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By Toni Elizabeth Sar'h Petrinovich, Ph.D. |
It was going to be a marvelous trip to New Mexico. My friend, Marilyn, and I had it all planned out and awaited this time away with great expectation. Little did we know what awaited us as we ventured into mutually uncharted territory. Only our Spirit knew... and it was not telling!
Our getaway adventure was part research, part education and part re-creation. Marilyn is the single Mother of three children... enough said about the busyness of her life. I have my own healing practice and business in which I am involved 24/7. Five days away in the sunshine was exactly what we desired.
Leaving the Pacific Northwest through Seattle, we flew to Albuquerque, NM and rented a car. Marilyn had made the reservations for us in Santa Fe and also in Taos where we would go after attending a two day conference hosted by Zechariah Sitchin. Since I have spent years studying Zechariah's work and giving synopsis presentations on his many books, I was especially excited to hear him speak in person. Once the seminar was complete, Marilyn and I were going to drive to Taos, a must see in the art world.
The Sitchin presentation was marvelous. We stayed until the last word had echoed through the hall including having dinner with Zechariah and meeting many new, wonderful friends. Yet, Taos called and so the morning after the conference ended, we packed our bags and settled in for the 1.5 hour trip. We knew we might visit interesting places enroute and looked forward to having nothing to do except relax and enjoy the beautiful countryside.
Once we arrived in Taos, the real adventure began. Driving down Paseo del Pueblo Sur (the main street), we found our chain hotel where Marilyn had made reservations. Upon obtaining our room keys, we discovered our room smelled very heavily of cigarette smoke even though we had requested a non-smoking room. Back at the front desk, we requested a non-smoking room once again. Reluctantly, the desk clerk changed our room, gave us our keys. We proceeded around to the back of the building where all of the rooms had the usual No Smoking sign on the outside of the door. We were utterly surprised when we opened the room door the second time to find that it smelled even more strongly of cigarette smoke.
"Let's get out of here," I said to Marilyn, who agreed immediately. "I saw a very quaint, small motel on this same street. Let's give it a try."
Returning our keys without saying much except to ask for the deposit refund, we were quickly back in the car and down the street to a more local motel. The room was quaint, clean and comfortable. Perfect! Now we can enjoy our stay in Taos.
We spent the first day downtown where we discovered the city getting ready for its annual Arts Festival. We talked with many artists, saw fabulous artwork and had a fairly good meal before deciding to retire early. After all of the traveling in the past few days, we were beginning to feel the tiredness.
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About 11:30 p.m., it all began. I awoke to Marilyn's screams as she knelt on her bed looking out the window and exclaiming, "No, no, no! I'm going to die! Can you hear that sound? What is it?" She was crying so hard I could barely make out her words. Now, my usual, natural inclination when someone is having a difficult time is to comfort them. I am naturally a nurturer. I know this intimately about myself so I was very surprised to hear my thoughts which went something like this: "The hard way! Why do we always have to do it the hard way! Okay, okay! If that is what it takes, then we'll do it!" Yes, I could hear a deep rumbling sound overhead. It sounded like someone was vacuuming the mountains around the Taos area. It was very, very loud.
Meanwhile, Marilyn was asking me if I could smell the ozone in the air. My only concern was for myself. I had to use the restroom and that was where I was headed - leaving Marilyn sitting on the bed, crying and mumbling out loud. In the restroom, I noticed the ozone smell and kept hearing the same thoughts in my head. It felt like there really was nothing to do except surrender to what was happening and go back to bed. And that was exactly what I did. Looking straight at a very distraught Marilyn I said, "Do you want some Kleenex to plug your ears?" got back into bed and went sound to sleep.
In the morning, I asked Marilyn what had happened to her the night before. She said that she did not know except that if reminded her of something that had happened to her when she was very little and sleeping in her crib. She said, "If I told you that last night, I know I would have died. What do you think we should do?"
I suggested that we sit in meditation for a few moments. I began to feel like we needed to be with the people of the area, become very grounded and stay present so that we would not get caught up in the drama of this situation. "Let's go to that neat little place we saw last night for breakfast... the one that reminded us of blueberry muffins. We will eat lightly and then go to the Tao Pueblo to be with the people who belong to this area." Marilyn liked that idea very much and finally allowed me to drive since she was in no shape to be behind the wheel of a car.
On the way out of the motel, we stopped at the front desk to ask the clerk if she had heard the noise the night before or if anyone else had reported it. "No, I didn't hear anything because I don't live in Taos itself, yet when I came in this morning the keys hanging on the wall were on the floor and the file drawers were open." She didn't know why the office was in such a chaotic state.
