I’ve heard dead people: Part I

(This will most likely be the post that causes my follower count to plummet…)

Before I continue, thank you all for making me feel better on Monday.  Fortunately it was only a 24-hour Meh so now I’m back to my old self.  I self-medicated with the best possible over-the-counter treatment: Haagen-Dazs.  And peaches.  All is well.Now for the spooky stuff.  I’m going to preface this by saying that although I love real-life ghost stories, I regard most of them with a huge dose of skepticism—especially the stories on television.  And I think Ghost Hunters and all the other shows in that genre are completely full of shit.

But over the years I’ve met many sane, reliable people who have stories they can’t explain.  And now I have a few of my own.

The first incident happened 2 years ago when we adopted our third Weeblette.  She needed a new home because her owner had died.  I made arrangements with a neighbor of the woman who died so that we could pick up our new kitty.  During my phone conversations with the neighbor I noticed that she never mentioned the deceased woman by name; she always called her “the owner.”  I thought that was peculiar.  Why not just use her name?

We drove to the house of the deceased woman, where her sister and the neighbor were meeting us.  Again, they kept referring to “the cat’s owner.”  Didn’t this woman have a name??

The poor, scared little cat was hiding in the woman’s bedroom.  So we went in there to try to calm her down and get her in the carrier.

While Mr. Weebles took the bed apart to get to where kitty had taken refuge, I looked around the room.  It hadn’t been packed up yet.  It looked like “the owner” still lived there.  I felt bad that we were in her bedroom like that.  And I wondered what her name was.

Just then I heard a female voice in my head—not my own voice but a very different voice, as clear as a bell, say “Janice.”

Janice?  Nah, that doesn’t make any sense, I thought.  That’s my brain pulling a name out of the ether and playing games with me.

Finally, Mr. Weebles wrestled our new Weeblette into the carrier and we got ready to leave.  The sister was crying.  As she said goodbye to the kitty she said, “Janice would be so happy to know her cat is getting a nice new home.”

Janice.  I felt all the blood rush out of my head.

They hadn’t said her name before then.  Not once.  I kept going back to all the conversations—maybe they had mentioned it and I had just forgotten.  But no, they hadn’t.  I’m sure of it.

I like to think that Janice knew we’d be good kitty parents and chose us to take care of her girl. And I’m happy she introduced herself to me.

If you’re still with me, stay tuned for Part II . . .