My friend, Margaret, lives in the village of Long Melford, near Sudbury, Suffolk, England. We have been very great friends for many years after she tragically lost her only son, Peter, at the age of 17 years. This is her story.
     To put the reader in the picture, Margaret and her husband, John, live next door to an elderly man named Jimmy. He is wonderful for his age of 90 and has been their neighbor for many years. Sadly, his wife, Grace, passed away about three years ago. They were a very close couple and Margaret knows Jimmy misses her very much. Still, he is fit, drives his car, and often jokes with Margaret over the fence. His two daughters, Wendy and Jill, always make sure he is well looked after, visiting him most days.
     This story I was told last evening, 14th May, 2011, just had to be written down and shared.
     As the weather was sunny, and the other day quite warm, Margaret sat outside near Jimmy's fence reading. John was cutting Jimmy's overhanging bush for him in the front garden by Jimmy's gate. Jimmy opened his back door and joked with Margaret, telling her he was going out in the car. He was wearing a gray sweater with stripes and some gray trousers. Meanwhile, John completed cutting down the overhang and went indoors.
     Sometime later, Margaret looked up from her book to see Jimmy walking down his path. He was dressed in a black sweater and black trousers. She saw the side of this head and then the back. It was Jimmy, but she was puzzled. She never heard him open his back door which sounded quite loud when opened and she also never heard Jimmy's gate which definitely made a noise when opening. She was very puzzled. She hadn't heard a sound and she said Jimmy was not in the clothes she had seen him in earlier. Calling to John, she told him that she had seen Jimmy.
     "Is Jimmy home?" she inquired.
     John was reluctant to knock as he knew that Jimmy always took an afternoon nap. Margaret told him she had seen Jimmy walk down his path to the gate and that the clothes he had on were not what he'd been wearing earlier. She also explained that Jimmy did not come back up the path. John decided to go around and check on him and, in case he was napping, he would just peep in the window. Jimmy was in and when he saw John, he unlocked his back door and came outside.
     He was wearing exactly the same black sweater and trousers that Margaret had noticed. She wished John had also seen Jimmy walking toward his gate, but the clothes were as she had described. Margaret asked Jimmy if he had come outside a while ago and walked to his gate.
     "Och, Margaret," he replied in his Scottish accent. "Nooo, I have been lying on ma bed sleeping. I have not been outside. Are you sure you have not been on the booze?"
     "But, Jimmy, I saw you as clear as anything in the clothes you are now wearing walking toward the gate!"
     Jimmy laughed, but Margaret did not. She also told me that she had noticed something else about Jimmy. He had seemed to be gliding silently. She did not hear footsteps although she was very close.
     She knew he missed his Grace very much and, as it was coming up to her anniversary, I suggested that what she saw was Jimmy's Ka or Spirit. This all happened when he slept.
     This was not the first time Margaret has seen such a thing. As a little girl of about ten years of age, she awoke one night to find her mother, Jessie, in the bedroom looking out the window at the garden.
     She told me she said, "Mum, what are you doing?"
     Upon receiving no answer and then seeing her Mum vanish, she screamed. Her mum, Jessie, rushed into her room and asked her whatever was the matter? Margaret told her that she had seen her standing looking out her window, but Jessie laughed.
     "No, I have just woken up when you screamed," she said.
     Again, no explanation. Jimmy is a very down-to-earth sort of person and laughed off Margaret's story, but it will be something that Margaret will never forget.