alice?
JUDITH: I have a friend named Alice.
MICHAEL: Who crossed? Is her mother over there? There is somebody here who wants to connect with Alice. Say, "Hi." to Alice from her mum. Okay?
My friend Alice's only child, her son, died in an automobile accident on New Year's Eve in 2003. I tried to comfort Alice. After this session I told her about Michael and Marti and showed her Austin’s spirit portrait and his matching real life photo. Later in 2005, Alice came for a reading with Michael and Marti, where it was disclosed to her that her son was with her mother, who had come for him after his accident. [See Michael and Marti session 5.]
MICHAEL: Does your brother have a tooth missing? Who bashed out their teeth?
Christopher had a small chip in his front tooth. In later readings, Austin referred to him as the one with the chipped tooth.
MICHAEL: Is there, like one - This is funny. I don’t know what this is. He is not a fighter is he? Your brother?
And Nick. Nick. Nicky. Is Nicky a friend of his? He might be saying a whole bunch of stuff here. Is Nick a real good friend of his? Nick's over there with him.
JUDITH: Yeah.
Nicky was on the football team with Austin in high school. Nicky died in an automobile accident while they were still in school.
MICHAEL: Must be that then. It could be just that we're drawing to a close here. So he is saying Nick is over there with him, I guess. Somebody like do boxing or karate or something? [Michael demonstrated as if he were boxing a punching bag.] Did he ever do karate or judo or something? He did, didn’t he? When he was little, didn’t he? That's it. That's it. Yeah, he did. He did some sort of martial arts, he's telling me. The one that does the boxing. Right? Yeah.
JUDITH: Chris. [Christopher].
MICHAEL: That's it. Is Chris the brother?
JUDITH: Yeah, the littlest brother.
MICHAEL: Okay, then that's it. Puutt. Puutt.
JUDITH: Yeah. He has a bag in the garage he punches.
So Austin had been watching Christopher, who had recently hung a boxing bag in the garage and had been working out with it, similar to how Austin had done at about the same age.
MICHAEL: Yeah! Yeah. That's it. “Tell him I see him doing this." [Gestures again] This is recent. He just got this.
JUDITH: Uhm huh.
Chris did aikido when he was younger. He ran about the house stealthily attacking us like the pugilistic housekeeper Kato in the movie, “The Pink Panther.”
MICHAEL: Yeah, he did. He says keep your spirits up and try not to be sad. Okay? Time heals, alright? He’ll-- he’ll let you know he is around. Okay? Alright!

