Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?

Subject: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 09:00 PM

In another thread someone mentioned visiting Patsy Cline's resting place (think it was "Flattop"), and it got me thinking. I've always loved to walk through graveyards, check out the names of the folks who've "been", and in general just revel in the peacefulness. Many times I've taken an instrument and just sat under a tree and played (no jokes about "captive audience").

Once I discovered a hitherto unknown relative (a "Fielding" from the mid-1850s) as I walked through an older part of a local cemetary. A little further research made that person "live again" for me.

Friends of mine have made pilgrimages to the graves of Charlie Poole and Leadbelly, and while in Britain I've hunted down Marx, an obviously fraudulent "Robin Hood" site (that he probably didn't exist didn't deter the locals) and an equally fraudulent but nonetheless fascinating "King Arthur" site.

Perhaps one of the nicest sites I've been to, is the grave of humourist Stephen Leacock. He's mostly known in Canada, but made millions laugh. I played a song about Orillia Ontario for "him".

Any other graveyard wanderers?

Rick

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Irish sergeant
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 09:13 PM

Rick: i've walked grave yards but for me battlefields are also places to confer with those gone on. It is always special to me to participate in the annual re-enactment of the battle of Cedar Creek for that reason. The re-enactment is held on the actual battlefields and I make it a point to walk (Respectfully of course) through the Belle Grove plantation house. The house is reputed to be haunted. It is also the place where General Stephen Ramseur died as a result of his wounds. The Confederate general was a classmate and good friend of Gen. Custer who would suffer a similar fate twelve years later in the wilds of Montana. I played Taps and Amazing Grace at Cedar Creek. Both bring tears to my eyes each time I play them. How about the other mudcatters? Any input? Neil

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 09:20 PM

I have to state my Christian view point here. To enjoy the peace of a graveyard is fine but talking to the dead is forbidden and is IMO dangerous.

Jon

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: DougR
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 10:29 PM

Jon: Don't know what you base your statement on. I'm a Christian (if that makes any difference) and I can't recall any substantive reports written or verbal that forbids one to talk to the dead. My wife died last August and I find myself, from time to time making comments to her as though she were present. Does that mean I am condemned to some sort of purgatory or something? I'm really curious. Where did you get such an idea? Or maybe you are just putting us on!

Rick, I think cemeteries are facinating. I went back to my old hometown recently to attend a reunion of classmates and visited my mother and father's graves. I saw markers on graves of many old friends that brought back lots of good memories.

DougR

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 10:44 PM

Doug, I am no good at rembering quotes from the bible and where they came from and I will try to find some referene tommorrow. I think it starts in the OT with somebody consulting a medium instead of God.

Like it or not, these matters are religion specific and in some cases divisions within a religion. I am one of thsose Christians who believes in the unseen world. It would be impossible to proove one way or other but my personal feeling is that when people think they are talking to the dead, they are in fact communicating with imposters - demons/ evil spirits.

Jon

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Sorcha
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 10:46 PM

Jon, I think that it is Calling Up the dead that is forbidden, and I agree, it can be dangerous. I was raised, but am not now, Christian, and yes, I talk to the dead nearly every day, be it in a graveyard or other. We need the counsel of the dead, we need their wisdom, their "advice". What we don't need is their actual presence. And neither do they.They are "There", we are "Here",for yet a while.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 10:50 PM

Jon, I understand where you're coming from- I was brought up that way. However, I do believe you're jumping the fence here instead of using the gate. When a person goes to a seer with the aim of contacting the dead, that is a dozen miles' difference from talking to someone in a graveyard. I personally don't see any reason why a person's spirit would hang around the grave site- or around a cast off body- so I doubt that one would have a meaningful experience in a graveyard with that person.

However, again, anecdotal evidence suggests that at least on occasion there is contact. Perhaps it's simply that we are easier to 'reach' in a relaxed or pensive or wistful state than when we are busy in our work-a-day lives. Maybe, if we were but sensitive enough, we'd find there are beings who have tried unsuccessfully and repeatedly to get our attention.

In any case, intent must be the operative ingredient. When a person walking in the light, protected by the light of Love, whether purposefully or inadvertently contacts or is contacted by beings gone before, I say it comes from God.

I trust the Creator and if he/she ordains that I have such an experience, I'm humbled and exalted at the same time.

So I shall continue to stroll and linger and ponder among the graves. And yes, address a thought or a song to individuals.

All the above IMHO. :)

Ebbie

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 11:09 PM

It's been a while but I occasionally visit the graves of dead friends, most of the old gang having succumbed to overdose, fatal traffic accident, or gun violence. I pour a little libation over them, take a swig myself, ask how they've been doing, tell them the latest news about so-and-so and such-and-such. They never answer back, but communing with them like this makes it seem as though they've not gone so far away.

Relatives the same way. I pat their gravestone, as if I were stroking my grandmother's hair as she lay dying in a hospital bed, and offer a few words of encouragement.

"It's okay," I say. "It's all right."

