LexiMe - My journey of faith

  I feel I have been very blessed throughout my life. Growing up I saw and went through things no child should ever see or feel. Most people would be bitter and harbor anger from it. I chose the high road and made it strengthen me. There was no sense in pissing and moaning of what was. As an adult I have made good and bad choices. I saw them as learning experiences rather then to take it out on everyone else.       

   Some people feel better if they can bring others down to their level.   I’ve always had to clean my own doorstep off first.  Others sweep things under the rug for it’s better to not deal with them, to not feel those feelings.   I’ve never seen myself as remotely pretty, smart or a best dresser but what people do like is that I am a what you see is what you get person.  I don’t have different personas for whatever place I am in.   I don’t have everything I would like but I do have what I need to get through my days and if not then I am not unfamiliar to having to go without.   I have worked long hours just to come home and start in again.   

  I’ve never minded hard work or struggling.   I think that is better than having everything handed to me.   At least I know I have worked for it even if the work was only sweat.   I was made to retire sooner than I wanted to.  I’ve gained weight, I’ve lost weight.   I’ve been in pain and I’ve worked through it.   I’ve never been perfect and never will be, however I am a happy person and that is a choice one makes no matter what is thrown at them.   One either plays the blame game or they change their way of thinking.   So anyone who wants to run me down just to make themselves feel better, they had better clean their own door step off first. You may just find there is more dirt on yours than mine.

I had always been one that knew what I didn’t want in life but did not know how to get away from it. I knew from a young age that I was one that felt things differently than others or thought I did. I was about to realize that one AHA moment would mix in with another but along the same lines. I wonder if it was just a continuation.

I was perhaps 11 and my girlfriends were starting their periods and here I was the late bloomer. I think I was 14 when I woke up one morning and said, “What the hell are these?” All of a sudden I had developed boobs. And yes, late. My dad was the one that took me to Woolworths and had Crystal LaRue fit me to a bra. When I got home and started wearing it, my mother called me a whore. Living a sheltered life, I did not know what that was. I did not know whether to smile or cry so I did nothing. Then when I got my period, she called me a slut. Again with not knowing what that was. I had to ask my girlfriend. She didn’t laugh at me because she knew how my mother was. Then I was left with the realization that is what my mother thought of me.

In my teens I had boys that wanted to go out with me but I shied away. The words whore and slut stuck in my mind and I was so shy it was not funny. I overheard my mother telling my sister that sex was only what men wanted and once they got it, you were thrown to the side of the road. I had not a clue about sex but listening to her, I wanted nothing to do with it. My girlfriends were having sex with many boys and ended up pregnant. I knew I did not want that.

I had never been with any man but my husband. That is how I felt personally. I knew of women who were married and were sleeping with other men. I had always drawn men who loved how independent I was. How confident I was. I was also called a looker and you can laugh but I did not know what that meant either. I had to ask my dad and he laughed as he told me and I admit, I laughed along with him. I told him I did not do anything to draw attention or men to me. He told me it was how I was. Talk about confusion. And yes I had led a real sheltered life.

I have never been one that has minded living alone. I rented an apartment from one of the teachers from the high school where I used to work at. I love music. Especially motown. I love listening to music and moving to it as I did my chores. Nothing like getting home from work, having a shower then to just wear a long t shirt, my undies and socks. The sense of freedom that I had was awesome. I had met some men but all they wanted to do was to take me out to show me a good time. Their definition of a good time was certainly not mine so home I stayed. In between times I had remarried. The same old strong, independent, confident drawing them in. Just to be cheated on when they thought they were bored then would change their minds. My idea of a good time was to make sure everything around the house was taken care of, inside and out. Then I would get a movie in or go out to eat or to a dance but I was not one to sit in bars and drink myself silly. Perhaps they wanted someone who was wanted by everyone else and liked going to bars. I never wasted my time to figure that out. I moved on.

I was not looking for anyone is when Mel found me. He had to ask me what my signature of “This is not a dress rehearsal” meant. We talked for a couple of years. I did go over to meet him and to work on family history since my roots came from over there. I came back home and in time, I went back. After all the emails, telephone calls, talking and being with him in person, I never saw what would end up being my life with him. He was always the gentleman. I did have a laugh when he asked me if I wanted an ice cream one time and I asked him if they had chocolate. He said we would have to see. We got to the counter and I asked the man if he had chocolate ice cream. He said he did and gave me one. When he passed Mel his vanilla he told Mel he was a nice man for taking his granddaughter out for ice cream. The look on Mel’s face was priceless.

We got married at the registrar’s office. I had been married before so we could not be married in the church. He just stood there. I could see tears in his eyes. I asked him if he had changed his mind. He told me afterwards that every emotion he had felt all along our journey had run through his mind. He was the emotional one where I was not. That should have been the first sign that I was heading for trouble. I am an emotional person but I was not then. He wanted me to give England a go so I said I would. It was like going back into the 50’s. I could not work for 6 months so I started walking around the town to get the feel of things while I was looking for a job to get an idea of what I could do. I hated being followed. It was as if I was a celebrity there. Where Mel worked at JCB, they wanted to do an interview on the tv of us. Even the radio stations did. I just wanted to be left alone. We were happy and in love, but the attention I did not want. We would work and on Saturday do our grocery shopping then Sunday maybe go for a ride or to one of the major malls. Otherwise, we stayed home and watched tv.

Our marriage ended up being platonic. He was unable to perform sexually. He tried the blue pill. Nothing. I surmised his issues were in his head on his shoulders so into therapy we both went. He was diagnosed as a covert narcissist. He sat there nodding yes and on the way home he asked me what it was and I told him. His exact words were, “I fucking arna going back there.” I knew then that I was in trouble. I had a feeling there was more to him than I knew.

I had always wondered why when he would walk around without any skivvies on, and hold his hands in front of himself down there. I never had the hangups he did. I could walk around bare assed. I did not wave my sexuality like a flag to the world. I knew I was a very sensual person. I responded to touch. I did not know if it was because I was 50% Italian or not. I also did not like to wear a lot of clothes. Never had. And with my mothers words always trying to make me think I was what I was not, went out the door a long time ago. I only knew that if the person I loved, loved me, I had no issues. I can only say that when I love the person who I love, they knew they were loved in every sense of the word.

My aha moment came in my late 30’s. I admit I had a lot of sexual frustration but what had always worked for me was to do manual labor. By the time I was done, I was too exhausted for any hanky panky. I also ran and worked out so that took a lot out of me. Still, I craved the touch of a man but it was not to be. I was not one to cheat no matter what.

I noticed when I would go into town early before work, I had 2 men that would follow me. I did not feel threatened by them but I did not know why they were following me. It was one day when I was in the art store that one approached me. He introduced himself and asked if I had time to talk with him. I told him out in the open I would but not privately. It was then that I was asked if I would let 2 artists paint me. I had to really think about that one. I was teaching and had to be professional whether I was working or not so the thought of being found out was a bit scary. In the end I agreed. I did not think much about the paintings. It was a little unnerving at first but the artist made me feel at ease. I was not happy when the girls that worked with us, put henna in my hair. I will always remember their words of “Don’t worry duck, it will wash right out”. Yeah , right. It did not. I ended up having most of my hair cut off before returning home to the states with that and the hair being done while modeling.

I had met a young woman, Julienne, while living in the UK. She was a photographer for the place where I bought my clothes in France. She had been following me if she would see me out in the markets or streets. She said I had a way of just being in the moment. She asked me if she could shoot me for the catalogue. I agreed but had stipulations. We started hanging out on my days off. We would take off real early to go to towns I cannot even say their names. Between posing and hitting the beaches with Julienne, those were my aha moments. By letting everything go, to just be me, to be in the moment. I had to always be in control of everything in my life. Even though I was in a loveless marriage, I felt free to be myself. I will always be thankful to Julienne, Doug and Gordon for ridding me of the feeling I was made to feel, that I was the cause of the problems of the man I had married. He hated how uninhibited I was. I knew it was his way to try to make me think less of myself because of his inadequacies.