Chapter 2
2001, Year of Losses (Chinese "Year of the Snake")
In the year or so before the death of our son our whole family seemed to be passing through a gauntlet of unforeseen traumatic blows: car accidents, loss of beloved pets, surgery, then reeling with the nation on September 11. All pressed our resilience, but they were only a foreshadowing of the greatest loss yet to come.
November 2000, the day of the contested Presidential election, I was not feeling well. After a hectic work day, then driving my daughter to a school event, I was finding it difficult to catch my breath. After I arrived home my husband, Tighe, took me to the emergency room. Struggling to breathe, I spent the next four days in the hospital. While I recuperated I watched as the election returns teetered one way then the other. Without foreknowledge that I would be so compromised, somehow I had known to vote absentee for the first time weeks before.
Not long afterward I was near the exit of a neighborhood shopping center when a truck ran a stop sign and plowed into the left side of my Saturn, totaling it and leaving me with a spasm in my upper back lasting for months. The location of my wreck and the place where our 21-year-old son, Austin, would later have his fatal accident were only yards apart.
Some weeks after this our 15-year-old daughter Bridgette, a beginning driver accompanied by me, was creeping slowly through another parking lot when a woman backed her car into the side of our van, creasing and scraping the entire length of our vehicle. The usual difficulties families face did not set us back.
Then we lost Mayor, our very adventurous cat. Cute and cuddly as a kitten, when puberty arrived, he seemed to explode into a feline Douglas Fairbanks! He used to shoot up to the top of the curtains, flash through the living room, rocket through the air and ricochet off my chest like a bullet, then streak away into the night. He catapulted five feet into the air intercepting his toys, held up playfully by Austin. Although Austin had a tight work and school schedule, he always made time to play with our exuberant cat. Cats go missing in our neighborhood quite regularly, victims of ghost-like coyote intruders. Not knowing the danger, Mayor sometimes bolted out the front door when we were coming or going. Austin and his 13-year-old brother, Christopher, were usually able to track Mayor down and recover him, often climbing into the tree tops where Mayor loved to lurk.
One night in late January, 2001 Mayor escaped yet again, but this time the boys were not able to find him. Later that night, returning home in his car, Austin saw in the beam of his headlights Mayor’s remains lying in the street. He had been attacked violently; the lower half of his body was missing. It could have been the work of a huge owl, spotted from time to time in our neighborhood. Austin, very troubled by the swift and brutal way his playful pal left this world, made a grave for Mayor, "out back" of our home, piling stones over his little friend.
Then April 1, 2001, on a cool bright spring morning, Tighe took our bulldog, Daisy, on her accustomed walk around our neighborhood. Muscular Daisy eagerly explored the earthy scents, pulling Tighe along with her. Returning home, Daisy took a cool drink from our pond. She lay down on the sun-dappled grass, then just seemed to melt, her body becoming completely flaccid, flowing down the berm. The emergency veterinarian clinic kept her for observation, ran some tests, and gave her intravenous fluids. Bridgette drew a portrait of Daisy with a large daisy flower in the background, while we prayed for her recovery. An hour or two later the vet called, Daisy had rallied, stood up once more, only to collapse for a final time. Her liver contained a massive tumor. The brilliant sunny day of her passing recalled the pristine afternoons when our children played with her as she cavorted outside with her brother and sister bumbling puppies, recollections of happy yesterdays.
Surprising as it was to himself, Tighe thought of the stool she had passed just hours before - her last. Strangely it now seemed a precious thing. He was even tempted to go collect it. Did we want Daisy's body, asked the doctor? Yes. We buried her at the side of the yard, where she once tumbled as a puppy. Stay close, Daisy. Each of us mourned in our own way. The realization of this unexpected loss - the stress created a fever in Tighe. Bridgette's big eyed portrait of Daisy, capturing her strength and loyalty, now hanging by the fireplace, watches over us today.
Sparkles, Daisy's mother, missed her. From the animal shelter, we adopted a young black border collie-German shepherd puppy. We loved our pound puppy, but it took us months to agree on the perfect name. The puppy had a large white “T” on his chest, and the name, Tito, was finally accepted by all. Tito was timid, shy and retiring. When Tighe took him out for a walk or when Chris took him to the local school yard for basketball practice, Tito would only go so far before turning around and high-tailing it to his happy home, perhaps fearing it would disappear.
Austin took Tito to his friend, Derrick's house to play with Ozzie, a young pit bull, the same age as Tito and from the same animal shelter. Austin joked with Derrick that the two dogs were from the same litter even though they did not look at all alike. Sometimes when Derrick was not at home, Derrick's mom would sit with Austin and watch the dogs play.
Tito was a natural camper, but not as good a traveler. He began drooling profusely as soon as he got into the car, often getting sick and throwing up except when he rode with Austin who held him all the way. Once I asked Austin if he ever took a camp bed for the puppy; it can be quite cold in the eastern Sierras at night. Austin replied, "Tito doesn't need a bed, because he sleeps right on top of me."
Monday morning, September 11, 2001, having returned from a business trip to Washington DC the preceding Saturday, I awoke as usual for work before 6 a.m. I showered, dressed, and turned on the television. A building in flames, a plane flying into a second building, I thought it must be some kind of a disaster movie, like "Towering Inferno." Within minutes I realized this was real, not a movie. I tried to comprehend the magnitude of human suffering and loss. I felt very badly for all the families who lost loved ones in the collapse of the World Trade Towers; I counted my blessings: 1,2,3,4, and 5, my husband and our four children.
Then in November 2001, after nursing a sore knee for years, I agreed to have surgery. The same-day-surgery went well and I was getting around with crutches within a few days. I enjoyed my recovery time. My mother and her husband, Bill, came for Thanksgiving. Austin asked me to help him purchase a black four wheel drive S10 pick up truck. The car Austin had driven all through high school, a Geo Metro, had 164,000 miles on it. Austin and his friends, all good sized boys, had endured jokes about all these big guys squeezing in and out of his little “clown car.” He didn't ask for much help any more; I was glad to help him get his dream truck.
After he had driven his new shiny black pickup truck for about a week he reminded me of how I used to worry about him in the little Geo Metro. He told me that now when the roads were icy he worried about all the rest of us getting around without four-wheel drive. He put 1500 miles on the truck within 15 days, driving it all over the Sierra foothills. Then one night his friend collided with it in a parking lot. Austin had to put his new toy in the shop for repairs. He never drove his truck again.
On December 1, 2001, it was discovered our beloved bulldog, Sparkles, the mother of Daisy, had developed cancer in her jaw. Sparkles, then 10-years-old, was sick for a short while. One night she found a nice bed in a basket of Austin's freshly laundered clothes. She drooled and left her coarse hair all over his clean clothes. Austin, always an animal lover and the staunch guardian and caretaker of the bulldogs when they were puppies, uncharacteristically yelled at Sparkles and told her to stay out of his room.
Tito mothered Sparkles, frequently licking and cleaning her while she was sick. We gave her medications for pain, immune system support, and tumor reduction, but we knew that when the pain became too much for her, we would have to let her go. It is very difficult to tell if a bulldog is in pain; they are very stoic creatures.
The tumor grew to the point that it was starting to displace her left eye. We knew she was suffering and decided that it was time to let her go. Bridgette helped her Dad take Sparkles to the Vet. As snow began to fall, Christopher said he wanted to go on to school. The snow storm changed to “white out” conditions as we neared his school. Troubled to the point of confusion and unable to recognize the usual familiar landmarks I missed the turn off to the school. Looping around on the highway for another attempt - again I missed the turn off to the school. I gave up, took the next exit, turned around and drove home. I called the Vet. He was putting Sparkles to sleep that morning. Tighe and Bridgette were there with her. Because of the storm, I was afraid to try and join them. Christopher and I began to dig a grave for Sparkles through the snow next to her daughter, Daisy, out back near the patio.
By then I thought we had endured all the trauma we could handle. I remember saying how this year had been the worst year of my life, but in my heart I knew that as long as we were all together there would never be a "worst."
Much later after Austin’s passing, I read how family pets sometimes pass over a short time before the death of a child, a dear friend in the dimension of spirit, there to greet them and ease their transition. Chapter 3
Precognition
Austin was about five-years-old. Traveling to Texas to visit our family, we were swimming in the pool at a motel. Remembering how I had taught Austin and his older brother Denny to swim when they were babies, how they had been dependant on me to stay afloat, and how they used me for their emergency landing anytime they grew tired or felt insecure: now, seeing both of them swimming so capably made me realize that they were gaining their independence, growing to a time when they would not need me, swimming away from me.
Tired and cold, I needed a warm shower. While Tighe stayed with the boys at the pool side I hurried so my shower would be finished by the time they came up to the room. In the shower, I continued to think about the boys' growing independence, I felt an unusual sense of emptiness, while at the same time I knew that this was the way it was supposed to be. Later it seemed that sometimes showering was some kind of a trigger, flooding me with that same feeling memory of that time when I realized how brief childhood is and how time changes things. After Austin passed, the shower became my crying room, a place to let go and wash away my tears.
When Austin was five-years-old he was invited to go to the Reno Hot Air Balloon Races with my friend and her daughter. Because of the crowd and the timing of lift-off one had to arrive at the park before 5:30 a.m. I was not able to go with them, having to work the night shift before the event. When I went home that morning, they had already left. While I slept I dreamed that Austin was abducted. Awaking in a panic, I discovered that they had already returned home and Austin was fine. It was just a bad dream, nothing more.
Austin, a typical child, loved to be surrounded by his stuff. His room, our living room, the bathroom, and the kitchen were always cluttered with his clothes and toys. The impact of that dream never left me. The sight of Austin's clutter all over the house reassured me: Austin was still here with us! I never forgot that dream and the empty lonely feeling of not having Austin with us.
There were other occasions when I had foreboding thoughts about losing Austin. Shortly after moving into our new house in 1992, one late night while looking forward to Tighe returning home, I had a deep sense that this was some kind of a foreshadowing of me waiting for one of our family who was not going to come home, waiting for the one who would never come home again. Again the empty lonely feeling had to be willed away. Whenever similar fears arose, I discounted them as common motherly anxieties.
I remember telling my mother shortly after my 51st birthday that I thought I was going to die that year (51 being my father’s age at his death). I did not die, but part of me died with Austin.
Quiet New Year's Eve
Christmas 2001 was quiet. Our family exchanged small gifts. Austin and Denny gave us a DVD of the movie "Excalibur," something they had often enjoyed watching with their dad. Tighe and I were inexplicably melancholy that Christmas. I thought it was because the kids were older, going out more, leaving Tighe and me thinking of how our lives had changed and would change in the future.
During the school holiday break, Christopher and I did some remodeling in Austin's bedroom. Austin was reluctant to leave his little room where he liked to hibernate, while we pulled up the carpet, sanded the walls, and scraped the acoustic oatmeal off the ceiling.
Austin had always lived at home, except for one summer when he lived in a hot apartment in town with some friends, riding his bike to work and school. When he came home on the weekends he told us how much he loved being home and enjoyed the cool summer breezes that streamed through his bedroom window. I worried about him riding a bike around town that summer and was glad when he returned home in the fall.
New Years Eve, after dinner, I was settling down to read Enemy at the Gates by William Craig, the true story of the heroism and resilience of the Russian and German people during the World War II siege of Stalingrad. Austin looked very handsome, dressed up, clean, bright, playful, sporting the short haircut I had given him just a few days before. While waiting to go out later that evening, he seemed happy and relaxed as he played with Tito. Denny and Austin were going to celebrate the New Year with their friends from our small community in Pleasant Valley just south of Reno. Austin used to call his friends the "Pleasant Valley Posse." Because Denny was one of the designated drivers, as they left I resisted the familiar motherly urge to ask them not to go - to stay home.
Denny, Austin, and the others gathered at a friend's house. Brock, part of the Pleasant Valley Posse, now in the Army, was home for a visit before leaving for Iraq. After awhile they all went to a sports bar, where they played pool, drank beer, and celebrated the New Year in together. At about 1:00 a.m., Denny said that he was going home and asked Austin to go with him. Austin gave him a look, as if to say, "I know I should leave with you, but” glancing at their friends, he said, "I’ll hang a little longer with these guys." Austin and his buddies decided to stop at one more sports bar to get something to eat before calling it a night.
The four friends had one vehicle, a red pick-up truck. Three of the large guys could squeeze into the cab safely, but one would have to sit in the cargo bed. Austin volunteered for the back and was joined by Andrew. Derrick, Andrew's brother was also a designated driver that night. Having shifted the tool chest so they could slide down lower if the police appeared, they settled into the bed of the truck with their backs to the cab. They gave the customary knock, knock on the side of the truck, signaling to Derrick that they were ready to go.
Although very cold, the night was clear and dry. They traveled the main streets, slowing down to turn into a shopping center parking lot, then slowing down more as they turned toward a gas station for cigarettes. With the truck going only ten or fifteen miles an hour Austin, for some unknown reason, pushed himself up and slid over the side of the truck, at first landing on his feet with his back to the cab of the truck. But then, according to Andrew, he stumbled backward and dropped beneath the line of sight.
Austin's jacket lay some ten feet behind from where he made final contact with the pavement. Perhaps it had snagged on the truck, pulling him off balance. It has never been clear. The boys pulled the truck around so the lights could shine on Austin. His friends attempted to lift him into the truck in order to rush him to the hospital, but he was too heavy. Andrew went to a phone booth and called 911 and then called us. Derrick moved the truck out of the way in order to make room for the Care Flight helicopter. Brock stayed with Austin, trying to reassure him and bring him around. Austin was lying on the ground, semi-conscious, but still responding by squeezing Brock's hand at one point. At home I had just turned out the light and was settling down to sleep. When I heard our front door open and close about 1:30 a.m. I assumed that the boys had returned home safely. Until the phone rang at 2.45 a.m., I was unaware that Austin had not come home. Denny came to my room and said that Austin had been in an accident and was being Care Flighted to the hospital.
Denny and I both hurriedly dressed. I woke Christopher, but having school the next day, he wanted to stay home. Denny and I sped to the emergency room. We were directed to a waiting room and instructed to remain there. I called Tighe at work. I stayed a few minutes in the waiting room with Denny, but I knew that I needed to be at Austin's side. Finding the trauma room, I stood outside. I told the nurse that I was Austin's mother and asked if I could please go in to see him, but they did not let me in. A little while later they came out and told me that he was going to surgery. Shortly after Tighe arrived, Denny, Tighe, and I were sent to the Intensive Care Unit waiting room. Finally, at about 5:30 in the morning, the neurosurgeon met with us and told us that Austin had multiple tears in his brain. They had removed a subdural hematoma and placed a pressure gauge into his skull so they could monitor the intracranial pressure. Now all we could do was wait. Chapter 4
Last Days
After the surgery I stayed with Austin while Tighe and Denny went home to sleep. We planned on taking turns with a vigil so he would never be alone. The ICU nurse, offering hope, said he had responded to her voice briefly - a good sign. When Austin heard me he fleetingly wiggled his toes and squeezed my hand. Then he was heavily sedated, a necessary step to allow his brain to begin to heal.
Louis, the father of one of Austin's high school friends, was the first visitor to arrive. He introduced himself and asked if he could pray for Austin. He told me how proud he had been of Austin whenever Austin talked about being in the welding and diesel mechanic’s program at school and about his job with an excavation company. He said that two years ago his son was in ICU after he was clubbed in the head with a baseball bat at Reno's Hot August Nights. He reassured me that they too didn’t know whether their son would make it, but after a metal plate was placed in his head, three days in ICU, and the curative power of time the boy was now doing fine.
I hoped Austin could come all the way back in three days. Louis came every day and prayed over Austin. His wife Mindy came and offered very fervent prayers - telling Satan to keep his hands off all our kids, Austin and his friends.
Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday: The ICU staff fought to keep Austin's intracranial pressure down. Denny, Bridgette, Tighe and I took turns sitting with Austin. As we watched the monitors our hopes and fears rose and fell in synch with the readings on the machines. Austin seemed to be unresponsive to the medications, his intracranial pressure remained persistently high. Then on Thursday morning the neurosurgeon started pentobarbital. At last, the wildly erratic pressure settled into a safe range. I felt this was the peace Austin needed. The surgeon said it would be 5, maybe 7, days before we could wake him from the drug induced coma. I hated to wait that long before I could see him open his eyes again, but I began to relax and believe that Austin was healing. He always loved to sleep. I knew this deep sleep would help.
Now waiting, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday - the neurosurgeon stopped the pentobarbital. After a few days of weaning while the drug slowly left his body we could expect Austin to begin to arouse.
I had been with Austin all day while Tighe stayed with him all night. But when I went home the panic kept me from sleeping. Father O'Malley, the hospital's priest, came every day and prayed for our family. Sensing the state I was in he told me to say a simple mantra, very simple: "Jeee-sussss or Abba, the informal term for God, Father, like Daddy," slowly and coordinated with each breath, slower and slower. It seemed too simple. But I knew that sometimes it is the simple things that really help. Each night, I repeated "Jesus" slower and slower until my panic subsided, my thoughts calmed, and I fell asleep.
My friends, Suby and Ellen, came to be with us in ICU everyday. Suby's mother sent the Mormon bishops to bless Austin. They anointed his forehead, blessing and praying for Austin and for our family. Over the ten days in ICU, the bishops came three times.
Raised a Presbyterian, I love the old hymns from the 1700 and 1800s. Presbyterians seem intelligent and rational. I came to my calling to be a nurse from the teachings I received in the Presbyterian church. I wanted to "serve God through service to man." I had always heard there were no atheists in foxholes. Now I know, there are no atheists in ICU either. I needed powerful spiritual connections - adult men with their faces earnestly and humbly turned down invoking God's presence and divine intervention, anointings with specially prayed over oils, and laying on of hands. Everyone prayed for Austin. Austin was added to prayer lists at the hospital where I worked, at the hospital he was in, at the Mormon Church, and through the internet - at other churches across the country. Surely, God would perform a miracle. Although today we have no specific church affiliation, we remain spiritual and deeply appreciative of new and old friends of all faiths who stepped up to pray for Austin and offer us assistance.
At one point when I was helping his nurse bathe him, I felt so helpless I began to cry out loud. I told her I didn't know what to do. She comforted me saying it is okay to cry and she suggested that I begin journaling. This nurse said she saw how much we loved Austin and needed him. She said that many of her patients did not have a close family to watch over them. The nurses tried to keep the extraordinary vigil that possibly could change this inevitable course.
Journaling seemed like a self-absorbed act during such a crisis. We needed action, prayer, big spiritual mojo! Father O'Malley anointed him with oil and prayed with me for him daily. This kind Irish priest told me to give Austin to God, fully knowing that each time I did I would grab him back again. I was afraid that God would accept this beautiful gift and take Austin forever. I knew that Austin was slipping away from us from the first when the neurosurgeon explained the seriousness of his injuries without offering any of the reassurances one expects to hear.
On the evening of January 6th, the sixth day in ICU, Tighe and I somehow were reassured by the nursing staff, that this would be a long haul, that we needed to begin to think about the time when Austin would come home from the hospital and need our supervision. I started to think that I had been overly pessimistic about his prognosis. Those with some experience in these matters were saying that this constant vigil would be more necessary when he went to the medical floor and after he went home than here in ICU where Austin was observed 24/7. So for the first time Tighe and I both left the bedside. Tighe went to work. I went home and went to bed. Bridgette stayed with Austin through Sunday evening, then my friend Ellen sat with him until I returned Monday morning at 4 a.m.
Monday morning, ICU day seven, things hadn't been going well at all through the night. The intra-cranial pressures were uncontrollable, scans showed huge blood clots, there were other signs that life was leaving our sweet son.
Assuming he could still hear me, I stumbled, not knowing whether to start saying goodbye or to continue to give words of encouragement. Sensing that he may be leaving us and at the same time not wanting to scare him, I playfully said to him, "Now, Austin, don't enjoy that astral traveling so much that you don't come back to us."
On Monday afternoon, January 7, after what I now believe to be his actual time of passing, Tighe said to try a Buddhist healing meditation he had heard described by Sean David Morton, reported to work "every time." I began to meditate, visualizing an amethyst colored healing light, growing brighter all around Austin, then being inhaled by him, traveling through him, filling his head with the healing purple light. Bridgette and my friend Suby came that afternoon and said they had been experiencing excruciating headaches all day. I told them how to do the meditation. We stood together at Austin's bedside envisioning this healing amethyst light around and in Austin. Then Ellen arrived. As she touched and prayed for Austin and before I could instruct her on this healing meditation she said she could see a purple light everywhere around Austin, around the room, like a cloud of purple, drifting under his bed and across the floor. Bridgette and Suby reported that their headaches had stopped. We continued to pray, gently rubbing lotion on his hands and feet, hoping that all this was somehow bringing him back to us.
On Wednesday, January 9, 2002, the neurosurgeon told us that the extreme pressures had cut off the blood flow to vital areas of Austin’s brain. Another neurosurgeon came and delivered the requested second opinion - "Your son will probably not survive. If he does, he will not be a sentient being." In denial, I childishly asked if Austin would be able to walk, talk, and hike. The kind neurosurgeon, who had previously told us he had a son Austin's age, just had to turn away shaking his head, "No."
I knew that Austin would do everything within his power to stay for us. I felt I needed to give him our permission to leave if that was now what was best for him. I whispered to him, "Austin, if you don't make it, it will be okay, I want you to know - we will always love you!"
Luke, one of Austin's closest friends, and his two brothers, Ken and Nate, came to visit Austin. These three Hawaiian boys, Ken, Luke, and Nate, towering over me, made a loving circle around me, embraced me, and cried with me. Then the older brother, Ken, sang a sweet lullaby softly into Austin's ear. The three of them later sang that same song at his memorial service.
The sorrow of revisiting the memory of the last ten days with Austin in ICU is bitter sweet, so unbearably painful, yet, I am drawn to go over it from beginning to end, only to arrive at the same place, feeling Austin slip through my fingers, away, forever.
We talked with the hospital staff about turning off the ventilator. Tortuously, they told us that as long as the pentobarbital remained in his system, legally, they could not. It seemed a cruel thing to allow his body to decompensate while the life support sustained his breathing. Having fought for his life, now we found ourselves being his advocates for death.
Wednesday night, ICU day-nine: We sat with Austin, believing he would pass in the night. We watched as his vital signs dropped and then rallied a little, but not enough to sustain life. Later another scan showed there was no blood flowing to the brain at all.
Thursday, January 10th, the Mormon bishops came again, this time offering another kind of hope: "Families are reunited in heaven and this life is just a speck of time!” emphasizing speck by holding up thumb and forefinger, pinching the air, reassuring us that we would be together again soon.
Thursday night, Tighe, Bridgette, Ellen, her husband - Grayson and myself gathered around Austin's hospital bed, praying for Austin and saying goodbye. Bridgette was very brave. She had been constant, coming every day, she wanted to be there all the way through the end. At 10:00 p.m. with all of us in a circle around Austin the ICU physician turned off the ventilator. With my cheek on his chest, I heard the last beat of his heart. Within seconds the color and warmth of life left his body. I wondered where his spirit was at this time. I thought he may have been in the room while Ellen and I sat and waited for the medical examiner to come. Tighe took Bridgette home. Earlier, when the physician had told us this was coroner’s case, I didn’t want to know what he meant. When the nurse refused my requests to remove the IV lines and tubes, I finally understood that “a coroner’s case” meant that an autopsy was required because of the circumstances, the fatal accident.
Knowing the regrets we would inevitably and repeatedly face, I asked the nurse for copies of Austin’s record so I would be able to use them to reconvince myself we had done the right thing. A small world, Austin’s ICU nurse that night had been Nate’s hula teacher. Later I read over the notes she had given me three times and then placed them in a brief case that I find difficult to touch today.
The medical examiner was very kind, carefully he asked me questions about the accident. I told him as much as I knew at the time. Again I heard myself sobbing at the thought of Austin going to the morgue. The full reality and finality of his death still eluded me - I told the medical examiner I didn't want him to be cold. The medical examiner tried to reassure me that Austin would be treated with respect. Ellen, quite small compared to me, rose up and spread her arms into a shield that enveloped me. I could see her intent to protect me from the worst pain there is. I thought how much I love Austin and how I wish I had gone first. He should have been turning off my life support. Why him? Why not me? I already had 51 years of living. Why not me? What good is God, if He cannot protect the children?
As the new day broke through the night we left the hospital. As we walked out to our cars the memory of leaving the hospital with baby Austin in my arms now almost 22 years ago came flooding back to me. It seemed like only yesterday. I felt a powerful urge to push back the world that was now closing in on Austin's earthly space, an indescribable drive to protect the place he had occupied during his short life and somehow hold it for him until he returned. Telling me she would follow me home in her car, Ellen instructed me that if I began to cry I should pull over and she would pull over behind me and wait there with me until I was okay again.
Many years later, while working on my own book, I found this written by Bridgette:
“Bridgette, the doc told us Austin isn’t going to make it.” The tears fell from my mother’s eyes, the thought of where her son will be when his world here is gone. The shock of that very statement hit me harder than any other statement before. With my brother’s friends waiting in the waiting room, I go out to tell them the news.
We all go outside and talk about our soon to come loss, over a cigarette to calm us a little. Thoughts are running through my mind and the emotions become so strong that no sign of happiness laid upon my face.
Austin had only been alive from his severe hemorrhage from being supported by a life support machine. The neurologist had pulled the family into a meeting room to tell us he had no brain reaction, and that he would never be able to survive on his own, leaving us the decision to pull away his very own life. . . .
Gathering around him we kissed him on his cheek and said our goodbyes, telling him I loved him and he will always be my favorite brother. The doctor shut off the machine and Austin turned blue. At this moment my whole world came down and my tears rushed to my eyes causing a waterfall. I could barely breathe because of the great emotions his loss brought to me.
After calming down a bit, my dad took me home, while my mother stayed to sign papers.
Everyday is a little easier now, but the thought and memories of my brother Austin remain within me for eternity. The very thought that Austin, at the age of 22, only in the prime of his life, will not physically be a part of our family for the rest of our lives.
Chapter 5
First Visits
Exhausted, bewildered, in our bedroom preparing to lay down and rest, Tighe and I talked about how we thought we had done the right thing (already the doubts were settling in) and how Austin wouldn't want to be trapped in a lifeless body. Suddenly our bathroom light - still fairly new and without having any previous problems - began to vigorously blink on and off, blink, on - off, blink, blink! As miserable as we felt, the timing of the spontaneous blinking of this bright light buoyed us. Could that be from Austin, a message of hope, that he was alive in spirit and still very much with us?
The night of his passing, Austin visited his friends. The two brothers Derrick and Andrew, who had been out with him the night of the accident, reported that they were going to their front door to go out when they saw Austin walking up to their house and tapping on the window just as he had done so many times before. This Austin visit occurred, around the time we were shutting off life support - something not known by Derrick and Andrew until the next day.
At this same time, Luke, Austin's friend, also unaware that this was Austin‘s last night, was in his room playing his guitar. That night Luke told his mother that he felt Austin was in the room with him because he always played better when Austin was there. Luke and his family had shared their love for music with Austin. The boys used to get together and jam around a campfire, on the beach, in a park, or at Luke's house. While Luke played the guitar, Austin played the drums and other rhythm instruments. I later read how the ethereal body may be visible to earthly sight for several days following death.
On one of Tighe's early morning walks, he saw Austin's face in the dawn sky. He recalled that the morning sky was hauntingly luminous, while the earth beneath seemed dark, hard, unconscious, and chill. Austin's face filled the sky. He was smiling. Much later when Tighe saw the third and final "Lord of the Rings" film, he was moved by the concluding scene, when Frodo is boarding the ship leaving Middle Earth, he turns to look at his friends. The expression on Frodo’s face seemed to be the same as Austin's face had been that morning in Tighe's vision - Austin's face. (Tighe had read the entire Trilogy to the boys when they were little.)
Ashes to Ashes
The Monday following the autopsy, we went to the funeral home. A young man only a few years older than Austin led us through a series of decisions about the care of Austin's body.
We chose no viewing of his body, but cremation. We selected a wooden box for his ashes. On the box we had engraved the Hawaiian petroglyph of two sea turtles swimming toward the sun. Additionally we had a stone engraved in the same manner. The whole process seemed unreal, we could not believe we were making these types of decisions for our child. We waited a few more days, returned to the funeral home and picked up the box of ashes and the stone. To Tighe and me the box seemed to be a little heavier than a baby. Tighe held the box like a child on his lap as I drove home. [See photo 2.]
Eventually we placed the stone in a sun room we later had built. We placed the box of ashes on the headboard of our bed. It is still there, not yet knowing where to permanently place them.
My older sister and her husband came and simply took care of us for a week: meals, the house, the family, giving us the time to come to grips with all that had gone on, all that had been beyond our control. I sat in the yard and silently talked with my son, now in the spiritual dimension.
Baby Scott, - felt his soul flutter away.
My younger sister, Lisa, came from Texas to Nevada, staying with us for several days before Austin’s memorial service. She sat with me while I cried and talked about what had happened, how much we loved and missed Austin, and pointed out all the parts of our little homestead that Austin had a hand in.
She cried with me and then told me about her baby Scott's passing. Scott was born with a congenital heart condition. Surgery was planned and could have corrected the problem, but Scott became very ill and weak and the surgery had to be postponed until he became stronger. Finally, he was well enough for the surgery. Initially it seemed to be a complete success. But later it became apparent the delays had weakened his heart and he had to return to the pediatric ICU. Sitting in ICU, holding him in her arms, Lisa felt his body go limp. His spirit gently fluttered against her cheek before moving out the window.
Lisa told me that baby Scott was the only one of her four children that she no longer worried about because she knew he was in the loving care of Jesus. She said it with such peace and assurance. After losing the fight to keep our son alive, I knew I had a long way to go to find that kind of sense that he was now safe. In my misery, I must have been asking, “Why Austin? Why us?” because she told me she too had asked those same questions over and over, until one day while entering the children’s hospital in Fort Worth, looking around at all the children, all the parents, she had sensed the many times this scene is repeated throughout the world, day after day, week after week, and suddenly the question became why not her baby, why not her? Her telling me this helped me momentarily climb outside of myself long enough to view the universality of this kind of loss. When the wound is fresh it is too deep to see that we are not the only ones in the world going through this.
Memorial
We knew we needed to have a goodbye service for Austin, but we were overwhelmed and did not know where or how to begin. Sharon, the mother of Austin’s three Hawaiian friends, offered assistance in planning a memorial service. She arranged the use of the Mormon temple in Washoe Valley for the service. We met with the bishop, our neighbor, Tom. Rather than the chapel we chose to have the service in the gym, less formal and more fitting Austin's adventurous and playful nature. Sharon and her sons set up the room with chairs and asked the church organist to play the piano.
Tighe and I wanted the memorial to be informal, intimate. We chose to have it on Austin's birthday, almost a month after his passing. I copied home movie video footage of Austin playing with his brothers, sister, and his pets; of family vacations to San Francisco and the ocean; of Denny and Austin trying to snow board down Sand Mountain; their playing on Lake Tahoe’s sandy beaches and jumping into its icy waters. My sister, my niece, and my nephew all came from Texas. We took turns reading meaningful scriptures, poems, and recalling special times with Austin.
Bridgette spoke of the day when she and Christopher played in the yard with the bulldogs and one of the bulldogs jumped into our pond. Bulldog heads are so heavy that they weigh the dog down, the bulldog was drowning. Bridgette ran to the house shouting to Austin who was in the shower. Pulling on his shorts while he ran from the warm shower, he jumped into the icy cold pond rescuing our heavy bulldog.
Derrick tried to tell of the closeness and of the fun experiences he had shared with Austin, but grief choked his words. Unable to continue, his intent was clear, he had lost one of the closest friends he would ever have. Derrick's mother recalled Austin as the lovable kid knocking on her door and asking if their dog could play with Tito - the doggie play dates. Ellen remembered how Austin had always been a helper, recalling the trees he had planted in her yard. Sharon recalled the trips to Hawaii with her "haole" kid. Luke, Ken, and Nate sang a lullaby, the same song Ken had sung to Austin in the hospital. I read from a passage from 1 Corinthians 13:
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all thing, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends; as for prophecy, it will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect; but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in the mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood. So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Tighe read the poem, Twelve Lies, by Jalaluddin Rumi, (1207-1273), translated by Robert Bly. Rumi, a young professor of Theology in Konya (Turkey) wrote thousands of mystical and rhythmic verses, which were expressed in the enraptured dances of the Whirling Dervishes.
People say, "The one you love is unfaithful." I heard that lie.
They say, "Your night will never end in dawn." Did you hear that one?
They say, "Why give up sleep and die for love? Once in the grave all that is over.” I heard that lie.
People wandering around in the underbrush say this: "There is no path to the mountain and no mountain either." Did you hear it?
They say, "The keeper of secrets never tells a single secret except to an intermediary." People love to tell lies.
They say, "If you are a worker you will never receive the key. The master alone goes to heaven." That's the eighth lie.
They say this, "If you have too much earth in your chart, you will never grasp what angels are." I heard that lie.
They say, "You can't get out of this earth nest with your stubby love wings. You will drop like a stone." Did you hear that lie?
They say, "What human beings do is insignificant anyway. Stones weigh more than our evil. God cares nothing." Did you hear it?
So just keep silent. And if anyone says to you, "No communion takes place without words." Just say to him, "I heard that lie."
Tighe later journaled his thoughts about the memorial.
I felt very wrung - out during the memorial. I spoke extemporaneously. It seemed to me that we are always experiencing good things slipping away from us. I began thinking of Einstein. When we begin moving faster and faster toward the speed of light, our mass grows larger as our energy becomes purer and stronger. We are joined to everything and they don’t slip away any more. That must be what Austin is experiencing. I was grasping for concepts which would make sense of the feeling of what was wrong - and what was right.
Years later Tighe read a remarkable book self-published by David Sereda called Singularity. Beyond all the limitations - beyond even light’s speed “limit” lies Singularity where All is One. It is mathematically demonstrable and we are moving there. We are there.
Christopher video taped the service. Afterward Sharon and other church members provided a meal and a birthday cake. When we entered our house after the memorial, I remember seeing Austin in my mind's eye sitting on a love seat with his legs crossed and one arm resting on the back of the chair, smiling and quite pleased over the memorial service and the many friends who came. A few hours later we gathered near the summit of Mount Rose where the kids did some extreme sledding until the sun set.
We were so devastated, without the help of Sharon, her family, and her friends, I am not sure we would ever have been able to arrange a memorial service for Austin. I will always be grateful for others' strength freely offered to us when we were at our lowest point.
Chapter 6
Losses
Losing Austin led me to remember beloved family members who had moved into the dimension of spirit before him.
The first loved one I remember losing was my grandfather. I was only 4-years-old. I really did not understand much, but I knew my mother and father were trying to protect me somehow from the reality of death at that vulnerable age. Its funny how the concept of mortality must be learned; intuitively a young child has no awareness of death until it is taught to them.
I don't think there was a viewing of the body; I know I never saw my deceased grandfather who remains in my memory the lively cheerful Norwegian, a sailor in his younger days. He used to coax my sister and me to eat our dinner or drink our milk with expressions such as, "down the hatch" and "bottoms up." He used to sing cowboy songs to us in a Norwegian accent, "Jippie, jio, jiya."
When I was 23-years-old my father died of cancer. Only 51, he was looking forward to an early retirement after a lifetime of service to his country, his church, and his family.
The last time I saw my dad I was a wreck. Knowing that there was nothing I could do to alleviate his suffering nor prevent his impending death, I could hardly speak with him. My mother and my aunt cared for my father at home during his last days. The family physician, a very good friend of my father, instructed my mother to give my father all the pain medication he needed or wanted. During this last visit, my mother offered me a tranquilizer to help relieve my anguish. Desperate, I took one. Instead of easing my pain, it opened the flood gates, leaving me even less able to manage the deluge of tears. My mother gave me only one task to do that I remember and that was to take my father's suit to the cleaners - which I did without realizing at the time that this was the suit he would be buried in.
My father's funeral was in his home town of Pecos, Texas. Our family and a few family friends caravanned from Wichita Falls in north central Texas to this far west Texas town, stayed in a motel, and attended the funeral. I asked the minister to read a passage from 1 Corinthians 13 at the grave side. “. . . But the greatest of these is love." I remember the minister saying that this scripture was an unusual request for a funeral, more often read at weddings. To me it was the perfect scripture, remembering my father reading it when I was 13-years-old. He was standing-in for the minister of our little Presbyterian church and chose that text for the Sunday sermon. I believed and still believe that this is the primary message and purpose of our earthly journey, how to continue to love, unselfishly, through all adversities, not only our family and friends, but all others everywhere, including respecting and loving our enemies. The physical plane is the opportunity to turn our love into action, to create and leave a legacy to the next generations.
I did not speak of my father's passing with my mother and sisters for a very long time. Three years rolled by and I continued to grieve the loss of my father in private, quiet times. I replayed the events leading up to his death as if I had the power to alter just one thread in the fateful chain of events - my attempt to manage that over which I had no control. His physicians said the likely risk factors had been his exposure to asbestos that lined the hull of the troop carriers during WWII. He had been a pharmacist’s mate in the Navy, stationed with the Marines in the Pacific islands. He had been at Guadal Canal and then Iwo Jima when the famous flag raising photo was taken.
I recall that my father told us, his three daughters, how he was glad it was he who was dying and not one us. It was not until we lost our son that I was able to really understand what my father meant. Having lived a full life, facing one’s own death, no matter how difficult, is easier than watching as your child is taken away. When the child dies the surviving parent is haunted by the feeling that they have failed their prime directive, to protect their child. They are driven by a compulsion to go and find the lost sheep.
On several occasions after our first son was born, while lying down with him for his afternoon nap, in the twilight like sleep - not quite asleep and not quite awake - I saw my father. He told me that he was okay. One afternoon in particular, actually the third occasion of meeting my father in this manner, he was standing on a pier, wearing his fishing cap. He had a smile so big that I could see his missing upper molar. Again he told me that he was okay, but this time he patted me on the head three times, which immediately brought me to full alertness. Having actually felt the three pats on my head, I was left with the conviction that my father really is okay. He loved me so much that he did not give up until he convinced me that he was alive, healthy, and enjoying his new life.
This was the beginning of my coming to grips with the loss of my father. As time passed, once in a while I felt my father's presence around me and my family - all my children were born after my father had passed.
Many years later, my mother told me that my father had visited her twice. Sitting at the foot of her bed, he told her that he was okay. Then later my sister told me that my father also had visited her, telling her he was okay. Additionally, my mother shared that after my father's mother passed, she had done the same thing - sat at the foot of the bed and told my mother that she was alive and well. Each of us had individual but similar experiences of receiving messages of love from my deceased father without previous discussions or awareness of each other's experiences.
Austin's Pets
When I was young, we would often see a large black furry green eyed spider near the kitchen clock. My sister and I would make a big fuss about it, but my mother told us that the spider caught flies and would not harm us. This taught me not to fear spiders. Now whenever I encountered a spider or a spider web in the house, usually I left it alone or we would capture it and take it outside. We had a spider web in the cabinet beside our kitchen stove. I didn’t use that cabinet often and would sweep the web out of my way and proceed to stick my hand back in the small narrow cabinet for the can or jar I was looking for.
On Austin's last New Years Eve, I opened the cabinet and was startled by a very large shiny black widow in her web. She looked as though she was determined to guard her space, so I asked Austin to come and kill her for me. Austin and his little brother, Christopher, rather than kill the black widow, took a spatula and gathered up the spider, web and all, and walked it out back past the back yard to the far end of our property. This was the last sweet gift Austin gave his critters.
I recall when Austin was a child, how he loved his many pets: the earthworms he found while I worked the flower beds, then later turtles, lizards, snakes, hamsters, rabbits, kitties, puppies, caterpillars, butterflies, tadpoles and frogs. Two turtles, Tank and Jade, were Austin’s favorite pets. He wrote his first stories in school about them. Jade layed infertile eggs. Austin gave the turtles baths and took them outside to play in the yard. He fed them red wrigglers, vegetables, but cottage cheese was their favorite. Tank and Jade lived in an aquarium with dirt and a lamp for heat. When Austin was sick he set Tank and Jade on his chest, a fair exchange, the turtles helped cool his fever, while he kept them warm and toasty. [See photo 1.]
When Austin was 13 he had a white rat he called Silky Mouse. Silky Mouse crawled all over Austin as he relaxed on the couch. Silky Mouse had the freedom to run away, but he would never go more than two feet, always turning around and coming back to Austin. Austin was broken hearted when Silky Mouse died. I wondered if Silky Mouse is with Austin now. Much later my question was answered by Marti Parry’s spirit sketch of Silky Mouse. [See sketch in photo inserts.]
I cannot remember the name of the blue belly lizard, but Austin used to hypnotize his pet lizard by stroking his belly. He positioned him in a chair he had sculpted from play-doh. I thought Austin would make a fortune someday as an animal trainer. I could visualize a television commercial with his lizard sitting in the play-doh chair wearing sunglasses. I always wanted to be able to send Austin on a trip to the Galapagos Islands to see the giant tortoises, or to the Caribbean to see the sea turtles lay their eggs and witness the hatchlings emerge. Austin kept that lizard for a long time, feeding him crickets from the pet store.
Perhaps losing our pets, who have shorter life spans, helps prepare us for the inevitable future losses of close friends and family.
Austin's Losses
During his high school years, Austin was pummeled with one loss after another. One of his friends, a girl, was murdered by her boyfriend. Two friends died in auto accidents - one was Nicky, who played football with Austin. I found Nicky's memorial bulletin in Austin's belongings after Austin passed. A video of Nicky strumming the guitar and singing Bob Dylan's, "Knocking on Heaven's Door" was played at Nicky's memorial.
Later in preparation for our first session with a medium, we had written the question "Is Nicky there with you?" We never asked that question out loud of Laurie Campbell because she mentioned Nicky by name and said he was there with Austin "playing his guitar." Later medium Michael Parry also said that Nicky was there with Austin,
Life after Life
Suby gave us a video of a woman who was of the Bahai faith. This young woman, Renee Pasarow, described her own near death experience, a result of a severe allergic reaction when she was an adolescent: Her consciousness hovered above as paramedics worked on her body. Assisted by loving entities, her spirit chased the ambulance as it took her body to the hospital. In this seemingly catastrophic and frightful experience she recalled the sense of humor and the joking manner in which she interacted with these familiar spiritual beings. She described exactly what the physician said in the emergency room as he made several desperate attempts to resuscitate her. She tried to reassure and comfort her anguished mother, but her mother could neither see her nor feel her. Eventually, and to her own horror, she found herself drawn back into her physical body. Through a long and difficult recovery and still having residual health problems, she was inspired by her afterlife experience, a message of hope which she continues to share with others today. This video is available on the internet at lightafterlife.com .
Lying on our couch in a half stuperous state, I heard this video playing. I was exhausted and despondent, but this seed settled into my desperate psyche, lighting a glimmer of hope, painting a picture of what the afterlife is like.
Ellen gave us a book by Dannion Brinkley, Saved by the Light. A bully as a child and later a merciless black ops soldier in Vietnam, Brinkley was struck and killed by lightning. He was 25-years-old. Officially a corpse for 28 minutes, he experienced the first in a series of life transforming near death experiences. Since then Brinkley has lived through heart failure, open-heart surgery, two ruptured subdural hematomas, brain surgery, a massive seizure, and - oh yes - a second lightning strike. In the afterlife he witnessed 360 degree total life reviews; conversed with magnificent light beings; was shown glimpses of future events . . . He experienced the impact of his own actions on others exactly as they experienced them. He felt the resulting ramifications of his acts even into future generations. These life changing events set Brinkley on a different path. He founded The Twilight Brigade - Compassion in Action, an international organization devoted to veterans in VA hospitals, hospices, and nursing homes. Brinkley, who has personally spent over 10,000 hours at the bedsides of ailing veterans, is a well known author and inspirational speaker.
Although these stories reassured me there is a life after this one, I was still envious that these people were returned to this life and their families: Austin did not come back to us.
The One Who Got Away
In the first few months after Austin's passing I was able to take short visits to the here and now, barely long enough for a half-hearted attempt at taking care of the daily business of family and work. All the while in my heart I was reviewing what we had done together, what we may have missed while Austin was still here, and the many joys he had brought us.
I remembered bringing baby Austin home from the hospital and how he kept sleeping and sleeping. Trying to include this very sleepy baby in our family activities, we nestled him in a bean bag chair in the middle of the living room. Every once in awhile he would open his little peepers, take a quick look at us and then just as quickly shut his eyes, as if saying, "You must be kidding!"
Toddler Austin was just learning to talk when he pointed to his elbow and asked his dad, "What's this?" Tighe replied, "Strong bones." Austin pointed to his knee and said, “What’s this?” Tighe replied, "Strong bones." Afterward Austin would often pat a hard surface anywhere and call it, "strong bones." One day when his dad was assisting him with toileting, Austin patted the toilet and in his deepest child voice said, "It got strong bones!"
He loved the outdoors. He rode in the pack on his dad's back as we hiked down to Viking's Home at Emerald Bay on Lake Tahoe. Later when he was a little older we climbed up Eagle Falls to see the waterfalls. He was delighted when we had to climb up and over large boulders. From very early on, this is what he thought we meant whenever we said we were going on a hike.
Tighe just reminded me of the time when the boys placed some kind of super "harness" ring magnet on the face of our TV screen. Suddenly all the picture particles were drawn to the magnet. We thought the TV was ruined, but it somehow recovered by itself after turning it off for awhile.
I recall one winter night with snow falling, eight-year-old Denny and five-year-old Austin looked outside. The sky was pink as the city lights reflected off the falling snow. The house was hot from the blazing fire in the wood stove. Suddenly the boys burst out into the back yard for a run in the snow, wearing only their underwear. This started a winter tradition, “underwear runs in the snow,” that continued until their adolescent modesty caught up with them.
The myriad of pets were usually kept in the family room to ensure that none were neglected. But one day Austin was playing with a pet hamster in his bedroom, when it somehow got away from him. We could not find the hamster anywhere. It apparently had crawled into the wall where all our efforts to locate and retrieve him failed. We had to shut off part of our house until the foul odor of dead hamster subsided - months!
It seems that Austin was always trying to scramble away from me. Tightly I held onto his hand whenever we entered the parking lot of a shopping center while he tried to shake off my grasp and make a mad dash to the car. I included footage of our family hiking across the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco in the memorial video: First Austin shook his little booty for the camera, then squirmed away breaking my grip on his hand so he could have some freedom and explore on his own!
I recall when Austin was a sophomore in high school, he tried out for football. He didn’t have much experience with it - not playing when he was younger. During practice the coach’s relentless antagonistic yelling at the kids was more than he could take. Austin left and hiked home, 5 miles over the hills rather than call for a ride. I respected his indignation.
My focus was always on Austin after he passed. No matter what was said to me, I referenced it to something Austin did, said, liked, or didn't like. Even pressing the info button on the TV remote control, the date of each movie I would (still do) calculate how old Austin was when the movie was made. It was hard on Austin’s brothers and sister, but I couldn't help myself as I took something Christopher was talking about and turned it around to talking about Austin. Other siblings who have lost a brother or sister have said that not only did they lose their brother, they also lost their parents. I knew that this was true; I just did not know how to change it.
Tighe and I were always touched whenever we found any item that had been Austin’s, a baseball in the yard, a half finished school paper, a copy of a check in his checkbook he wrote at the Indian Colony Smoke Shop for only one pack of cigarettes. Tighe went on Amazon.com and saw Austin’s name on a shipping address entry where he had ordered the “Excalibur” DVD he had given us on our last Christmas together.
What of the '63 Buick Austin intended to restore? It was parked and covered by the side of the garage. After removing the tarp, Tighe sat behind the wheel. It seized him: "The last one to sit here was Austin."
I returned to work one month after Austin's passing. I tried to be on task, but I was preoccupied with everything about Austin. From my journal:
I feel my face drifting into weeping like a car casually crossing the white line on the highway, but rather than correcting the course, I stay in this now very normal state; all other expressions are pretend. If only each tear were a particle of my physical self, shed one by one, diminishing my physical self until all that is left is my spirit so I could travel to where Austin is. Suby told me that I honor Austin with my tears. How reassuring it is to believe that tears that will not stop honor him.
Adding to this unbearable pain is the belief that parents should go before their children, prepare a place for them, be there to greet their children.
Now that I am a grieving mother, everything else I say and do just seems to be going through the motions. There is another type of suffering that is somehow worse than missing Austin. It is the sorrow of getting on with life, smiling, joking, working, casual conversation, time and energy which more honestly would be directed to his memory. Thoughts of who, what, and where is he now, how we can connect with him, wondering if the words I hear in my head are really him communicating with me.
The Splint
For months Tighe had the strange sensation that a wooden oar was stuck down his throat. Simultaneously there was a gag reflex together with a surreal comforting feeling as if the "oar" were a splint or supporting stake. Much later Tighe wondered if the "oar" weren’t a palpable symbol of the gagging on the impermissible, the splinting of the broken heart and gut, and simultaneously the oar for propelling the spiritual canoe ahead - somehow. Strangely this analogy echoed the folk song I used to sing to the kids at bed time, “Michael Rowed the Boat Ashore.”
Tighe and I made a decision that if Austin made any attempt to communicate with us, we would acknowledge it. Recognizing that we were novices at this kind of communication, we begin to notice every sign that may be from Austin.
Merry Wink!
From my journal:
The tears are always here, waiting for the frequent thoughts of my son to start them on their journey, flooding my eyes, running down my cheeks, like water over the spillway of a dam.
Sounding the depths of grief the first months after Austin's passing, I would awaken in a panic every night shortly before 2:30 in the morning answering the deeply encoded call, "Save your son!" I cried, replayed what happened, prayed, and then found it very difficult to get back to sleep. Having crying spells all day and not sleeping at night, I became more fragile, more tearful, less capable of meeting each day's demands. My doctor prescribed a very small dose of an anti-depressant to help me sleep. I continued to awaken just before 2:30 each morning, but the medication made it much easier for me to return to sleep.
Then one night, about a month after Austin's death, a week after his birthday and memorial service, I was awakened by a sudden silence caused by an electrical power failure. Typically, I leave a light on in the kitchen and a fan or an air filter running all night in my bedroom. When all this white noise abruptly stopped, the unexpected silence startled me awake. I checked the clock. It was 2:24 a.m. After saying, "Austin, is that you?" I eventually settled back to sleep.
I thought it coincidental that the timing of the power outage was 2:24 a.m. I assumed it was near the time of Austin's fatal accident, the exact time not yet confirmed. I went to work and asked everyone if their power had gone out too. I called my friends in the south valleys, and yes, the power outage had only affected the south valleys, Pleasant Valley, Washoe Valley, and the Toll Road area, all where Austin's friends and family lived.
I called the power company and asked what had caused the power outage. The friendly operator connected me to a manager, who connected me to a dispatcher who said that at 2:24 a.m. a cottonwood tree branch fell on the power line. I asked the dispatcher where this tree was, and although he didn't know, he said he would have the lineman give me a call later that afternoon. I was already amazed at how friendly and helpful these people had been with my sleuthing. I had not yet mentioned to any of them why I needed such detailed information. Early that afternoon the lineman called me. He said a branch of a cottonwood tree had fallen and bounced a couple of times before resting on the power line causing the power outage. He checked his written report: the event had happened at the "Merry Wink" signs along the right side of highway 395, heading north from Carson City to Reno. These Merry Wink signs marked the exit from Pleasant Valley and read in sequence (like "Burma Shave" signs), "He who drives - half asleep - is now burried - six feet deep - Merry Wink Motel." The branches hit the power lines between "is now burried" and "six feet deep"- an Austin-style joke! It seemed to us, a Merry Wink indeed. [See photos 4-8 of branches lying over the Merry Wink signs.] Later that same week, I obtained a copy of the police report which listed “2:24 a.m.” as the official time of the fatal accident.
When I told Luke's mother, Sharon, she said:
"I know the Merry Wink Motel very well. It is the reason my parents moved to Reno. They owned and operated the Merry Wink Motel on South Virginia. I have cleaned many a room at the Merry Wink Motel."
Austin had found a way to say hello to his family and his “second mom” and his friends at the same time.
I took photos of the cottonwood branches, now lying over the Merry Wink signs, and sent them to my family. I told all of Austin's friends. I know many may have thought I had some kind of grief induced psychosis, but I didn't care what anyone thought of me, after all, the worst that could ever happen had already happened to us.
We just wanted to acknowledge any and all efforts by our son to communicate with us. I see the cottonwood tree branches still lying over the Merry Wink signs while driving to work, a daily reminder that Austin is alive in spirit and that he wants his family and friends to know it. The power outage affected only those neighborhoods where Austin's "posse" lived.
Much later, in a session with the mediums Michael and Marti Parry, Austin validated this elaborate and multi-layered "sign" as indeed of his engineering, with repeated references to stopping the clock and "Of course that was me - who else?" [See photos 4-8.]
Chapter 7
Saying Goodbye
Gently in the comfort of sleep - Austin began to come to his friends and family reassuring each of us in his own way.
Luke and Austin's friendship began in high school. I remember when Austin came home one day and said that he had met a new friend named Luke. Luke encouraged Austin to play football his senior year in high school. They camped in the Sierra and Virginia City foothills and at Lake Tahoe, jumping into its freezing waters in March. Luke taught Austin how to build sleds from chairs and what ever else they could find; they tested them on the long down hill runs at Mount Rose. This big boned Irish kid, Austin, told his Hawaiian friend, Luke, that they were "soul brothers" because they both had similar upper eyelids with a Mongolian flap. Austin went to Hawaii twice with Luke. I always said they both were descendants of kings. Luke from the kings of Hawaii and Austin from the kings of Ireland.
After Austin passed, Sharon told us that Luke never had a friend like Austin. Luke dreamed that Austin, Luke, and their other friends were riding motorcycles together up and down the hills surrounding his home. Together, the "posse" climbed to the top of a hill where they could see all around for miles. When they started down the hill, Luke looked back. Austin lingered at the top of the hill. He waved Luke and the posse on, signaling them that he was staying but that they needed to go on (with their lives).
Sharon said she dreamed that her yard was full of Luke's friends. She could see Austin there in the crowd, happy and having a good time.
Little Lamb
Jordan, Austin's 14-year-old cousin, had a dream in which Austin was in a lush green pasture crouched down with his back to Jordan. Jordan walked up to Austin. He could see that Austin was holding a little lamb. Austin turned around and told Jordan that everything was going to be all right.
In Jordan’s second dream Austin was standing up, holding Jordan's brother, Scott, who passed over at six months of age from a congenital heart condition. Bridgette had this same dream weeks before Jordan told me about his dream. (The mediums, Laurie Campbell and Michael Parry would later ask us if the name "Scott" had any special meaning to us. It was Austin's middle name, my maiden name, my father's nick-name and the name of Austin's six-month-old cousin.)
Clinton's Dream
Within the first month of Austin's passing, Clinton, one of Austin's closest friends through grade school until Austin's untimely death, said he often had dreams of Austin. Usually in the dreams they simply sat and had long talks just as they had always done before. In one particular dream Clinton saw Austin sitting on a park bench. Clinton sat down and they talked for a long time. Clinton asked Austin what he had been up to. Austin said that he was hanging around us a lot, trying to help us get through this hard time. They talked for a while longer and then Austin said he had to go.
At the River
Bridgette is blessed with frequent dreams of Austin. Sometimes he's in the middle of a big circle of friends at the river, laughing and telling stories. In one dream he was traveling with us on an upcoming road trip we were planning to visit family in Texas.
In another of Bridgette's dreams, Austin was older with a van dyke beard. Lifting the hood of our - now her - 1987 Safari van, he asked her what she had in there. She perceived that he meant he was going to help her keep it running. It was our family's old van in which he had made many road trips as a child. I remember when it was new how Austin, then seven-years-old, always asked me if we had enough gas. I guess compared to our previous smaller car he thought this new van used so much gas that it might run out.
Someone Else's Child
Before going to sleep each night I pray for dreams of Austin. Often I awaken with the feeling of having visited with him. In this dream about "someone else's child," I had a five-year-old little boy who looked a lot like Austin when he was younger. However, the little boy in my dream was someone else's child - only staying with me for a while. In the dream today was the five-year-old little boy's first day of school. I was busy trying to get him ready for school. I dressed him and helped him wash his face and hands. Starting school causes enough anxiety for children and parents so it was very important to me that he looked and felt good on his first day. Some of the children that used to be around our home when Austin was five were there to walk with him to school. When all seemed set to go, I noticed that he had poopie on his hands. I didn't want to embarrass him so I carefully cleaned his hands, cautiously avoiding shaming him about it. Again, all set to go - this time I noticed a little poop patty in his pants. Very patiently I bathed him and looked for clean clothing for him. Since he wasn't my child I had to search a long time through a large chest of drawers to find clothing that fit and matched. I dressed him again while the other children waited. Finally, everyone left for school, happy, clean, and with self-esteem still in tact. When I awoke from this dream I immediately knew that the dream was telling me that although I had Austin to love and care for, and while I always believed he was my son, in truth, he always belonged to God who had temporarily entrusted him into our care, “some one else’s child.”
Picking Up the Pieces
I had two more dreams where Austin appeared very healthy but we knew he had a terminal illness. In both dreams I was trying to obtain health care for him.
In the last dream we had gone to a physician's office that seemed very familiar but was not the one my family now used. In this dream, I argued with the intake person at the desk, yes - Austin was covered by insurance, yes - this physician was his preferred provider, and the reason he hadn't been in for a such a long time was because he had been so healthy. The clerical person said that he couldn't be seen that day, but I could take away the linen and clothes lying on the floor if I wanted. I presumed I needed to go ahead and do this. When I started picking up the sheets, I realized they were soaked in blood. I felt weak and confused, but nevertheless, I knew I needed to pick up the blood soaked linen, which I did, although I felt awful.
When I awoke I realized this dream had been my attempt to make sense out of what didn't make any sense - of losing my precious son - how the health care system could not save him; the hopeless feeling I had while speaking with the medical examiner who came to the hospital for his body; the helplessness we felt as we went through his belongings, giving some of his things to his friends; closing his bank account, picking up his truck from the shop, and arranging his memorial service. . . . These are things that a parent tries to arrange in advance of their own passing to make it easier on their children. Of course no one ever dares to think about having to do these things for one so young - one's own son - so young.
Leaving Tibet
This dream, a spiritual gift to me, continues to reassure me even today. I was hiking on a beautiful high mountain trail with my family. The trail was surrounded by small evergreen trees, rocks, and boulders. The sky was wide open, clear blue, with small clouds about. It was cool but the sunshine warmed us. This hike was surprisingly easy for us. I looked down and we were wearing Tibetan clothing, which to me meant this trek out of Tibet was not just a fun hike but a very serious journey to save our lives.
I looked up and suddenly realized that I was alone. Rather than becoming frightened as I might have expected, I was calm, happy, and without fear. Somehow I knew my family had gone ahead of me, we were all going to the same place and I would catch up with them soon. I continued the trek, finally reaching the trail crest where we were reunited. Looking down about 20 feet below we saw a small valley dotted with campfires, each with a family around it. This was a refueling station and not really the end of our journey. People were walking around, cooking and resting, and sitting in circles around the campfires. No one there was fearful or anxious. It was a place of great solace and comfort.
The feelings elicited by the vivid images in the dream are of families coming together again, and even if the circumstance is one of extreme danger, we do not have to be afraid because our journey continues and families are reunited. When Tibet was invaded by China, it seemed the nation of Tibet was lost forever. In the physical loss of the country, Tibetan Buddhism, the foundation of the nation survives, a living metaphor for transcendence that has since infused throughout the whole world.
Texas Branch, April 2002
The first April after Austin’s passing we traveled to see our family in Wichita Falls, Fort Worth, and Austin, Texas. We had just arrived in Austin and were catching up with my sister, her husband, and other friends. Austin’s memorial had been only a few months previous. We had already experienced the power outage from the tree branch falling on the Merry Wink signs. So when a large tree limb with a loud “C-R-A-C-K” dropped right next to my sister's back door just at the time we were telling them we knew Austin was with us, Tighe and I looked at each other knowing this was yet another dramatic hello!
Chapter 8
Mediums
The decision to be open to any efforts Austin might make to contact us led us to enlist the aid of gifted mediums. We are fortunate to have been introduced to several genuinely psychic mediums. A friend directed us to John Edward’s television program. Bridgette’s friend introduced us to the work of Michael Parry and his wife Marti. Laurie Campbell was featured in Gary Schwartz’s book, The Afterlife Experiments. Bridgette’s high school psychology teacher very kindly volunteered her own psychic perceptions which were quite clear and accurate. John Edward, Bridgette's psychology teacher - Mrs. Salver, Laurie Campbell, and Michael and Marti Parry all have relayed messages to us from Austin. These individuals have earned our sincere admiration and gratitude.
The following chapters contain excerpts from our sessions with mediums. Time, space, and the personal nature of parts of the sessions does not allow an all inclusive account.
John Edward, May 2002
On the first Mother’s Day after Austin’s passing, I was drawn to a small lavender colored heart shaped plaque with a ribbon attached for hanging it on the wall. I remembered when six-year-old Austin gave me this little Mother’s Day gift with a white doily and a scene of a little white rabbit delicately painted on it. At that time we had a white lop-eared rabbit living in our back yard. Austin loved to sit and hand feed the rabbit carrots. [See photos 9-10.] I hung the little heart shaped plaque on the cabinet by the kitchen sink at our old house. When we moved to our new house in Pleasant Valley in 1992, I hung it on the cabinet next to the kitchen window over the sink. On this first Mother's Day after Austin's passing, I found myself cleaning this little plaque, remembering Austin and his lop-eared rabbit.
Suby had arranged a trip for us from Reno the following Wednesday to see the psychic medium, John Edward, at the Masonic Auditorium in San Francisco. She wanted to hear from her father and she knew I needed to hear from Austin.
I had just started watching John Edward on television. When Tighe first turned on the John Edward show, I felt angry at this man for taking advantage of the poor desperate grieving people (like me) in his audience. But, gradually, after several of the occurrences listed in this book, I was beginning to believe that there are gifted people who can relay messages from the departed, and over time I became a John Edward fan.
We arrived in San Francisco early enough to take a trolley to Pier 39 for dinner and then back to the hall. While we waited we went across the street to a large cathedral. We walked through the cathedral and sat in a pew, quietly praying. All the time, feeling desperate and emotional, I was begging, "Please, please, come if you can."
The Masonic Auditorium was packed with over 2,000 people. Like us they were longing to hear from their departed love ones. John Edward came out and explained what would happen that evening and warned the audience against "relative stealing” that is hijacking a reading that was directed to another person in the audience. He also said that sometimes a spirit may run through saying a few words while he is giving a reading from another spirit. He advised the audience to recognize and claim the “cameo“ appearance if it related to them, should that occur. Then he went to a small area of the audience and gave very specific information from a loved one on the other side. Someone amongst the five or so people in the area stood up. He continued to give information from a departed relative or friend. The information was very detailed and included family stories, jokes, and references to which only the person standing was able to acknowledge.
Witnessing this live performance, seeing that it was not an illusion created by editing tricks, I became convinced John Edward has a true gift for communicating with spirits. He selected a woman from the audience. After giving several messages from the other side, this woman was able to verify that the messages were coming from her father. The woman's father spoke about her sister having done something that her mother didn't like, some kind of surgery to her chest. This woman's sister, sitting in another section of the auditorium, stood up and admitted that she had breast enlargement surgery and truly her mother was opposed to it. She described how she asked her dad, now in spirit, to help her with her mother.
John Edward continued to work in this manner for two and half hours. The last woman he talked to was sitting near me. Quickly he uttered: "Someone's son has passed." "He's saying, 'I fell from a bed-like something. I died of a cerebral hemorrhage. The family dogs are with me.’” John Edward described the pink heart with the white doily on it hanging on the wall. My heart raced. I wanted so badly to jump up and claim this spirit as my son. I resisted, thinking John Edward would soon direct himself to me. The woman he spoke with confirmed only part of what he said. I didn't speak up, I didn't want to be a "relative stealer." I have always regretted not standing up then and claiming this reading from Austin. It was my first experience with a medium.
Suby drove us back to Reno. I told Suby that I thought her dad and Austin probably were there together, but they were both so polite and gentlemanly that they did not push ahead of others. I thought at the end of the presentation they realized they were running out of time and her dad unselfishly pushed Austin in. It all happened so fast and then the program was over!
Even today, I believe that Austin, through this "cameo" appearance, tried to reach out and let me know he is alive; especially, after experiencing the other occurrences described throughout this book.
Who is Stroking Kitty?
(Again, Austin was an animal lover.) We began to notice unusual events involving animals. One day I was sitting with Tighe and Bridgette, discussing our upcoming telephone session with medium, Laurie Campbell. As we talked our attention was drawn toward Molinki Koshka, our Russian Blue cat standing on the carpet behind Tighe's chair. She paced a few steps to and fro and undulated as if she were being stroked by an unseen being. Bridgette and I both commented that it certainly appeared as if kitty were being petted. She continued this behavior for quite some time. Was Austin there petting kitty?
Brandy - Ellen loses her baby.
Ellen, who had comforted me through the loss of my child, had no children of her own. For someone who always wanted children this was devastating. Ellen had rescued a nearly starved three-year-old orphaned cat, whom she named, Brandy. Brandy became Ellen's baby. Brandy was so shy that whenever visitors arrived she ran and hid. We often made jokes about Ellen's cat - the cat we never saw for the first fifteen years of visits to Ellen's house. Brandy was very affectionate with Ellen, tenderly placing her paw on Ellen's face while she cuddled in the crook of Ellen's arm. At 23-years-old, Brandy became ill and frail. Ellen nursed her, made special food for her, and took her to a holistic veterinarian, but Brandy eventually died from kidney failure. Ellen buried Brandy in a special place on her property. The next three mornings, Ellen felt Brandy lying in the crook of her arm. She knew this was not a dream, but rather Brandy visiting her in that twilight state between awake and asleep.
Many months later Ellen adopted a new kitten. This kitty, Chloe, sleeps in the crook of Ellen's arm and wakes Ellen each morning by tenderly touching Ellen’s face with her paw. She loved Brandy so much, Ellen can't help but think that perhaps Brandy has returned to her as Chloe.
Birds of a Feather
Our home in Pleasant Valley is on a street laced with ponds. The acre is covered with pine trees, bitter brush, and sage. We have been fortunate to have all kinds of birds here throughout the year. We feed hummingbirds in the summer, hang bird feeders for the wild birds and toss seed for the ducks, quail, and squirrels that call our back yard their home.
In spring, the ducks bring their babies to feed, maybe eight or nine per family. They are so short they can barely be seen as they follow their mother through the tall grass. The baby quail with their tiny top knots line up single file like kindergartners crossing the street as their parent leads the family to the feast. Many other birds frequent our yard: mountain blue jays, finches, even flickers - large spotted woodpeckers.
The woodpecker is one of the first harbingers of spring at our house, announcing his arrival with his rat-a-tat-tat on our metal chimney. I don't know how successful he is in retrieving anything from the small holes at the top of the chimney, but the noise he makes echoes down the chimney and throughout the house early each morning.
We have lived in this house for thirteen years. 2002 was the first spring that we were visited by a pair of cream colored doves. Later that spring we noticed two babies added to the dove family. Perhaps Austin sent the doves to say hello at this difficult first spring after his passing.
That same summer, I was leaving a restaurant with Christopher, two of his friends, and Bridgette and her friend. Bridgette got into her girlfriend's car, a 1975 Volkswagen Rabbit. We were admiring the nice job she had done fixing it up inside. The boys were waiting in our van in the next parking space. Bridgette and I noticed a lone dove sitting on a car parked in front of us on the street. He danced around, looked about, but stayed there near us while we lingered and chatted. This may seem like an insignificant event, but to a spirit boy who is checking in on his family while they try to go on living, this may be his way of saying, "Hello, I am here, I still love you all."
Weeks after returning to work, I often noticed a bird on the lawn as I walked to and from my car. The bird was not startled nor did it fly away, no matter how closely I approached. One morning an entire squadron of birds flew within a foot of my head. I came to expect these kinds of visits when I was going to and from work. I always talk to Austin, telling him how much I love and miss him. In return I experienced several full body shudders, now familiar to me, what I came to call “Austie hugs.” One day after feeling him near me several days in a row I left work expecting the same experience, but this particular Friday afternoon, he didn't come. I was not upset because I do not expect him to hover around me all the time, that would be too boring for him. Just the same, I did notice that he was not there.
Later that evening Denny told me that all of Austin's friends went camping at the Yuba river that Friday afternoon. Then I knew why Austin did not greet me after work as usual. Austin had gone camping with his friends, as he had done so many times before. Months later in a telephone session the medium Laurie Campbell said: "He is showing me the lake or river, now the tents are popping up. Did he camp there? I see him with his friends at the river, joking and having fun."
Laurie Campbell
I read about the medium Laurie Campbell in Gary Schwartz's book The Afterlife Experiments. I contacted her through her web address and in August 2002 Bridgette, Tighe, and I participated in a telephone session with Laurie. In the days before the session I talked to Austin, telling him the date and the time of the session. I asked him to come and let us know that he is okay. I told him to say anything about his feet or about his barbequing out back for us on the 4th of July so that I would know it was really him. That morning I brought Austin’s things to my room, including his little treasure box. We settled around the speaker phone.
Laurie described Austin as:
Such a good person, open and honest, with a good heart. He had a lot of fun and did a lot while he was here. He touched a lot of lives. You worry he doesn't have a future. He has a future there. . . . “It will be only a blink of an eye and we will be together again.”
Birds
Before I started to read, it was interesting because a little hummingbird came up to my window and was looking in. And that always tells me too that in your life you should be watching for signs from spirits just like I watch for signs. I know that they always send me things and bring things forth to me to make a connection to who they are connecting to. And a lot of times it can be through birds, butterflies, and different sources of things coming forward or coming to us. . . .
Today, a huge dove was eating at the thistle seed feeder with the finches, then immediately after, the hummingbird was buzzing at the window. I told my kids that is spirit sending the hummingbird because I was getting ready to do the reading.
Austin described his passing.
He gives me the feeling of things spinning out of control, a stupid thing, not knowing the consequences of the actions. He is showing me a dark colored truck [the truck was red] in a parking lot. Everything comes down very quick around him. There was one other person with him - one friend there.
Brock had stayed with Austin, reassuring him, while the other boys called 911 and moved the truck out of the way.
They had been inside of a place - other people around at the time.
They had been in a sports bar playing pool.
His passing was quick. He was here and then he was gone. It was a quick passing. A quick passing is a blessed event - a breath here and then a breath over there. Never alone. . . .
Before he passed he was outside. He loved to be outside.
He had been riding in the back of a pick up truck immediately before the accident.
Always outside - at the river with boats, very active, not a couch potato, out and about. Did he actually pass by the truck? Something that occurred that happened earlier that day.
In the police report when Brock was questioned Brock said that he thought that Austin hopped out of the truck trying to compete with a stunt Brock had done earlier in the evening - when he had dropped and somersaulted several times down a slope in a friend’s yard.
Everything in there shut down . . . all stopped. A time of wavering. Others [on the other side] knew he was going - it was time for him to go. He had fully stepped out to the other side. People looking at him, but he was no longer in his body. People were there from the other side. They are just as alive there as you are here. Grandfather, balding, heavier around the middle, was there. Judith's grandmother-- He was never alone. . . .
Do you have a picture of a child dressed up and on a pony, maybe not of one of your children, but connected to you, Judith? Or you, Tighe? The loved ones on the other side kept showing me over and over again - this picture. I didn't feel like it was one of your kids.
After the reading we found this picture. It was of Tighe's dad when he was about 3-years-old wearing a cowboy hat and sitting on a pony - an obvious connection to Tighe's grandmother, Josephine, who had passed over several years earlier. [See photo 11.] Later in the reading Laurie referenced Josephine again as the
. . . older lady with a bird on her finger, a parakeet on her finger, he keeps showing her with a blue colored parakeet on her finger.
Tighe confirmed: “She would hold that bird right next to her lips.”
Her husband passed before her. [True.]
He [Austin] is showing me, after he passed, people with white coats, but not in the hospital, like at the coroners.
A week after this phone session I called the coroner's office and found out the coroners wear white biological suits that protect them during autopsies. An autopsy was required because of the circumstances of Austin's death - I did not want it and would have refused if I could have.
He's showing me great sadness with the event and a lot of people coming to pay respects. Such a good person, a lot of people really liked him.
We had thought that about sixty people would come to his memorial, but actually the gym was full of his friends, our friends.
Did you donate anything of his? He is showing me boxes and people looking at things - laid out.
His things were laid out in the living room and in the entryway, still there from the remodeling we had started in his bedroom. A few weeks before Austin’s accident, he bought new jeans and a work coat. We asked his friend to come over and take what he could wear. Tighe and Denny took some of his tee shirts. Bridgette sewed the logos from some of his favorite well worn tee shirts onto some of her clothes and purses. I took a pair of raggedy sweat pants and an old flannel shirt that I still wear around the house. This was another way we are able to feel close to Austin - wearing his clothes.
He is showing me his picture where he is surrounded by green.
Sharon took a photo of Austin in Hawaii - he was reclining in the middle of large grass covered field - gazing off into the horizon. We set this photo along with others on a table at the memorial next to his camping gear. We encouraged his friends to take what they wanted. This photo now hangs on the wall in our the living room. [See photo 12.]
Laurie described a candid photo of Austin lying on the couch with the dogs asleep near him. I did not remember this photo, but Bridgette had it in her room and gave it to me after this reading. [See photo13.] Just as Laurie said, in the photo Austin was asleep on the couch and nearby were the two sleeping bulldogs with Mayor the cat wedged between them.
He is naming Jeb and Jess - people he knew.
Jeb, Denny's close friend and Jess, Austin's childhood playmate and good friend through high school came to his memorial gathering. Laurie continued:
He keeps showing me his feet in boots, with his boots on.
At age 12 Austin developed terrible ingrown toenails for which he had several surgeries. Once he even had the wrong toe operated on in error. During that time he only wore open toe sandals. He used to stick his bare feet into my lap for a foot massage. After his accident while he was in ICU I was afraid to touch him because I read that a head injury made the patient very sensitive to all types of stimuli. However, I did very gently rub lotion on his feet. Remembering these things before the reading, I had asked Austin to say anything about his feet so that I would know that it was he indeed. All through the reading, Laurie Campbell asked if he had “stinky feet” or if I had been “after him for putting his feet on the furniture.” She said she was trying to understand why he kept showing her his “big bare feet,” “his feet in tennis shoes, in boots,” “kicking off his shoes,” and his “feet in white sox.” Also, this references a scene in one of our favorite movies, “Tombstone,” watched so many times we wore it out. In one scene Doc Holiday, on his death bed, notices his feet sticking out of the covers. He laughs, saying "That's very funny!" - meaning that he always thought he would die with his boots on.
Then Laurie asked if he and his friends liked to "go to the Outback Steak House for barbecue, because he keeps showing me ‘Outback’ and ‘cooking steaks on a grill’ . . . he is standing there and flipping stuff."
Knowing that Austin and his friends could not afford to frequent the Outback Steak House, I explained to Laurie how Austin used to cook steaks for us when we had our traditional July 4th barbecues. He was particularly talented at cooking steaks, a skill he perfected while camping with his friends. I never learned how to do this well and was always very appreciative. The barbecue was on our back patio, an area we have always called "out back."
Laurie said, "You are so fortunate, he is so funny, he has the best sense of humor, so funny. He gives me the feeling of the focus of the humor is from liking to be with and talking with people and family and being together with others while he was here. It's about relationships."
Then Laurie asked if we had "a medallion or cross on a chain, it could be anything, in some things that were personal to him, that meant a lot to him, a silver round thing, like a Saint Christopher's medal, but with a raised center - bumped out. He has been showing it to me over and over - silver, rounded. He liked to wear it." Then she described "a box of his treasures or things having been moved to another room."
Laurie had just described the small silver turtle pendant I had given Austin. It was in Austin’s treasure box, which I had moved into my room that morning just before the call. I recalled: One day Austin, age 15, playfully wrestled with Christopher, then age 8. Austin straddled Christopher and held him down. Christopher, with his hands pinned down, resourcefully did what was left for him to do, he captured Austin's turtle pendant in his mouth. But as the wrestling match intensified, Christopher swallowed the small turtle pendant. Austin and Christopher called me at work to tell me about it. I called our pediatrician who said it had to pass through Christopher within four days or I would have to bring him in for her to examine. She instructed me how to easily examine each of his stools: by covering the toilet with plastic wrap, then covering the stool with another sheet of plastic wrap, then by gently smooshing each part of the stool - any hard object could be readily detected. (This was no big deal to me - a nurse.) Well, on the fourth day, voila there it was. I cleaned it, polished it, and gave it back to Austin. In this session, Laurie Campbell had described this little turtle pendant as having been left among Austin's other treasures in his wooden treasure box.
Laurie described how Bridgette had been swimming in her girlfriend’s above ground pool that summer and how her girlfriend’s big black dog had always joined them. It was obvious that Austin is keeping his eye on Bridgette.
Laurie said Austin had a “heavy heart” as he described “sorrow, sorrow everywhere“ and a “garden being planted in sorrow” and “you, Judith, kneeling down and picking up pebbles.” The day before this call, tearfully, I prepared some pots for our new sun room, the beginning of the Austin memorial garden, that later would include a planting bed out front. I was on my knees in the back yard, picking up small pebbles for drainage in the pots. She also said he was showing her “bronze” and “white.” The new sun room had bronze colored walls framed in bronze colored metal. The only thing in the sun room at that time was a three tiered white rack for the new plants. She went on to describe a “stone path” and a “water feature” with the garden. The day before this call I was admiring the work of a stone mason who was building a stone retaining wall for our neighbor’s raised bed. Later we added a stone path and extended the irrigation into our raised bed, the Austin memorial garden. I knew then very clearly that Austin was with me the days before this phone session.