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: JenEllen
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 11:30 PM

My mom has been dead for 20 years now, we were great friends while we had the time. I can only get back home to 'visit' about once a year or so, but when I do, I always make time for 'girl-talk'. I remember when the Reese's Peanut Butter Cups with cookies in them came out, my first thought was "Mom would LOVE these!" When I went home that year I left some out at her grave. It's a strange thing really, I can't say that I believe in an 'afterlife' of any kind, just that your energy goes on, but I can't stop going out and sharing the news of family, boyfriends, and where life has taken me.

We clean up the pioneer cemetaries out here, and I fell in love with the cemetaries in Williamsburg VA. In high school, my best friend and I got plastered and drove in the middle of a thunderstorm to 'visit' Hank Williams. I remember going out there, but I can't say I remember coming home. I like to think he was watching out for a couple of stupid kids.

Rick, did you ever think that we go to the cemetaries more for ourselves than those who are buried there? Like the thought of them 'looking down' (in the case of most of the folks that I know it would be 'looking up'!) on us gives us a sort of protective shroud to face what life on this earth doles out? I think some of the best decisions that I ever made after talking to my mom weren't so much from her approval or disapproval, but in sitting quietly for a few minutes and hearing myself say the things out loud. If it sounds ridiculous saying it to a tombstone surrounded in sweet-pea vines, then it's probably not a very good decision to begin with.

~JenEllen

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: bflat
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 11:31 PM

Yes,I do that. I have read letters and played recordings that I felt the deceased would have an interest in knowing. I like looking for names I might recognize. There are some very pretty graveyards which I have strolled through for the view and the chance to have some time with my thoughts; to speak aloud without anyone giving me negative feedback. It has helped me in an odd way.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: DougR
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 11:35 PM

Rick! You opend this door. where are you? I think I'm a little bit out of my element here. I do believe that somewhere in the bible there is an admonition (paraphrasing), if thy hand offends thee, cut it off, or words to that effect. Not to make light of the subject, but a bunch of guitar players would be in deep dodoo if they accepted that passage literally.

DougR

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Bill D
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 11:42 PM

reminds me of an old joke....

One day a sailor, while bringing flowers to a cemetery to place by the grave of a departed friend, noticed an old Chinese man placing a bowl of rice on a nearby grave.

The sailor walked up to the man and with a smirk on his face, asked,

"When do you expect your friend to come up and eat the rice?"

The old Chinese man replied with a smile, "Same time your friend comes up to smell the flowers."

When I am dead, you may do as you wish...sing to me, offer me pie, but I doubt very much that it will make any difference....I expect to be very quiet forever.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Sorcha
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 11:43 PM

Thank you all, somehow, this was just what I needed to make me feel better.(serendipity in action again). Both of my own parents are gone, and am in process of losing an "adopted father". It helps to realize that I can still talk to all of them, somehow..........I just hope that there really is Peace in the Valley for all of us. Whichever valley that is. Or maybe all of them. Guess that makes me a Lumper, eh?

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Mbo
Date: 16 Jun 00 - 11:51 PM

I barely talk to live people, let alone deceased.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: GUEST,Mrr-chez-Mom
Date: 17 Jun 00 - 12:19 AM

I love being in graveyards; touristing, camping (they are flat, not rocky, and quiet), just hanging out. One of my very favorite picnic spots is the "family plot" that has my paternal grandparents, their parents, and where I would put a marker for Dad if that agreed with mom's preferences, which it doesn't. My personal belief system doesn't include life after death, so I don't talk to them, but I like walking up and down and reading the headstones, especially in Europe. And I am very careful not to tread on them, out of respect. In Brittany you see graves with "bubons" all over them and positively swarming with little people, that represent the hundreds who died in the Plague years; there will be headstones in groups representing mom dad brother sister uncle aunt grandparents babies all of whom died within a few days of each other, and so on. It makes one realize how mortal humans are, which is kind of comforting to me. The "countless white crosses" one sees in Normandy are also impressive, standing in mute witness to man's blind indifference to his fellow man, as the poet said...

(rethinking) I said my personal belief system doesn't include life after death; that isn't quite accurate. Rather, I don't believe in souls, but I don't disbelieve ghosts. Our late father visited 2 of my sisters - vrey soon after dying, he came and sat on my oldest sister's couch. She could see through him and the couch didn't depress, but there he was, and she thought "this won't be so bad, if he comes to visit once in a while" - but he never came back to her. And several years later, another sister named a son after him, and one night soon, when my sister was up tending to an older child, he "walked" into the nursery and looked into the crib at his namesake. This frightened my sister badly and he quickly walked out. And he never appeared to me or to our fourth sister. I wish he would come visit me; THEN I would talk to him. But I find that I can't talk to him when he isn't there..

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Jun 00 - 12:28 AM

....and I found this while searching...aren't we an amazing species! burial customs around the world

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 17 Jun 00 - 01:58 AM

Well I didn't say they talked back! (grin)

Glad I don't live with the "demons and evil spirits" mindset. The Bible is just too contradictory and open to political agendas for me to take it as anything more than a fascinating book, but that's just my take. I just don't equate a cemetary with anything scary or nefarious....never was superstitious about anything. My parents are there, a couple of friends who made great music are there, and in general, it's just a nice place to plunk myself down and think.