I tried many times to get him to open up to what his issues may be. He would start then stop, never wanting to talk about things that had to do with him personally. When with some members of his family that he got along with, I would always be alert to anything I could pick up and learn from. He had had a real sad life but most of his feelings of back then had been brought on by his own way of seeing things. I tried asking him about the things he said he hated that happened to him to see if perhaps he could see them in a different light. No matter what was said, he had to be right and everyone else was wrong. Nobody can say I did not try in this marriage. Afterall, that is what one does when they love a person. I was not trying to be nosy. I was only trying to help. It became obvious to me that he did not want any help. He wanted to hang onto the hatred and the anger.

In any case, I started to take care of myself, do what brought me happiness while working. I still worked out. I still ran. And I walked everywhere. I learned that I loved the Turkish baths. Julienne and I would go to different beaches on my days off. She would take pics to see if I was going to be comfortable in doing so. I told her if Mel ever saw them, he would have a fit. For her catalog that she worked for, there was never any head shots. It was for security reasons. I have to admit I liked some of the clothes I modeled for her. When I looked at them, I could not believe what I looked like. I never paid no mind to how I looked. I had always been a wash and go girl and still was actually. But the rest of my years there, I was her top model along with me working. I did not see where I got the energy that I had. But even with finding out who I was, it was not fullfilling to me any longer. I wanted to go back to what I knew. Plus I was getting sicker the longer I stayed there. With all the rain, the mold and spores were attacking my immune system. Antibiotics became the norm for me.

Between being painted by 2 artists and modeling, it was a no turning back of finally finding out just who I was. There were many good times but it was during my last year living in the UK that after all of my soul searching, I knew I wanted to be back in the states to hopefully live back in the country. I also knew it would be a hard time relocating. I still had not found my “home” and pretty much gave up on ever finding it. I think I gave up on everything…..but work. Work was always there for me. It never let me down. But deep within my soul, I finally knew who I was and what I honestly wanted. It is what it is.

There were some hard times when I lived abroad.  Where I was I was told it would be a lot easier if I told people I was from Canada instead of America.  I understood what they meant but I cannot be anyone but me.  The Iranians and some Paki’s hated Americans.

While at work, the Iranians and Paki’s would come in and start yelling at me.  They told me to go back home and speak with then President Clinton to straighten him out to their plight.  Me………yeah right I thought.  Some Brits would also holler at me for taking a job away from one of their own.  I never said anything at first but if a Brit had applied before me then they would be there doing my work.  I finally leaned over the counter to these people and asked them if they wanted to take their fight out onto the street.  They backed off then or I thought they had.

I could see the problems I was having if I had been how I usually was when standing up for myself but being in a different country, I just shut my mouth.  One man I was on the watch for was a man who just did not like me and was a woman beater, so I was always alert to my surroundings.  I would hear whispers from people who also watched out for me that the Iranians and Paki’s were out to get me for not heeding their warnings.  I heard how I was going to be killed while walking home, while at work,  how they would burn my house down, etc…   I walked to and from work and through the tunnels without fear but alert.  After many months of realizing that someone was following me, I found out later it was my contact that had been set up by a friend, but before knowing this, I was alert. 

One day as I walked into work, I would always turn to ask Sandra what was going on that day and what did I need to know.  That day she told me that the “new security person” was staring at me from over the shelf behind me.  I turned slowly, while lowering my sunglasses just as slow to stare right back at him.  And there was my follower.  He seemed to always be near me everyday at work.  And he would let me know that he had seen me on my way to work.  One day he was stretched out on a stone slab and when he spoke, he jumped the crap out of me.  I was not used to having someone have my back but in the end, it was the best thing for me.

One day right before Christmas we had a massive delivery.  It was very hard to get around all the boxes out back in our stock room.  As luck would have it I was asked to go out back to fetch something.  I got out there and could not find what I was sent for but all of a sudden there was smoke filling in the back by the door.  I was stuck.  To make a long story short, my “follower” had hauled me out of the back area and had called the police.  Seems someone had moved the dumpster so it blocked the back door and had started a fire in and around it.  After getting oxygen I went upstairs to wash up.  I was not about to go home just to change.  I cannot remember now if they caught the persons responsible or not but it seemed that my troubles stopped. 

I had a dog at home.  Man she could be a pain when it came time for me to go to work.  I was already to leave and she would not come in.  I had to go out to lug her in and where it had rained, there was mud so I had to change.  I was running late but made good time walking.  I really had to pee so thought I would go to the public toilets instead of having to go up 3 flights of stairs at work.  I was just going to turn the corner to go to the toilets when someone jumped out from behind a huge tree.  He had the balls to stand close to me and ripped my headphones off of my head and put them on his.   “What are you listening to” he asked.  I told him Bryan Adams.  He said he liked him.  I stood there just waiting.  He could not see my eyes because of my sunglasses.  I was already late for work and really had to pee bad.  Long story short again, I left him lying on the sidewalk.  I told him that if I peed my pants I was coming back to kill him.  I got to work and had to tell my boss what had happened because of looking a bit disheveled.  He could not believe who it was. 

I used to stop at the little shop across from where I worked to buy a pack of smokes.  One day the wife of the owner was there and she said, “There is the girl with the blue backpack”.  I turned to look behind me and she told me she was speaking about me.  Then her husband came out and they both told me how I had always been watched.    They told me that I was always noticed for how I walked with confidence.    I really chuckled then.  They told me the market people always liked watching me walk around.  I thanked them and went to work.  I found I paid more attention to the locals walking that day.  Not a lot smiled and they always held their heads down.  I wondered if that was because of all of the rain they had. 

When I moved back home, Mama and Colin came over to stay for a couple of weeks.  Too bad they brought the rain from there with them.  They wanted to go to the mall and I am not one to just want to walk around all of the stores so I told them I was going to get a haircut and would catch up with them.  When I was done I started walking to find them.  They had decided to sit and people watch.  When I caught up to them, Colin told me how I walked with confidence.  I just smiled.  I guess it was true even back then.  I do miss all the walking I did back there.  I should have had a fitbit then but still to this day never thought about me walking as I had heard from others.  I have never liked attention like that.  I am a background person.  I do not think about how I am walking, etc… I just go. And I am and forever will be a backpack girl.

I can remember it clearly as if I was right back there in time.  I was 8; he 10.  Vacation Bible School.  I was walking up the path to the church.  We had had a storm and he was picking up branches that had fallen.  He stood up and when I looked into his eyes, I saw the warmest soul.  He had those boyish good looks.  He was tall, had dark hair and the warmest eyes that twinkled with life.  He talked an awfully lot for not knowing me but I remember how he made me feel.  I felt so relaxed, safe in his presence.  He did not act like a jerk as the other boys that were in my class at school did.  I also met his sister while at bible school.  She had the same demeanor.  When the bible school was over I gave him the pencil case I had made. 

   I would ride my bike out to where he lived to visit with his sister.  Their parents were not what I was used to.  Her mother, “if I could have had a mother like that” is what I always thought.  Their dad would always tease me and reminded me of my dad.  I was so innocent then and was not used to people being kind to me.  I would enjoy their company then I would start to pull back.  I had to be careful not to let on what my home life was like.  I rode out there one day not realizing it was lunch time.   When they were getting ready to eat I tried to excuse myself and got ready to leave but their mother told me to sit down.   Then she asked me if I liked corned beef.  I had never had it before so I did not know what to say.  She made me a sandwich which I was not used to either.  I was a latchkey kid.   I remember sitting there picking at the sandwich trying to figure out if I liked it but I also felt like a tomato in a pumpkin patch.  I believe they could tell I was a fish out of water but they kept on talking about different things. He was never there.