Chapter 9
"Move On"
I called my mother to tell her about the latest after death contact with Austin. Always very eager to hear about these experiences she never doubts my word about any of it. I also called my friends Ellen and Suby and a few other friends. Excitedly I shared the news of this most recent hello from Austin. I thought this was a very important message to share - We do not die!
Once in a while amongst words offered in encouragement, the words “move on” and “let go” are sometimes offered in an instructive and leading manner.
If only the complexities of grief could be minimized into those few words. Coping with the loss of a child is complicated by survivor guilt. The natural course of things has been turned upside down. We ask why my child first, before me? We cannot help but feel we have failed the mission, the prime directive, to do what ever it takes to keep our child safe so they will have a rich and full life.
I cannot speak for everyone who has lost a child, but the concepts of “moving on” and “letting go” are antithetical to my experience as a parent. The incomprehensible thought of letting Austin go chokes me to the point that I can hardly speak. Sometimes I still feel I will never be right until I am with him again. Being asked to “let go” and “move on” feels like being involved in a fatal highway accident and when other travelers arrive they know the victims are lying there hemorrhaging, but their primary concern is to keep the traffic flowing. Tighe had often said how losing Austin was like an amputation. Moving on is a denying or a skipping over, a shutting down, a hit and run.
Not only is the pain of losing a child unbearable for us, the parent, it is also unbearable for our friends to witness. Our friends feel powerless and by instructing us to let go and move on they are actually saying they have gone as far as they can with us on this painful path; they need to move on. Knowing the depth of suffering, I understand that it is too much for them. If I were them I think I may feel the same sense of being exhausted and have the same desire to escape.
For us the journey is not optional, there is no moving on, there is no learning to let go! We are adjusting to a change in our relationship, similar to the changes in how parents and children relate when the children become adults and claim their own life path. The connection between parent and child is eternal and death does not break it. I know men and women whose child died 20-30 years ago. They still love them, miss them, dream about them, and pray for them everyday. Through the grief process we learn to integrate or weave this tremendous loss into who we are now; it is not something that one can run through or leave behind.
While Tighe was walking the dogs one morning, again he thought how Austin would not want to be around us if thoughts of him always bring us pain and sadness. Why would he choose to be around us? Because Austin loves us and he has demonstrated his love for us by the many times and many ways he has let know he is still alive and continues to check in on us.
Much later on the fourth anniversary of the fatal accident Suby greeted me with “How’s Austin doing?” I know most people are afraid to bring up that which matters the most to me, probably because they do not want to take me to that painful place again. But those who understand how Austin is always on our minds, that we always miss him, and that we miss him more during the anniversary time, they honor our loss and our love for Austin by mentioning his name and asking us how we are doing during this difficult time of year.
From my journal in September 2002:
Suby told me that I honor Austin with my tears. How reassuring it is to believe that the tears that will not stop honor him. In our session with the medium, Laurie Campbell, she told us that Austin has “a heavy heart,” from seeing me "planting a garden in sorrow." Austin said of me and Tighe, "sorrow, sorrow everywhere." I want to cheer up so I will not burden him with the grief that is in this world and most hopefully not in his. I think about where Austin is now and what it must be like for him. Everything I've read about the after life says that the weather is always perfect, our loved ones are feeling peace, comfort, and joy. They are the lucky ones. Sometimes when Austin visits me, I feel that peace as if Austin is trying to give me a glimpse of what spirit life is like. I am comforted by a love that pushes away sorrow.
I believe Austin actually passed eight months ago, yesterday. A friend of ours used to call baby Austin "an old soul," and "little pharaoh." Somewhere I read that when a baby is born, the earthly parents rejoice while the heavenly spirits grieve for the loss of their precious one. Conversely when an earthly loved one passes, the earthly family grieves while the heavenly family is celebrating their return.
Spider Drops In
September 9, 2002, Tighe’s friend at work, John, lost a very good friend in an accident. Acknowledging each other's loss, they talked about ways in which spirits may communicate with us. As if orchestrated, on cue a large long-legged spider slowly descended from the ceiling on its finely spun tether and lingered in the air between Tighe and John, not to interrupt but to punctuate this emotional conversation. Now most people would say this is only a coincidence and I might agree, but it requires a great deal of effort to continue to discount a chain of "coincidences" having similar themes.
Alternate Ending
September 30, 2002. This morning I awoke remembering this dream of Austin. He was well, smiling, happy. He looked very healthy, but he complained of a bad headache. I explained to him about his head injury because he couldn't remember any of what had happened. I went to another room and found a pain pill for him. Then I explained that he would need to take these sometimes for his headache. The dream ended. This dream was actually an alternate ending that will never be.
Mrs. Salver Speaks for Austin, November 5, 2002
After reading Raymond Moody's books, in which he described how he constructed a psychomanteum to facilitate contact with departed loved ones, Tighe and I decided to make one and see if it worked. Tighe hung dark quilts over our windows and hung an octagonal mirror on our wall near the bed. One Sunday I wrapped myself up in Austin's comforter, the one I made for him several years ago. After a cold wet day of sledding, he used to wrap himself in it and lie on the couch by the fire. I meditated and gazed into the mirror as described in Moody's book. Often when I meditate and talk with Austin I feel very relaxed and peaceful, followed by a pleasant full body shudder, an "Austie hug." In spite of feeling a series of these "Austie hugs," I remained tearful and emotional. I could not be sure they were not coming from my imagination. I never saw his face or image in the mirror so I gave up after trying for more than an hour. I thought my extreme longing for him kept me from being able to see him. Feeling like a failure I continued to cry off and on while I cooked dinner that evening.
The next day when Bridgette came home from school, full of excitement she said, "You are not going to believe this!" She looked around for Austin's wooden treasure box. I found it for her. She took a few minutes to look through it. Then she said that her teacher, whom we had already heard was psychic, told her (in the company of her friends) that Austin had been bugging her all day and he was not going to leave her alone until she told Bridgette what he had to say.
The teacher began to describe Bridgette’s bedroom: purple and blue walls with a canopy type thing over her single bed. Bridgette confirmed this, clarifying that she attempted to hang a canopy of scarves over her bed without much success the previous week. She finally settled for an Hawaiian pareau tacked to the ceiling. When we discussed this, Bridgette said, “He [Austin] sure tells a lot of people about my room.” (Laurie Campbell had described Bridgette in her room in great detail and later Michael Parry described Bridgette in her room, lighting candles, meditating, saying how much Austin liked the environment.)
Mrs. Salver said that Bridgette had been doing something with trains lately. [Bridgette had a new job at a restaurant in the Tamarack Junction, a local casino with faux railroad décor and a locomotive on its tracks coming through the ceiling over the breakfast bar where Bridgette worked as a cashier. See photo 14.] I assumed it had been one of Austin's hangouts after finding a match book with their logo on it amongst Austin's belongings.
Mrs. Salver continued, "This is for your mother: Did Austin have a favorite blanket? He says your mother has been wrapping herself in his blanket. He says that he was there with her and he does not want her to do that anymore because it hurts him to see her so sad." Bridgette answered that I had made them each a comforter and that Austin's was on my bed. Not knowing what I had done on Sunday, Bridgette understood this to be a metaphor for grief. The teacher also agreed - probably a metaphor for "a blanket of sorrow.“
He had been there! I explained to Bridgette how I had wrapped myself in Austin’s blanket and how I had tried to see and hear him in our makeshift psychomanteum, just the day before. I told Bridgette to be sure to tell her teacher that this really happened. It was more than a metaphor!
As in the session with Laurie Campbell, Austin through Mrs. Salver again brought up the treasure box, telling Bridgette “There is something in his wooden treasure box that gives your mother a lot of comfort.” Trinkets from Austin's childhood kept in the wooden treasure box gave me a lot of comfort on a day-to-day basis. Bridgette strung together on a hemp string, two small silver feathers, the small turtle pendant, a whale bone hook from Hawaii, and a couple of little clay beads. For a while I hung it on the rear view mirror in the car. Since then I have made them into a necklace, often wearing it when I want to feel closer to him.
Finally, the teacher said Austin is with the grandparents, sitting there with them in the white Adirondack chairs, under the tree in the yard. [My grandfather built those white Adirondack chairs that we used to sit in under the huge oak tree that shaded their yard.]
Mrs. Salver's spontaneous reading was completely unsolicited by us, although it appears that Austin actively recruited her. She accurately described Bridgette's room and my sorrowful attempt to contact Austin while wrapped in his blanket. Her reading provides convincing evidence that Austin is watching over us, that he continues to exist, although in a dimension we are unable to see.
Why is there a Veil?
I try to understand the need for us to go through this physical existence if life in spirit is so good. Why do we have to go through life with such painful loss? We have been told we are created in God's image, so perhaps our life in this plane is our opportunity to allow those God like characteristics to grow in us. If we have never known loss or suffering we cannot really know compassion. When I first had children, realizing how much I loved my children, the imperfect parent that I am, caused me to reflect on how much God, the perfect parent, must love us. Perhaps there is no other way for us to learn these valuable lessons except through our own experiences, this life, a physical life.
Losing a child takes one on a journey of investigating the unseen. Here are some of my thoughts, I journaled in November 2002.
Another long weekend - I feel I need time to sort through all the feelings I have about this big change in our relationship. As I go about the house I review what Austin missed or will miss and how much I miss him. Telepathically he replies that he is here and isn't missing anything.
Last night, sitting by the fire in the wood stove he helped his dad install, Austin told me that his love for us was like the fire, continuous, warm, and strong. I told him that I was torn between always wanting to stay in contact with him and at the same time I wanted him to go forward and have a good spirit life with more to do than follow us around. First I lost his precious body that I have loved from conception to death. I do not want to lose the constant loving voice that is there whenever my thoughts turn to him, the voice that continues to reassure me of his love for us and his knowledge of what we are doing daily. When I tell him that I want to be in spirit with him he says soon enough I will be. (Not to frighten me, but rather meaning how short our earthly lives are compared to the immortality of the spirit.)
When he was a toddler, we would all get into the car, and while I fastened him into the car seat, he would say, "I want to sit in you's wap." Now I tell him, "I want to sit in you's wap." Laurie Campbell said that time is very different to those in spirit. She said that when they refer to us, they show us marking off days on a calendar. To them it is only a blink of an eye until we are together again.
We often ask ourselves: Why am I here? What is my purpose? Why must I go through this? I always believed we were blessed, so protected; our four children were healthy and safe. Bad things, tragically, happened to others. God was taking care of us - we were thankful.
If we know where we came from and where we are going then we know what to do while we are here. Now we see through a glass darkly, then we will see face to face. No more veil for Austin, now face to face; how fortunate he really is.
What about - God never giving us more than we can handle? Friends tell me, I am handling this. Oh yeah, I am handling it. I am weary and weepy all the time. I think of how sweet it will be when my earthly life is finished so I won't have to bear this pain anymore.
I wonder why we must be separated by this veil, it causes such sorrow over here. Now with mediums on television every night, a person like me can see that veil, if not lifted, thinned a little. It has given me the faith to believe the silent, instantaneously responsive voice in my head is the voice of Austin, speaking to me. Although I cannot see him with my eyes, I can see him smiling and laughing and quite pleased by how he reached us through Bridgette's teacher. For being over there for such a short time he has a lot of skill at making contact and has demonstrated that over and over to us. I am very proud of him.
I continue to question why he was taken so young. Was it because of the way I raised him, something I missed. It sounds rather silly as I write it. We are spiritual people, but our spiritual beliefs have always been eclectic - not exclusive but inclusive, not judgmental but a belief in the power of love and grace while acknowledging how much we really do not know. There are many paths to God. The path given to me is Christian, but that does not make other ways wrong or untrue. Austin was such a respectful, loving person. He was good to his friends. He had compassion for those younger or less fortunate than himself. [He brought the best out in me.] Although I didn't always give money to a person begging on the street, I do remember doing so several times when I was with Austin. Also one time when we had gone to a restaurant for a little special time, we left the waitress a particularly large tip. We could see her delight as we were leaving. [Now I am a very easy target and will empty my wallet to help a stranger no matter how far fetched their story may be.]
After his passing we tried to find adult pictures of Austin for the memorial and the poster we were making for friends and family. All of his adult pictures, and there were not very many, were of him facing the horizon or pointing to the horizon. Sharon gave us the best shots from the trips he took with her family to Hawaii. In one he is on his back in the grass gazing at the sunset. In another he is in front of a waterfall gazing at the water with his profile to the camera. In another he is at Haleakala pointing to the sunset, this time facing the camera. In these photos it seems he is acknowledging where he would be going, although no one knew it at the time. [See photos 12 and 21.]
I allow myself to review the time in ICU, turning off life support, the silence as his heart stopped. Laurie Campbell told us that Austin doesn't want us to think of how he died, that he died quickly, one breath here and the next one there. She said that he did not suffer. I have to purposefully think of that when I find myself reliving Austin's last moments with us.