About 5 years ago, some folks were visiting a deceased relative and saw me sitting with the guitar. They asked if I would sing "Amazing Grace" just for them and I was happy to oblige. I've certainly asked my Dad for advice, and whatever thoughts came to mind after leaving, made me feel pretty good...and that's good enough for me.

Rick

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Jeri
Date: 17 Jun 00 - 08:11 AM

Well, this certainly has got me thinking. I think being in a graveyard just serves to focus thoughts - I don't think very many people believe people's spirits hang around in them. You can do the same in another place a person spent a lot of time, or with an object someone loved. I don't have conversations with my mother, although I belive I did after she died in an unnecessary effort to keep part of her from slipping away. They were more along the lines of "what would mom say if she were here." They were chats with my memories of her. I think the reason I don't do this now is because her way of thinking and our shared memories are so much a part of me, I can't separate them from who I am.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: DougR
Date: 17 Jun 00 - 12:23 PM

That's neat, Jeri, I particularly liked the last sentence.

I go along with Rick on the Bible. A great book but subject to interpertation. Folks that take it too literally might not be considering that God gave us the intelligence to reason. There are too many conflicting things in the Bible, I think, to take it too literally. That's just my opinion of course and I'm aware a lot of people thing differently.

The recent ruling by the Southern Baptist Convention (I was raised one of those) boggles my mind. Women can't preach the gospel? Why not? The Bible says (paraphrasing) women should be seen and not heard. Wow! To my mind that's great 15th Century thinking. DougR

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: GUEST,Allan S.
Date: 17 Jun 00 - 12:47 PM

Yes yes I have done a lot of geneological research and have found myself talking to thost who have gone on. Even threw a salute to one who was a soldier. There does seem to be a connection some how with the living. When my parents died, within 6 weeks of each other I was out in the garden and I saw them there only I also could see through them too the plants on the other side. Also our best friend died last August. I had left the house early and had not returned when my wife awoke. She heard Phil talking to me. When she went downstairs there was no one there. That happened at the same time that he died. We have had too many "Happenings" that we cant explain. In our faith we do believe in the soul [Nashumma] ? is the spelling correct?? So why not think there could be some contact.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Little Neophyte
Date: 17 Jun 00 - 01:33 PM

When I was a kid I went to a summer camp in Temagami. There was an old indian graveyard near by that was overgrown and difficult to find unless you followed an animal trail. My dad spent lots of money sending me to camp to learn how to sail, water ski and canoe. What was I doing? Hanging out in an indian graveyard. I loved it there. I didn't talk to the spirits much, I just went there because it made me feel peaceful.

Bonnie

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: SINSULL
Date: 17 Jun 00 - 11:30 PM

What a relief to read that I am not alone in seeing, hearing,etc. people and animals who are no longer with us. I stopped talking about it years ago because half the world thought I was crazy and the other half painfully prone to the power of suggestion.

None of this involves haunting or seances or any Hollywood type nonsense. I am unmoved by graveyards. In my mind they contain shells of former people not their essence. There is a place in my garden where a long dead tomcat I adored chose to stay. None of my other pets are around. But if I sit in that part of the garden Fred eventually shows up.

I don't offer my services up for hire. They are about as perfected as my singing technique. But I never turn my back on a "visitor". The ancient Greeks believed it was unlucky to turn a stranger away from your door. It may be a god in disguise. I had a nun tell me the same thing when I was a child claiming it might be an angel.

Demons? I would rather take the chance on dealing with one than risk turning away a friend or my mother. I have seen and experienced too many "coincidences" to discount the power of the human mind. And more than likely there is a rational, practical explanation for what is going on.

I rarely cook roast beef with Yorkshire Pudding but whenever I do my mother (It was her most famous dish) is in the room with me. Anyone else have a similar "kitchen" experience? I believe it's not uncommon.

No I don't believe that aliens are walking among us plotting a takeover or that Area 51 is housing UFO crash wreckage.

I do however firmly believe in Santa Claus.

SS

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: alison
Date: 18 Jun 00 - 06:37 AM

Jon, you were thinking of the "Witch of Endor" (1 Samuel chpt 28 verses 3-25)... she was a medium and he tricked her into calling up the spirit of the prophet Samuel who had died.

