GUIDING HANDS - THE LIFE EXPERIENCES OF A MEDIUM
BOOK EXCERPT
By Angie Christie

HOW IT ALL BEGAN
     I first saw the light of day three days after the Christmas of 1942, weighing in at seven pounds five ounces, at the Warley Nursing Home in Wimbledon, London. According to the nursing staff, or so I was told, I looked like Bud Abbott. For young readers who have never heard of Bud Abbott, he was part of an American duo called Abbott and Costello who were very popular comedians on screen in the 1940’s.
     A doctor’s daughter from Birkdale, Southport, Lancashire, my mother, Olive, was new to London. Birkdale is a part of Southport and is up in the north of England about 250 miles away from London. My dad, Ken, was in the Auxiliary Fire Service during this dreadful time and I was told that Mum was often alone with me, caring for me either under the stairs or under the table as the bombs fell on London.
     Circumstances changed one day for us when Mum was wheeling me out in my pram and began talking to a neighbor who lived nearby and had also just given birth to a baby boy. From that time on, we were invited to join these kind people in their Anderson Shelter.
     Anderson Shelters were in gardens, often dug into the Earth with corrugated iron, and were to be life saving for many, many people whilst the bombs dropped. These were my first months on Earth – in my carrycot with the noise of the bombers disgorging their bombs over London. I, of course, do not remember this time as I was so young, but years later in the 1950’s, Mum often said that the nerves I sometimes suffered were the cause of the bombings during our time in London.
     I have vague memories that come and go in my mind from about the age of ten months. One of these was during this time in London when my parents were invited to tea by an elderly couple who lived in the same road. Of course, I went too and while the adults chatted over tea, I disappeared. When they realized I had crawled out of the room, they came looking for me and found me peeling the very drab brown wallpaper off the wall of the couple’s home. Mum told me that she and Dad were extremely embarrassed! Strangely, all my life I have loved ‘peeling paper’.
     Once the war was over, Dad joined the Royal Air Force and was sent to Germany being given accommodation with several other Airmen in Bookeburg Castle. As an interesting side note, my youngest daughter, Adele, was born in 1968 only ten kilometers from Bookeburg while my husband, Wally, was himself, posted in Germany.
     In 1945, whilst Dad was away in Germany, I was taken up North to Lancashire to Mum’s family home where we resided with my grandparents. Although very small, I have quite a good memory of that time. They lived in a huge house which was very exciting to a small child. I remember running around huge rooms on three stories and the massive cellars and attics appearing to me like a rabbit warren. My nursery had large windows covered with blackout curtains during the war.
     Other memories include my Grandfather Alfred having surgery in the home as this was the time before the National Health Service was introduced in Great Britain. Living with Granny, Granddad, my Aunt Laura, Uncle Edward, and my dear cousin, Anthony, we made up one big happy home. One very clear memory in this home was being taken in my grandfather’s big black car to the hospital to bring my Mum and my new brother home. He was born on March 17^th, weighed in at ten pounds and was named Patrick William.
     William is a famous name in my Mum’s family. My grandfather’s second name was William and there was also William John Wills, an explorer, who walked from Melbourne to Carpenteria, losing his life on the journey.
     Last year, I was asked by my editor, Chris, if the name William meant anything to me as she had received this name for me from her guide, Sakeina. This name was also picked up on an Electronic Voice Phenomenon (EVP) by a friend, Carolann Crowley, from New York.
     Since my grandfather was Alfred William and my brother, Patrick, was also called William, I made inquiries of Mum’s brother, David. He told me that William was certainly a name in the family and a famous one. Writing to the Burke and Wills Society in Australia, they told me I was the Great Grand Niece of William John Wills. This thrilled me so much! My grandfather, Alfred William Hare, was born fourteen years after the death of Wills. He was William’s nephew.
     A really good friend of mine, John Myers (known by me as JJ), spent some years in Melbourne, Australia. He told me that almost all Australians knew of the legendary pair from the 19^th century. Last year, JJ went back to Melbourne and brought me back a newspaper informing that more artifacts had been found of my great grand uncle. Both Burke and Wills have a statue in Melbourne and it’s massive. I would love to, one day, be able to go myself and see all the monuments that are in Australia for these men. I feel immensely proud to know the family is associated with him. It was also wonderful to see John Wills’ name in the family tree of my mother, Olive’s, side.
     My daughter, Adele, bought me a book called “The Dig Tree” by Sarah Murgartroyd. It’s a wonderful book full of the expedition and very exciting reading. This book told me so much about my famous ancestor and is a very easy read. William was only 26 years old when he died on the journey.
     Continuing on now with my immediate family…
     After Dad came out of the Air Force, he went to The Atomic Energy Establishment at Harwell, Oxfordshire where we lived in a pre-fabricated home, commonly known as a Prefab. My mind goes back to that time in 1947 as I became very ill with a Tuberculosis germ. The snow was so heavy that the ambulance could not get through so I turned up at Oxford’s Radcliffe Hospital in a taxi. My entire body became covered in blotches and I was in the hospital for six weeks. My father was not as lucky and ended up in Peppard Sanatorium in Berkshire County with full Tuberculosis. He was away for six months, but made a complete recovery. Strangely, Dad and I often came down with the same illnesses.
     Years later, a medium told me that I had ‘died’ at one point, but had been sent back as Spirit told her I had much to do and it was not my time. She also mentioned that this type of experience, known as a near death experience or NDE, often causes a person ‘sent back’ to develop mediumistic ways.

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