1. Austin with Tank and Jade. 2. Wooden box of ashes engraved with a Hawaiian petroglyph, two sea turtles swimming toward the sun. 3. Bridgette’s tattoo, a tracing of the turtles. Austin through the medium Michael Parry described Bridgette holding a mirror to look at the tattoo on her shoulder and how she worried that it was too big.

4-8. The tree limb fell on the power line over the “Is now burried” Merry Wink sign at 2:24 a.m. causing a power failure in the south valleys where Austin’s friends and family lived. Later we learned that 2:24 a.m. was the official time of Austin’s fatal accident.

 

9. Austin feeding our pet rabbit. 10. Six year old Austin gave me this small lavender heart with a doily and a rabbit painted on it for Mother’s Day. On the first Mother’s Day after Austin’s passing I found myself cleaning this little heart hanging on the cabinet by the kitchen sink. Three days later, the medium John Edward referenced it at his presentation in San Francisco.

11. Tighe’s dad on a pony. This picture was shown over and over to the medium Laurie Campbell as she was preparing for our telephone session.
12. In our session with medium, Laurie Campbell, she said, “He is showing me his picture where he is surrounded by green.” Sharon took this photo of Austin in Hawaii reclining in the middle of large grass covered field, gazing off into the horizon. We displayed this photo at his memorial service. At the time of the Laurie Campbell reading it was on the wall in our living room.

 

13. Laurie Campbell described a candid photo of Austin laying on the couch with the dogs asleep near him. I did not remember this photo, but Bridgette had it in her room and gave it to me after the session. Austin was asleep on the couch and nearby are the two sleeping bulldogs with Mayor the cat wedged between them.

14. Bridgette’s teacher, a gifted medium, asked Bridgette if she had been doing something with trains lately. Bridgette had just started a new job at a restaurant in the Tamarack Junction, a local casino with faux railroad décor. This locomotive on its tracks is coming through the ceiling over the breakfast bar where Bridgette worked as a cashier.

15. Just before Christmas 2003, Bridgette was meditating out back by the clothesline, near the place Austin used to sun bathe. She was drawn to a big rock and was sitting on it during her meditation. When she got up she saw "A.O." in silver letters on the rock.