I consider myself to be a Christian, but I have seen "dead" people, they don't often talk but I can feel their presence. I don't ask to see them and I don't seek them out, it just happens. Maybe some people are just more receptive than others....

slainte

alison

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: AllisonA(Animaterra)
Date: 18 Jun 00 - 06:44 AM

Sinsull, I have never had tangible experiences like yours but I never feel so close to my grandmother, dead thirty years, as I do when I bake apple pie- she doesn't seem to mind that I've changed her recipe over the years! And my grandfather was a Methodist minister- he seems to positively beam whenever I'm in a Methodist church- it doesn't happen often, but I'm pals with the choir director and he sometimes asks me to sub for him.
Is it my imagination? I do't think so. Those we care about are so deeply connected to us in life that the connection continues after they're gone. Maybe it comes from within me, as I've never had "visits" such as others have told, but that doesnt' minimize their impact.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 18 Jun 00 - 12:49 PM

Should also mention that Heather (at the ripe old age of 31) learned to ride a bicycle in a cemetary. Fortunately she shared my lack of apprehention around the departed and we often went for long walks there. I don't have a clue whether a part of us survives after death, and I certainly don't think that anyone else knows. I sure do know that every country and culture through history is willing to pay those handsomely who say "they do know".

Now the folks who talk to vegetables (and get answers) make me wonder.(grin)

Rick

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 18 Jun 00 - 01:44 PM

Difficult one Rick and I don't think anybody can know for sure. Having said that, forgetting the bible, I have seen enough to convince me that things outside the physical world do exist.

Jon

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 18 Jun 00 - 08:07 PM

Me too John. Literally every day. Sometimes I'm simply gobsmacked (Heather's term) at the astonishing beauty around me, and it's inconceivable to me that it just happened "by chance". There are other times when a series of "coincidences" lead to something amazing...and I have to think "this can't just be luck". My well known cynicism about religion is based almost wholly on two things. #1. How religious LEADERS exploit folks who dearly need answers to survive this life. and...#2. Fundamentalists of any stripe who use religion to advance intolerance of others. T'aint God who makes me mad it's his P.R. team.

Rick

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Jun 00 - 09:39 PM

OK, I have to bring in a Star Trek reference now. There was an episode where a long-dead race took over Captain Picard's mind for about half an hour, during which time he lived an entire lifetime with this race, raising children, giving up his "known" identity when nobody would believe that he was Captain Picard, and at the end, when he's very old and just before "waking up" back on the Enterprise [and still the age he was], he finds out that the whole thing was set up because it was MORE IMPORTANT TO THIS RACE TO BE REMEMBERED THAN TO SURVIVE. I mean, with that kind of technology, they could have stashed themselves on the probe, not memories of themselves. Those of us watching had several really involved conversations about whether, in the possible absence of literal life after death, being remembered after death would suffice. I certainly keep my dad very close to my heart and in the front of my mind, and it's been 17 years. Obviously many of you also have very close thoughts about your dearly departed. But I have to admit jealousy of the 2 sisters whom he visited.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Mbo
Date: 18 Jun 00 - 09:45 PM

Mrrz, that was "The Inner Light", on of my favorite episodes of Trek ever. Did you know the young guy who plays his son in the other life is Patrick Stewart's real life son? The music from that episode is absolutely gorgeous, with the tinwhistle, it's very popular at weddings.

--Mbo

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Little Neophyte
Date: 19 Jun 00 - 07:05 AM

Just thinking about what Jon and Rick were saying there seems to be The Good, The Bad and The Ugly when it comes to religion and if we throw the entire thing out with the bathwater, we can wind up missing out on the spiritual waters within our lives.
Although I am a believer that the spiritual pool comes from within, I have found some valuable insights from religious guidance.
In the end it will always still be up to an individual to discern what is truth for them. Truth is intimately different for each person.
Some people see spirits, others don't. We all have a unique expression of contacting the spiritual waters of our lives. When we start comparing our perspectives to each others to see what is Truth, that can sometimes leaves us with frustration because how do you compare two thumb prints?

Bonnie

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: GUEST,Allan S.
Date: 19 Jun 00 - 09:54 AM

THe one thing that many of us forget is that all religions teach us is a moral code to live by. Also it makes comming in to and leaving this world a little easier. A cleargyman once told me even if Christ could be shown to never have existed.it is his moral teaching that are important. I am not a treckie, but somewhere I read that the benidiction ? Spock uses with the 1st. and 2nd. fingers together space and the 4th and 5th fingers together is the one used by the ancient high priests is Israel. Any one know about this ??

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 19 Jun 00 - 10:24 AM

This thread brought to mind the following:
1)In the newspaper reports of Robert Johnson's natural son being verified by DNA ( and due to get megabucks in royalties )the old story about RJ learning to play the devil's music on his guitar sitting on a tombstone has been resurrected.
2)The late jazz club owner and saxophonist, Ronnie Scott, used to say to an unresponsive audience:"Let's all join a hands and try to contact the living", a sentiment I can empathise with!
RtS

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: SINSULL
Date: 19 Jun 00 - 11:10 AM

Live Well and Prosper, Allan s. Yes, you can see a depiction of this (Spock's salute) on the front of many synagogues. I can't swear to the literal meaning. SS

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Kim C
Date: 19 Jun 00 - 11:43 AM

I have never "chatted" with the deceased but I have felt them many, many times. As a living history reenactor I visit a lot of places that are really charged with energy. I have been to places that conveyed much joy, such as the 2nd story ballroom at the Michie Tavern in Charlottesville, VA, and places that conveyed so much sorrow or other type of power that I could barely stand it. A couple of years ago we visited the Blandford Church in Petersburg, VA, which is one of the oldest churches in VA, and (I believe) was used as a field hospital after the Battle of the Crater. The second I walked through the church door I was overcome by something I still cannot describe except to say that I wanted to crumple into the corner and just sob. I could barely speak when I was in there, and hardly paid attention to the tour guide.