So many years went by. In time I was living in the same town as he. I would see him on and off but he never knew I saw him. Always happy and he had the same smile and demeanor about him. The last time I actually spoke to him was 1996. He had shown up at a store where I was. I was happy to see him. He told me he still had the pencil case I had given him and then he told me how he never thought I would ever marry where I was so independent. He did not have to make it sound so condescending. My only thought was, “Well you didn’t ask me out now did you?” I thought about him for the next few days. He had always been single and the way he spoke to me that day, made me think that he had never worried about others’ feelings as he spoke to them, only his and how he felt. Perhaps that was how he talked to others.

After I had moved back to the states and years after that, I had made a Facebook account, he showed up under people I might know. I looked his page over and thought about sending a message to him but I didn’t. Many times I started a short letter to him.  I cannot say how many times I started a short letter just to delete it.  Over a year it was before I just said to hell with it and sent him one.  And what made me think he would want to be friends. He was going gray and a little heavier but he still looked good.   

  It was one morning when he had sent back a message for me.  I read it after a while and was pleasantly surprised.  We talked on the phone. I had sent him a Christmas gift of a pen and pencil set.  On the enclosed note I wrote that he could put that in MY pencil case.  I guess it didn’t click with him.  When we talked I asked him if he had put the set in my pencil case.  He had put them on his desk at work.  I think it surprised him that I had sent it.  I had also sent his dog, Mason, a toy.  Again, he knew not who had sent it.  He sends me pics of Mason on and off but otherwise, nothing. 

  It was only in my later years that I realized that even though we were just kids, it was when I fell in love with him not knowing what love was.   I am hopeful to always be his friend if he can get over himself. 

Found out I am 50 percent Italian,  20 percent Indian.  I get that from my daddy. 15 percent French and 15 percent English. I wasn’t going to do the testing but am glad I did.

I had a feeling I would end up being more Italian.    I am a passionate person.  When I love, it is all-encompassing.  My mother……there are many words I could use to describe her but love would not be one. She was a miserable bitter cow.  She was an Italian born in the south. I did pick up southern sayings plus I actually had that drawl.  I had had it since being able to talk. A lot of it has faded over time.  My mother, my oldest sister, my brother and myself spoke that way. My dad used to love it when I was pissed off because my drawl would come out in full force. I believe it was because he still loved my mother. Even after all she did to him.

My mother did everything in her power to not speak with her drawl.  She thought it made her a hillbilly.  Nothing ever made her happy unless it had to do with money.   Her foster parents were rich.  Her foster mother was one of the Zigfield girls and her foster father did commercials for magazines and tv when tv’s came out.  All I ever heard was how she loved the world’s fair in New York City.  She could not deal with having 4 children she never wanted and living poor as we did. I remember hearing her on the phone with her biological mother when I was only 3. I heard her say, “No, it will only be me”. I knew that meant she was going to leave us behind so she could try to get away from life as it was. How does a child know things like that.

My Indian roots I tend to follow as far as how I am in everyday life.  I have the patience of a saint.  I am very good at playing the waiting game…..that is until I am fed up and the drawl comes out.    Thankfully, I have always had a good nature.  I am a happy person.  I love to laugh.  My dad was always good natured.  He was either singing or whistling.  He loved to laugh also.  He was very frugal which is where I got that from.  He had money up the ass but would still wear his old flannel shirts with the holes in the elbows.  That must be where I get my love of old clothes from.  I much prefer to be comfortable.  I actually dislike wearing too much.   Simple and uncomplicated is so much better.

My dad always told me I had a gift. I thought he had bought me something but it was not to be found. He said I would understand as I got older. As I got older I would ask him if I would get that gift now. He would only smile and say, “Not yet.” I think I asked him that every year that I got older. After a fashion I stopped asking. It was not like my dad to lie to me. My dad was a peaceful man. He grew up dirt poor, never had an education and had worked all of his life until he couldn’t. He died from ALS when I was 33. I took care of him the last years of his life until I could not. I miss him so much but I feel him with me.

I noticed things that other did not from a young age. Things I had no reason to know. I was only 3 when my Uncle killed himself, but I remember him sitting me on his lap telling me stories. One night my dad, aunt, uncle and I were sitting talking about old memories and my old potty chair got brought up. I told my dad I remembered sitting on it at the end of my bed. He told me it was impossible because he had gotten rid of it after I was potty trained. I described it to a T, colors and all and he could not believe it. I also brought up how I would fall asleep in the peddle car while sitting beside him as he watched tv. He said I was too young to remember that, but I did. When I was older it was said to me that I had something called hyperthymesia. Just what I needed, as if being dyslexic wasn’t enough.

I think I was around 9 the first time I vividly remember seeing someone I should not have been seeing. I had spent the night at a girlfriends house. During the night I heard my name being called. It took a while for me to wake up, then to focus my vision and that was when I saw my deceased foster grandfather standing at the end of the bed I was in. In his arms was his dog, Jack. I wanted to scream but instead, I stuffed the end of the bedspread into my mouth. I remember staring at him wondering why I was seeing a dead man. I was not close to him but I did love his dog. When I woke, I looked around the room. Lois asked me what I was looking for. I said nothing. For about a week as I laid in my bed trying to get to sleep, I kept the blankets over my head and every noise I heard shook me to my core. I didn’t even tell my dad at first. I certainly did not tell my mother. She would have loved having me committed.

When I lived in Waterville, it bothered my husband how I could tell him the phone was for him, who it was, and what they wanted. We would actually go back and forth about who should get the phone. After he answered it, he would just stare at me like I had a want about me. I was stalked when I lived there. I told my husband about this and he thought I was imagining it. Another couple of weeks went by and that is when I spoke to one of the librarians and found out this man had been unable to be caught where he had done this before because the other women that he had hurt, were afraid of him. The hang ups when I would answer the phone. Wherever I went, this man was always near. According to the police once this person had been booked, he had been driving up and down past my house. He had followed me as I walked into town. He knew where I worked, knew which church I volunteered at. And he knew I spent a lot of time at the public library. And somehow, he knew my landline number even though I always had unlisted numbers. When all was said and done, this man had terrorized many women. He would get them alone, he would rape them and he would cut them up. The police needed me to be the bait for them to catch this man. I was the only one who had not, yet. They did not have cameras in places back then. My husband said no. I said I would do it. There were 4 plain clothed police officers, my husband was there and myself. The librarians were told ahead of time what was going to happen. I had been told which aisles and floors to go to. I still remember very well that on the second floor, I pulled a book out to look at it and his eyes were staring at me. I admit, that startled me. What really bothered me is he was the spitting image of my dead brother in law.

Around 1981, my dad asked if I would sell up and move in with him to help him out. I thought that was odd because he never needed help. He was in his mid to late 60’s then. I went down to see him. He looked pretty normal but he said he had been having problems breathing. I noticed when he leaned on his knuckles on the kitchen table, it shook a little. I told him I had a lot to handle and it would take some time but I would move in. It took me a couple of months. I was back in the town I really hated but he needed me. He had always been there for me so it was only fair. I got a job teaching at the school about a half mile away. I could walk to and from with no issues. I helped him take care of the farm when I wasn’t working. That was when things really got……extreme?