16. Near the rock is the fence at the back of our property next to the corrals and the horse riding arena. When we go back there we always think about Austin and talk to him, a point not missed by Austin in the session with Michael and Marti Parry.
Chapter 10
Winter Butterfly
In the summer of 2001 Christopher found a plump green caterpillar. He placed it in a jar with a stick and then he placed the jar in the corner of our kitchen. The caterpillar quickly formed a hard grey cocoon. Then we more or less forgot about it. The next summer passed without the butterfly emerging. One fall day while cleaning the kitchen, I considered throwing it out, but I did not have the heart to just give up on it. Again, we forgot about the cocoon in the jar in the corner on the kitchen counter. Then came Thanksgiving and then Christmas, then the first anniversary of Austin's passing was upon us. We each struggled silently and sometimes not so silently with our feelings of overwhelming loss. On New Year's Day a butterfly burst forth from the cocoon. We allowed it to fly around the house and unsuccessfully tried to make a feeder for it. Then by January 7, 2003, the butterfly was still. The delayed emergence of this butterfly, coinciding with the dates of Austin's fatal accident and the date that Austin likely left the physical dimension, comforted us and reminded us of how life emerges from what appears to be death. Again, a little encouragement from spirit was offered at this most difficult time of year.
Blow Me Away
Tighe recalls the first anniversary of Austin's accident, New Years Day, 2003. Tighe’s usual work hours are at night, however he happened to be scheduled off for New Years that year. He stayed up late and watched an old movie. Everyone else was in bed when suddenly a gust of wind pushed open the front door. Tighe glanced at the clock; it read 2:24 a.m.
That same New Year's Eve Bridgette spent the night with friends in a cabin at Lake Tahoe. After celebrating the New Year, when the girls were settling down, the cabin door suddenly blew open. Bridgette asked her friend what time it was; it was 2:24 a.m.
We continue to try and make sense out of what has happened, through dreams, meditations, and observations, while we look for signs from Austin.
Voice in my Head
From my journal:
This past week in January 2003 has been very difficult. Last weekend I cried all weekend in anticipation of this week's anniversary. I have thoughts of how I could end my life and move on to spirit. The opportunity is here all the time. At the same time I feel I must stay around to help my earthly children and my husband, although I do not feel that I am that much help to them lately. Staying here feels more like a duty than a privilege.
Driving home from work, I caress Austin's trinkets strung together into a necklace by Bridgette, now hanging in my car. I continue to be very tearful, and tell Austin how much we all miss him. I talk to him, but this time, I say that I will be quiet now so that he can speak to me. Immediately, I heard in my head, "Mom, I am okay." "Don't think about how I died." "We all have to go through it someday." When I hear him talk to me, it is in very fast short sentences. Sometimes I catch his scent, the smell of sweaty boy, the same smell that I noticed when I would cut his hair. I do believe he is near me at those times.
Advanced Indian, January 22, 2003
Tighe wrote his thoughts about this dream that he had the week of the first anniversary of Austin's passing.
In the dream, I spotted a White Pinto automobile (Metaphor for a white horse?) with two figures inside that seemed to be watching us. [Later in the sessions with mediums we would find out how much Austin really was watching us.] I approached the car which was parked by a curb and sidewalk. The figures appeared to scramble to hide inside the car. I stood by the car and looked inside. I thought that maybe one of the figures was lying on the floor in the back. I opened the side door and as I looked inside I noticed that the back hatch was up. Sitting in the cargo space, there was Austin, appearing to be about seven-years-old. I saw him so distinctly, so clearly. I said, "Austin, where have you been?" I reached for his arm and squeezed it gently. He said that he had been to a funeral, but an "advanced Indian" showed up to help him. "I've been in a hospital for five months. Can you write me an excuse for school?" Austin was wearing a baseball-type cap, which looked like nylon taffeta or silk, and it was colored a calm day-glo orange. It was unmistakably his voice I heard in the dream too. Every detail was convincing. I think I woke up at that point - or was awakened so that I would have the memory.
I read an article yesterday in the Delphi Associates Newsletter by Robert Ghost Wolf. The words were like streaming poetry. There was a painting of what I would call an "advanced Indian" figure, a spiritual person. Robert discussed the feeling of being without hope or bereft one moment, and then the next moment feeling uplifted, etc. Ghost Wolf said that we cannot live life any longer as a "leaf flitting in the wind." We are responsible, we ARE the decisive beings. We are on duty for ourselves and humanity and our Earth. "The Way of the Samurai" is pertinent. And we are the ring bearers. "To be a ring bearer is to be alone." (Quote from Lord of the Rings.) There are companions.
When Tighe shared this dream with me I told him that in several of the books that I had read about life after death, advanced spirit guides were often Native American.
Coyote Dreams, July 2003
Two times this month I was abruptly awakened from dreams in the early morning hours by the cries of a pack of yipping coyotes - allowing me to recall the dream.
In the first dream, our family was at a grave site in the hills. We were each saying something in respect over the grave. A small clairvoyant woman stood over the grave and with broad sweeps of her hands she said, "Austin completely reviewed his life the last week of his life so he was ready to go."
One week later, again awakened by the coyotes, I was able to remember this second dream. Again our family was at a grave site in the foothills eulogizing or paying respects. It was my turn. As I talked about Austin, I saw to my right two spinning balls of light, each about six inches in diameter, spinning and moving in tandem randomly around the grave site. I suddenly (in the dream) realized that the spirits we were speaking of were not in the ground, but were with us in this form of these spinning balls of light. I received the impression that one was Austin and the other was me.
“A.O."
Just before Christmas 2003 Bridgette was meditating out back by the clothesline near the place where Austin used to sun bathe. She was drawn to a big rock and was sitting on it during her meditation. When she got up she saw "A.O." in silver letters on the rock. [See photo 15.] Bridgette told her dad, who already knew about the initials. When he told me about it on Christmas Eve, I said that I had been looking for a Christmas gift from Austin. I went out back to the rock and talked with Austin for a while.
Le Buick, New Year's Eve, 2003
Clinton, one of Austin's closest friends called me on New Year's Eve, 2003. Tighe was at work, the kids were out, I was home alone. Clinton said he had been thinking of us. He said he didn't know how we could stand it. I told him we wanted to have another memorial on Austin's birthday and maybe take his ashes to Lake Tahoe. He said he thought that Austin would like that. He said Austin wants us all to get on with our lives and not be destroyed by his passing.
He said the pasture light on their property, although never having any problems before, began to flicker after the tow truck delivered Austin's 1964 Buick, "Le Buick," last year. Austin and Clinton had planned to fix up “Le Buick” for Hot August nights. Now when Clinton is leaning against the car, contemplating what his friend may be doing, the light blinks on and off, Austin letting his buddy know that he is still alive and he is glad that Clinton has “Le Buick.”
New Year's Sign, New Years Day, 2004, Second Anniversary
Tighe was working at the hospital. He had a radio playing low. He was certain that Austin would manifest some sort of signal at 2:24. He had noticed that certain songs would appear on the radio at times. He did not know whether this might be a means of signaling this time. Then the computer monitor, a room away, suddenly clicked-on. The patients were sleeping, it was very quiet. Suddenly a huge gust of wind rushed down into a small courtyard near his desk and rattled the door. He checked the clock, it was 2:24 a.m.
Helping Ann, January 20, 2004
Tighe's brother called in January, 2004 and told Tighe that their mother, Ann, had died on the previous Sunday. She suffered with dementia and was hospitalized toward the end of her life.
I lit some candles for Ann and Austin and said prayers throughout the day for their sweet souls. Then before going to sleep, I prayed and asked Austin to help Ann during her transition. I was sleeping very soundly, when for some reason, I suddenly woke up and looked at the clock, it was 2:24 a.m. I knew that Austin had awakened me, this was his way of letting me know he heard my prayer and that he is helping Ann. In the morning I told Tighe how I was awakened at 2:24 a.m. He said he hadn't thought about Austin helping Ann, but he was relieved to think about it.
Mechanic says, "Good Job!"
In the spring of 2004 Christopher, age 16, was supposed to meet me after work, but he called and told me he had a flat tire on his new VW Beetle. I found him a few blocks from the hospital where I worked. Christopher had never changed a tire and figuring out what to do on the new Bug made it a challenging experience for both of us. I read out loud the instructions from the owner’s manual while Christopher tackled the tire. We were dressed in light clothing, as the day had started out very spring like, but had suddenly turned very cold and windy in the afternoon. After a struggle and chilled to the bone, finally we were triumphant. Just as we finished, we heard a long thunderous cracking sound, CraACK, CRaaAAAAK, CRACK, a gigantic tree limb broke off a nearby tree and crashed 30 feet to the ground. Awed by this spectacular salutation, Christopher and I could only assume that Austin, the mechanic, had signaled his approval.
There’s a hole in my head?
On a Saturday in May 2004, I experienced sudden partial vision loss in my right eye. The following Monday, the ophthalmologist told me I had suffered a stroke, an embolism in my eye. I started taking aspirin as he recommended and saw several other specialists. Although my vision soon returned to normal, the follow-up studies showed that I had a hole in my skull, somewhat to the left side on the top of my head. My first response to this was, “Good - now I will go see Austin.” I was probably one of the few people in the world who considered this to be good news. My three specialists could not agree on what to do about the hole in my skull. The neuro-ophthalmologist wanted the neuro-surgeons to do a CT scan guided needle biopsy. The neuro-surgeon wanted to cut it out and replace it with a plate. His partner, who would actually be doing the surgery, wanted to wait and watch it. Of course, I chose to watch it. Now at two years, after many more tests, we are pretty sure it is not growing, but we still do not know what it is or why it is there.
Ellen gave me a journal article that said that people who have undergone traumatic losses sometimes develop a corresponding physical manifestation of the trauma. This condition is often temporary, lasting for two to three years before resolving on its own. I cannot help but wonder if this is true as I recall how one friend who lost her son developed an almost crippling pain in her left hip. Another friend, after losing her son, developed a baseball size tumor in her abdomen. And then I discover this mysterious hole in my skull after losing Austin from a head injury.
One Saturday afternoon, Tighe, Bridgette, and I went back to Pathways book store to a psychic fair. They had someone doing psychic readings and other interesting things going on, but I was drawn to the aura photography. We each had our auras photographed. The lady doing the photography pointed out a hole in my aura, which coincidently matched up with the hole in the top left side of my head. She told me that spirit speaks to me through the hole in my aura.
There is no way of knowing how long I have had the hole in my head, nor the hole in my aura, or whether they were there before Austin’s passing left this hole in my soul. I am left wondering if this is just another coincidence or if this is a psychosomatic manifestation of the loss of my son from a fatal head injury. Whatever the cause, I am delighted that spirit is speaking to me.
Chapter 11
Clock Stops, Michael and Marti Parry, Second Session, July 1, 2004
In our first session Michael relayed recognizable elaborate details of what each of us had been doing recently, little snapshots of time, letting us know that Austin, still part of our family, drops in when he pleases or when we need him.
Assisted by spirit guides who work with artists in the spirit dimension, Marti sketches deceased friends and relatives and, on occasion, a sitter’s spirit guide. Depending on which artist is assisting her, the style of Marti's sketches vary, some resembling a photograph, others a caricature. After Marti reveals the sketch, Michael and Marti share their impressions about who it is. The sitter leaves the session with an audio tape of the session and a spirit portrait. We now have Marti's spirit sketches of our son, Tighe's grandmother, our aunts, each with their matching earthly photo framed and posted in our family gallery. It is reassuring to know that although unseen by our eyes, loved ones are still here, helping and looking after us. [See our sketches and photos in this book. See over 100 comparable photos and spirit sketches on their website: spiritart.com.]
At times I find myself wanting to answer Michael's questions before realizing that the question or attempt to clarify his impression is directed toward spirit not me. Some of the messages or references that we do not understand at the time of the reading hit us later, much later. These missed points, remembered and understood sometime later, are often not relayed back to Michael and Marti, who may not always be aware of the full sum of their accuracy.
The first session with them was almost like being on the receiving end of heavenly telephone call from Austin. Continuing to check in with the owner of Pathways bookstore, I did not want to miss Michael and Marti when they returned to Reno. When I heard they were coming in July, I was the first one to book a session. Bridgette had just left on a high school graduation trip to the Bahamas with nine of her girlfriends, so only Tighe and I attended this session.
Waiting to leave for the session, and more anxious than I realized, I made a cup of tea, only to knock it over, spilling it into my purse and onto my white stretch pants. I tried to wash the tea off with a red dish cloth, which turned the white pants red. I took them off and placed them in the washer. After they finished washing, I pulled them from the washer and carefully inspected them for the stains.
On our way out the door I noticed that the little ceramic bear drinking from a pot of honey, made by Austin in high school, had fallen over. Setting it back up, I wondered what caused it to fall and consider moving it away from the entryway.
As we turned onto the highway I recalled the last motherly advice I gave Austin, “Always take the right exit from our neighborhood onto the freeway because there is a protected left turn lane, it is the safest route.” To which he replied, “Oh, Ma!” [Stop nagging!]
It is clear that someone cares enough to be watching me all day, as Michael described these events and more in the session.
MICHAEL: Your son's gone? He is the one I talked to last time. Your son. I don't know. I mean I see so many people.
Michael snapped his fingers.
MICHAEL: What? This was an accident. He went in an accident. He says, he "went in an accident." He says, "I'm the one that jumped out of the truck." Okay? "Hi, Dad." He says, "Hi Dad."
. . . I can see him now. He wants to give you a hug. Do you have some dreams about him? Since last time. He said you have had dreams about him since then. Uh--, you guys didn't drink to him or toast him did you?
TIGHE: Why? Is he making those gestures?
MICHAEL: He's going like this -
Michael raises his clasped hands as if he is sliding them along a smooth surface until they meet at an angle in front of his face. He repeats this gesture over and over.
MICHAEL: I don't know. I said, "What the heck is this?" [He repeats the gesture.] Like this. [Gestures again.] He's going like this. [Gestures again.]
I have no clue, but Tighe recognizes the gesture as the shape of the pyramid he recently built of copper tubing. It sits on the kitchen counter next to the turtle tank.
TIGHE: A pyramid. We have a little pyramid.
MICHAEL: He's going like this. [Gestures again.] I don't know what this is. He goes just like this. [Gestures again.]
JUDITH: They are wires that are shaped just like that. He's [Tighe] been building them.
MICHAEL: You have been building them?
TIGHE: Yes, I have been building them.
MICHAEL: I didn't know what the hell he was doing. He's going like this. [Gestures again.] I thought it was like-- But there is something to do with-- Uh. [The next questions are directed to Austin.] Okay. Go on. Go on. What does that mean? What? What does that mean? He's telling me some stuff. Hold on. Go on. Go on. What does that mean? "Like toast." What are you saying to me? [Questioning Tighe.] Do you do this in the morning or something? Go-- go on.
Is there an Erik? Earl or Erik? [Probably a reference to my father, Everett.] Connected to you? I'll get to this in a second. Okay, he is trying to explain something to me. Hold on. Hold on a minute. He, he, he! [Laughter] Uhm. What’s this thin wire that you have? There is something else that you make that's got thin wire. Are they like coils or something? Or springs? Something with springs?
TIGHE: Springs?
MICHAEL: What are these springs or coiled springs he's talking about? Springs, in something you are building or making.
TIGHE: Well, I'm planning to make a kind of a large pyramid.
MICHAEL: But it has springs in it or something.
TIGHE: And they are anchored with springs.
MICHAEL: That's it! That's it. He's says, “that's it!" Okay.
TIGHE: It's very unusual.
MICHAEL: I know. I know. Okay. I know. But he says, “Tell him I know about the springs. That coiled wire. The springs.” He said, "Yeah, it's got to do with the pyramids." It's in the pyramids or something. Or on the pyramids. Okay? So he's watching you go on this way.
The second larger pyramid Tighe had been working on was made of PVC pipe joined together at the corners with small springs, actually they were coiled door stops - “springs.”
MICHAEL: Uhm. Do you drink? Do you? Like whiskey or something. Like little shots.
TIGHE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: So you have like a shot of whiskey in the evening or something. Then this is when he comes to see you. When you have-- Do you do this in the evening?
TIGHE: Uhm. My evening is in the morning.
MICHAEL: Exactly! When you eat “toast!"
JUDITH: When you eat toast? You did! You eat toast in the mornings.
MICHAEL: That's it! That's it. So that's your-- This is what he's talking about. And I get it. I get it. So this is your evening in the morning. Because he is going on about your morning. And this is when you do this. And you have like a little shot and you eat toast. And you got these spring things he's going on about. Uhm. And he's laughing. He's laughing. He says, "It will keep you out of mischief, Dad." [Laughter] But you have some books you are studying up on this with. Like pyramidology or something? Uhm-- And you are going to build a radio so that you can talk to him, huh?
JUDITH: That would be great. If he will tell us how to do it. [Laughter]
Working nights, Tighe came home, sipped a shot of whiskey and ate toast, no eggs, just toast, almost every morning. Then he worked on the pyramids, the springs held the corners together. Austin had been watching his dad!
MICHAEL: I've built one. [Such a radio] Oh, yeah. I'll tell you about that later. Uhm. Go on. Go on. . . . Hold on a minute. Here we go again. Do you have crystals that you are putting in this thing? Did you buy some crystals the other day or something?
TIGHE: Are you saying, is there something in it?
MICHAEL: He says you have something in the pyramid, but he says that it has something to do with crystals around it or near it.
TIGHE: We have a turtle. It [the tank] has little crystals in it.
MICHAEL: He says there are crystals near the pyramid or something. Near where you work. Is there like a vase there? Go on.
TIGHE: It's in the turtle tank.
MICHAEL: You have things in the turtle tank? Like a little vase?
TIGHE: Yes. And there are crystals.
MICHAEL: There is something about this that he wants to bring up.
TIGHE: There is a ceramic thing.
MICHAEL: And he [Austin] made something that is in that? Okay, because he wants to bring up that. Okay, I don't know where he is going with this, but-- [Michael laughs] Are there two turtles?
TIGHE: Yes, there is a live turtle in the tank--
MICHAEL: And a fake one!
TIGHE: And the one he made on the ceramic thing.
MICHAEL: He made that. And it's on that. ‘Cause he said, "There are two turtles." And one's alive and one's his that he made, which, he said, "is better!" [Laughter]
JUDITH: He says his is better? His is cute!
MICHAEL: Yeah, it is cute; he says it's a better looking turtle or something. He is very fun, your son. I have to tell you, okay? Uhm. He's glad that you are more upbeat, since the last time you were here. You are aren't you? ‘Cause he is coming across like this to me.
Austin let us know that he knew what was going on at our house. Bridgette brought home a tiny baby water turtle. It wouldn’t eat for weeks. She was afraid it would die. When it persisted to show no interest in food, while offering it food one day she said, “Austin, please help me with this turtle, make the little guy eat!” In the next second, the baby turtle opened his little mouth and gulped down his food. As the turtle began to grow we knew we needed to get a bigger aquarium for him. We placed the large aquarium on the breakfast bar next to the pyramid that Tighe had been working on in the mornings after work, while he sipped a shot of whiskey and ate toast. I had spread colorful glass beads [crystals] across the bottom of the turtle tank. Inside the aquarium, I placed the ceramic house made by Austin while he was in high school. On the roof of the ceramic house was a tiny turtle. Yes, there were two turtles in the aquarium, Bridgette's real turtle and Austin's ceramic one. [See photos 27-29.]
MICHAEL: And who has his watch, or his watch? He is bringing up a watch. What? Did somebody just buy a watch or lose their watch. . . . Okay. He is showing me - like it's my watch you see, my clock and she-- You did something with it, he says. Or you've got it. And are there several pictures around it? There are pictures of him near by, he says. A collage of pictures. ‘Cause he says, “There's all my face in one frame.” He says.
JUDITH: Yeah.
MICHAEL: And it's right near there, right? Is it on like a little table? Is there a little table near by? He says, “There is a little table right near there too!” And there is a figure on there, also, that he wants to bring up. Like a-- Is there like a little Buddha or something? Or “There is a figure there,” he says.
JUDITH: We've just moved a bookcase over by the door and it has his ceramic little bear that he made, eating a pot of honey.
MICHAEL: Okay, is it about that big? Is it about that big?
Michael pointed to a small Egyptian statue on a nearby table. It was the same size as Austin's ceramic honey bear.
JUDITH: Yeah.
MICHAEL: Is it broken?
JUDITH: No, well-- Yes it is.
The honey bear’s foot had broken off and we had glued it back on.
MICHAEL: Touch that. Touch it. Now push it.
I turned around. As I touched the little Egyptian statue, its head fell off and broke a nearby small glass. Startled, I began to apologize.
JUDITH: It fell over. I picked it up today and set it up [Austin's bear].
MICHAEL: Because he says, "It fell over." That is why he wanted me to say, "Push it."
JUDITH: Because it had fallen over, so I picked it up [today just before the reading].
I tried to pick up the pieces of broken glass.
MICHAEL: Don't worry about that. It's broken already. He says, that's why he wanted me to say push it - ‘cause it fell over.
JUDITH: It fell over [Austin's ceramic bear] and I wondered why it fell over.
MICHAEL: That's him. He did that.
JUDITH: He did it?
MICHAEL: He knocked it over. That is why he is bringing it up. He says, "‘Cause I pushed it!" He says that's why he is saying, "Push it." Okay? Ha, ha, ha! [We all laugh.]
JUDITH: Oh my gosh! [See photo 26 of ceramic honey bear.]
MICHAEL: They can easily do this stuff and he-- He will mess with you. Okay? Trust me. And who does the painting? Like the picture painting? Is there a portrait of him that was made into a painting? You know when you--
JUDITH: The one she did [pointing to Marti]. She did it.
MICHAEL: Did you do something special with it? Did you frame it and put it up or something?
JUDITH: I did it. I framed it with his other pictures and put it up on the wall.
MICHAEL: Oh, okay. So you mixed it up with the other pictures.
Amazingly, it seemed that Michael had just taken us on a walk through the entrance of our home. Austin’s antique looking pocket watch is hanging in the window of the sunroom porch. In the entryway is the table with his ceramic bear next to his collection of turtles, including another ceramic turtle he had made. Entering the family room, the collage of his pictures is on the wall with his spirit portrait by Marti.
MICHAEL: What are you drilling? What's the drilling he is showing me? ‘Cause he is showing me zirrrllll, zirrrrrllll, he's going “with the drill.”
JUDITH: You bought a new battery to charge up the drill.
MICHAEL: Did you?
JUDITH: He was trying to run the battery down by going ynnnhh, yernnnnhh.
MICHAEL: He is-- “Dad was going, yrrrrhhhhl, rhhhhlllll with this drill." He says, "What in the hell are you doing?" [Laughter] He's very, very good at communicating and he wants you to know that he is around. So he's been looking in on you and messing with you and trying to let you know he is around. You see?
Not significant to me at the time, Tighe had bought a new battery for his drill. He had tried to run the battery all the way down by running the drill while he walked around the house. He had been drilling air, something unusual and observed by Austin.
MICHAEL: And there is an item of jewelry that went missing. Do you have a chain? He brings up some-- Does this have to do with him? ‘Cause he says this thing has to do with me or something.
Michael pointed to the beads I was wearing made from the items found in Austin's little treasure box.
JUDITH: Yeah, these were his things.
MICHAEL: And you put them on that. Okay, there is another thing though, that should be on there. There's- Is there a ring? Were you going to put his ring on there? Wait a second--
I had strung Austin's little treasures onto a beaded necklace. I wore them almost all the time. Purposefully I left off the white whale bone hook just in case I wanted to wear them while I slept. This hook was circular or ring shaped. After this reading I sewed the hook to this string of treasures and beads.
MICHAEL: And uhm. Is there somebody called like Aaron, Aaron, Darin? Sounds like Aaron, Aaron, Amon, what?
Later, I realized it was my father, Everett Lehman. He never went by his given name, but was called Scott or Scotty because his name was so unusual and often mispronounced. Sometimes in error he had been called “Reverend” by mistake. Aaron is perhaps an approximation of Everett and Amon does sound like Lehman.
MICHAEL: Does he ride bikes? Okay does he do some sort of karate or something? Who does karate? Kick boxing? . . .
Austin through Michael had previously referred to Christopher as the kick boxer.
MICHAEL: He's going on about-- [Michael rubs his nose.] He's going on about this, like he hurt himself or something.
JUDITH: Chris just skinned his nose in the pool. I just saw it last night and I said, "What is that?"
MICHAEL: ‘Cause he says, "Tell him, ha, ha!"
JUDITH: He's the kick boxer too - the karate kid.
MICHAEL: That's it! That's it. He's saying, ''The one that does the kicking and the kick boxing and the karate." And, "He is skinning his face." Does he ride a bike? Does he ride a bike? What is the bike thing? Is that his brother? He is absolutely trying to connect with everybody and say, "Hi!" to everybody and to tell them he is around.”
Austin had been watching Christopher who had skinned his nose in the pool and had been spinning on the stationary bikes at the gym.
MICHAEL: There's four?
TIGHE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: Wait a minute. Did you lose one?
JUDITH: Yeah.
MICHAEL: ‘Cause he is insisting on "five" to me. He met one over there, so there is another child to you over there. ‘Cause he is saying, "Five! Five. No there is five." I said, "Alright, then there must be one that was lost then." And he said, "Yeah, absolutely."
I had a miscarriage between Denny, the oldest, and Austin.
MICHAEL: It's so accurate, the stuff they give me. If I am hearing that, then I'm getting that right. But the difficulty is the stuff they sometimes try and show me. And I go "What the heck is this you are trying to show me?” And I just keep going until you get it. And some people are a bit dense and so they don't get it. But you guys, I am going to have a good session with you because you are thinking and you are going, oh, I bet that is that and you will confirm it, ah yeah, you know, and that's how it works, you see. ‘Cause I mean, I'm good, but I don't see everything perfectly clear sometimes, so I don't know exactly what they are trying to show me. These pyramid things, are they new? He says, "Some new thing Dad's into here." So are you selling them on the internet?
TIGHE: No.
MICHAEL: What do you sell on the internet? He says, "Dad sells stuff on the internet." He says, "Why don't you sell some stuff on the internet?" [Laughter]
MARTI: Business advice from the other side.
MICHAEL: Business advice from son on the other side. He says, ‘Cause he's got the heads up. Do you have a web site? I guess you've got to get a little web site. Now, these pyramids are hand made?
TIGHE: What he may be thinking about is the sun calendar. I've been thinking of selling them on the internet. Casting them and selling them.
Many years before Tighe had sculpted, cast, and painted Mayan calendars. He advertised them over the internet and sold them to an interior designer. Austin was suggesting that he give it another try.
MICHAEL: Why don't you? Why don't you make yourself a website and sell stuff on the internet? You are very creative. "Do it! Do it!" Is there a Mayan thing connected to that?
TIGHE: Yes.
MICHAEL: He says, "Go on and get on it, Dad!" Is there somebody who is ill at the moment that is here? That he would be close to. Is anybody having cancer issues?
JUDITH: I am having tests done [for the hole in my head].
MICHAEL: What do you mean? Like biopsy or something? Okay, he might be bringing this up. He knows about this and he says, “Don't sweat it, mum, it's benign. It's benign. Don't sweat it, mum.” He is looking after you.
I was having CT scans, MRIs, lab tests, and a PET scan, and unknown to me at the time of this reading, all the reports came back benign.
MICHAEL: Did you buy new pants the other day? You got stretch pants?
JUDITH: Yeah. I didn't buy them.
MICHAEL: You were looking at them. He says something about mom was looking at these stretch pants or something, these stretchy pants. This must have been-- You just did this.
JUDITH: Well, I had some pants on today and I knocked a cup of tea on them. I tried to wipe them off with a red wash cloth and they just turned red. So I had to take them off and put them in the washer. When I pulled them out, I held them taut and looked at them to see if the tea had stained them. They were white stretch pants.
MICHAEL: And you just did it. He's going on that he saw this. He is going on like this, "I see. I am watching you, Mum. I am around the house. I am watching you." And he will let you know like billy-o he is around so you will feel better. You see. Now, of course he's not going to do this indefinitely on a daily basis, ‘Cause he is going to have to get on with other things over there. But he's absolutely going to come back and see you quite often, as often as he can. And on those times it would be best if you set a time aside or make a special occasion, like once a month set aside “so we can get together.” But of course he is going to pop in when you least expect it, too. And there will be a cool sign that he will give you.
You are cool with him doing all the talking, your son?
TIGHE and JUDITH: Oh, yes!
MICHAEL: There are so many other people here. They are here to help facilitate this to happen. They are saying, "Don't worry! Don't worry. He is here with us." They're all together and he is doing stuff with the favorite people he likes over there. "I am going places and I do stuff over here." He said he was a bit sad at first, because it was a surprise to him. It was a surprise and it took him a little while to get over this. So-- but he realized who he was with and what happened. Because at first he didn't really understand. But it didn't take him long and then he realized he could do things around you, like - to make you aware of him. Do you understand?
You have a wall clock that has stopped. He says, “It stopped once.” Since he's gone? He's talking about a clock that's stopped and the time is significant he says.
JUDITH: After he passed, I started awakening at 2:24 in the morning. Soon after his memorial service, the power went out at 2:24 in the morning. We found out that a tree branch had fallen on the power lines at the Merry Wink signs along our highway. The Merry Wink signs say, "He who drives half asleep is now buried six feet deep." After the power outage we discovered from the police report that 2:24 [a.m.] was the time of his fatal accident.
MICHAEL: Wow! That gives me goose bumps! That's why he's bringing this up. He is saying, "I did that!" That is why he is going on about the clock and the time. I felt like the power or battery went out. This is not a battery clock, but he said it happened exactly at this time and it was me! It was him. It was him. "Who else? Who else? Of course it was me! I do some cool shit! I do some cool shit!"
MICHAEL: Is there a road being resurfaced nearby you? ‘Cause he says, "near you." This is so clear guys. Jabbering away, ‘Cause he says, “Tell them about the road being resurfaced." Is there a cul-de-sac there too? He says, “There is a cul-de-sac nearby." Are they going into the cul-de-sac with the road resurfacing? Are there two bridges?
TIGHE: They are building that highway up above us.
MICHAEL: “And there is like a cul-de-sac nearby,” he says.
TIGHE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: You can get out either way.
JUDITH: Uh huh.
MICHAEL: I have no idea what he's talking about.
JUDITH: You can get out two ways.
The right exit from our neighborhood onto the highway is safer, as I had pointed out to Austin only weeks before his accident.
MICHAEL: Then there must be something significant about the tarmacking. There was a sign given to you around that time too. With the, whew-- with this road resurfacing thing. Go on. Go on. Isn't that right? Has he got that right? Whew-- Is there a house for sale right next to you? Isn't there a for sale sign, like on your street there?
JUDITH: There was a house that just sold.
MICHAEL: ‘Cause he says, there was a house for sale, like on your street. ‘Cause he says, "My dad goes on these walks and it is past the house. And, "It is up toward the road that is tarmacked."
TIGHE: There is a canyon.
MICHAEL: Do you walk near there?
TIGHE: There is a pond where he used to fish, and it goes up there. Leads up there.
MICHAEL: Okay. ‘Cause he says-- ‘Cause he is trying to get me to tell you that when you go out on these walks, that he goes with you. And he walks with you. And you take the dog with you. ‘Cause he says he goes out and walks with the dogs and I walk along with him. So pay attention to the dogs. ‘Cause they may let you know he is there. Okay? They kind of act weird. He says, "Pay attention to the dogs." It must have been cold one evening when you went out and you came back and you went, "Whoa! Should of took a jacket, or something?"
Two bridges are being built for the new highway just up the hill from our home. The construction road going up to the bridge had recently been paved. Just off this road is the cul-de-sac and a pond where Austin and his friends camped when they were in middle school.
Marti reveals her sketch.
TIGHE: That's Josephine. Yeah, my grandmother.
MARTI: Is it?
MICHAEL: That's the lady that was grabbing my attention.
TIGHE: Yeah, that's my grandmother. Yeah.
MARTI: Was she religious? Or--
TIGHE: She was very spiritual.
MICHAEL: Yeah she is. And she, she, she met him. Josephine met him.
MARTI: When they show me this they are saying “religious" or "like a saint."
Marti points to the jewel pendant Josephine is wearing in the sketch. [See photos 23-25.]
JUDITH: We were told that a woman’s hand pulled him from his body, [session with Laurie Campbell] and Josephine had these big muscular hands, strong hands.
MICHAEL: Oh, yeah, that is her. Okay, now I get this. Josephine was right there to meet him. She must have been a very spiritual person, like a spiritualist. Did she do healing or some sort or read tea leaves or something? There is a metaphysical aspect to her.
TIGHE: She was very big hearted. She called herself a peasant.
MICHAEL: Well, I tell you what - a very open minded woman. She has moved on. This lady is far from a peasant. I can tell you that. This was a great woman! Okay? So you have some wonderful people looking after him over there. Okay?
This was particularly reassuring to Tighe who had spent summers with his loving grandmother.
MARTI: She is bird lady.
MICHAEL: I felt somebody had all these birds too. And she's got your bird. She looks after the birds.
TIGHE: She had all the birds.
MICHAEL: Wow! That was a great session. I could do this for hours with him. He's very clear. Very clear. Yeah, I have to stop, I could go on for another hour with him. But know he is around you guys.
Michael said that on the 9th something special would happen and for us to know it would be from Austin. In the early morning hours of the 9th, Christopher got up to go to the bathroom. Returning to his room, while in the hallway, he shouted out with fright, then he mumbled something and returned to bed. The next morning, I asked him what made him yell out in the night. He said he thought he saw a very tall man in the hallway and it frightened him. Actually, Christopher is 6"4" and Austin was 5"11", but if spirit is in another dimension and it is, as some say, only a few feet higher than ours, then a spirit visitor may appear very tall, if you are only looking at their face or head.
Later in the evening of the 9th, Bridgette was sitting outside on a bench near the front door. It was dusk and she thought she saw a shadowy figure about 30 feet away. Austin's dog, Tito, seemed to see it too. The shadowy figure went around the corner of the house with Tito following it. Shortly, Tito returned to Bridgette, now happy and very excited. Bridgette hurried into the house and told us about it.Chapter 12
Tree Trunk, October 4, 2004
Clinton, Austin’s friend, said he woke up in the night clearly remembering all of a long and very detailed dream. Drifting back to sleep he thought he would easily recall this vivid dream in the morning. But when he awoke he only remembered this small part: All of Austin's friends were at our house celebrating some kind of anniversary. Clinton was helping us move a big heavy tree trunk. With great effort we struggled, trying to move it to just the right place, the place that Austin would want it to be.
Unknown to Clinton, the previous week we had purchased two willow trees with gift certificates given to us by Ellen and Grayson. It took us a week to decide where to place the trees, finally agreeing and planting them adjacent to the Austin memorial garden in front of the sunroom. We selected willows because they were like the tree that Austin and his friends spent most of their summers climbing in and swinging from - the willow tree at our old house. Austin used to refer to the willow tree as a “rain tree.“ Austin wrote a paper about those precious childhood days climbing and playing in that tree. [See appendix.]
After Clinton shared this dream with me, I told Clinton about our previous experiences with fallen tree branches - this seemed to be a common theme. The tree keeps growing even when some branches die and fall, but a tree trunk has lost all it's branches. Did the big heavy tree trunk represent the tremendous burden of grief that each of us now carried, a load too heavy for any one of us, alone? Was Austin helping us to find the perfect place to lay it down together? Was Austin communicating to Clinton our efforts to plant the young trees in just the right spot? Was this another way of affirming to Clinton and to me that he is indeed watching us and from out of what we think of as death comes life?
Reaffirms His Presence
October 10, 2004, I noted in my journal that I was up three times in the night. Each time I could hear the music we played at Austin's memorial. It was the IZ, singing "In This Life" from the CD "Alone in IZ World," by Israel Kamakawiwo'ole, also known as the IZ.
" In this life, the only thing that mattered has come true, that I was loved by you."
IZ died at a young age from congestive heart failure. He was aware he was dying when he made this CD of beautiful songs. On the CD he describes how his family will gather together in heaven.
In this next dream, I was engrossed in a work project. All of my attention was on this project (now I cannot remember what that was). Just before awakening, my attention drew away from what had occupied all of my attention and I saw an 11-12 year-old Austin in the background some 20 feet away. Although I had not noticed he had been there all along.
World Traveler, Tighe's Dream, October 18, 2004
I went to sleep in the afternoon at around 3:30. I was anticipating a 2-1/2 hour nap before getting ready for work. I had been working in the yard, gathering wood, taking down clothes from the line, plus some other little chores. I was frustrated that time was running out before I should go to bed. [Tighe works nights.] I then thought that such self-complaining was probably pretty petty.
During my sleep I had a dream that someone was calling out: "Mr. O'Neal! O'Neal!" I thought that our neighbor was approaching our back patio door. I think Christopher, Judith, and I were hurrying to the back door. The dreamer's viewpoint was somewhat to the right of "Mr. O'Neal." A figure arrived at the patio door wearing a wet rain suit with a hood and carrying a large wet duffel bag [the weather had been windy, chilly, and rainy]. The figure pushed the duffel bag through the narrow opening of the sliding patio door. He seemed to fall backward after the exertion of pushing the bag forward. He lay there laughing. I offered him a hand up. After rising back up, still laughing, he pushed back the hood - and it was Austin! I wanted to ask him a question. I think that he was telling me to lighten up.
Failed Love Test
Friday morning, October 28, 2004, I had been doing an exercise to improve dream recall and help facilitate astral travel. The exercise included bringing a whole glass of water to the bedside and drinking half before going to sleep at night. Then gently rolling my eyes up while inviting my spirit guides and angels to help me leave my body and travel to see Austin and then to safely return to my body. I gave myself the suggestion that when I awoke and drank the other half glass of water I would have complete recall of the dream or “visit” with Austin.
Just before the alarm went off this morning, I dreamed that Austin was here. He was 11-years-old and he was in a wheelchair. He was visiting and all through the dream, it felt really good to be with him. It seemed so normal as if these were frequent visits. Then he said it was time for him to go. He asked if he could take a breakfast bed tray with him. I showed him several that we had and he picked the best one. I did not want him to take the best one. I thought how he would not need it in heaven, that we had bodies and may need it. When I awakened I felt ashamed that I had been so selfish and I had failed this test of my love for him.
Although we like to think of ourselves as perfectly magnanimous parents - in reality there is no such thing as perfect. We are only humans with human frailties. Perhaps the dream was a reminder to me to not always expect perfection from myself when I review our life together. Or perhaps the dream was a signal that I needed to begin to focus more on my earthly children.
Figure in the Night
In October 2004 Tighe was working at the hospital when he had a chance to talk to his friend John whose father had recently died. He told him about the mediums, Michael and Marti. On the computer he brought up their web page at www.spirit.art.com. He showed him the spirit portraits drawn by Marti during sessions. They were talking about their experiences with messages from "departed" family members. As they talked, Tighe caught a glimpse of a form, which seemed to be made of spider web or white string, move across his peripheral vision field to the right. Tighe got up and moved in that direction looking around for a patient, but did not find anyone. He told his friend about it at the time.
Changes Forms, November 8, 2004, Tighe's dream?
On the morning of November 8, 2004, I got up and told Judith that I had a dream about Austin. This was not a total deep dream state. I was dreaming, but still held on to some conscious inquiry and control. I was sitting, in the dream, in our chair near the patio door. I saw someone standing across the room holding a baby (Baby Scott?).
This person was holding the bundled baby in a vertical position, moving it up and down. I was concerned that the baby might be getting jostled and spoke up about this. I then realized that the person holding the baby was - Austin. It was his way of joking with me - teasing. He had a very neat buzz cut and was dressed very attractively in black and grey. He was smiling broadly. He reached out his hand and shook mine. I asked him if he had been working on things - did he have some projects going? (I had made some pronouncements about this a few days before at work, that they have projects over there, and seemed to feel Austin acknowledging the truth of this.) He did not speak, but still smiling, seemed to instantly drop his visual form - his recognizable form - and turned into a multi-color, plasma-like form, which spanned numbers of dimensions at the same time. I seemed to understand this at once. I was glad that he was so happy and active - having fun.
Chapter 13
Bahamas, Michael and Marti, Third Session, December 2, 2004
As soon as I found out that Michael and Marti were returning to Reno, I called Pathways and booked a session. Since Michael said he was really better as he grew more tired, I booked the last session on Friday afternoon. Tighe, Bridgette, and I browsed the pleasant little book store while we waited our turn. Ushered into a small corner of the store we sat down across from Michael and Marti, who now seemed like dear family friends. Unaware of how much they now mean to us, they are warm, sincere, open, nothing pretentious. As Marti says, it is completely natural [seeing and hearing spirits].
MICHAEL: Was there anybody-- Wait a second. This is really weird. You didn't get the sign where the clock stopped? That's you, isn't it? That's you that I told last time, isn't it. That's it. I know it's him. That's it. Like with the wink!
JUDITH: Yes. The wink.
MICHAEL: That's it! That's it. That was you! Right? You know, come on and trust me - he can do anything, this kid, this guy. Alright. You bought new jeans.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: You can’t get into the old ones, or something? [Laughter]
BRIDGETTE: I know.
MICHAEL: He's just messing with you. I said, “What do you want to say to your sister? I know you want to mess with her.” He said, "Tell her she had to buy new jeans, because she can’t get into the old ones." [Laughter] He's just messing with you, “As you can see, I m fine!"
BRIDGETTE: I just went shopping and I tried on like big ones. [Bridgette had just been shopping and trying on jeans immediately before this session.]
MICHAEL: New make-up, too? Is this new stuff? He says this is new. [Pointing to Bridgette’s lashes.] Yeah. It comes off easier?
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: Yeah. I know. "I've been watching you," he says. “It comes off easier.” You don't have anything on your back do you? You've got a tattoo!
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: He never mentioned this before? Well, he is now. You know how he was showing me that? He was showing me - you in the bedroom looking in the mirror at this tattoo. Did you just do this recently?
BRIDGETTE: It was a year ago.
MICHAEL: It was a year ago? You were like doing this all the time after you had it done.
MICHAEL: He's like: "Oh, my God, it's bigger than I thought it would be." Was it bigger than you thought?
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
The first thing Bridgette did when she turned 18 was to get a tattoo, two sea turtles swimming toward the sun. She traced the engraving of the ancient Hawaiian petroglyph, etched onto the box that held Austin's ashes. [See photos 2 and 3.] Bridgette’s tattoo was on the back of her right shoulder which was covered by her shirt. That did not stop Michael from demonstrating as if he was holding a mirror the same way Bridgette had done to see the tattoo reflected in the mirror behind her.
MICHAEL: Uhm. And you've rearranged your room. You just did this, you rearranged your room. Go on. Is this different? He is talking about the hair thing, about the hair.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
Bridgette had recently cut and highlighted her hair.
MICHAEL: Unh huh. Go on. He says, "I've been watching you, Sis! I've been watching you."
MICHAEL: You’re taking something. Medicine or something. What's this you're taking? He says you are taking some stuff. Do you have a congestion thing then?
JUDITH: Yes.
Just minutes before beginning this session I went out to the car and used my asthma inhaler. Michael demonstrated as if he was using an inhaler.
MICHAEL: I guess that is what this is about then. Who went on the plane trip recently, you? You don't like heights? You don't like planes?
BRIDGETTE: No, I do.
MICHAEL: There is something he wants to bring up here. Go on. He like pinched you or something. Or poked you. And I said, “Oh, you mean her?” And he says, “Yeah.” And I says, “What?” And he says, “Tell her about the plane trip.” Did you just get back?
BRIDGETTE: No, that's why I missed the session last time.
MICHAEL: Oh, because of the plane trip. That's why he is pinching you. [Laughter] Ah, that makes sense. I see. I see. You hadn't got back in time, or something. Is that it? Oh, you had to go out of town. I see. I see. What-- what are you doing? You went east . . . The Bahamas. For two weeks. You were there two weeks. He says you were there two weeks.
It was quite apparent in this reading that Austin was with Bridgette on the two week trip to the Bahamas. Always ready for a good time, Austin described many details of Bridgette’s experiences in the Bahamas, some she had shared with me before the reading and some she elaborated on after the reading. It confirmed what we had heard before that Austin was keeping up with Bridgette and was looking out for her.
MICHAEL: “Yeah! I know. Yeah, anything you need to know I'll tell you.” Your brother will tell you. [Laughter] Oh, you went with your boyfriend?
BRIDGETTE: No.
MICHAEL: Really? Wait a minute. He was here. You've got your boyfriend here? Was there a fellow there kind of keen on you, while you were there? You don't have to play this [tape recording of the session] for your boyfriend.
BRIDGETTE: No, he knows. [Laughter] Am I red?
MICHAEL: Do you have something new here? [Points to Bridgette’s pendant necklace.] Is this something new? You know the fella' that was trying to pick you up in the Bahamas, did he have a kind of chain or a like a medallion or something? A gold chain.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: It's like a heavy chain? He is hairy. Has a hairy chest or something? He’s an older guy.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah, yeah.
MICHAEL: Come on, come on. Yeah, yeah, you know this.
BRIDGETTE: Oh, my God!
MICHAEL: It was like “Mr. Medallion man” was trying to pick you up or something. This is an older guy, right?
BRIDGETTE: Yep.
MICHAEL: Yeah, ‘Cause he is showing me, like Mr. Medallion man is trying to pick you up.
MARTI: Your brother probably urged him on.
MICHAEL: I bet your brother was so messing with you out there. Did you go with someone though? You went with girlfriends.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: Were your girlfriends being bad? Like egging them on or teasing you or something?
BRIDGETTE: Oh yeah, they were all teasing me.
MICHAEL: I feel like your friends were setting you up or messing with you, like there was a lot of playing around just for fun.
Soon after Bridgette’s return from the Bahamas she told me about how the guide who took them all over the island wore low cut shirts showing off a huge bling-bling medallion on a gold chain hanging over his very hairy chest. He constantly flirted with Bridgette and insisted she ride up front with him. Her girlfriends had teased her about it. And now Austin was teasing her about it, too!
MICHAEL: This is also for you guys, you understand. Because she didn't come last time, he just wants to talk to her so she knows and gets the picture. And you had the music up really loud. didn't you?
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: What did you do, have like a party there or something? Yeah, you did. You had it up loud, didn't you? Yeah, you did. Yeah, you did. [Laughter] Because I see someone coming knocking on the door, like “Can you keep the noise down?” You understand?
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
Bridgette confirmed that the music was so loud the neighbors came to the door to complain.
MICHAEL: So you went out on a boat trip. A small boat. He says you “went out on a small boat.” Didn't you? Did you round the island or something?
BRIDGETTE: Unh uh.
MICHAEL: He is saying “a small boat. Not one of those paddle boat things.” Go on. Go on.
BRIDGETTE: No, actually, I don't think we ever went on a boat.
MICHAEL: Hold on a minute. Yeah, you did. “You went out on a small boat,” he says. Yep! I am going to stick to what he is telling me, I don't care what you say.
This was a group snorkeling trip - more of a raft than a boat - so Bridgette did not get the connection right away.
MICHAEL: Who had the liver problems recently. He is talking about eating liver or liver problems.
I had just started a new medication. Much later after this reading I had to stop the medication when I found out that it was causing me liver problems.
MICHAEL: You didn't go in the water much while you were there.
BRIDGETTE: Uh, no.
MICHAEL: There is someone who wouldn't go in the water because they were afraid of sharks. One of your friends.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah, two of 'em.
MICHAEL: I said, "What are you talking about? "And they are like, "Ooh! The sharks! There might be sharks!” And you are like, "Nay, nay, that's fine!” And you are out like fifty yards or something and they are like: “Oooh! The sharks! The sharks!” And you were way out and they wouldn't go in.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah, they were like hanging onto the raft and they wouldn’t go.
Bridgette took off exploring while a couple of the girls were afraid to leave the raft.
MICHAEL: Exactly. And one of them is blonde, got very fair hair. Oh, this is your best friend. I said, “Who you talking about?” He said, “The best friend, she's got like blonde hair.” So you two are the conspirators, huh? Yeah, I think so. It is alright, mum, you can relax, they weren't too bad while they were out there. Because he was spying on you guys. You understand? Well, you needed it. You needed it. You were thinking about him while you were out there? I know, he said that. He said, “She was thinking about me while she was there.” That's why he was bringing it all up, you understand? ‘Cause you needed this break, you needed to get away. And he wants to let you know that he was there with you.
I think he would of liked that holiday if he had been there. He's kind of a party animal, your brother. He likes your friend with the blonde hair, your brother. She's single? He must like her.
TIGHE: He's mentioned her before.
MICHAEL: He has? He must like her. Yeah, say, “Hi!” to her.
BRIDGETTE: She's dreamt about him before though.
MICHAEL: Has she really? Well then, he must be coming to her then. Tell her he likes her. Say,“Hi!” Okay? Uhm. Go on. Go on.
You have been having things going on with lights. He's talking about lights. There was a lightening or thunderstorm while you were there.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: Yeah? I said, “It looks like a thunderstorm, not lights.” And he said, "Yeah, it is. They had a thunderstorm while they were out there.” It was neat, huh?
BRIDGETTE: Yeah, it was so cool!
MICHAEL: So you were out there like, "Whoaaa!” And there was like, “Craeechhhhkkkk, kuichkk!” That's it! That's what he says. He's going on about this holiday thing.
Bridgette called me the night they arrived in the Bahamas and told me they were welcomed to the islands by a powerful thunderstorm. She said she felt Austin was with her while they stood outside in awe of the spectacular thunder and lightening show.
MICHAEL: So your friends didn't give you a chance to get sad about him.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: Which is a good thing. It's a good thing. Is he the sort of guy that wears his heart on his sleeve, your brother? He says, “Heart on my sleeve.” That's him.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: That's your brother. That's how I feel with him. He wants to know how Pop’s doing? How are you doing? Are you holding up alright? You have been inventing things a lot. How is your inventing doing?
TIGHE: You had mentioned something about a radio. I found the ITC and there is Dr. Bodkin’s who does the eye movement, that people have experiences with-- You know people from the other side - it goes to the most traumatic and it's quick, it clears it up. Have you heard about Tom and Lisa Butler in town?
MICHAEL: I've got that little radio and I’m so busy and tired I don't get to use it. But of course it works, of course. I figure what are they going to say to me that I can’t hear anyway? I should take a picture of it and put it on the web site. Hold on a minute. . . .
MICHAEL: Who's John? His name sounds like John to me. [This is Tighe’s friend, John. See Spider Drops In, Chapter 10]
TIGHE: I have a friend, John.
MICHAEL: Would he know him?
JUDITH: No.
MICHAEL: Oh. Hold on, maybe this person is here for John, and wants to say hello to John. You understand? Was this in an accident, also?
TIGHE: John had a friend who passed [in a car accident].
MICHAEL: I said to him, "Is this person here and if so how did they cross?" And he said, "Yes, he crossed in an accident." “It's a he?” I said to him, "Have I met John before?" And he said, "No." “I've never met John, have I?” “He's not sat with me," I said. And he said, "No, you haven't." This is a vehicle accident, a car accident, though - like a car accident. John's friend. There is a head trauma. Because he said a head trauma. I said, "What is the injury?" And he said, "Head trauma." Tell John that you say hello from this fella'. And that your son brought him in. Okay? Did you just talk to John?
TIGHE: I talked to him about this.
MICHAEL: Does John have a lot to do with cars? He like tinkers with-- I feel like - tinkers with or messes with cars. [John is a common name so for clarification, spirit gave this additional identifier of John.]
TIGHE: John has a little MG he works on.
MICHAEL: Are your hands cold? You don't have any gloves.
BRIDGETTE: I do.
MICHAEL: You forget them.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah, I wasn't going to bring them in here. I just bought those too (today). [Laughter.]
MICHAEL: You just bought them, but you forgot them. [Laughter.] I mean he just said to me to - "Tell her, her hands are cold." I said, "Alright." [Laughter.] You know guys, you think to yourselves, I mean some people sit here, he's still here, obviously, he is still standing there. Uhm, he's winking, he's winking. He says, "That was me, Mom. That was me! You know that thing I told you," he says, "That was me!"
Austin referenced the power outage resulting from fallen tree branches at the Merry Wink signs at 2:24 a.m. [Same time as his fatal accident.]
Okay, what I was going to say to you, is that people sometimes come and they expect things from me. Like - they expect a message from their guide or this or that or this specific thing that I am going to say that is going to make this all happen for them. To me it is just like, “Hey, how you doing? What's the weather like?” You know what I mean. That's what its like for me. Half the time for me its like, “Tell my sister this. Oh, yeah, by the way -” blah, blah, blah. “What you doing - hanging out? What you doing?” It's like that! That's how I see it. It's just like-- that's how it feels with him. That's how it feels with your brother. You know? What's he going to talk about anyway - what you're not doing? [Laughter]
Why is he going on about buttons? Were you doing something with buttons the other day? He is showing me something-- with you sewing on buttons. Why is he going on about buttons here? You sewing on buttons?
Michael pointed to Judith’s button on her sweater. Next to the button was the bead necklace with Austin's treasures on it.
JUDITH: Well, the last time we were here you said that something was missing from these things [the necklace]. You mentioned that last time. He said that something was missing. So I got the missing thing and sewed it on here.
MICHAEL: Is that his?
JUDITH: Yeah.
MICHAEL: That's his. It's an Eskimo thing. [Pointing to the whale bone hook that I had sewn onto the beaded necklace.] This belonged to him. Okay, because he is talking about sewing something on, and he's making me look near the buttons or something. Something was missing and you had put it on. He had said something was missing. And he tried to get me to look at the buttons. And you just sewed it on. Oh, that? And I just thought he must be talking about a button or something. He knows you just did that then. He made me look at it earlier, and I thought that is unusual, but I didn't know why he made me look at it. Okay? You’ve been doing meditation work.
TIGHE: Yeah, uh.
MICHAEL: Can you hear him? He says he's been talking to you and you've been catching stuff from him. You understand? What is this smell? I can smell a strong smell. You‘re burning incense in the house or something. Perfume candles or something. Because he says he can smell it. It's not lavender, is it? I can smell lavender. He wants to put it with you [Judith].
JUDITH: I take lavender baths. And it's real aromatic. [I have lavender soap and bubble bath.]
MICHAEL: Yeah, he says, there is a strong smell of lavender in the house. Okay? Also, I want to say like vanilla, which is like candles.
I often light a scented candle on the table near his picture.
MICHAEL: Now is there anything you want to ask him? Everything is pretty cool, isn't it?
JUDITH: I want to know what he is doing besides watching us. I really want to know what he is doing. I know he is with us. I want to know what else he is doing.
MICHAEL: Okay, okay. Did he goof off a lot when he was at college or school? He did. He did, he's telling me. Well, he says he's kind of studying a bit more. ‘Cause he used to goof off a bit when he was here. But he is not like that now, he's paying attention. Go on. Go on. Who does Biology? Would he be interested in biology?
JUDITH: His brother. That's his lab.
MICHAEL: He's talking about Biology. Oh, that's his brother?
Christopher, now a senior in high school, was enrolled in college level courses and attended the University for the Biology lab. [See photo 30.]
MICHAEL: What are you doing? Oh? No, no, no! What are you doing? I think he likes traveling. I said, “What are you doing?” He said, “Well, I go to all kinds of places.” He's kind of religious. He has a spiritual bent. Let's put it that way. In a kind of religious-- he likes studying religious-- different religions and different stuff. And he said, “I go traveling” and uh-- “I go traveling and I kind of--.” And he studies. But he studies how people-- how different people look at different things, how-- like, what makes people tick. You understand? Like, what? What? And future events. “Because when I come back-- I'll be back--” he says, “There’s a lot to do!” Hmmm. He said, “When I come back it is going to be tough!” Hmm. I think if he was here he would be into this, wouldn't he?
JUDITH: Yes.
MICHAEL: Like, if he had a friend there, he’d be here. That's the way, I feel with him. When he was here, I don't feel like he found his feet, like-- he found what he wanted to do. He didn't have a goal? I feel like, “I didn't really know what I wanted to do,” when he was here. Do you understand? Going from one thing to another with him, kind of thing.
Who is into Buddhism?
TIGHE and JUDITH: He was.
We found Austin’s book on Buddhism in his belongings. I recalled when Austin was 15 Tighe took him to watch a Buddhist monk make an intricate mandela from colored sand. After finishing the elaborate rainbow colored mandela, the monk carried it to the river and brushed it into the rushing waters, a lesson in impermanence. Austin saved a small amount of that sand in a little bottle, which was left among his belongings.
MICHAEL: He's talking about that. He's like-- gone to Tibet. You understand? [My “Leaving Tibet” dream.] Like going there. He says, “I’m progressing, slowly, but just like everything, it is not easy.” I think he is trying to put into practice some of the things that he knew here, but he didn't apply. You understand? So what he is doing over there is that he is actually working on some of the things that he knew here but he never kind of applied it. It's kind of a book-- he's a book learned person, but he doesn't apply it while he is here. Does that make sense? So when you cross over, nothing has changed. You don't instantly become enlightened because you crossed over there. You still have to work at it. You still have to do things. You have to study. You have to apply yourself. And that's what he is doing. Okay. He is a strong thinker, he's a-- Go on. He didn't have a girlfriend when he was here. . . . Like for a year or two? So he didn't really have a regular girlfriend, did he? He is talking about meeting someone over there that he likes, that he hangs out with. I said, “Am I right here?” And he said, “Yep.” ’Cause I see him going to like see some people, spiritual people. And he is sitting there in the crowd, and he is listening and studying, and he is really applying himself. Do you understand? He is not just sitting around in some bough of a tree. He is applying himself and he is moving on, you see. And “you would be proud” of him, he says. You’d be proud of him. Tell mom, “She’d be proud of me.” Was he a little bit depressed when he was here? Mood swings, I feel like a little moody. And there is a sense of his not feeling able to do anything about it, the situation or the thing, so things would depress him. You understand? Does that make sense to you?
Austin may have had a difficult time when he and his high school girl friend broke up - more than a year before Austin’s fatal accident.
MICHAEL: But now he doesn't feel that way, he has the ability to change things. And so he's attentive to all these things that he goes to. So he is hanging out with some cool people, some neat people over there. He said they are like guides.
Are you interested in vehicles that use different fuels? . . . He is showing me vehicles and stuff that are ahead of their time that they already have over there. And he is showing me that you are interested in advanced vehicles, that you are interested in this. And he is bringing this up. Okay? So he says, if you need any help, he is there. But he is showing me some pretty cool vehicles over there.
Austin and his dad used to talk about how to convert our cars to alternative fuels, like hydrogen.
MICHAEL: He says, “They've got everything over here, Dad. Some pretty cool stuff!” Hmm. Huh. He is showing me a little thing on my wrist, it is like a little TV and you can view past events on it. That's pretty cool. I have never seen this before, but he is saying, “You can view past things with it, your life, you can view past things with it.” Why is he showing me throwing the ball through the hoop?
BRIDGETTE: Denny.
MICHAEL: Can he get it pretty much every time? Bamm! Say hello to the older brother for him. Okay, so he is going on about this to me. And I don't think it is the tall friend, it's his brother. He eats too much? Go on. Tell him, “He eats too much, from me, okay!”
Denny was playing city league basketball. Austin was teasing Denny about his weight.
MICHAEL: Who would B-u-d-d be? Buck. It's a B-u-- Buddy. Is there an animal with a name like this?
BRIDGETTE: A dog named, Buddy! Steven’s dog is named Buddy.
MICHAEL: Then he is-- Is the dog here? And also Steven’s here? Are these friends of his?
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
MICHAEL: The one who plays basketball, your brother would know him as well.
BRIDGETTE: Yeah.
Denny frequently watched basketball at his friend Steven’s house. “Buddy” was Steven’s dog.
MICHAEL: I guess this is, “Hi!” to him then. Tell him, “Hi! from me too!” Are you doing yoga? [Bridgette was taking yoga lessons.]
BRIDGETTE: I was.
MICHAEL: He says, “Do yoga and you will get new jeans.” [Laughter.]
MICHAEL: Alright! High five from your bro!
JUDITH: Thank you so much. That was really great!
Marti revealed the sketch. It looked like Tighe’s great aunt. Unknown to us at the time of the reading, Fanny had just recently died shortly after her100th birthday.
Chapter 14
Seeming to know when we are feeling low, loved ones in spirit send another encouraging sign, a 2:24 wake up call, power blip, or blinking light.
Wake Up - It's 2:24!
New Years Eve, December 31- January 1, 2005, Tighe stayed up late watching a DVD of "Return of the King," which he had just received for his birthday. He loved J. R. R. Tolkien’s, The Trilogy, having read it to the boys when they were little. A fire was going in our wood stove, visible through the tempered glass door. Suddenly the firelight flashed brighter. He looked in that direction and saw the flame roaring very rapidly, burning bright white. He thought that the stove door had been latched for some time, but it was now unlatched, allowing a stiff draft to shoot across the fire. Tighe noted, the time was 2:24. The flashing firelight event coincided with the "cracks of Doom" scene near the end of the film.
Peripheral Vision
Always thinking of Austin, but more so during the anniversary time, in January 2005, on three different occasions I saw a figure of a man in my peripheral vision, but when I turned my head to look more carefully, the figure was gone.
De Ja Vu
January 9, 2005, Judith's Visit
Sleeping soundly, again I was awakened by the sudden stillness caused by another power outage. The fan in our room was off. The house was completely silent and dark. After a minute or two, I woke Tighe up to witness. I asked him what time it was. He checked his watch, it was 2:27 a.m. Another hello from Austin, similar to the power outage that happened after Austin's memorial, caused by a tree branch falling on the Merry Wink sign along highway 395. The first time the power company was very cooperative in giving the details of the cause of the power outage, so the next Monday morning Tighe called the power company to inquire about the cause of this most recent outage. This time they were not very helpful, only telling him that a power line was affected by snow. We were having record setting snow storms that weekend.
Austin's Parents?
Sunday, January 16, 2005, I recall a dream from earlier in the week, the third anniversary of turning off life support. In the dream Tighe and I were trying to convince Austin that we were his parents. Austin was about 25-years-old, filled out, "burly" and had shoulder length curly hair. He was dressed in winter clothing with a muffler about his neck. It seemed he knew us but did not accept us as his parents. Perhaps a signal of the change in our relationship; relationships in the spirit dimension are more egalitarian, less hierarchal. Although all are connected, all are equal in the eyes of God.