Call it what you will, because I don't know what to call it.

I too am a Christian and I firmly believe there are things not of the physical world that we are not meant to fully understand, because we are mere humans who cannot comprehend the full workings of the universe. I believe in evil spirits and good spirits and trust God to give me discernment with regard to which is which.

Mister thinks our house is haunted, albeit in a good way. It's a very friendly place. I think we have a prankster, though, because things very often disappear, or turn up totally out of place. The dogs bark at things that aren't there.

A few years ago I became really interested in sea music. I don't know why. I'm an earth sign and petrified of the ocean. But I went along. My landlady's daughter had a 40th anniversary party for them at her house, and had lots of family pictures scattered hither and yon. There was an old portrait of a handsome young sailor on the mantle. I asked the landlady who it was. "Oh," she said, "that's my daddy." Well, y'all, the house I live in belonged to her daddy. I had never known he was a sailor. It gave me the willies. Her grandfather, a Confederate veteran, actually died in the house.

I think the energy of times past still exists among us --- after all, the first law of thermodynamics says that energy cannot be increased or decreased, but simply changes form. If that's the case, there's no need to call up or conjure anyone or anything. It's already there.

Music is a gift from the Great Good Power of the Universe and if Robert Johnson met anyone at the crossroads, it was probably an angel. --------------KFC

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Brendy
Date: 19 Jun 00 - 02:05 PM

Chatting with the deceased?

Oh yes, many times, though mostly in the 'Flyagaric days'
Haven't done it in a while - due for a right old natter soon.
Come the Autumn, maybe!!

B.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Peter T.
Date: 19 Jun 00 - 06:32 PM

Returning to Star Trek theology, the "Inner Light" episode was not about it being more important to be remembered than to survive. It was about a planet too stupid to do something about planetary warming (like our own), or to take measures to escape, except in their case it was their sun heating up. After it was too late, they were faced with this puzzle, which was how to preserve the "feel" of their culture, and not its artefacts -- classic sociological problem. So they contrived this process of getting someone to live through a virtual life unbenownst to him or her, in that culture. What is most curious about it is the way in which it leaves this eerie idea of people carrying around whole lives that are different than the one they are now living -- but immigrants do this every day, or rehabilitated people in many walks of life. Very powerful story.

I note that in Shakespeare's Hamlet there is an interesting contradiction. In "To be or not to be," Hamlet says of the land of the dead that it is "an undiscovered country, from whose bourn no traveller returns" -- when he has been talking to his father's ghost for at least two acts.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: GUEST,Allan S.
Date: 19 Jun 00 - 07:31 PM

Wow I like that law of thermo. That energy canot be increased or decreased only changed. Doesn't that answer all of our questions about those who have passed on. I was at a geneology conference in wash D. C. and went to ther holocast museum. One starts on the top flour and spirals down to the bottom and then exit. At one place the only way to proceed is through the open side, and out the other side of a RR car that was used to take people to the death camps. I could not go through for the longest time. Just stood there and cried. I know their soul or spirit was still there. Later I learned that all the people from Osieck a small town in Poland where my ancestors came from. were all taken to Belzeck extermination camp. Those that arived one day were all killed that day and went up in smoke the next morning in the furnaces. It could be that this car was one of the cars used, who knows. Remember for everyone who came to America they left some relative behind. So those with East European roots all lost some relative. Some how I think there souls are still out there to warn us all of what mankind is capable of.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Ebbie
Date: 19 Jun 00 - 10:21 PM

Wow, Allan S, powerful stuff. And I think you're right. It's so pitiful that we seem to need periodic reminders.

Ebbie

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: katlaughing
Date: 20 Jun 00 - 12:12 AM

Whew! I haven't posted to this because there is so much I could say and I just didn't feel up to it. I have always been a *sensitive* and seen and heard things. I also have my own beliefs about such things.

Graveyards have always been one of my favourite places, since I was a little girl and loved visiting where my grandparents were buried to help tidy up the stones around their plot and place flowers on Memorial day. This has been passed on to my kids. One of the first sight-seeing places my son, Colin, takes people when they visit is to a huge cemetery in Louisville, KY!

In Connecticut, we once found a small, very old graveyard which had a gravestone naming a "Jerusha, wife of". I tried to take pictures of it and others in that cemetery three times and nothing came out on the film, except of other places I'd also snapped on that roll. The last time, my daughter, who is named Jerusha, stood beside it and the picture came out beautifully!