Dad and my husband were watching tv in the kitchen while I went to my bedroom to make my class their flash cards. I had made them, cut them into the size I needed, and had stacked them in a pile which was about 3 inches high. My eyes were tired and took my glasses off to rub them. After rubbing my eyes, I looked and the pile has been splayed out. I had not hit the table or bumped anything. I put my glasses back on and went out into the kitchen. I told them I was going to bed and said goodnight. I went back into my bedroom and the flash cards were stacked up again. I admit I felt uneasy but tried to brush it off. I got into bed and I could hear footsteps walking ever so softly. I thought it was my husband coming to bed but the door had not opened. I kept my eyes closed and tried not to breathe all the while wanting to scream. I ended up pulling the blankets over my head as a child would. I heard the footsteps come right by my side of the bed. I could have screamed but I just laid there until my husband came in. He asked me why I had the blankets over my head so I told him what had happened. He laughed saying I must have hit something. I just let it go.

It was about a year later that something frightened me so much that I wasn’t sleeping. When my dad bought his house, the first owner had built a fireplace for his wife, which she had asked for. The owner made the statement that if anyone who bought the house, tore down the fireplace, he would haunt them. After that man moved out, his daughter lived there and my dad bought the house from her, Inez. I never saw the fireplace. It was taken down before I was born. I had always heard footsteps on and off but never thought too much about it. I think I talked myself into believing that it was the house settling, being an older house. One night I got up to pee in the middle of the night. I saw my dad sitting in the easy chair he had in the kitchen and said, “Daddy, it’s time to go to bed”. I said it again and got no answer. I went to the bathroom and in the middle of having a pee, my mouth dropped open and my eyes bugged out. My dad did not have a beard. You talk about having a panic attack. I stayed in the bathroom a long time and had to talk myself into having balls enough to walk back to my bedroom, as if I could sleep. I opened the bathroom door and looked at whoever was in the chair. I wanted to get closer to see if I had imagined the person having a beard and it was just my dad. It was no imagination. I turned quickly and walked to my bedroom and crawled into bed, shaking. I said nothing for 3 days. My dad told me I looked like hell and to get some sleep. On the 3rd day I was so exhausted that I just flopped into one of the kitchen chairs. My dad thinking I was ready to pass out asked me what was wrong with me. That was when I told him what I had seen. He only stared at me. He asked me to tell him again and I did. He said nothing more about it and cooked supper that night where I was exhausted. The story did not end there.

The next day as I was walking home from work, I could see dad had a visitor. It was someone on a tractor. As I got to his driveway, I saw it was Tildon. He said something told him to stop in to see my dad. Then my dad asked me to tell him what I saw. It was Tildon’s grandfather that I had seen. Now I knew who I was “seeing” that would be walking across the backyard near the farm pond with his hands in his pockets with his head down, down by the chicken houses or out in my dad’s huge garden, but I never saw him in my daddy’s chair again. The question of why was I seeing him bothered me. Why was he here. I think I found out soon enough.

About 5 months later my dad had just had his load of chickens picked up to go to the processing plant and he and Bruce, a neighbor were down by the grain bins. I had just gotten home from school and sat on the end of the bed, taking my work clothes off, changing into my farm work clothes when I heard a soft high pitched sound. It sounded like a woman crying or a man with a higher pitched voice. Talk about wanting to shit ones self, I froze with half of my work pants on one leg and my school pants half off the other leg. I kept listening to the soft sobbing wondering who or what it could have been. I know his mother died a young woman. I also knew his youngest brother had killed himself after coming home from WWII. Or was it an animal in the cellar even though I knew one could not get in there.. Was it a breeze sneaking through a crack in the trim of a window. We had no windows in the cellar. I thought of everything it could have been while thinking why in hell he left the grates in the floor after he tore out the furnace. I could not figure who else it could have been. I knew who had lived in this house before and wondered if something bad had happened here. I remembered my uncles voice and it could have been him but I had never heard him cry. And my grandmother, I had never met. Panicking as I was, I finished getting dressed and went out the front door. I was not walking by the cellar door.

I would soon learn why John Loren visited his old house. It was his last time seeing the old homestead he once knew before it going into another’s hands which would not be family. This was when my dad’s health issues went from bad to ugly. First it was his breathing, then his fear of not daring to drive where he shook so bad. He said it was if his muscles were not working for him anymore. He was put on proventil and theo24. It didn’t help much. He had other test that was available back then, done. He had to stop driving. He would never raise chickens again. I would have to change the channels on his tv for him. He could get himself to bed and to his easy chair he kept in his large kitchen but that was it. His doctors had no idea of what was going on. I contacted my doctor when his could not be reached and she took over my dad’s health care. That was when I was told after further testing that he had ALS. I took care of him until I could not. He had to have a feeding tube put in. The last few months of his life, he spent in the hospital He was transferred from the hospital in Belfast to the one in Bangor. And that is where he passed. I would go up when I could. Traffic was busy with construction so many times I would take my bike because with a bike, I could take shortcuts where a car could not. He could no longer talk so he had to write everything down on paper, if one could read his scribbling. It was very hard for me to see what was once a strong man, still alert unable to breathe on his own or speak let alone unable to walk. I was going up one Saturday but got called into work so figured I would go up Sunday. I got the call at 2:30 a.m. Sunday morning that he had passed. Then the guilt set in. I felt I had let my dad down, not seeing him before he left. I had not had my chance to tell him how much I loved him and to say goodbye. He did pretty good I felt. His health issues started when he was in his late 60’s. So now I understood him wanting me to sell up and move in. He knew. I figure he had been having symptoms for at least 6 years. Most die within 3 years and there have been some who have lived 15 years or longer with ALS but at that time, in a small town, I think he did pretty damn good lasting that long. His funeral was full of people. I sat away from my siblings. I was his favorite. They knew it and I knew it. It hit me the hardest. After viewing him in his coffin, people walked by me, reaching out for my hands and holding them. I had slipped some cash in his pocket of his suit and kissed him goodbye for the last time. My world, as I had known it, was over.

I got done my job. I needed a long time to deal with my dad’s passing to figure out what I was going to do with my life. I got a lot done on the farm and inside of the house. I stayed mostly to myself. I knew what was coming up, having to deal with it. It seemed it took years to deal with probate and his property. Once his will was handled and all monies was being invested at Smith and Barneys until I would reach the age of 50. I never thought about it. My only thought was that I lost my daddy, the only stability in my life, at the age of 33. So now I had to build my own stability. A few years went by and that was when I had an email from someone asking me what my signature meant.

I had been a member of a newsgroup of people that lived all over the world. That is where this person had seen my posts. It was my signature that drew him to me. The sender of that email and I talked via email and via the telephone.

My son was going for his drivers license. I was stressed out about that because I knew how my son was and I just pictured how things would be going after that if he did indeed get his license. I thought I would mow the lawn figuring the exercise from that would help alleviate my stress. I was down by the road where there was a dip in the lawn. It had rained a few days before so there was a bit of a puddle but I continued to mow. I started to get stuck in a spot or two and with the stress I felt, I just wanted to leave the damn mower there and walk off. It was then when I heard my dad say, “Give her some gas Rhettie.” I must have been in a real pissy mood because I looked up to where I heard the voice come from and there was my dad, standing, leaning against my mustang. One hand on my car and the other in his pocket which was his usual. My dad in his green chinos, gray t shirt and his Mork and Mindy suspenders on that I got him. I remember telling him to shut the fuck up. It was then when I realized I had actually seen my dad and looked up to where I had seen him. He was gone. I gave the mower more gas and finished what I started. I noticed my stress had gone and I had a smile on my face.

The man who had sent me an email, was the man I would end up marrying years down the road. The funny parts were as we were discussing our parents, I told him about how my dad would be checking him out. I think he thought I was just telling him porkies as he would say. It was 9 pm one night when I got a call. He said he was in bed sleeping and all of a sudden the wardrobe doors burst open and scared the shit out of him. I asked him if they were not fastened properly. He replied they were never used, that his mothers old furs and clothes were in there and the doors had never been opened for anything where it was more for storage but it was chuckablock full. That is when I told him my dad was indeed waking you up to some things. I had all I could do not to laugh picturing him jumping out of bed and standing, staring at that wardrobe. After the call, I was laughing my ass off. I have to add that after living there for a handful of years, that wardrobe never opened while I was there and it was chuckablock full. I am surprised the items inside did not fly out of there but why did the doors fly open that night………..