The Farmhouse
One day after prayer and meditation Tighe had this vision.
I approached a large farmhouse with a long, wide porch running the length of the house, with a wide, high set of stairs between the ground and the porch. I believe that I was moving up the steps when I felt myself being hugged. I and another were like a single cloud of golden light. In wonderment, I soon felt that it was Austin. Standing on the steps and then up on the porch, I could see Austin standing there beside me. He was full of golden light and could catch every suggestion of this light that was available in the mellow yellow sunlight. His eyes were clear and full of transparent gold. His facial expression was so relaxed and peaceful and loving. He did not have to speak with his mouth, he "glowed" messages over to me. We walked over to a tree, and two smaller balls of golden light moved toward the tree. There were moving tendrils or veins of gold moving in these clouds. Light was coming out of the clouds. Austin communicated that these were Daisy and Sparkles. I saw their bodies moving within the light. I saw their faces, and then felt their tongues and breath on my face and hands. Other small balls of light also moved closer. I saw Jenny, Mayor, Silky Mouse, Jade and Tank, and every pet I could call to mind were arriving: Cleo, Murphy-- All these and many more beings were close by in the light and air and could materialize easily, peacefully, and in perfect health and happy energy.
I was concerned about the limited time given to me to stay there. I asked Austin how he was able to work the signs he has been giving to us and to others. Being there, I could not imagine how one would go about making that limb fall in Judith's sister's backyard, or the ones that fell on the power lines above the Merry Wink sign, etc. It was obvious that Austin was connected with everything.
We exist in a level of consciousness that seems to be tacked - out in time. We're either leaving people and situations behind or anxious about something else arriving. It is never there all at the same "time."
Back to the question of signs, how is it done? Nothing is lost to Austin. He is connected to all. Everything that happens is in harmony and is a part of all. Therefore all the signs (maybe) were first potential events balanced on the edge of a feather, requiring the merest nudge to be activated. Or they were chains of potential causation, like cascading dominoes, needing only a slight touch to be activated. Maybe there was special intervention.
For some reason I asked Austin if we could run across the field. We both began running. The running was a speeding, but it did not feel like earthly running because it was so in harmony with all the forces and presences there. Everything willed and cooperated with one's running; not even the wind opposed us. As I go along after this experience, these images seem more and more like jewels (like a rosary) which keeps bringing through fire and information. Perhaps the most important messages have yet to dawn on me.

The President Knows
In February 2005, around the time of the anniversary of Austin's birthday and memorial, the President was on television talking about how he understands loss of life (Iraq war) and how he understands what families feel over the loss of their loved ones. I told Tighe, there was no way the President could know that kind of loss without experiencing it himself. Tighe commented that many of the wounded [soldiers] were coming back with severe head injuries.
Overcome by emotion, somehow I still managed a barely audible, “I have been having regrets over the choices we had to make when Austin was in ICU.” Tighe said he knew. Then he said, "You know Austin hears everything you say; he is listening to you now!" At the exact moment I said, "I know," the lamp began to blink on and off, twinkle, blink, on and off, blink, blink. This continued for about 90 seconds. My weeping turned to laughter, I remember thinking that the bulb was going to blow. Then it stopped, leaving the lamp on. We have never had problems with that lamp before or since that night. Tighe and I both knew that again Austin confirmed not only does he hear us, but he loves us enough to check in with us when we need him the most, announcing his presence in a manner that dispels doubt!
Later in that same week, sitting "out back" by the patio, next to the family room’s sliding glass doors, I told Ellen of this recent blinking light experience. The turtle tank, previously referenced in the second session with Michael and Marti, was on the kitchen counter. [See Michael and Marti, Clock Stops, Session 2.] Tighe opened the patio door and told Ellen and me that the turtle's basking light had suddenly blinked on, off, on, off, and on again.
Hummingbirds
May 13, 2005, several days before our Michael and Marti Parry telephone session with Austin, Tighe was working outside near the patio. He heard a rattle behind the back of his head. Then he heard a whistle from behind his head go from the corner of the house to the patio. He heard it five or six times, before he realized that it was a hummingbird. Communications have come through hummingbirds before. Tighe said he believed that this had been a hello from Austin.
Gravity lessons
Sometimes in my sadness and anger, I asked how could something this difficult to endure even happen in a world planned by a loving God. Perhaps, if I could answer that question, I would be wise indeed and wouldn't need to be here myself, learning more lessons. I know this chapter on gravity lessons may sound as though I believe there is a little spirit causing us to sometimes slip on a banana peel, which does sound ridiculous, but there has been a trend of connections between our saddest moments - our dwelling on how we feel it was our fault and some obvious gravity lessons. The message being - Austin’s accident was caused by gravity, not something we had done or failed to do. However, it does seem that for a while someone was trying to drive this lesson home to both of us.
Arabesque
On October 15, 2002, I was doing the weekly grocery shopping, a job that quite often started me thinking of and missing my son. When I was in this kind of mood, I questioned everything. I replayed the events, looking for a different turn on the path, if we could have changed one small thing - could there have been a different outcome?
Pushing the grocery cart through the store, distracted and preoccupied, I came to the part where I blame myself for not giving him more of my time, teaching him to have more caution, for not intervening more about the beer drinking while he and his friends played pool, when a small boy and girl dancing around one of the people giving away samples caught my eye. They seemed playful and reminded me of my children when they were young. The carefree little girl happily twirled around, but lost her footing and fell to the ground, the kind of fall that knocks the wind out of a person. Then there was a long silence. I was expecting to hear her wail out after catching her breath, but she just got up, brushed herself off, and ran to her mother a few feet away.
Witnessing this startled me out of my misery. Immediately, I heard, “accidents happen.” It wasn't his fault. It wasn't my fault. It wasn't anyone's fault. Laurie Campbell said Austin described to her, "things spinning out of control” and “not knowing the consequences."
This gravity lesson was reinforced as I approached the pasta section. Before I touched anything on the shelf, bags of spaghetti began to fall to the floor, one after another. I picked them up and stacked them, but they began to slide and fall again. Eventually, I considered it futile to continue to restack them. More fell to the floor behind me as I moved on. When I passed the bread section bags of breakfast muffins began to fall to the floor without any apparent provocation. OK, OK, I get it!
When I told Tighe about this, he shared his recent "gravity lesson." Tighe was walking the dogs, feeling pretty low, longing for Austin, regretting what happened, and blaming himself. Suddenly, his footing slipped, and although he desperately tried to recover his balance, he spun around and fell backward, hitting the ground very hard. He was not injured, but he did see a similarity in what just happened and Austin's fatal accident, again driving home how accidents do happen and how Austin did not want us to blame ourselves.
Pumpkin Pie
December 29, 2002, the anniversary of the accident and Austin's passing was fast approaching when I had another gravity lesson. I was revisiting my feelings of guilt and “what if?” I was also baking a pumpkin pie. I checked the pie in the oven, it looked done. While taking it from the oven the aluminum pie tin bent a little and the entire contents slipped into the oven spilling out onto the oven door and the floor. What a big mess! After trying to clean up the hot oven and floor the best I could, I took the ice cream out of the freezer. It leaped out of my hands. After rescuing the ice cream I tried to put it back into the freezer and it slipped right out of my hands again.
Again seeing the connection between self blame and these "gravity lessons," I had to agree it wasn't my fault, it wasn’t anybody’s fault, accidents happen.