Somewhere in one of these threads is an article I wrote for a CT newspaper about the old house we lived in in Mystic which was haunted, very benevolently. Here is a bit of a letter I wrote to my mom on the subject of graveyards a few years ago:

From a letter to my Mom, 4/26/93; Mystic, CT

"Jerusha and I have been walking everyday at an old cemetery. It is so interesting! There is one stone with Chinese characters written on it and, in English, it says, "we are one in God's heaven". There are many little children's graves from the sixteen and seventeeen hundreds; as well as many of ships' captains and soldiers of all wars.
Huge, peaceful trees lend their serenity and protection amid great, broad expanses of green grass, while the Mystic River, broadened into a wide delta, slowly wends its was to Long Island Sound.
The dirt roads are paved with clam shells dropped, from high on the wing, by hungry seagulls. Great drooping tree branches offer cool shade from a not very bright sun.
Small hawks, raucous gulls, brash ravens, articulate mockingbirds, and robins trill, whistle, mimic, and wax poetic, lifting one's spirits no matter the day's weather or events. Majestic headstones proudly proclaim the hoped for immortality of each family through whatever claim to fame they may have -- even the humble, abiding love stated for one another.
I've seen vaults with monumnets to soldiers who died while trying to escape the "Rebel prisons of the South"; babies who drowned or died of "the fever"; women who literally gave their all to carry on the husband's name through death in childbirth; couples who have their stones mounted, but no death dates etched in -- they are still alive! Talk about early retirement! The old stones are my favorites. Each one tells a story, allows me a glimpse of a life gone by -- its struggles, hopes, and joys.
(I think of the graveyard as nature undisturbed; I guess because all of the people in it are so deep and quiet!**BG**)"

There is a huge weeping copper beech tree there of which I have several really good pictures. I am putting some pix up on a website of Allan and Bill's visit and my cats. When I get them up, I will include the tree one and let ya'll know. It is incredible.

kat

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 20 Jun 00 - 12:22 AM

I was hesitant to go into this thread, because I was sure it was going to be really weird. Instead, I found all sorts of wisdom.
Yeah, I like to visit cemeteries. I find they're full of stories that capture my imagination. Cemeteries are also full of profound expressions of love that people have for those who have left them. There's a richness in cemeteries that's inexhaustible.
On the other hand, it's not in graveyards that I feel the presence of the dead - but there are other times and places when I strongly feel the presence of certain dead people that I've loved deeply.
My dead grandmother is the one who's with me most often. She was a very positive influence on my early life, and I've always tried to emulate her joyful, positive, loving attitude and her love of life. As I grew older and moved to the other side of the country, I kept in touch with Grandma by phone or letters, but it seemed that she was always there with me when I needed her. She died in 1982, but I feel very strongly that she's still with me.
I think this is something we all experience in one way or another. If our love for a person is strong enough, that person will never leave us, and even death can't part us.
As I said, this is something we all experience, but something we will never be able to explain. If we try to explain or understand or prove or even just talk about this sort of experience, we start sounding really tacky, really quick. Discussion like this can quickly bring out all the quacks and weirdos and fanatics. I'm glad all us normal people can discuss a subject like this with such wisdom. [grin]
Ah, life is good.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Amergin
Date: 20 Jun 00 - 12:56 AM

I just came back from the Shakespearean Festival in Ashland, Oregon and this thread here got me thinking. Yeah, I know I feel something melting from the heat inside my head. Well, anyways, couldn't watching the plays of dead writers be a way of communicating with the dead? How about reading their novels and and poetry? Aren't listening to their songs and singing back at them but ways to "talk" with the dead? If that is true, then we all must to some extent or another.....

Amergin

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Gervase
Date: 20 Jun 00 - 04:33 AM

Amergin, couldn't agree more. That's one of the reasons why f*** music is so important (to me at least), in that it helps us connect; to dip our toes in that river of humanity that flows all the way back to the Rift Valley. There is an atavistic thrill in raising one's voice in song; in repeating the words and notes that have been formed in throats long dead and giving them new life.
I know I often bang on about Joyce, but I can never read the conclusion of The Dead without thinking of the great unnumbered congregation behind us and which makes us what we are.
One by one they were all becoming shades. Better pass boldly into that other world, in the full glory of some passion, than fade and wither dismally with age. He thought of how she who lay beside him had locked in her heart for so many years that image of her lover's eyes when he had told her that he did not wish to live.
Generous tears filled Gabriel's eyes. He had never felt like that himself towards any woman but he knew that such a feeling must be love. The tears gathered more thickly in his eyes and in the partial darkness he imagined he saw the form of a young man standing under a dripping tree. Other forms were near. His soul had approached that region where dwell the vast hosts of the dead. He was conscious of, but could not apprehend, their wayward and flickering existence. His own identity was fading out into a grey impalpable world: the solid world itself which these dead had one time reared and lived in was dissolving and dwindling.
A few light taps upon the pane made him turn to the window. It had begun to snow again. He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark, falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time had come for him to set out on his journey westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. it was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling, too, upon every part of the lonely churchyard on the hill where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.
I have to confess that I blatantly and shamelessly plagiarised that last paragraph when filing a report from Rabin's funeral, but that's another matter...