The years went by and we had moved to the states. I figured where I chose would be good job wise. Within a week I had found a job, a vehicle and a house to rent and ended up buying it. A lot was going on with setting up a new house. The furniture, the transferring of monies from hither and yon. Things were not the same for me in this city compared to when I left years ago from a country farm. I was like a fish out of water.

One morning my husband asked me if I had heard that noise last night. I told him I had not. I was struggling with PTSD and to get some solid sleep was well advised by my doctor. I asked him if perhaps the plow picked up a rock and it hit the house. He said no. I asked if it was something else and again he said no. He said it sounded like a gun. I then asked if he thought it was a backfire. Again, he said no. I left for work. It was about a mile if that, so I walked, no matter the weather. I didn’t think much about what he heard that night until one day when I noticed that spot of the side of the house. I stopped to look at it and it did look like a bullet hole. That weekend we both went out to look at it. That was when my neighbor came down to ask if we wanted the police involved. He was always nosy no matter what we were doing. I told him no. He said it was a bullet hole and should be looked at. That piece of siding was replaced and it was left at that. I cannot say who would have made that hole but I had a real good idea who was behind it. A little time after that I went down to the police station and had a talk with an officer. IF it was a bullet, it remains stuck in probably a stud. There were no more problems after that.

Being a new home, the noises are something one has to get used to whether the house is new or not. Why I could hear whispers is anyone’s guess. There were times when it got to me and I would turn off the PC or tv and go to bed just to hopefully fall asleep quickly. It sounded like the room I was in had a million people in it, all whispering. Even my little dog would wake, crawl out of her bed near me, growling. My husband, who still did not believe in spooks as he called them, asked me if I could shut the dog up. I just gave him a look to let him know it was not happening. She was not barking, just growling while dragging herself out of her bed, on her belly, along the floor.

We had 2 cats. Their litter box was down cellar. I used to go down there every day after supper to clean it. Being tired I would clean it not thinking about the light being blocked so I could not see what I was doing. The light was behind me and off to the side a bit but I could see if I was getting all the litter clean. I sat on an old stool while doing it. All of a sudden, everything would go black then the light would be back. I asked hubby if he had been playing with the light but he had not. Besides, I could hear him in the back room. It wasn’t until the weekend when it happened again and I had set a little mirror against a post so I could see the light while cleaning the litter box. The light did not go completely off but there was a shadow that kept moving back and forth in front of it. I went upstairs and typed what I just wrote and shadow people popped up. I have never heard of it. What first caught my eyes were the words that shadow people wanted to cause harm to one. That was all it took. I did not want to hear about it. Nuff said. I started to clean the litter box in the daylight.

I had started a job as a custodian at a large corporation. It was 7 floors I had to take care of. I would go in at 3 a.m. I would gather all the trash first on all the floors. Then it would be dust mopping and vacuuming the rugs. I did that, especially in the offices before people started to pile in. One night I watched a horror movie with my husband and when I went into work that next morning, I was terrified to go across the room to get to the hallway. Let me explain that the large building was completely dark. I would unlock the back door and had to use my swipe card to get anywhere else in the building. That morning, I froze just inside the back door. The door across that large floor kept banging. It didn’t open but it just kept banging. I was not about to stand there until Kevin came in at 4:30. I had work to do. What made things worse was the company had erected cubicles all over the floor. I finally went to that door without anyone jumping out from the cubicles to get me…lol. The door was jammed and did not close correctly. I was okay then but I have to admit I was jumpy all day long.

On another morning I started in doing my work. I grabbed the large trash tub and went up to the highest floor and worked my way down, fetching the trash. I got off the elevator on the 3rd floor and noticed a man sitting all alone at one of the tables. I said, “Good morning” to him and got no answer. I spoke a little louder and said it again. Still nothing. I said to myself that I must have pissed him off somehow and I had not even met him at all. He must have been new here. I went all around the 3rd floor then came to the room where he was. I fetched the trash, wiped the tables and walked right up to him and said good morning again. Still nothing. That time I figured he was just being an ass or he was so engrossed in the article he was reading in the newspaper so I finished my work. After fetching all the trash on all floor, as I was going out to the dumpster, Kevin was walking in with his usual 2 cups of coffee along with his donuts. I said to Kevin, “You must have a new guy working here. I saw him on the 3rd floor, said good morning 3 times, even standing right beside him and nothing.” Kevin just stood there. He said he did not hear of anyone new starting and asked me what he looked like. I told him he was in his 40’s, brown hair, medium build and wearing a blue button up shirt and that he was reading the Bangor Daily. Kevin just stared at me. He said he had to go to the bathroom and for me to wait until he got back.

We went out to have a smoke and he asked me to describe this person again. He said he had to throw some cold water on his face to wake up. When I described the guy again, I also said he would not even say a good morning back to me and asked Kevin what I did to piss him off. Kevin was hemming and hawing, then he said that the man would not be saying anything to me. I asked him why and he told me the man was dead. I thought he was joking but he was not. I went back to work. Kevin had told Pat on the 3rd floor what I had told him. I guess it spread like wildfire. I felt like a fool but Pat told me I was not the only one who noticed “things” around there. Come to find out, this person that I saw, his name was Paul. He loved working there. He had also developed cancer. He had treatment and he was well enough to come back to work but the company did not want to have to keep paying for his treatments so they told him he was done. The people that worked there said they thought that was what ended up killing him. I could not say. He had died long before I worked there.

While working there I had those shadow people around a lot. It bothered me. I always found myself looking behind my back. One thing that happened, I had heard that saying of one’s heart in their throat and I never thought much about it until it happened to me. I was on the 7th floor and had put the large trash container then myself in the elevator. I pressed the number 6 button to go down to the next floor and all of a sudden the elevator dropped. It stopped on the 2nd floor. I can say that it is true, one’s heart does feel like it is in one’s throat. I wasn’t afraid but it felt like any organ I had inside of me was fighting to come out of my mouth. I was only there for a couple of years but I had had enough of different happenings to last me a lifetime. I left to be employed at a larger company.

I had my own business plus working my 40 hours. I had 2 clients on Silver Road and one in Veazie. The first place I did, her name was Irene. She worked for a bank before retiring. She had been widowed for a long time. She was well ahead of her 90 years. Still sharp as a tack and what would drive her family wild would be to see her driving her 1988 Nova going down Broadway Ave. She was a spry old lady and still had all of her marbles. One morning she had bought me a muffin and while we were eating them, she told me I was a doctor in my previous life. I found myself sitting there just staring at her wondering what in the hell. I picked away at the muffin and then she said that I knew too much. She then proceeded to tell me she was a Japanese prisoner of war. I was still in that what the hell mode. I had never thought about reincarnation before but she filled me in with her thoughts. I asked her if her husband every visited her and she said yes. She lived alone but was never alone. One time I was over there and she was so excited telling me something and someone kept tapping me on my right shoulder. I would shrug to get rid of it but it kept up and kept up and I turned to look and I told whoever it was, “Do you mind? She’s talking”. After I turned to get back to the conversation, Irene was smiling looking at me. There were times when I could smell cigarette smoke in her kitchen. I knew she didn’t smoke. Her husband had died from smoking when he was in his 90’s so I knew George was still hanging around. Irene passed a year later. I know he was there waiting for her.

