A friend of mine always knows when someone close to her passes away. She’s visited by what she calls a dragonfly.
She describes it as a sort of quick, sharp vibration or buzz that zaps her somewhere around the head or face, often waking her in the night.
The first time it happened to her, she didn’t realize exactly what it was until later, when she learned that someone close to her had died at that time.
But then when her mother died, my friend woke in the middle of the night to a snapping buzz at the base of her skull, just above her neck, and she knew it was her mother–who’d been declining, but wasn’t necessarily on her deathbed. It was her mother’s soul, her mother’s spirit…whatever it was, saying goodbye.
“It’s a pleasant, peaceful feeling, usually with the essence of that person. I can actually feel them,” she explained to me.
Another time, a friend of hers buzzed her near the face, while she was awake. She says, “I knew it was her immediately–I was overwhelmed by the sense of her. Peace, joy, and her personality.”
This friend of mine is much more attuned to her subconscious and unconscious than I am–although I’m trying to change that. She meditates regularly, and often has a sixth-sense about things that end up proving right.
I’m fascinated by stories like this–of experiences people have when a loved one dies, or when a health care worker sees or feels something as one of their patients passes on. Hospice workers have so many stories about seeing guides or angels waiting to usher their own loved one on to the next plane, or of things that the dying person says or does. By way of research, I read a book written by a hospice doctor when I was writing Night Betrayed (as Joss Ware). It’s the fourth book in my Envy Chronicles, set in a dystopian world, and the main character is a woman who’s gifted with very special skills–and sensitivities–to help people pass on.
In the dystopian, post-apocalyptic world of The Envy Chronicles, there are no hospices or hospitals, or even doctors or drugs. Their health care is primitive. People die much more readily then than they do in our world.
As I wrote the book, I was reflective about hospice workers and how much they give to us and to our loved ones as they pass on. The nurses, physicians, assistants and volunteers that I’ve met who work in these situations have such breathtaking and special views on death and dying. I learn something new every time I speak with one of them. I admire them beyond words, and that’s why I dedicated Night Betrayed to hospice workers and caregivers of the terminally ill.
Some of the stories are heart-wrenching, some are beautiful, and others are even amusing. After hearing many of these anecdotes, I have no doubt that there is a life, a plane, something beyond this world, after death.
Another friend of mine had a husband who passed away after a long bout of cancer. He was known throughout the family for being extremely, extremely frugal. His wife, my friend, claimed John wouldn’t buy milk if it was over $2.00 a gallon, even though he loved milk. Even their nieces and nephews were aware of this frugality of his, and it was a family joke–so much so that one of the nieces tucked a dollar bill into his suit when he was in the coffin.
When John passed away at last, he was to be cremated after all of the viewings and funeral. My friend was meeting with the funeral director and going through things, and which of John’s items she wanted to keep (wedding ring, no, watch, yes, etc.). The funeral director quizzically asked her about the dollar bill they found in his suit after removing him from the coffin in preparation for the cremation. Was there some significance; did she want to keep the dollar or not?
My friend got a misty-eyed look and said, “Oh, let him take it with him.” And so the dollar bill was thus cremated along with John and his wedding ring.
The next day, which was to be John’s funeral at our church, one of the staff members arrived very early that morning to open up and get prepared for the funeral. There was no one else there. Everything was deserted.
But there, in the middle of the parking lot, all by itself…was a dollar bill.