Spilt Milk
On the morning of December 31, 2002, Austin visited Tighe for another gravity lesson:
I was pouring a small glass of milk. Unintentionally, a bit of milk missed the glass and made a puddle on the brown tiled counter top. I brought a dish cloth over to clean up the spill. As I lifted the milk jug which was sitting behind the glass, the bottom of the plastic jug seemed to have caught the lip of the glass and caused the entire glass to overturn and spill the contents down the front of the cabinet and onto the floor.
Rinsing and wiping repeatedly, I cleaned the spilled milk starting from the counter top down. Nearing the floor, I began mopping the cabinet doors. I seemed to have disturbed a black widow spider which had been living out of sight. It swung out and dropped in the middle of the milk puddle on the floor. I picked the spider up by enveloping it in the wash cloth. I took the spider away from the house and released it into a sheltering plant. It was a large, shiny-black, adult animal. The last evening Austin was home, a black widow spider had made a web in a kitchen cabinet. Instead of killing it, Austin rescued it and took it outside to the back of our property.
Pear Harvest
Once in a while, it seems I still need a reminder. October 6, 2005, this year we had a large pear harvest from the fruit trees in our yard. I was slicing the pears for pies. A huge bowl full of cut up pears was sitting in my lap. I was again in a tearful, remorseful mood-reliving our ICU experience and the loss of Austin. I began to get up from the chair and somehow the huge bowl slipped from my grasp, and no matter what I did to try and recover it, all of the contents fell onto the carpet.
After several of these types of experiences, when my grief turns to blaming myself, I find myself declaring out loud, "And I don't want any more gravity lessons either!"
Chapter 15
Telephone Session with Michael and Marti, Session 4, May 15, 2005
We decided to have a phone session with Michael and Marti, who claim they are as gifted and accurate by phone as they are in person. We were not disappointed, they were just as personable and on target in the phone session as they had been in our previous sessions. Bridgette planned to join us, and although she had a hard time deciding which to do, at the last minute she decided to go with Nate to a birthday celebration, a barbecue for his cousin. Tighe and I set up a speaker phone in our bedroom. I gathered a few of Austin’s treasures around us and wore his black felt prom hat, hoping that these things might help call him in to us. (Now I believe that Austin comes to the readings for us and bringing some of his things is not really necessary. His attachment is to us and not to his things.)
MICHAEL: He says there is a book, something about writing a book. It's about him, he says.
JUDITH: Yes.
MICHAEL: And the purpose of this is to help other people who have lost children. And that's why you are going to do it. And how you dealt with it. Is that it?
JUDITH: Yes.
MICHAEL: That's it. This is what he brings up, okay? Have you had this in mind for awhile? Are you starting it already?
JUDITH: Yes.
MICHAEL: Good! Good! He said he is going to help you with this, okay? ‘Cause he said, “You are not too good at writing.” [Laughter] I think he is a joker. I think he is messing around with you.
JUDITH: I am not very good.
MICHAEL: Is he quite good at writing, your son?
JUDITH: Yes.
MICHAEL: I think he is quite good with words, isn't he? I think he is just joking around with you. But, I think he is going to help you with this book.
JUDITH: That would be good, I'm going to need help!
Michael asked us if the reason that Bridgette couldn’t come tonight was because of the kids? I answered yes, assuming that Bridgette’s boyfriend’s niece, to whom Bridgette had developed a strong attachment, would be at the birthday party.
MICHAEL: That's what he's telling me. He's bringing up-- I said, "Why isn't your sister here?” He said, "Because of the kids." You understand? This is what he's bringing up. So say, "Hi!” to her from him, okay? She really wanted to come didn't she?
JUDITH: Uh huh.
MICHAEL: Have you been getting signs from him? He says he's been giving you signs.
JUDITH: Yes, he does.
MICHAEL: Did you get a flower the other day, mum? He says you got a flower.
JUDITH: I got a flower.
MICHAEL: He says its from him.
JUDITH: [Laughter] Is it?
MICHAEL: You understand that?
JUDITH: Yeah.
MICHAEL: He says, "The flower's from me. Did you get the flower?”
JUDITH: Yeah. It was strange, uh, Nurses Week, they gave us each a flower with our face on it. [Laughter]
MARTI: What was that?
MICHAEL: It was Nurses Week or something and she got a flower with her face on it.
JUDITH: That's right.
MICHAEL: Yeah. Go on. Go on. He says he was there. He says he was there. Okay?
JUDITH: I know he is there.
MICHAEL: And there is like a switch board. I mean-- I don't know what you call it, behind the desk. Do you work behind the desk or something in the hospital?
JUDITH: Yes.
MICHAEL: Is there like a switchboard there or something? Like a communications board? I hear a lot of beeps and lights.
JUDITH: Beeps and lights?
MICHAEL: Right near where you work.
JUDITH: I don't know about that, beeps and lights?
TIGHE: Don't you have a screen saver with his picture?
JUDITH: I do.
TIGHE: On her computer screen.
MICHAEL: Oh. I am hearing, "beep" and “lights.”
JUDITH: Oh, that could be the computer, huh?
MICHAEL: Oh, it could be, yeah. Yeah. It's--
JUDITH: I work at a computer.
MICHAEL: In your hospital.
JUDITH: Yeah.
MICHAEL: Oh, I see. I see. In the picture he is grinning. He says he is grinning, in the picture. That's it. That must be what he's talking about, ‘Cause “It's at the hospital,” he says. You understand?
JUDITH: Yeah.
Although I am a nurse, I no longer do direct patient care, but rather work at a desk with a computer and a multi-line phone with half a dozen buttons that beep and light up. I have my family’s pictures on the bulletin board over the phone and next to the computer. After Austin passed I made his photo into the screen saver on my computer.
MICHAEL: Has the picture changed at all? He says the picture changed.
JUDITH: Yes, it did.
MICHAEL: Do you understand what he means? I don't. What is he talking about?
JUDITH: Ask him what he is talking about.
MICHAEL: Well, I think that something weird happened with it. And it changed. But I can't explain it. I feel like-- uhm, I don't know if it changed size or what? I feel like it changed, or something, somehow.
JUDITH: Well, this-- uh, this--
MICHAEL: Is it a different picture?
JUDITH: This guy I work with-- and when I close down my computer, there's a little computer box over his-- my son's face. The picture of my son is the screen saver. But there was a little computer box that was right over his face, and this guy I work with, told me the other day - that he noticed that, so he moved that - the box, so it wouldn't cover his face. [Laughter] I thought that was very nice of him. [More laughter, then a long pause.]
MICHAEL: I think that's it, because he was talking about something small. Like his picture changed.
JUDITH: It was a small box - right across his face.
MICHAEL: Ahh. That must be it, then. Okay. Uhm.
JUDITH: That was last week.
Days before this session, my friend at work noticed that whenever I locked my computer, my son’s face (screen saver) was covered by a small box. Very thoughtfully, he moved the box off of my son’s face, and then told me about it the next day. After my son died, this same friend helped start me on my journey of learning about afterlife experiences by giving me Betty Eadie's first book, Embraced by the Light.
MICHAEL: Are your arms all right? Or wrists. Who hurt their wrists just recently or wrist is hurting them?
JUDITH: My wrists hurt me sometimes.
MICHAEL: He says your wrist hurt. Do they? From like computer work or what?
JUDITH: I don't know if I am sleeping on them funny or if it's computer work. It's not bad, but once in awhile they do. They do.
It was so clear that Austin was watching us; he noticed small things, like how for the past week I had been wondering why my wrists had suddenly become sore.
MICHAEL: Okay. Uhm. So do some stretches, some stretching. You don't do anything do you?
JUDITH: I clean the house.
MICHAEL: “No, that's not exercise,” he says, you've got to do some stretching. Stretching. . . . Uhm. You guys got a dog? Did you just change the dog biscuits or something? Did you change his food? He says, “just changed the dog's food.” “Does he need more biscuits?” or something? Is he pretty skuzzy looking?
TIGHE: Oh, yeah.
MICHAEL: He says the dog looks pretty skuzzy. This must be the one he's talking about, okay?
Something very funny happened the day before this phone session. I was cleaning out the turtle tank and set the turtle in the sun room to run around for a while. Multi-tasking as usual, I got busy and more or less forgot she was out there. A short time later, our dog, Harry, the "skuzzy" looking one, picked up the turtle with his mouth, brought it into the house and layed it down in front of Denny's feet. Harry looked at Denny then at the turtle and then back at Denny, as if to say - look what you nearly let get away! After the phone session, I knew that Austin was making a joke about Harry carrying the turtle in his mouth - the “change in dog food,” a “biscuit!” [See photo 37 of the “skuzzy” dog, Harry, and the “dog biscuit.”]
MICHAEL: Now there was a birthday recently also. He is showing me a cake.
JUDITH: That's where Bridgette is tonight, at a birthday party.
MICHAEL: Oh, he's bringing up the birthday party. The birthday. So that's where she is. Is it for one of the kids?
JUDITH: Uh, yeah.
Again Michael brings up these kids. I didn’t know where he was going with this, but he just couldn’t leave it alone.
MICHAEL: Not her kid. Is it one of the kids of this fella'? Does he have three?
JUDITH: Well, this is his family.
MICHAEL: There are “three children.”
JUDITH: I don't think so.
MICHAEL: Where are the “two girls and one boy?” Does Austin have two sisters?
JUDITH: No.
I did not understand why Michael continued to talk about these kids, two girls and one boy.
MICHAEL: Then this has to do with that family. Go on. Go on. Are there twins anywhere connected to you guys?
TIGHE: I can't think of any off hand.
MICHAEL: I am seeing two little girls who are twins. He is showing me. Okay? And I think it is connected to that family. Anyway, maybe he is telling [me] things you don't know yet. Who knows maybe she is going to have twins. Wouldn't that blow your mind. Anyway this is what he is showing me. Uh, maybe she will have three kids and two of them will be twins. Okay? Now.
Bridgette had gone to her boyfriend's cousin's birthday barbecue the evening of the this phone session. After the session and after Bridgette came home, I asked her how was the birthday party? She said, it was okay, but she wouldn't have had any fun at all if it hadn't been for the two little girls and the little boy with whom she played all evening. The two little girls were very close in age and looked like twins.]
MICHAEL: Something about “cutting” back on “hamburgers.” Who is “cutting” back on “hamburgers“ actually?
This was a reference to my cooking turkey burgers just before the call. The ground turkey was still slightly frozen so with a sharp knife I carefully cut it into hamburger patties before cooking it.
MICHAEL: Outside the house, is there a wall that is broke that needs fixing or something? Why is he showing me some concrete that needs fixing? Did you comment on this the other day? He took me outside and he said, "Where the concrete is." There is something that needs fixing there. And there is like a hole there. Like a big hole or something. [He] said, "You wouldn't want the dog down there, would you?" Is there wooden boards on it at the moment? Plywood or something?
TIGHE: I need to make a cover for a concrete like thing that goes down to our septic tank cover.
MICHAEL: Ahh, that's it! you've got to fix it - make a thing for it.
TIGHE: I've got to make a lid for it.
MICHAEL: “Get to it, Dad!” he says.
TIGHE: Okay.
The hole was about four feet in diameter and about three feet deep.
TIGHE: It is like tempered glass, shower doors that I just pulled over when it started snowing. I didn't want it filling up with snow. So now that the snow is gone, I can put a lid on it.
MICHAEL: You have something temporary over it. Has it got warmer up there now? Just in the last week or something? I don't know, this is what he is telling me. Uhm, so Dad's been chomping at the bit to get out and do some things.
TIGHE: Things are piling up.
Austin seems to be concerned about our home, noticing any changes we made and prompting us to finish our projects. This was not the first time that Austin commented on the homestead in sessions with mediums. In a previous session with Michael and Marti he described the many branches left on the ground after Tighe had to cut them to allow for a truck to come and repair our well. Perhaps it is because Austin is invested here after having done so much work on the place: painting and roofing the house, pulling tiles off the bathroom wall, moving rocks, digging plumbing line trenches, digging holes for trees, raking the rocks and debris out of the culvert after the flood. Commenting on the tree branches was characteristic of Austin. I remember how after I pruned the shrubs around the house, he had asked me why I had done it when they had just started to look good.
MICHAEL: He wants you to know that he feels great! And he's in really good shape over here, okay? He just wants to let you know that. He said, "I've been doing a lot of catching up on things over here." Meeting people that he didn't know that well, now he knows better. I don't know who this is. I said, "Is this like grandparents or somebody?” And he said, "Yeah." So it's like great grandparents and grandparents and that sort of people. . . . You know, he wants to contribute to things in some way. You understand? But he is not sure how he can accomplish this, while he's here, I mean. Now that he's over there he's been looking around and seeing all the things that can be accomplished in different ways and keen when he comes back - you are coming back aren't you? He says, "Oh yeah." When he comes back to accomplish something. He said not yet though. I'm not coming back just yet. Go on. He's very interested in the earth's resources and stuff like that - like ecology, like how to take care of the earth. And this is what he is bringing up. When he comes back he wants to get involved in a big way, ecologically.
TIGHE: There's a need there.
MICHAEL: Yeah, there's a big need. And he understands that now. So-- He said, "I won't be so flaky next time, not flaky, more dreamy. I'll get my hands on-- I'll get down to it quicker.” He doesn't want you guys “to give up” though.
TIGHE: Give up?
MICHAEL: He doesn't want you to give up. He wants you to-- how can I put it? Not give up on life. He wants you to, uhm, “keep your spirits up,” he said. And get involved in all the things you are getting involved in. And I think you're going to get a sign from him. Who has the interest in magic then, like pulling magic out of hats? [See photo 30.]
JUDITH: Maybe it is Chris [Christopher]. He writes, directs, and acts in his own movies. Oh, I know what it is. He [within the past few weeks] bought one of those hats that magicians use to pull stuff out of.
MICHAEL: That's it. That's it - what Marti's drawn, a magician's hat with a rabbit out of it.
JUDITH: Yeah, he wore that [stove pipe hat] at a dance just this past week and in a movie he made.
Christopher recently purchased the "magician's hat" for the prom, but in the preceding week he used it as part of a costume in a movie he was making.
MICHAEL: Like a ball, a party?
JUDITH: Yeah, for the prom.
MICHAEL: That's it, ‘Cause she has drawn like a chandelier as well and that goes with it. No, no, you don't have a chandelier in the house. She draws these pictures but it is my job to interpret them. Does he have a girlfriend? Your son? The one with the hat?
JUDITH: I don't know if he has one girlfriend or several friends that are girls. He may have a girlfriend and not be telling me yet.
MICHAEL: I feel like it has to do with a girl. Marti's drawn a picture of a startled bird. Now I feel like it has to do with a girl.
Among Marti's sketches was a distraught looking bird - the day before the telephone session Bridgette saw a stunned bird in the street next to a neighbor's fence. Bridgette stopped the car and got out to check on the bird. Apparently the bird was not injured, only startled; within minutes it recovered and flew away.
MICHAEL: Also do you have to fix a fence? That's outside? Or is anyone interested in horse riding? [See photo 16.]
TIGHE: No.
MICHAEL: What's this about man? [Directed towards Austin.]
JUDITH: Right behind our house, people ride horses.
MICHAEL: Is there a fence there? A wooden fence?
TIGHE: Yes, there is.
MICHAEL: Is it a little dilapidated?
TIGHE: There was an old fence and the neighbors back there put up new fences, the old fence is there.
MICHAEL: Your son used to go back there didn't he? He gives me the sense of going back to where this fence was. Do you understand this? When he was here, right?
JUDITH: We found his initials on a rock back there.
MICHAEL: Did you?
JUDITH: Yes.
MICHAEL: It is kind of a cool spot for you, isn't it?
JUDITH: Yes, it is.
MICHAEL: You know you kind of go back there and you get a sense of him there. ‘Cause this is where the fence is. And she has drawn this. And it is the old fence, because it was when he was here. Okay? That's what he wants to bring up.
When Marti's sketches arrived in the mail, the fence looked identical to the old fence at the back of our property. Austin used to soak up the sun out there. The lawn chair he used to sit in is still there. I used sit back there just to unwind and relax. Near that fence and near where Austin sat, is a rock with his initials, "A.O." painted on it. We have a clothes line near by. The view of Mount Rose is spectacular out there. I consider hanging out clothes to be my moment of Zen. We always think of him and talk to him when we are out there. Hearing these things from Michael and Marti reassured us that when we experience Austin’s presence he is with us, hears us, and sees us.
MICHAEL: He's also drawn a picture of a lady here. She has wavy hair and it's parted on the side and it's short or pulled back. But I think it's short. You didn't feel anything like it was in bun or anything did you? . . . She kind of, is she not chubby, but full in the face? She's not fat, she's just got nice cheeks.
JUDITH: Cheeky, we were all cheeky.
MICHAEL: Do you understand? And she is giving you a smile here, kind of a closed lips smile, and a cute nose. And this is who she's drawn. Okay?
My aunt, my father’s sister passed over only a few months before this session. Marti’s sketch looked as she did when she was younger. [See photos 35-36.]
JUDITH: Can I ask him if he's seen Jesus or angels?
MICHAEL: Seen Jesus? Hold on. I asked him if he's been anywhere where he might have met him. And he said he has been to temples, some big temples. He said some of these older people go there with him, the grandparents. Some of them must have been into religion. I feel quite religious with them. And they took him to some temples over there. And he says he loves it. I think there's a lot of--what? What? He says they have a lot of music in them. Go on. And they're big! They're big! Massive! He said they would dwarf anything on earth. These temples. He said he is having a great time and you should see what he sees. “But don't be in hurry to get over here. Accomplish what you have come here to do,” he said.
You know sometimes a short life like he had can act like an impetus to decide to do something more aggressively the next time you come in. And that's the feeling he is giving me with this. So he doesn't feel like it was a failure or a waste of time. He feels a little bit pissed at himself that this happened. You know what I'm saying?
JUDITH: Yeah.
MICHAEL: So he is very determined the next time he comes in, he is going to make the most of it. But you know, everyone has karma and you never know when karma is going to hit you. And you've only got to do something stupid and karma can slap you in the kisser. You know what I mean? Give you a slap in the face. So he said he understands why it happened the way it did. And I may not be able to put it into words for you, but this is what he is telling me. Okay?
MICHAEL: Have you had any weird stuff on the answer[ing] machine lately?
JUDITH: Yeah.
TIGHE: Yeah, actually.
MICHAEL: He's bringing this up. I feel like strange messages, like broken messages.
JUDITH: We got something like that.
MICHAEL: Did you not understand it?
JUDITH: We didn't understand it. We always suspect him.
MICHAEL: It's him, he says.
TIGHE: Okay.
MICHAEL: He was attempting to leave a message. It is almost like a little garbled thing and then it breaks off.
JUDITH: That's what it was.
MICHAEL: It's like, "ckree-achshskk" then it hangs up.
TIGHE: Yes.
JUDITH: That's what it was.
TIGHE: Right.
MICHAEL: Well, that's him. Do you understand? He says he attempted to leave a message. Okay.
TIGHE: We suspected he did it.
MICHAEL: Well, this is what he's telling me, anyway. And trust me, your son can do some shit. He can do some stuff. He said, he is fixing to let you know big time! So you are going to get some cool validations, guys. Just keep going the way you are going, okay.
Weeks before this session, a 90 second message was left on our telephone answering machine. The message was garbled, but at the end of it, through the static and cutouts I could make out "I love you guys." The message had a date and time associated with it. I asked our daughter, Bridgette, if she left the message and she assured me on several different occasions that she did not. She was the only one we know who would call and say, "I love you guys." I recorded it onto my computer for analysis. But I was just learning how to use the software and was unable to decipher anything other than, "I love you guys!” at the end of the message.
MICHAEL: Did you just bring some new fake flowers into the house? Who was talking about putting some fake flowers up or something? Or dry flowers. “ I saw you do that,” he said.
A few days before the session I had placed some dried bright blue bachelor button flowers in a vase in front of his picture.
MICHAEL: Well, you're just lucky you have a son that communicates well.
JUDITH: He does do really good.
MICHAEL: He's a damn good communicator.
TIGHE: Well, he's teaching us how to listen, so-
MICHAEL: Well, I'm glad that you do.
JUDITH: We try to do this on our own.
MICHAEL: Well, that's a great thing, you know?
JUDITH: We're using this Bob Monroe Institute, hemi-synch CD's. We're trying to get our brains so we can do this on our own.
MICHAEL: That's good. It's kind of-- of course it won't be like I do for other people, but you will get your own connections, you know.


17-19. When Marti drew this sketch in our first session, Austin said, “Not a bad picture, but I am better looking this!”
20. Austin buzzed his hair for the 1998 high school graduation trip with his friends to Hawaii.

21. Austin at a water fall in Hawaii.

 

 

 

22. The photo of Austin in Hawaii wearing a knee brace is on our living room wall in the center of our daily activities. Austin referenced this picture in a session with Michael and Marti, “the knee brace.”
23. Left to right, Denny, Tighe’s grandmother, Josephine, and Austin in 1980.


24. Josephine’s spirit portrait wearing a pendant that denotes a very spiritual being.

25. The self proclaimed “peasant” Josephine and Tighe’s grandfather.

 

26. Just before leaving home for the session with Michael and Marti Parry I noticed that Austin’s ceramic honey bear had fallen over. Wondering what had caused it to fall, I set it back up. During the session Michael directed me to touch a small Egyptian statue on a nearby table. As I touched it the head fell off and broke a nearby glass. Notice the honey bear’s broken and glued left foot, a detail not missed by Austin through Michael, who said that is why he told me to touch the statue, “because it was broken.”

 

27. Austin made this ceramic with a small turtle on top. We set it in the aquarium with Bridgette’s live baby turtle.

 

 

28-29. The pyramid is on the kitchen counter beside the turtle aquarium with the colored glass beads “crystals” across the bottom. Austin expressed his awareness of these things in the session with mediums, Michael and Marti Parry, saying “Two turtles, there are two turtles, a real one and a fake one, but mine is better.”

 

30. The biology book was referenced in the third session when Michael Parry asked us “Who is studying Biology?” While still in high school Christopher was taking college level Biology, going to the University for the lab. Christopher took this picture of his new “magic hat,” also mentioned and sketched by Marti during a telephone session. Christopher, a non believer in spirit communications, took this photo without knowing that Austin would mention both the magic hat and the biology class in sessions yet to come with the mediums, Michael and Marti.
31. Marti’s sketches all rang a bell with us. Bridgette had been going to yoga lessons.

34. The day before the session, Bridgette stopped for a distraught looking bird on the road - he soon recovered and took off. The sketch is evidence that Austin keeps his eye on Bridgette.

32. The chandelier was a reference to Christopher’s school dance.

 

33. The fence is at the back of our property where we can sit and watch the horse arena

 

35-36. My father’s sister who had passed over several months before this reading, appeared younger and without glasses in her spirit portrait by Marti.

 

 

37. Harry, the “scuzzy” looking dog and his new “dog biscuit” referenced by Austin through Michael Parry. A joke about the previous day when I was cleaning the turtle tank and left the turtle in the sun room. Harry picked up the turtle and delivered to Denny.
38. Again Marti‘s sketches were very meaningful to us: The lamp that blinked on cue to Tighe’s telling me, “Austin hears everything you say.”
41. The ladder in the pool - Christopher was swimming nearly everyday with the swim team.

42. “Ketchup Casanova,” was a teasing nick name given to Christopher by some of his friends after a waitress gave him some extra attention by helping him get the ketchup bottle to start flowing.
39. Before the session Bridgette had complained to Tighe and me that the seat of the bike she had ridden to the session was hard and it hurt!

 

43. And the “Route 66?” Tighe’s brother and father had just traveled from Texas to Reno for a visit. Although we didn’t know until after the session, they had detoured off the interstate to explore the “old Route 66” on their return home. They were not traveling alone!
40. The unicorn was Austin’s way of telling us to say hello from him to his cousin who loved unicorns when she was a child. She had been telling us that she sometimes felt Austin’s presence near her.

 

 

44. And there is Silky Mouse!
Chapter 16
“Proud of Me,” Spring 2005, Session 5, Michael and Marti
By now I was so confident in Michael and Marti's ability that I began encouraging our many friends and associates who had lost a loved one to schedule a session the next time Michael and Marti came to Reno. As soon as I heard they were coming, I called Pathways book store and booked their last session on Friday afternoon. Then I alerted my friends so they too could book a session. The week following the sessions I followed up with our friends, who told me they were certain that Michael and Marti spoke of things about their loved ones that only they or close family members had any knowledge of. What surprises me is their accuracy about the mundane, day to day things, no one but close family members really know of, things that otherwise would not be spoken of because of their insignificance, evidence that someone who really cares about them has been witnessing their activities in the days and weeks leading up to the session.
The day of our session, after work I drove to the book store in Austin’s pick up truck. Although I enjoyed driving the truck because it was something that Austin had cherished, although briefly, I always have a difficult time seeing out of the back of the truck due to the camper shell. And because the truck is so high off the ground sometimes I miscalculate and almost fall when stepping out of it. I arrived at Pathways early so I could have a little time for prayer and meditation before our session.
My friend Alice, a Native American Indian single mother, who works at the same hospital I do, lost her only child, her 21-year-old son, in an automobile rollover on New Years. Her son, Alex, his best friend, and two other boys were traveling from Reno to Las Vegas for a New Year's celebration. No alcohol was involved, but the weather was bitter cold. The car hit a patch of black ice at Tonopah. The car rolled and threw Alex and his best friend out of the car, fatally injuring both boys. Alex was careflighted to Washoe Medical Center, but he never regained consciousness. Alice, like us, had to turn off life support. Alice and Alex had been a real team after her divorce. Although Alex was very independent and self-supporting, he continued to live at home and helped his mother.
The tribe's medicine man came to the hospital and told Alice that Alex was not with them or with his body, and that he did not know where Alex was. This left Alice tormented by the thought that the spirit of her loving son was wandering around the desert near Tonopah. I tried to reassure her that her deceased mother had probably come for Alex and he was now surrounded by her loved ones who had previously passed.
I began telling Alice about Michael and Marti. I showed her the spirit portrait of Austin. So when Michael and Marti came to Reno in the spring of 2005, Alice made an appointment.
We also knew another couple who had lost their four-year-old daughter. They were very active in a self help group for parents and siblings of deceased children. I called them and told them of our previous experiences with Michael and Marti. They too made an appointment. And other friends, another couple who lost a child, made an appointment that week. Then Suby, who had stood with me each day in ICU and with whom I had seen John Edward in San Francisco, made an appointment for herself and her mother.
Spiritually speaking, this was a very busy week! Through the week, I asked for help from my spirit guides, my angels, Austin, and his spirit guides and angels. I really wanted my friends to have contact with their loved ones, just as we had. I wanted them to be reassured that death is not the end, that families are reunited in the dimension of spirit, and know that their loved ones are around them, can hear them, and at times, signal their presence.
Alice's appointment was finished an hour before ours started. I sat with Alice on a bench outside the bookstore while she tearfully reviewed her session. She said she is certain that Alex came through. She said that the first name Michael mentioned was “Ralph“ . . . “Ralph is with him.“ Ralph was Alex’s dog. Michael accurately described her spirit family as well as her earthly family. Michael described Alex's best friend who died at the scene of the accident, and said he was with Alex. This experience was cathartic for Alice; she was so relieved that Alex was not wandering around alone in the desert. She eagerly told me all about her session between her sobs of sadness, relief, and happiness - knowing that Alex was alive.
Then it was our turn. Michael had a headache and he asked Marti for some aspirin. He had a bump in the middle of his forehead, exactly at the site of the pineal gland, sometimes called - the third eye. I noticed it in previous sessions, but this time it was much more prominent. His eyes reddened, he looked like he didn't feel well at all. When he saw us he said, "Oh! that was the big fellow I saw standing in the previous session, it was Austin, waiting, telling me he was here and ready.” Then Michael started our session, and to tell the truth, for the first ten minutes, none of us, Bridgette, Tighe, nor myself could identify what he was talking about. This was very unusual. Always in the previous readings there had been one recognizable event after another. Then suddenly, Michael asked us about the other young man that was with Austin, another big guy like Austin, who also passed from an accident. The more he talked about the other young man I began to realize it was Alice's son, Alex.
Through Michael, Austin said, "I helped bring him to the reading, Mom. You would be proud of me! I have been helping a lot of people!" Austin had been busy - helping spirits reconnect with their earthly families.
Then Michael described a “father-like figure”. . . “the bald one” . . . “with a mason's ring.” That was Bill, my mother's second husband of fifteen years. I always kept my mother informed of each after-death communication we received from Austin and I loaned her books from my growing library on near-death experiences and after-death communications. Always supportive and considerate of my feelings, Bill did not want to discredit my experiences, but he just had to let us know that spirit communications were contrary to his religious beliefs. One day while my mother and I were talking about one of the books, Bill simply said, “There is a word for this, I believe it is [pause] atheism!”
In this session, through Michael, Bill described his death as “sudden” . . . “from a brain hemorrhage,”. . . “his heart stopping.” During Bill’s life, he and my husband were politically oppositional, sometimes antagonistic. At the dinner table there were often heated discussions, little jabs at each other's beliefs, the usual stuff that makes family get-togethers interesting. Bill was a 32nd degree Mason and proud of it. Tighe, an avid reader of history, politics, and “conspiracy theories,” wouldn't miss an opportunity to open Bill's eyes to at least question Masonry. Bill on the other hand, although a loving father, grandfather, and a successful man in his community, had inherited a degree of racial prejudice shared by many of his generation raised in the south. At one of our family meals together, Tighe mentioned something about a well known African American leader. Bill couldn't resist saying how he never liked him, in fact, “he [the black leader] should be taken out and--” Scoldingly I interrupted, "Now Bill!" in a manner intended to cut him off before he said something we all would regret. Then Tighe quickly threw in that this black leader was also a mason, a 33rd degree Mason. I have to say, that in this sparring match, Tighe had just scored.
Since we never shared this story outside of our family we knew this had to be Bill when Michael described Bill as teasingly pointing his Masonic ring at Tighe and saying, "he thought we were as bad as the KKK!" Through Michael, Bill went on to ask us to say hello to the woman who was with him when he passed. I didn't know whether he meant my mother or his daughter, because my mother was with him when he had the fatal stroke and during the ambulance ride to the hospital, but his daughter was with him the night he passed in the hospital. I don’t think there could have been any other way that Bill could have identified himself more convincingly than this. There was nothing generic about this message!
Bill, a man who while he was here did not really believe in spirit communications, energetically identified himself by projecting his relationship with my husband. By simply coming to the session, not only was he expressing his love for his family, but also how his vantage point may now have expanded beyond his formerly expressed opinions and beliefs.
Again Austin said he had seen my dad, describing his death as 30 years previous, which was true.
Then Austin made it clear to us that he knew I was driving his truck. He described how the truck was higher than what I was used to and how I would almost fall as I stepped out of the it. He described how I couldn't see when I was backing up, warning me be to be careful. There was no earthly way that Michael and Marti who were busy in sessions with others in the back of the book store had been able to view any of my truck problems out in the parking lot.
Michael accurately described Denny, Bridgette, and Christopher out back on the patio viewing the stars with their uncle, the astronomy buff, who had just recently visited us from Texas, “and one of them is saying to themselves, ‘I wonder where my brother is?’”
When I followed up with my friends who had lost their daughter, they were convinced that Michael Parry had given them very specific information about their deceased four-year-old daughter, personal information that would not have any significance to anyone else. Suby's dad also had come describing things that definitely assured Suby that her father was still very present and active in her life. Notably, her father described how she had been annoyed for quite some time that when she had an addition built to her home, the roof color of the addition did not exactly match the rest of the roof. A small point, but one that is not generic in any way.
Later, I thought about this reading and how Michael was seemingly off the mark at the beginning of the session. I thought this may have been the result of Michael obviously not feeling well, but more particularly a result of Austin's and my investment in reuniting our friends with their loved ones. Was the slow start, the initial lack of clarity, due to Austin and myself reaching out to help others? Isn't that what we all do when we grow up anyway? Isn't that what we want for our adult children, to reach out and help others traveling with us? The accompanying temporary relief from our own deep sense of loss is not the reason for our actions, but rather an unintended and beneficial consequence. [See photos 38-44 of Marti’s sketches from this session.]