I was in Walmart one day wanting to buy some beans. While in the bean aisle, an elderly man came up to where I was and started talking to me about the different varieties of beans. As he started to talk about different things. He had said a few things that I did not put two and two together with. It was personal things that only my dad and I knew. I must have stayed there with him for a half hour then I told him I really needed to get home. I said goodbye and started down to another aisle. That was when it hit me that, could that have been my dad using that man’s body as a way to talk to me like we used to talk? And the personal things he had said. I started to run back to that aisle and he was gone. I rushed all over the store and by the check outs and he was no where to be seen. It was not like he moved quickly because he didn’t so why could I not find him. I really felt defeated so I cashed out and as I neared my truck, I noticed pennies all in a line right up to where the drivers door was. As defeated as I felt for not finding that man again, I had a smile on my face because it had to have been my dad. We had this thing about pennies and how he said he would leave them for me to find so he would know he was okay and still watching my back.

At this time in my life, My husband passed and I have heard the kettle turn on and off. I swear that I used to see him walking from the living room to the kitchen numerous times. I also have times when I turn my head to the left to look at him as if he were going to come around the corner to ask me a question. Right after he passed, I heard a crash, and the picture of an outhouse I had hung in the bathroom had landed on the floor. There was no reason for it to fall. I had the nail pointing towards the ceiling and the hook on the back of the picture was a complete circle so there was no way it should have fallen. I picked up the mess then went down cellar to fetch a piece of glass from another frame and put the picture back up and it hasn’t fallen. Same nail, same hook on the back.

It makes me wonder why I had heard all that whispering years ago. I knew my dad visited me often. I’ve been able to tell when my dad had visited me. He raised chickens so I could smell chicken shit. He chewed Copenhagen snuff. I could smell that at times. I could smell his pre shave at times. There are sometimes when I have smelled a woman’s perfume. I only wished others could hear what I do. If this is the gift my dad said I had, I don’t like it and I don’t want it. When he knew what I know now, he would tell me to use it to my advantage. Whatever in the hell that meant.

I have to admit that in the few years since my husband has passed, the sounds have more or less stopped. The whisperers as I call them are gone. I wonder if they were all watching over me living with what I had. I also think that is why I don’t sense my dad anymore. He always had my back no matter where I was. If anyone has ever asked me if I believe in angels, I do. I can only imagine my guardian angel has spent many hours shaking her head at the things I have done. I believe we all have someone who watches over us.

I was 6 when my folks divorced. I had not a clue what was going on. I only knew I was being taken out of school that day. We, my sister and I. We were left at somebody’s home somewhere. I knew none of these people. I was not allowed to go to school. All I did was to sit outside wondering where I was and missing my daddy. My mother had hidden us away from our father. That is how she was. We were her bargaining chips. She would get what money she wanted out of him in order for him to see us.

We did spend some time staying up to my foster grandmothers. I do not think she was happy to have us there. It was a large brick house with a fireplace in every room. There were antiques all throughout the house. There were no toys but plenty of books to read only if we sat while reading. Grandmother would cook us our breakfasts but it was nothing I wanted to eat, but eat we did. There was a hammock between 2 large trees. I used to go and lay on that during the days. While I swung on that I would dream of how I wish I lived.

Uncle Ernie, as we called our foster grandfather, was not usually around much. He was always golfing. My grandmother had a henhouse full of chickens. I helped her with those. 3 stories of chickens kept me busy. There was also a hired hand named Jerry. He used to play music which flowed out of the window of his rooms above the house. We would all dance around in circles in the driveway. I think it was then when I realized music would play a big role in my life. Uncle Ernie had Scottish Terriers all named after the Kennedy clan. Jack was the last one left that I remember. One day the mailman ran over Jack. It sent Uncle Ernie to the ground. Gram drove Uncle Ernie to the hospital and he was transferred to the VA hospital. He ended up passing from a broken heart. He loved all of his dogs very much.

After Uncle Ernie passed we moved to a little house out on Route 3. We had to lug our water from a spring that set deep within the woods behind the house. I never minded. It was like an adventure. The neighbors used to go with us. Their home was full of life and there was always fresh baked bread going in the oven. I can still remember the taste of that bread slathered with butter. It was a nice house where I lived but there were only two bedrooms. I had to share one with my sister. She was always mean to me and very secretive and hated my mother. There was a garage across the road. If I had a quarter, I would walk across the road to get an ice cold bottle of root beer from an old fashioned cooler. You put the quarter in, slide the bottle down and lift it up out of the ice cold water.

Living in that little house was the first time I heard my mother cry. She had always been so mean and vindictive. She thought nothing of raising her fist to me and here she was feeling vulnerable. I could not figure out why but I bet it had to do with the divorce coming up. While listening to her cry, I remembered all the times I had cried when she was taking my baseball bat to me, pulling my hair so I would land on the floor or hit me with her fists. I only went outdoors and walked down to where the stream was. Then the day of the divorce hearing. As I went to get into the taxi because the judge wanted to talk to me, my sister slammed the taxi door onto my fingers. I hated my life. My sister was as miserable as my mother. After the divorce, we moved to an apartment in town. It had running water so I did not have to lug that anymore.

The new place we lived in had a large kitchen downstairs and a garage. Upstairs were 3 bedrooms, a living room and the bathroom. There was an upstairs door so we could exit that way if we chose to. My mother grew more miserable. The man she had been chasing did not want anything to do with her but she would tell him stories of to get his sympathy. And when she grew angry, it was taken out of me. My sister was more interested in finding boys. She would hand wash mini skirts as mother left for work, she would turn the heat up high so the skirts would dry. One day she forgot to turn the heat down and it killed my mothers canary. I got the beating for that. I was to do all the housework as if I knew what I was doing with having no teaching of anything. All I could think of was Cinderella but there was only one sister there.

I did not have many friends. I had also gotten pretty good at reading people. I was usually not allowed to stay at a friends house just as I was not allowed to have friends at my house. God forbid if someone saw my mother backhand me. Lois asked me if I wanted to spend the night one time. Her mother surmised there was something amiss in my household but she let me stay over. It was during that night when I heard my name being called. When I finally woke up, it was dark. As my eyes focused, I looked at the end of the bed I was in and there stood my Uncle Ernie with Jack in his arms. I wanted to scream but only stuffed the top of the bedding into my mouth. Why did he come to see me? We were not close but I loved that dog. I never spoke of it. I had to figure out what and why.

It was at the end of my 8th grade that we were moving. My sister had run away from mother and was living with her friends. So I was left to be alone with mother. We moved to another town far from what I had been used to. She ran a small roadstop. She thought with me going to a private school that it would keep me out of trouble as I was becoming a teen. I did not like Lincoln Academy. Different classes in different buildings. All brick built. I was shocked to make a few friends. We would go to the movies or to the dances at school. It is also when I would smoke a cigarette. My mother was too busy chasing men to know what was going on in my life. Some of my friends had parties at their homes and I went. I never drank with them. I met a lot of parents who were not what I was used to. They were actually nice. All it took for me to stop going to the parties was one guy, Buzzie, he was called. He was in the navy and really liked me. He wanted what I was not giving out so I stopped going to parties. That was also the time in my life when my mother told me I should marry rich. That money was everything to a woman. She was even picking out boys who came from money for me to date. I showed no interest which pissed her off even more. I mean, by then I was only 16.

At school I found I was good at sports. I was good in all sports except baseball. I got sick of getting hit with the balls. I was good at tennis, basketball, soccer and was exceptional at running/track. I only contributed that to running away from my life with mother, but I was good in it. I did not like gymnastics. Especially after falling on the balance beam and it sending me to the hospital bleeding. It was then when my mother looked at me as a whore because the beam had broken my hymen. Here I was at 16 and I not a clue of what a whore or slut was. I never asked any of the other girls what it meant because I was the laughing stock of the kids as it was, coming from a small country town. I tried tag football but being the runt, the other girls laughed when they would all land on me. I was to assume they wanted me to cry to make fun of me but I did not.