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Peter T.
Date: 20 Jun 00 - 10:17 AM

Michael Furey's favourite song was "The Lass of Aughrim", which seems to have been a version of "Lord Gregory" -- it hasn't got into the DT. We have had a couple of rounds on this.... Story full of ironies, not least the urban sophisticate wrecked up against the dripping corpse of Irish folk music!
yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: paddymac
Date: 20 Jun 00 - 11:49 AM

Thank you, Rick, for starting a great thread. I frequently "chat" with loved ones who have "transitioned". I don't know whether the loved ones are actually there in some form or whether my mind is playing both parts in the conversation. But that really isn't important to me. What is important is that I find the "conversations" to be helpful, and sometimes comforting. I suspect that most people have similar experiences, but may call them by different names or cast them in a different light. Words like remembering, reflecting, reminiscing and recalling don't seem to cause anyone to so much as raise an eyebrow, but to phrase the same experience in terms of "chatting with the dead" can conjur up all sorts of negativity in the minds of some people. Whatever label we attach, or however we choose to explain it, the phenomenon is the same.

Kim C, I especially enjoyed your line: "energy of times past still exists among us." It speaks volumes.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: GUEST,BarbaraLynn
Date: 20 Jun 00 - 08:41 PM

I have to add my voice in along with those who talk with the departed -- I do so more or less regularly, with the soul of my former fiance who was killed in the Vietnam War. And I have no doubt at all that he is definitely with me ... too many experiences, of which few could count as coincidence. At first, it mattered to me to prove it to others, but I got over that. In one way or another, he has been my muse, too, for most of my life, so this companionship has birthed many a written song and poem.

Can't say that I've ever particularly hung out in graveyards or been drawn to them, but for an experience that likely equates I can say that a visit to the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington, DC -- a visit at night -- could well make a believer out of anyone. I've gone there at night primarily from sentiment, and have both taken music on tape "to play for Them", and have sung..."Amazing Grace" but to the tune of "House Of The Rising Sun", it was. And I've come away realizing that it was not I who gave a thing, but simply received.

And as for the Bible proscribing speaking with the dead, my thought is this: they've passed from this earthly world into the one everlasting, which is called Life. So they aren't dead, are they?

BarbaraLynn

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Mbo
Date: 20 Jun 00 - 09:35 PM

Read this!

--Mbo

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Sorcha
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 12:58 AM

Mbo, YES!! How do you do/find/know this stuff? It is indeed the Silent Hours. And, Barbara Lynn, I still can't go there, even if it were financially and physically possible. Bless you for being able to.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Mbo
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 01:04 AM

Sorch, "Stepping Stones" is one of my very favorite Dougie MacLean songs.

--Mbo

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: GUEST,Allan S.
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 11:05 AM

Wow back again Yes the wall in D.C. !!! I was a Scout master and went in to the Army on the same day with my first eagle scout, 1953 Korea, He ended up Airborne and I was a medic stationed in D.C. at Walter Reed Hosp. Years later both families went on a trip to D.C. and part of the tour was to "The Wall" at night. What feelings the wall brings up 2 grown ex G.I.'s standing there blubbering in each others arms. Yes their spirits are there. This thread really has been a catharsis for many of us The interesting thing there have been no people humbuging us. God Bless All. I wonder what our ages are. Me 71. When I was a callow youth and knew everything I didnt believe any of this. But now with all these happenings boy do I believe. Years ago I was teaching with a woman of Irish extraction who was telling me about "THe changlings" in Irish lore. She made an interesting statement or thought. In early times people believed in contact with the dead, ghosts, etc.they needed that ability to survive. now we call it superstitions. but now the more civilized?? we have become we have lost that ability .to communicate with them. Any comments???? Allan

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Little Neophyte
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 04:48 PM

Allan, I don't think we have lost the ability to communicate with spirits, we have just forgotten what has always been available to us. It is a matter of opening up our perception of reality.

Bonnie

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Peter T.
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 05:13 PM

We also lost touch with the animals (embodiments of spirit as well). It was all part of what I call "the hardening of the human" that got rolling in the 17th century. The previously flexible boundaries between the human, the animal, and the spiritual were tightened to the point of asphyxiation. Just about the time people began to get real lonely in an absurd, empty universe. Funny, huh?

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Peter T.
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 05:14 PM

We also lost touch with the animals (embodiments of spirit as well). It was all part of what I call "the hardening of the human" that got rolling in the 17th century. The previously flexible boundaries between the human, the animal, and the spiritual were tightened to the point of asphyxiation. Just about the time people began to get real lonely in an absurd, empty universe. Funny coincidence, huh?

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Peter T.
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 05:14 PM

We also lost touch with the animals (embodiments of spirit as well). It was all part of what I call "the hardening of the human" that got rolling in the 17th century. The previously flexible boundaries between the human, the animal, and the spiritual were tightened to the point of asphyxiation. Just about the time people began to get real lonely in an absurd, empty universe. Funny coincidence, huh?