Chapter 17
Signs, Serendipity, and Synchronicity
Hawk Soaring
This morning, November 6, 2005, I told Tighe that I was going to work on Austin's book today. I don't know if this started him longing for Austin, or if he would have spent the day thinking of and missing Austin anyway.
Hanging clothes on the line, Tighe thought about the nearby rock with Austin's initials on it. He told Austin he loves him and that we missed him. Tighe said he heard a distinct call from a quail near the patio, then he looked up and saw a hawk soaring stationary directly overhead.
Lady Bugs in Winter
This is Thanksgiving week, November 2005. I usually become sadder this time of year. I miss Austin all the time, but I especially miss him on holidays and at family gatherings. Additionally, this past few weeks, I had been under a great deal of pressure with deadlines I was finding difficult to meet at work.
One day this week, a lady bug landed in front of me on my desk. Just seeing this ladybug in my office on the second floor of this building and at this time of year lightened my mood. I picked it up and showed it to my fellow workers, declaring I had been visited by a ladybug. With the help of a friend, I managed to assist it outside through a small crack around the edge of a window screen.
Several days later, another baby ladybug landed in front of me on the desk. It was very tiny. I didn't think it would survive long out in the cold so I placed it on the plants in my office. Within a day or so, there it was again, right in front of me on my desk.
These seemingly serendipitous experiences coming at the time we are most in need provide glimpses of the unseen world to which we are connected. Even the most skeptical person, must admit that there is more to life than meets the eye.
A Bad Fall
On December 11, 2005 with the anniversary time fast approaching I was wondering what kind of hellos we would be receiving this season. Then one morning I dreamed about a strange pig-dog at my feet. It looked somewhat like a fat brown bulldog. It grunted and nudged my shins. Frightened, but also curious, I was not sure if this rotund animal at my feet was a danger to me or was just saying hello in it's own language. Later when I reflected on the dream I saw similarities between the “pig-dog” and our bulldog, Sparkles.
Two days later, I dreamed that I was riding in a hot air balloon. Rising higher and higher I held tightly onto a handle in the gondola. Leaning over and looking down - suddenly my hand slipped. As I hurtled downward, I saw the ground rushing up telescopically. I knew there was nothing I could do to change the inevitable impact I would make within the next moment. In the blink of an eye, my trajectory did a complete 180 degree turn and I shot straight up toward heaven at the speed of thought. I was literally ecstatic - not only because I had avoided unavoidable death, but also because I knew that I had escaped my body and my spirit was zooming home! Smiling, eagerly I traveled as fast as I could. I couldn't wait to see my family and friends, and be where everyone was safe, but free. Then suddenly, I was awake. I did not get to see heaven, though I knew it was there and that I was happily on my way! I turned to check the clock, it read 2:23 a.m.
The very next week, I saw a news story about a woman parachutist, whose chute did not open as she free fell all the way to the ground. She landed in a parking lot, miraculously only suffering multiple fractures. During her emergency care, it was discovered that she was pregnant. She said all she could recall of the event was the chute not opening and falling. Perhaps I had experienced some sort of precognition in my dream, but what held the most meaning for me was not the falling, but the sudden change within a nano second from the certainty of my death to the joyful flight toward heaven.
In Spirit
Tighe and I both find the holidays very difficult every year. In 2005 we were traveling through the familiar sea of desolation and despair, missing our son, trying to understand why this loving and losing is even part of our of existence - what is to be gained through so much pain? All the while, we feel there is an expectation of us to somehow be better by now. Then came Austin's birthday, February 5, 2006. Grief does not go away according to a time table. We cannot will it away. Finding it difficult to hold it together, I continued to pray each night that I would visit Austin and remember it the next day.
Then on February 9, 2006, while preparing to go to bed, I touched my husband's jeans on the dresser and the adjacent lamp turned on. I wondered if there was an electrical problem or if, perhaps Austin was giving me a sign. Excitedly I contemplated what happened as I went to sleep. Then during the night, again, I knew I was traveling, I felt free and unencumbered by a body. Curiosity propelled me where ever I wanted to go at the speed of thought. I felt safe, contented, very curious, and at the same time - completely free. My care free explorations were soon intercepted by the tug of a tether; now a rag doll at the end of a rubber band, stretched as far as it could go, I was being pulled back to my body. Like a hermit crab backing into his adopted shell, I settled the rest of the way into my body. Then - boom - I was awake! I was disappointed to be in my tired heavy body, now dull and sluggish compared to the freedom I had just experienced. As I realized I was really here and not there, I looked at the clock - it was 2:28 a.m.
In these two most recent dreams was Austin trying to alleviate my suffering by showing me what being in spirit is like? Since these dreams, I feel much more at peace. When I begin going to grief and start to walk the lamentable landscape of loss, I remember that dream and my indescribable feeling of unfettered freedom. I can not continue to wish that Austin was here when he is feeling so good in the dimension of spirit.

That's Right, Mom, February 25, 2006
I had been compiling the previously journaled notes of dreams, blinking lights, and falling tree branches into this book. I moved the work into my bedroom. I was sitting on my bed listening to the tapes of the sessions with the mediums. We have a touch lamp on the dresser which I was not using. After an emotional day of listening and writing, the lamp spontaneously came on. While thinking that maybe Austin did this but also wondering if maybe there is an electrical or other kind of problem with the lamp, I turned it off. I could hardly believe it was from Austin. I checked the plug and the lamp, making sure that it wasn't touching anything else on the dresser. Back on my bed, sitting and writing, I was delighted when it came on again. Again I turned it off and went to the living room and told Tighe.
Later at bedtime, after reading for awhile I turned off my bedside reading lamp, hunkered down, and pulled the covers up to my ears as usual, when - blink - the lamp on the dresser came on again. I started talking to Austin, telling him how much I love him and how much I am thankful that he lets me know when he is around. I wondered if this was a sign of his approval of the book I was writing about him.
I tried to call Tighe, now at work, but he was busy and could not come to the phone. So I hung up, turned off the lamp and again tried to settle down. Too excited to sleep, I called Tighe again. While telling him about the lamp, it came on again! After we talked for a while I hung up the phone and tried to go to sleep without much success. Then Bridgette came home. I told her about the lamp coming on by itself after a day of focusing on Austin and writing this book. She fell asleep on my bed and eventually so did I.
The next morning while showering and then drying my hair, I reviewed what had happened and again wondered whether there was a problem with the lamp or if Austin had been signaling me. As I walked from the bathroom to the bedroom, I noticed that the lamp on the dresser had turned on again. I told Bridgette how it had turned on while I was thinking, electrical problem or Austin? I decided if it continued to do it progressively more often, I would assume it was an electrical or lamp problem, but if it quit, I would know - like the others - it was a signal from Austin.
That afternoon about 4:30 p.m. when Tighe woke up he was thinking about Austin. When he opened his eyes he realized the lamp was on. That was the last of the lamp's spontaneous activity for several days, again it seemed to be working normally.
But after ten days, it started to come on again, just when I was trying to go sleep at night. I got up, turned it off, and returned to bed, but just after I settled comfortably into bed, it turned on again. It seemed to be like a game, coming on only after I huddled neatly under my covers. It continued to do this until, out of fear of no sleep, I unplugged it. The following weekend I moved it out of my room. But I continued to feel ambivalent about it and I moved it back to my room. This time I placed it on another table from where it has continued to function normally. Tighe checked the wall outlet to see if anything was wrong with it. Finding it okay, he then checked the lamp plug. It was okay too.
I think Austin used the lamp to signal his approval of the book, then he realized it was fun to mess with me - making me get up and turn it off several times at bedtime. Although I really needed my sleep, I could not help but wish it would come on, just once in awhile, which it did about eight months later, in October 2006.
Dream On, July 13, 2006
I dreamed that I was helping a severely handicapped person into a pool for hydrotherapy. I held his head as it gently rested on my shoulder allowing his contracted twisted body to relax in the water. I held him in a manner similar to how I had supported the kids when they were babies first learning to swim. Unable to speak, the unbounded love between us was exchanged through eye contact, alone. All I knew was that this was someone whom I loved very deeply. Then for some reason I woke up, allowing me to remember this dream.
I settled back down and had another dream before morning. Although Austin was nine-years-old, he was still very contentedly playing at home, reminiscent of the year (third grade) when Austin did home school. I knew that in spite of his happiness he would very shortly need to go out into the world to make friends and go to school. I was so afraid to let him go. I knew the world was dangerous. I was afraid of what might happen to him if he went out and yet I knew he wouldn't be satisfied with life at home no matter how pleasant it was. Then I found a few of my sewing tools in his little treasure chest. I thought it odd that they would be there, but I was touched by the thought that he had considered my pin cushion and thread to be a treasure worthy of adding to his collection. I woke up, remembering this second dream, as well as the first one. This was very unusual to have two dreams of Austin in one night.
These intuitive yet instructive dreams allowed me to explore another alternate ending and face the reality that I could not always protect him. Interestingly, instead of my cherishing his belongings, in the dream, it is he who is cherishing my things.
As I became more aware that our work on this book was growing to a close, I had the following dreams.
August 25, 2006
I awoke about 4:30 in the morning. I was glad that I could settle down for a little more sleep before the alarm went off at 6:00. I dreamed that one of my physicians came to my house while I was getting ready for work that morning. He checked me over and then said that I was doing “just great” and he was “very pleased.” Then another young man (seemed like my eldest son) came by for a visit and said he was in graduate school and that things were going very well with him. Both of these men were dressed very smartly in their sharp suits with vests. After this short visit I watched them drive away together in a convertible.
I felt my knees buckle and give way, as a mournful wail resonated up from my bowels, shaking my entire body, then rattling the windows, before thundering out of the house and echoing into the hills. I collapsed prostrate on the floor. Never having heard anything like this before, I was startled awake. I knew that this dream meant that on the outside all was well again, but on the inside I still had inexpressible pain. Yes, I was well and I was not going to be joining Austin just yet. No matter how much acceptance I have gained over the years and no matter how much I have learned - the hole in my soul will always be there. Like the wounds of a warrior, they may scar over, they may be accepted, but the truth reveals itself in my dreams, the wound is still there, painful and deep.
August 26, 2006
Again I awoke early in the morning, but knowing it to be Saturday and I could stay in bed as long as I wanted, I went back to sleep. This time I dreamed that I was dreaming. In this dream’s dream I had an image of Austin - a large solid physical form. I was trying with all my might to hold onto this form, but it began to diminish bit by bit. First it losing it’s weight. Then losing the third dimension, becoming flat as a piece of paper. Then the paper began to deteriorate until I was hardly holding anything at all. In the dream my heart was breaking as the last of this form fell away. In the dream I, the dreamer, was trying to understand the meaning of this dream and what was written on the last of the form, the paper, before it shredded into smaller pieces and disintegrated into dust. I awoke with the realization that this dream reflected the desperation I felt from the loss of physical Austin, the drawing to a close of my work on Austin’s book, and my attempt to understand the meaning of the temporal nature of our life on the physical plane.
September 1, 2006
I dreamed I discovered in our yard a large hole five or six feet across and four feet deep. Exploring the hole, aching with yearning I reached down into the hole and unearthed another link to Austin, three sweatshirts and a note. While fighting against being wrenched away by wakefulness, hungrily I tried to read the note. The large hole in the dream is the hole in my soul left by Austin’s leaving us. The note is a symbol of our investigation of the unseen, our desire to understand and stay connected to Austin.
September 29, 2006
This past week when our very dear friend passed over, I asked Austin to help him in his transition. When I awoke at 2:24 a.m. the next few nights, I knew that Austin was letting me know he was there assisting our friend. When I told Tighe, unexpectedly he said that perhaps I was waking myself up [an auto hypnotic suggestion]. I know it must be more than that. Auto suggestion does not explain the insightful dreams synchronized with a 2:24 wake up call or the 2:24 power outages or how I had begun to awaken at 2:24 even before we were aware that 2:24 was the time of Austin’s fatal accident.
October 13, 2006
It was time for another session with Michael and Marti at Pathways book store. Again we arranged for a session late Friday afternoon. Again Austin made it clear he had been keeping up with Bridgette. Bridgette was jolted when Austin through Michael quoted, verbatim, words Bridgette had shared with her girl friends only days before this session, something a little too personal for me to quote here.
Our friend, Lester, who had passed over the previous week came through. Austin said he had brought him to the reading, just as I had asked him to do. I had just visited Lester’s family while they were preparing for his memorial. I picked up two photos of a younger Lester in a Superman costume. I commented that these would be nice to enlarge for the wall. With his arms up and flexed to show off his biceps Lester was posed like Superman. He was happy, healthy, and vigorous, a drastic contrast to his last weak and frail days. Through Michael our friend told us to give his love to his wife, who was identified when Michael wrote “Don” the first part of her name, Donna. Lester told us to tell Donna that although he had lost a lot of weight toward the end that now he was like this: Michael made that same Superman pose. He repeated the message and made the Superman pose again!
Then Michael said that they are yelling “Scott, Scotty” at me. I knew this was my dad. Michael asked a series of questions to which I repeatedly answered, yes: “Was he in the Navy? Was he a medic? Was he in the Marines?” At this point Michael became tearfully silent. When he recovered he said that when he connects with the WWII veterans he is often overwhelmed with emotion. Michael Parry believes he had been in WWII as an American soldier in a past life. When he resumed he asked: “Pearl Harbor? Troop carriers? Was he on an island like Guam? In the Pacific?” Then Michael cringed with pain in his right arm. Then Michael said my dad was saying, ‘“Give my love to “Dar” [Darla, my sister] and her husband, her son, and her daughter, and to the one who has my medals.”’ I replied, “That would be my mother.” But I found out after the session that it was my younger sister who had his medals. All that Michael said about my father was completely true. At 17, he had joined the Navy immediately after Pearl Harbor and was trained as a Pharmacist’s Mate. The Marines he was stationed with in the Pacific islands called him “Doc.” He was on Iwo Jima when the famous flag raising photo was taken. The Marines traveled in the troop carriers and one of the suspected causes for the very unusual cancer that first appeared as a tumor in my father’s right arm was his exposure to the asbestos that had been sprayed onto the ship’s hulls for insulation. During the war my father was stationed at Pearl Harbor for a while. Michael further described my father as a deeply religious person who had survived the war and put together a good life afterward despite having seen and endured many, many terrible things, because he had dealt with it all this by saying, “It’s in God’s hands.” “It’s in God’s hands.” This too was true: My father carried the bible with him through the war. He served as a Deacon and then an Elder in our Presbyterian church where I grew up, the church he helped build, devoting one evening each week visiting new neighbors, inviting them to come to our church. Austin said he was modeling my father since he had been there.
Austin then showed Michael a bowl of berries, prompting Michael to ask, “Did he have a sweet tooth? Because he is showing me a bowl of berries.” Tighe and I thought it referenced the abundant crop of fruit we had harvested this year. But as we were leaving we talked with Michael and Marti in the parking lot where we all agreed to go for a cup of tea at the restaurant across the street. We each ordered tea and a piece of pie; three of us ordered blackberry pie. The berry pies were served as blackberry cobblers, each baked in its own round bowl, three “bowl(s) of berries,” foretold to Michael by Austin earlier that evening in the session.
That evening I told Michael and Marti this story I had heard only a few years before from my older sister about my father’s war experience. Since he never spoke about the war, she had heard this story only because my father witnessed to the draft board regarding my brother-in-law’s application for conscientious objector status during the Viet Nam war. My dad told my sister and her husband that although he carried a weapon all thorough the war, he never had to kill anyone and the only time he came close was when he was caring for the wounded on Iwo Jima and at the same time caring for and guarding a wounded Japanese soldier. An enemy sniper began firing at them. As my father started to move the wounded to safety, he thought the Japanese soldier he had been guarding might take this opportunity to kill him or his patients. He considered killing the Japanese soldier, but suddenly he realized this injured young man was just as frightened as he was. Working together, this Japanese soldier and my dad were able to move all of the wounded out of range of the sniper.
That evening I gave Michael and Marti a copy of the first draft of my book. I had also given copies to a few friends to read and comment. For a few days I was feeling quite relieved to have come so far. As I waited to hear what my friends thought of the book, I experienced a backlash of shame, a sense of having been too self-disclosing, of being judged and criticized. That night I received another signal of support from Austin.
Sleeping very soundly, I was startled awake when the bedside lamp and the fan in my room suddenly turned on. In my deep sleep I had been unaware of the power being out until the lamp blinked on, probably from the power coming back on. I looked at the clock, it read: 2:28 a.m. This could only have been an encouraging signal in this now familiar language.
In November while visiting my mother in Texas, I told her about this timely power outage. She expressed that perhaps I was waking my self up at 2:24 a.m. I said how does that explain the power outages at that same time? She called me the week after I returned home and told me, she too had spontaneously awakened at 2:24 a.m. I knew it had to be Austin.
Anniversary, January 2007
In anticipation of the fifth anniversary of our loss, a few days before Christmas, I felt the familiar tidal wave wash over me, first the empty feeling like something very precious was taken from me, then the memories flooding in, the solar plexus knotting up, my face tightening trying to resist the inevitable tears. Then I began to recall, Josephine, my father, my grandparents, our aunts, all those wonderful loving entities who had so affected our lives and how now they were helping and nurturing Austin. I thought of Austin’s friends and his pets who were there. As rich and full as my life here seems, I thought how Austin’s life may be even richer and fuller.
Then on the morning of January 1, Tighe told me that he awoke in the night. The bright moon light gave the illusion that it was nearly dawn. Wondering if it was time to get up, he looked at his watch. It was 2:25 a.m. Was that the anniversary hello? Not me, but this time Tighe spontaneously awakened. Tighe, who only a few months earlier had said perhaps I had been subconsciously waking myself up. A happy new year with Austin’s familiar signature.
January 6th, I awoke in the night, having to go to the bathroom. I resisted coming to full alertness because I did not want to leave this beautiful dream: Austin was a young man, healthy, strong, real, solid, curly hair tousled, his skin was sun touched and a little bit sweaty as if he had been working or playing. He was in jeans and a tee shirt. We were outside on a warm sunny day, reminiscent of summer afternoons spent on the beach at Lake Tahoe. Delighted to see him, I said, “Austin, how are you? Are you alright?” Smiling and laughing and somewhat breathless from being interrupted during his vigorous activities he said, “Heck, yeah! What did you think?” Excitedly he continued to catch me up on all he has been doing over there. In the morning as I was telling Tighe the dream, I recalled how solid his form was, no wispy ethereal ghost or spirit lurking around us - trying to make contact, just more real than life.
July 2007
The 4th of July left me feeling blue and miserable for days. I am always surprised at how low I can still go after so many years have passed. I just couldn't shake the anger, the loneliness, the missing him.
A few weeks pass and I am not getting much better. It has been a long time between hellos. I go to bed very early, before 8 p.m. I am sleeping very soundly when I awaken to the sound of Tito out in the dog yard barking his little head off. “Oh please, Tito, stop barking and come in. Don't make me get up and make you come in. Please don't make me.” Then I hear a little voice say, “look up” (our clock projects the time on the ceiling). I look up. It’s 2:24 a.m. Tito calms down and comes in. Thanking Austin for enlisting Tito to wake me for this hello, I go back to sleep.
August 30, 2007
When I arrived at work I picked up a phone message on my answering machine. It is Alice, tearfully mumbling, “Judith, please call me when you get here.” Running down the stairs to Alice’s office, I ask Austin and my father to help me to be a comfort to Alice to be able to say the right words that will help her. Through her sobs she said she had a troubling dream and had no one to talk to about it. She said in her dream her son was a mature young man and he was visiting her for a while. Then he asked her to give him a ride to a big house. They both knew that this house represented her son’s death. She drove him to the house, left him, and then drove away. This morning she felt so ashamed that she just left him there when she knew it meant he was dying. She hated herself for not making him stay with her. We talked about what the dream may have meant and how we do not really have control over our dreams. It was significant to her that in this dream he was an adult and not a child as he had been in her previous dreams. She began to realize the dream may symbolize the beginning of the adult Alex’s visiting her and that there may be more of these visits in the future. I told her that I had similar dreams that made me feel ashamed. We talked about how we are here for a purpose and how our family in spirit is encouraging us to have a meaningful life. We talked about our resilience and how we are able to go to the emotional depths of hell and yet still sometimes feel good, even happy. She said before the dream she had been feeling happy, like she was getting over this, like she was strong enough now. I agreed with her how sometimes it seems that patting myself on my back for managing grief and getting on with living, how that in itself seems to be the very trigger for a freefall to that most sorrowful place again.
I told her that her son and her mother love her and are with us to help her during this difficult time, just as my son and father are here to help. Right on cue, the power momentarily blinked off and then on again. I said, “See, there they are!” We both had a good laugh about it. There is no doubt in my mind they were there!Chapter 18
The Gift of Life
In the years following the loss of Austin many of our co-workers and friends have lost children, grandchildren, and spouses from accident or illness. We hurt for each one of them as they walk in loss and longing, while they try to make sense out of what has happened and wonder if they will ever see their loved one again.
We have often heard that losing a child is the worst experience there is and a person who has lost a child has suffered and is suffering the worst possible grief. As soon as Austin passed, we knew this loss to be our "worst of the worst." Although there are times when this wound hurts less, it is always here. The anguish we experienced, my sister experienced, our friends have experienced, we would never wish on anyone.
But not much can be gained from comparing degrees of grief. To the person who is deep in the throes of grief, their loss is perceived as “the worst.” Who is to say that we suffer more than you because our child died at 21 and yours died at 6 months, 4-years, or your companion cat of 23 years died, or more than the suffering of a nation over the collective loss of thousands in the September 11th tragedy or the parents who grieve the loss of the thousands of sons and daughters who have died in recent wars.
Loss of a loved one is something that most of us cannot get through life without experiencing. We learned we can not run from our grief. We can not pretend all is better - that time has completely healed the hole in our souls. But at the same time, we know we have been given glimpses of another dimension where our son is alive with his grandparents, friends, and pets. We are grateful to our son and others in this heavenly realm for coming to us and reassuring us that they are not dead, that we do not die. We have learned that our loved ones in spirit continue to guide and help us on our earthly journey. Our spiritual family has reassured us they are there taking care of our son. This tragic experience has taught us to not be afraid of the transition from this life to the next - called death.
We learned that our “survivor guilt” comes from our fear that the physical existence is all there is, our fear that this is the end of the relationship. Knowing we are part of a spiritual family that endures beyond this so-called death expands our previous definition of “survivor.” Death occurs when the physical being can no longer serve the eternal spirit, a spirit that has grown beyond the constraints of the physical host.
Recalling the powerful light beings witnessed by Dannion Brinkley during his after-life experiences, we know there is more to life than meets the five senses. We look at people we encounter in a different way, seeing beyond the visible to the spiritual, we know they all are powerful beings with a spiritual body that is not limited by the physical body, giving new meaning to the biblical warning to “beware of angels unawares.” I find myself praying for everyone, children, the elderly, friends, and strangers that cross my path, because I know that they are so much more than what I can see and I have no way of knowing how hard their earthly journey has been or will be. And because I know from my own experiences that each of us needs all the help we can get, I quietly bless them as I pass by.
We see ourselves differently. We are more than grieving parents. We are reminded by our spiritual family that although not perfect, we are courageous, loving, helpful beings dwelling in a temporary physical form. We have a responsibility to ourselves, our earthly friends, family, and future generations, as well as, our spiritual family to make the most of the time given us.
For various reasons our culture conditions us to rationalize away any signs that may be coming from our loved ones in the spirit world and to discredit (as I once did) the gifts of mediumship. When Austin died, we asked him to come to us and let us know he was alright. In return we promised to be open so that we would not miss his messages. Paradoxically, it is the help offered by loved ones in spirit that encouraged us to rediscover how much we love this life with all its challenges. At his memorial service our recently transitioned friend reminded us of the preciousness of this physical life through the reading of this excerpt from his journal.
Notes on letting go of life, written by Lester Lisamon some time during the last few months of his life: I think it would be really good if rock music was played! And no sad prayers! That is such silliness, because moving on is natural. I think. And it must be. It sure is sad if I would have to leave everything I love - the fantasticness of life, the just plain greatness of each day.
Now we know how short our time here really is.
We also know that we are aided by a spiritual eye and the knowledge that the physical is only a part of our whole story. The physical being is the dim reflection seen in the mirror. Now we live with an earthly foot in this world, knowing we are never alone, and the other foot in a heavenly realm where families are reunited, from where loved ones help us and never really leave us.
Although the book must end, our story never ends. We know we will continue to grow through the insights given to us from dreams, meditations, synchronistic signs, and “coincidences”. . . . We know we are aided by an army of loved ones in spirit reminding us the illusion is death, itself. Each of us is a beautiful, powerful spirit who will also transcend from this world to the next.
We wrote this book to thank Austin and all our friends in this life and the next for their help, encouragement, and reassurances as our faith in love - our faith in God - was tested. We hope this book does the same for others who have lost a loved one by assuring them that leaving this life is not death!
We are grateful that we have lived long enough to realize how powerful our thoughts, words, and actions are. Not only are they witnessed by our spiritual family and along with their ramifications reviewed by us when we pass into the next realm, but through them we are co-creating this world, a ripple effect that goes on forever.
As Austin’s father said, "Nothing is lost!" This life is our opportunity to see the world through the joyful, trusting, hopeful eyes of a child; to experience the courage of throwing ourselves onto life - testing it’s capacity to bear us as an adolescent and young adult; to learn how to cherish and protect as a parent; and to experience the paradox of acceptance of our losses while we undertake the responsibilities of stewardship in old age. Physical life allows us to explore who we are and what our true nature is. We are the lesson and the teacher, the creation and the creator. Made in the image of the Creator - what else could we be?
But we do not undertake this awesome journey alone. Our loved ones, now in the company of their family and friends who have preceded them, let us know in many different ways they are with us. They are here in our darkest moments, assuaging our suffering and giving us the strength to embrace the gift of this physical life, until it is our time to join them.
Appendix
The Tree, by Austin O’Neal
There was a giant tree in the front yard of the first house I ever lived in. It had a trunk three feet wide that went up and exploded into a community of branches and leaves that had to be thirty feet by thirty feet. It was the first thing really significant to me. I mean, come on, my bike still had training wheels. This tree could hold six neighborhood kids in it for a game of tree ball. Tree ball was dodge ball, but you’re in a tree dodging a soccer ball being thrown at you from the ground. I remember sometimes kids would jump out of the tree and on occasion some would fall out, but no matter what, [they would] always be back for the next game. Once News Channel 2 came to our house to interview my friends, my older brother, and myself. We all gladly explained our game and they put us on the night’s news, because we all had a way to have fun off the streets.
One summer in a rain and thunderstorm our tree was struck by lighting. The massive trunk was split up the middle. It hadn’t fallen down, but it looked close to it. The sadness I felt was great when I saw the tree that had shaded the whole front yard and the carefree children that played Legos under it, the tree that seemed stronger and more forever than the house it belonged to. The next day I went to school passing the sad tree on the way, the whole day I could picture the Weeping Willow weeping ever closer to the ground. When I returned from school that day my father had drilled a whole through the tree and bolted the two pieces of split trunks back together and cemented up the crack. My tree had survived an act of God and did so with flying colors, I knew I had a hell of a tree.
The summer before my sixth grade year, many years after the lightning incident, my parents bought a house out in the suburbs. This house was bigger, had more land, and even a pond with water rights, but the tree out front didn’t hold my childhood. I return to the old hood in the ghetto every once in a while to check on the biggest tree on the block. But one time I returned and the giant tree was gone. Nothing left, but a stump and some of the most vivid memories from my childhood. Why it’s gone I don’t know, but whoever did it I can assure you it wasn’t their childhood that came down with it.

 

 

 

Addendum
In a May 2009 session with Michael and Marty, Marty drew another one of Tighe’s aunts who had recently passed over. The spirit portrait, a caricature, matched her photo from the 1960s. We sent both to her son. A few hours after our phone session Michael Parry called us and said they just completed a session for a young woman whose brother had recently died. Michael said she was having a terrible time dealing with the loss. But the reason he called us was because she had been referred by one of his regular clients, who had accompanied her to the session wearing a t-shirt with “AUSTIN” boldly printed across the chest. When Michael asked him why he had worn that shirt, he replied he didn’t know, he just felt like wearing it.

 

Copyright © 2007 by Judith and Michael Tighe O’Neal
Published and distributed by Judith and Michael Tighe O’Neal