Christmas came and went. My dad had called me to say he would see me. My mother gave him directions. Come to find out, she had given him the wrong directions so that he would drive right by where we lived. I wondered why she was laughing hysterically at one point. It must have been when she saw him driving by. It would have been the first time of seeing him in a very long time. And then the next move.

She was still chasing the man who would become my stepfather. I liked him but also felt sorry for him. We then headed north, next to New Hampshire. It was out in the country which was more my style. She had opened another restaurant. The school I would go to next would be the newest up to date school in the whole state of Maine. It was high tech. I met a few of the girls in the neighborhood but they came from real good families. I tried fitting in but I was not in their league. It was my own insecurities that kept me from forming friendships. I never felt good enough. They remained kind and friendly. I am to assume that from the way I was built, the boys felt I was older than I actually was. I had one boy, well a man, that wanted to date me. I admit I was afraid of him because of his size. He was very tall and muscular. I told him I was too young to go out with him but he persisted. In the end, my mother scared him off. He had a car and she worried I would leave. That meant her not getting child support. Again, after the end of that school year, my mother had pissed off everyone as usual so we moved again.

The next stop was near the coastline. I was happy with that. Being near the water gave me peace. We rented an apartment near the next school I would be going to. It was a nice school but the “uptown” girls were really mean. I made one friend, Ella. That was when I first got a taste of bullying. I was bullied my entire year there. The town was a rough town. My mother worked at one of the top restaurants downtown. I liked that I had a large bedroom. I also liked that she was not home much. I cannot remember what happened but for some reason we had to move again and quickly. I had not finished that year in school so she went to my school and told them we had to move then and there so they gave me my grades and we were off, again.

The last stop with her was in Old Orchard Beach. The city of sex, drugs and rock n roll or back then it was. I cannot say why but I never touched a drug nor hung out with any of the girls. They were too wild for me. And the drugs they took, well, I wonder what they are all doing now or if they are even alive. I got a job after school. I would go to school, come of the front door and hop on the bus to take me to my job in another town. Once done work at 11 pm I would walk the 7 miles home. When I got home she would accuse me of being with a boy because I did not walk home fast enough. When I got my paycheck and cashed it, as I opened the door to enter the trailer we lived in, she would meet me at the door, hand outstretched. She took my pay for that week, giving me 50 cents to go me the week. I also had to find a place to stay every weekend so she could entertain her men and here she was married. Red, my stepfather, had run away from home. I would stay at some off season motels where the rest of the homeless kids stayed. I was allowed back home late Sunday night to shower and to change for school and work the next day. I took that for a long enough time. Graduation day was the last she day she ever hit me. It was right in front of my nephew. She had taken her fist to the left side of my face. My eye was bruised and bleeding. I jumped out of her car, ran across a field and went to the police station. They directed me to the judges office and I signed papers to have her arrested with her sitting in a chair opposite of me. Then I took off to never see her again. I hid out at a friends far from where I had been for the next 3 weeks, until I turned 18. I did not even see my dad but I did call him to let him know I was okay. That was when he said he had bought me a car so I could go job hunting where he lived. I told him I did not want it. I was going to stay where I was. He was not happy about it but he knew I had to find my own way. My dad had always told me I would need someone to take care of me. If he had only known that I had always had to take care of me. I could not count on anyone else.

I cannot say how I made it through all I had. I had never taken an illegal drug nor smoked pot. I was not chasing the boys and had no relationships with them. I only knew I had to get through school while keeping what sanity I had and get away from my mother and I did just that. She was really pissed off that I had signed papers to have her arrested. She broke into a chest I had been saving dishes, etc… to equip an apartment with, broke the dishes and tore my yearbook to shreds, then dropped it off at my dad’s house, telling him what an ungrateful little whore I was. What she did not know was that I had never been touched by a man, only her abuse.

Years later my dad told me it was a wonder why one of us kids never killed her. I told him we never thought about that. It was not how our generation was. However, I was proud that I was the only one of us who did not get pregnant or run away just to get away from her. I only wanted her to stop hitting me. Her bitterness, her nastiness, her abuse. I spent too many times at a clinic getting patched up. I also spend too many days missing school so no one would ask why I had the cuts and bruises I had. Perhaps the kids in school took their drugs and drank to escape what unpleasantness they had in their lives but I was not going to do it. And I am proud of that.

What is an old soul?  Being an old soul refers to how you view and approach life.  Your views echo those of someone much older than you, who has lived a long and fruitful life. You approach life with a greater sense of knowledge and wisdom coupled with a greater sense of inner wealth.

I am an old soul and have always felt like I was living in the wrong generation.  The way my mind works does not fit in the time span I am existing in.  There is so much greed; power struggles with everyone wanting what they want no matter what.  I do not see much compromising done.  I remember a time when life was easier.

  I miss my clients who have passed on.  I felt so connected to them and fortunate to remember all of our conversations; the subjects we spoke of at length.  Though they were older,  they were so far advanced of the people of today.  They were far advance of myself as I listened and learned. 

    My way of thinking is so different from most I know.  I see, hear and feel things that most others do not.  I had always felt I was a freak but now I have found I am more in touch with what is most important in life.  I actually feel sorry for the ones that  are not.  My dad was that way.  He always told me I was special.  I did not always feel that way.  Being different tends to make one always keep to themselves.

Ways to know if you are an old soul:

You know there’s another way to do things.  You often say things like, “I have a feeling this will work”, or “there’s no harm in trying.” People may view your suggestions as outdated or done, but you know that sometimes, just sometimes, the tried and tested ways of doing things are best.  You feel that not all problems require a new and innovative solution, and going round in circles when the answer may be staring you in the face is usually a waste of valuable time, and energy.  You have no problem trying out new things, but know, too, that oldies can also be goodies.

You give advice well beyond your years.  You somehow seem to know how to do things you haven’t even done yourself yet. It’s like you’ve lived before, and just know how it all works. People often look at you with that “how do you know?” expression, and you respond with a confident, “I just know!”  Truth is, you do just know, but don’t know how you know. 

You like to think things through.  Even the most impatient of people will need to think things through if they are an old soul at heart. You need that time to mull it over in your head.  It’s an important part of your to-do process, and it enables you to move forward in the direction most in sync with your mind, body and soul.  To you, not being able to think things through, even a little, leaves you feeling uneasy, and that does nothing to help.

You don’t waste time asking why.  After you’ve thought things through, you move ahead, confident in the knowledge that you’ve done all you needed to do to get going.  You don’t waste time in trying to justify it to yourself or anyone else. You have little time and patience for the nonsensical and would prefer to utilize your time getting things done, rather than sitting around talking about getting things done.

You don’t like to go out just for the sake of going out.  It’s quality over quantity for you. You love to go out and have fun, but going out because others feel it is required, or you look boring if you don’t, holds no merit for you.  When you go out, you’d like to experience something; something that resonates with your way of perceiving the world and challenges you.  You’ll happily spend money on those things that give you wonderful experiences and broaden your horizons. Going out just because, seems pointless to you; you’d rather save your time, and money, and do something of quality.

You have an appreciation for old literature.  You respect the classics. You’re often found getting euphorically high off old books. You’ve probably sniffed a good few old books in your time, and you don’t care who sees.  For you, old literature should be respected and valued; they hold history and historical experience between their pages and deserve to be exalted.