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Peter T.
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 06:14 PM

sorry about that. having basic difficulties with contributing to mudcat these days. yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: Amergin
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 06:20 PM

Oh I just thought you were trying to get your point across....

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: JamesJim
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 06:36 PM

I believe the poets of the world (including songwriters) have a unique ability to commune with what is defined in Websters as "the vital and animated force/soul." That, most importantly, includes their own soul. Where some might find it strange to sit in a cemetary, the quietness and solitude is often what the poet needs to be the most creative. There may be more going on there than meets the eye! Jim

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: katlaughing
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 07:04 PM

According to some lore I've read about, in old Scotland, it was believed that a murdered person could be questioned very soon after death as to who their murderer was and that they couldn't lie about it. It was said to have been soemthing many could do, but eventually only the "sheriffs" knew how to use the old custom. I am not positive of my source, but I think they called this all importnat event a "lyke wake." Also, as the old ballads suggest (?) the dead were said to make their accusation in poetry form.

Anyone know anymore about this?

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: GUEST,BarbaraLynn
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 07:15 PM

I wonder if in times past we all REALLY did have the ability to communicate with those who have gone on, or if this is just something now that we think we lost along the way. A friend of mine has the theory that this sort of ability is something one is or is not born with, along the same lines as being born with more than average musical talent (many here demonstrate that one!) -- in other words, that it is a natural trait that can be inherited. I've got strong Scots/Irish on both sides of my family, and I have to wonder about this -- some years ago, I went to a Scottish festival to try to find out where the McHendry side of my family came from in Scotland, to help an aunt who was into genealogy. A man at one booth said, "Oh your people come from a place called Glencoe, my wife and I were in that area last summer, here -- look at our scrapbook." I thumbed through the photos with interest. Then I turned a page and came across a photo of a narrow bleak valley between two rather bald knobs. There was nothing outstanding about this photo, it was in fact in line with all the other scenic photos I'd been looking at, but when I saw this one, I burst into tears and could not stop crying, just sobbed like my heart was breaking (to the consternation and embarrassment of my 10-year-old son). The gentleman in the booth leaned down and said, "Oh, then you know the story." I said, "What story?" He said, "About the massacre." I said, "What massacre?" He said, "Why, the massacre at Glencoe -- quite a few people were killed, young and old, and many more died trying to escape." I said, "I have never heard of it." He said, "Ah, but your blood knows."

BarbaraLynn (who wonders why she is showing up as a Guest when she is a member??)

Subject: Lyr Add: HALLOWELL (from Northern Harmony)
From: AllisonA(Animaterra)
Date: 21 Jun 00 - 07:30 PM

Here's a song that's in the Northern Harmony hymnal. My chorus, Animaterra, sang it a year ago. It says a lot about what we've been talking about.
Hallowell
1. I thought when someone died the spirit flew over furthest field.
Now I see death will leave behind (a scrap of light, a broken smile)
the remnants by which I might be healed.
REFRAIN: The Dead lift me up: In brightest sky, the clouds below me race. The Dead lift me up. I see them face to face.

2. Held high by these strong hands, breathing the wind I am born again.
The mountain flow'rs, the desert sands
Surround me now, comfort me now.
In death or dreaming I find my kin. REFRAIN
3. Our voices shake in song for memories we have long endured.
Though this begins to make us strong
(the combing through of shreds of love)
It is through living that we are cured. REFRAIN

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: katlaughing
Date: 22 Jun 00 - 12:25 AM

How beautiful, Animaterra! I would love to ehar it by your group.

Barbara Lynn, probably just need to reset your cookie. I know what you mean. I don't do it as much as I used to, but I have a really hard time viewing tv shows etc. of the Highlands (as well as hearing the "pipes") which many of my ancestors came from, the sight of which set me to welling up with tears and such longing to be there. It's funny, this time round, I've always felt as though IT was home and not Colorado and Wyoming where I grew up.

I have a friend whsoe mother was *born with the veil*, menaing the caul over her face...that was always meant to signify having the "Second Sight" and she has had an uncanny ability all of her life.

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: katlaughing
Date: 22 Jun 00 - 12:47 AM

It's late....sorry for all of the typos...or dyslexic fingers....kat

Subject: RE: Chatting With The Deceased? Do You?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 22 Jun 00 - 01:40 PM

Well, let's see. I really had to think about this one. I talk with Jesus, but although he is deceased he is also alive, and it is his alive self I talk with.

Then there are the people who've gone ahead in heaven who I sometimes ask to pray for me, but usually I forget that I can do that. Once in a great while, someone I knew well seems to ask me to help or pray for his widow. But these are things God prompts me to, which he seldom does, as he seems to prefer that I focus on the living who he calls me to serve. Or that I focus on trusting him, and keep my psychic communication between him and me.

And it is a funny thing, but any effort I have ever made to communicate spiritually has always gone much more powerfully when I pray directly to him rather than trying to send a personal message directly to someone. And has had a much greater impact. (I like what happens when I leave him in charge of things he says he is in charge of.)

~S~