The Family that Visits...Forever

I've never understood a fear of death, or people who feared their loved ones returning after passing over. My parents were the best anyone had; if there were ever any doubts about that in my mind, and they were few and far between, they were over-ruled by the fact that, from the time I started to have friends, they all wanted my parents. That continued throughout my lifetime, until the death of my father in 1990 and then the death of my mother in 2000.

I am an only child, and until I was twelve my maternal grandmother lived with us, and was my primary caregiver. Both my parents worked, which I grew up believing was normal, but we still spent a lot of time together. When my grandmother died, I was the one she visited for several years afterwards.

My family had a relaxed attitude towards religion. My father, who grew up a Southern Baptist, renounced Christianity when in his teens and was content to believe there was a benevolent God out there who loved us all. My mother was a searcher, and went through several incarnations of belief, including Religious Science, until she and I both embraced Wicca when I was a teenager. Again, my father was fine with that, as it seemed like a good path to him.

Nanny's visitations to me were gentle, and warm. She and I discussed how the world was changing, and what I would do with my life. She had been a remarkably sophisticated woman for her time, growing up in London and having her own career as a dressmaker before World War II. My mother was the same, but she managed the beauty salon at The City of Paris in San Francisco. It never would have occured to me that there was something wrong with people visiting after they died...after all, Nanny loved me, and she naturally wanted to be with me. When she finally said goodbye I was sixteen, and she told me it was time for her to move on.

I told my parents about Nanny's visits, because as an only child I was very close to them. We had few secrets from one another, and they, too, thought it was natural for her to visit. But I never discussed them with my friends; somehow, I knew our family experiences weren't the norm. Or perhaps most people denied them out of their own fear of the unknown.

When I was eight or nine, and my visitations from the dead hadn't yet begun, I had a friend named Marianna. Mari was a Catholic, and I struggled to understand her beliefs. They seemed very strange to me, and one day she told me that because I wasn't a Catholic as well, I would go to hell when I died, and burn in torment forever. This seemed very strange to me, and when I told my mother about the encounter she went to visit Marianna's mother. The subject was never mentioned again, but from that day on Marianna was somewhat wary around my mother.

Mom explained to me that everyone has different beliefs, and even if we think they're silly, we have to respect them. The fact that Marianna and her family seemed unable to respect our beliefs only proved they were young souls, destined for many lives until they reached understanding.

Perhaps a belief in reincarnation helped me to accept visitations from those who had passed over. They were still themselves, just between lives. When my college lover Philip died at the age of 28, I was angry with him -- no, I was homocidal over his refusal to take control of his life. Philip died of AIDS because he couldn't overcome his need for drugs; when he went to Los Angeles to go to graduate school at the age of 23, he injected heroin with a group of friends. They shared needles, they all contracted AIDS, they all died young. Philip didn't visit my until 1991, a year after my dad died suddenly of cardiac arrest.

My dad visited us often. During his life he'd loved to play practical jokes on my mother; after his death he continued to do this, occasionally. His favorite was candy bars; he'd hide them and she had to find them. We never did find one Mounds bar...

Dad stopped visiting after about a year. Philip only visited me once, during a guided meditation. I was searching for my spirit guide; it never occured to me it would be Philip. I was standing on a beach at sunset, nowhere I've ever been during my lifetime, I'm pretty sure. He came towards me up the beach, dressed in tight jeans and a black tee-shirt, looking pretty much as he had in life...at least, until that last, ugly year of his life.

"Hello, Ice Queen," he said, coming up beside me. That pet name was an irony; he started calling me that because I refused his advances when we first met.

"Hello, Lucifer." My name for him came from his looks -- too good to be true, like a fallen angel. "What are you doing here?"

"You called for your Spritual Advisor."

"You? You're my Spiritual Advisor. Something strange about you being a Guardian."

He smiled. "I'm only temporary. But we were soul mates, no matter how many problems we had. Now, I understand everything I did while I was Philip. You have some important years ahead, Butterfly. But first, your mom is going to need you. You'll be her last caregiver."

"I figured I would be, once dad died so suddenly. Is it important?"

"She's going to be completely dependent on you during the last few years of her life. Are you ready for that?"

"I don't know, but I'll do whatever I can."

"After that, things will change for you rapidly. You've got great things in your future, love."

"I wish you were here to share them with me. I wish it every day."

"So do I. But I can only be here in spirit, now."

He turned and walked away down the beach. After that, he visited me every six months or so, guiding me through the years when my mother was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease and deteriorated until she couldn't stand alone. But after she died in April of 2002, I only saw Philip one more time.

My longtime friend and business partner Sandra Brandenburg has a more acute sense of spiritual visitations than I do, and she was the first to see mom after her passing. I put my house in Petaluma up for sale, but it was the height of selling fever in Northern California, and my friend Cathy wanted her friend Elise to have the first chance at the house. The day she brought her over, Elise was like a chihuahua on speed, and she didn't seem to like anything about the house.

Sandra was staying with me at the time, and she intercepted me when Cathy and Elise went out into the garden. "Moomoo's here, and she's pissed off!" She whispered to me.

I looked around wildly, somehow expecting my mother to be sitting there in her wheelchair. "No, not there...in her bedroom! And she's dancing around on those spike heels she used to wear, waving her cigarette around. She doesn't like Elise!"

What a surprise, I thought. I managed to get rid of Elise, after her husband arrived and loved everything about the house that she hated. Fortunately they held off on their decision, and I sold the house for $40,000 more than I'd anticipated.

That was when Philip stopped being my Spiritual Guardian, and my mother took over. She visited frequently, sometimes in dreams but more often during parties, which I host frequently. She loved them during her lifetime, and passing over didn't change that. Between her death in April of 2000 and the beginning of 2002, I bought a little house in Cotati, California and settled in, making changes to suit my eclectic style. I often thought how much mom would love the little house, and she visited it often. Then, in January of 2002, she told me she was moving on. She would still be my Guardian, but she wouldn't be visiting anymore.

She told me she knew I was going to all right without her, now...everything was going well for me. Now, I find myself meeting people who never knew my parents, something every person faces at some time in life. But it seems inexplicable to me; all my friends knew my parents, except the ones I met while living in England. How could everyone not have known them?

So now I write about them, to keep their spirits with me throughout my life. And I know, one day, they'll visit me again...until we are reunited.