You have old ears.  You love and appreciate the classics and have a longing for the musicality of those nostalgic tunes. Your record (that’s right, record!) collection looks like a retro music store. Probably only 10% of your collection consists of what you refer to as “nowadays” music, the rest are from decades gone by.  You know only a handful of today’s artists, and that’s only because you haven’t heard an album yet to rival your favorite Grateful Dead album, or your favorite Frank Sinatra track.  You don’t go out of your way to avoid modern music, it just doesn’t seem to whet your appetite. So you’ll happily pump your beloved Janis Joplin or Nat King Cole all the way home.

You see no need in being unnecessarily stressed.  You don’t invite drama just because it makes you feel alive. You’d much prefer to live without it.  You appreciate the quiet, and invite peace. It’s become apparent to you that the world views stress and busyness as being productive.  But you know that being productive has nothing to do with being crazy busy or stressed, but everything to do with how well you utilize your time.  So you’re mindful about what you spend your hours doing, and make sure your doing something worthwhile, and not just keeping busy for busy sake.

You value deep connections.  For you, it’s all about quality over quantity. You require a deeper connection with those around you in order to feel any connection at all.  Half hearted friendships, surface-level relationships and fly-by-night hook-ups are not your thing. You value the essence of deeper friendships and long lasting relationships, as you give yourself wholly to them, too.

You love learning.  Nothing gets you going more than learning more about yourself, other people and the world around you.  For you learning is growth, and growth is part of life. As an old soul, you approach learning from the understanding that it doesn’t have to lead anywhere, for example, a degree or certificate.  Sure, those things are great and offer a sense of accomplishment, but for you it’s the act of learning something new and wonderful that motivates you, not the initials after your name!

You don’t see the fuss about the latest craze.  Following others just to fit in? Where’s the fun in that? To you, being a style chaser or tech follower is something you can never quite get your head around.  Sure you may even own a Kindle or you may have an iPad, but now they sit there, gathering dust, because you miss the feel (and smell) or the real thing, and the computer works just fine.  You don’t really care whether you’re an early adopter or a late comer. None of the things defines you, and you’re okay with that.

You value the company of those much older than you.  You want to drink in their wisdom and you hang on their every word as they tell you stories of their youth. You laugh at their accounts of old trends, and cry at the war stories, you reminisce with them about long lost loves, and actually listen to their pearls of wisdom.  At a time when we seem to have less and less time for the more mature among us, the old soul has nothing but time to give. That’s because you appreciate what they have to share, and let’s be honest, you secretly wish for a time when life seemed so simple.

You are the epitome of calm.  You are the steadfast one, the one neither swayed, nor toppled, even in a crisis. You probably say things like, “Slow is smooth, smooth is fast,” and tell people to “Get a grip!”   To everyone else, you appear disconnected, but to those who know you well, you’re actually hard at work, you just work differently.  You’ve learned that nothing actually gets done if everyone is running around losing their heads; someone needs to be the calm force. This is just how you make sense of what is happening.  You stop. Wait. Listen. Then decide what steps to take next.

You truly understand what it means to give.  To you, there’s no better way to live, than to give.  Giving your time, or money or those things you simply have no need for is the most rewarding thing anyone can do with their short time on earth. It isn’t an ego thing, far from it.  For you, giving is the purest act of love. Plus, you see no point in holding on to things you can’t take with you, so you’re more than happy to travel light!

I had met someone back in 2006. I had to have my vehicle worked on and a garage was recommend by a co worker. I hated going somewhere and meeting new people. I was not much of a people person yet I went. When I walked in the person behind the counter asked me if he could help me. It was then when I looked up into his eyes and I cannot describe how I felt but I knew I felt safe with this person. Perhaps he was another old soul.

I went into work the next day and asked my co worker who this person was. He asked me to describe him and then he told me the mans name. He wasn’t on my mind all the time but I did think of him. It was like he was always tucked away in the back of my mind. I would see him out in the public at times and would watch him, trying to read him. He was always friendly with people. He was soft spoken and seemed very relaxed. He was tall and lean.

As it was, my vehicle always seemed to have issues. Should have bought something else but I would watch him without him noticing or I hoped he didn’t. He was still the same way. Patient and soft spoken. I also noticed he moved with confidence. I tried to figure out why I felt he was my safe place.

As time went on with the dollars killing me over that vehicle, we would talk. That is when I knew he was an old soul. He felt the way I did on a lot of things. One time he told me he was tired of being taken advantage of. He would do for a lady friend he had but it was never reciprocated. I knew all too well what that felt like.

Years went by and so did the talks. Talking got me to knowing some things about him yet just watching how he was with people and how he carried himself told me more than words could. I could tell he had been hurt in his past and he had a hard time trusting. I knew it had nothing to do with me, they were his issues to deal with.

I was having problems sleeping. I had more times when I found I was in a grumpy mood. I really had no reason for being so or so I thought. More time went by. Talking with him I noticed feelings I had hidden for so long kept trying to come to the surface. That is when I worked harder to push those feelings down into a corner of my heart, tucked away where they would not rise to any occasion.

I have friends that I used to work along side of years ago. We had reconnected after me moving back from England. I picked up where I had let go because of my move. They noticed I was not my jovial old self. They were going to a sweat lodge and wanted to know if I would want to join them. I jumped at the chance hoping it would compartmentalize the feelings I had. I did not think I could make it through the sweat. I was older and the heat started to get to me but I made myself finish it. Well, it bit me in my backside. It intensified my feelings. On the ride home the tears were streaming down my face. I did not know what to do then. One of our crew, someone who I had had a relationship with many years ago and who still loved me figured out what was bothering me. He tried talking to me. I did trust him but knew what I would say would hurt him but I spoke of what was in my heart. The others had picked up on it also.

After many nights of getting very little sleep I spoke to this friend telling him what had happened at the sweat. Long story short, other things had happened in my life so I backed away. That was when Bobby was in contact with me. We talked and I went down to his camp with the others there. All he could do was stare at me. I went home and never heard back from him until he asked me out for a meal. That was when I realized that he was not someone I would want to hang out with much. I didn’t want someone who would use words but not back them up. Besides, Bobby was all about Bobby so I would feel alone whether with or without him. I chose to be without him.

So here I am, alone. I still think about my safe place. I don’t want a relationship with this man but do I want a friendship. Right now and the road I am on, I will settle for a deep friendship. He did come to my home to fetch some things a few years ago but he did the talking. I was still numb inside from circumstances and really felt nothing at that point. I can say that I really miss having a safe place but perhaps it is time to be my own safe place.

I am an older woman who has lived many places, had numerous jobs and loved very few. I have had many friends around the world, of different nationalities, different beliefs and different occupations. I have rubbed elbows with higher ups, and trained with my friend’s SEALS class. I chose a different avenue than my siblings, sometimes falling into the proverbial bucket of shit. Either or I have lived a different life from them.  

I have lived the high life and had anything anyone’s heart could desire yet with having all of those things and being with any of those people, there was always something missing. I never found what I had always looked for. That place that I could call “home”. It wasn’t until I realized that home was not a physical address but being with that special someone who you felt completely safe and at ease with. It did not mean having a fancy house, fancy vehicle, the best furniture or tons of jewelry. I had always preferred the simple life. As long as I paid my bills, had some food on the table and could put some into savings, I was good to go. Anyone I had ever been with always wanted more. I did not.

I thought I had found that “home” but he was not to be. I connected with him in so many ways but there was something missing. All the money, jewels, clothing, vehicles…anything I did or could have, meant nothing. I wanted to be “home” with someone who was humble, kind, sincere, loving, trustworthy, honest and who I could trust with my deepest thoughts. What the hell would anyone ever see in me. I am such a homebody. I do not like drama. I prefer to keep everything plain and simple. Life is complicated enough as it is.

If by chance it should never happen for me, I have lived a loveless life and whether I liked it or not, I could continue on.  My writings are from what I have lived through, what I have witnessed and what I actually have believed all along my journey, all the while hoping to find my “home”.