Once seated at the breakfast table, we asked the waitress if she had heard the noise the previous night. She didn't live in the area either so hadn't heard anything yet she believed she knew what we had heard. "It is called the Taos Hum," she said. "It usually drives people crazy." That was the end of the information she had for us. We made a quick job of breakfast and got on the road to the Pueblo.
Continued on page 4...
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Contained, herein, is an update with regards to the many different methods spirits use to get my attention when I am not on the dowse. By "on the dowse" I mean that there are many times one or more spirits are here for crossing over, and I do not have my dowsing pendulum in hand, so they must use some other method of getting my attention. I'm sure that most of you have heard the term, "nudging someone". If not, to nudge is to push, shove, poke, tickle, or to verbally rag on someone to do something, or make some kind of noise or event happen so as to get someone's attention.
Spiritual nudging takes many forms and, depending on who the spirit is, varies with each individual. Also, I have two angels with whom I deal with on a regular basis - Ralph, my personal angel and, Angela, an Arc angel - who, for some reason, will need to get my attention. For the most part, angels tend to tickle. About the closest I can come in communicating to you the feeling I get when one is "tickling", is the sensation you get if you touch your tongue to an almost dead 9-volt battery. It's that tingling sensation you get as the electricity runs across your tongue. It doesn't hurt, but it gets your attention really quick.
Another method that both angels and spirits use when I am in a dark place - like in bed at four or five o'clock in the morning trying to sleep - is to cause a blue light to appear. The light swirls around like looking at a lava lamp, and it happens if my eyes are open or closed. What I am seeing is the actual spiritual energy of whoever is there.
Physical sensations are at times a bit disturbing in that I actually have reactions to things that spirits bring with them on both an emotional and physical basis and, at times, I can experience real discomfort and, in some cases, pain. As an example, anyone that has died from suffocation as the result of a fire always affects me by causing my throat to become restricted to a point that it becomes hard to breathe with some degree of physical discomfort.
Probably the most common nudge is that of smell. It is not uncommon to smell smoke, a woman's perfume, gun powder and, especially, horses. Yes, horses. I am still getting spirits coming through from the Civil War and some of them were in cavalry units. I would imagine that the only time anyone ever got a bath was when they had to ride through a river and having to spend 24/7 with a horse under your backside, the smell of horse would permeate right down to the skin. One day I had so many come through, I had to go through the house with a spray can to get the smell of horses out.
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SPIRITS OF THE VICTIMS OF
"JACK THE RIPPER"
By Ron Bowers |
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Something of some interest to me was found in an old magazine that was published by a certain Wesley H. Downes who used to live in the Clacton, Essex area. Wesley had his own Essex Ghost and Haunting's Magazine that was quarterly. I have not been able to trace his whereabouts or even if he is still with us.
One of the stories found by Downes has to do with a village, about seven miles from where I live, called Thorpe le Soken. Buried in the church yard at Thorpe is William Witney Gull, Bt. MD. FRCP. FRS. It is alleged that he was very much connected with the five known murders and could well have been 'Jack the Ripper'. Downes shared these apparition stories of the victims.
Victim one of Jack the Ripper was prostitute Mary Ann Nichols who was murdered on the 13th August 1888. Her body was found in the street with sickening injuries. Her throat had been cut almost from ear to ear down to the bone, her windpipe and gullet cut open and the lower part of her abdomen had been ripped apart. For many years, there have been reports of Mary's ghost seen hovering around the area where her badly mutilated body was found.
Victim two was prostitute Annie Chapman whose disemboweled body was found in Hanbury Street on the 8th September 1888. Her throat had also been cut so deeply that her head was only held on by a small piece of skin. Around the area where Annie was found, many people have heard terrifying screams and moans and the apparition of her with the head resting upon her shoulder has been seen sitting on a wall.
Victim three was prostitute Elizabeth Stride who was murdered in Berner Street in London's east end, not too far from where the other victims were found. Her body was discovered with similar injuries as the other two. The apparition of Elizabeth has been seen on several occasions heralded by the sounds of moans and groans in the yard close to No. 60 Berner Street where her body was found.
Victim four was Catherine Eddowes who fell to the same unfortunate death as the other known prostitutes. Catherine's spirit has been reported to have been seen wandering around Mitre square known locally as 'Ripper's Corner'. Last reported sighting was in 1973.
Victim five - the last known victim of Jack the Ripper - was Mary Kelly. Mary had some different aspects to her death. Although she was brutally murdered in the same manner as the other four women, she was the only one to have been murdered inside a building. Her body remains were so mutilated that they were removed on butcher offal trays. Killed on the 9th of November 1888 in a room at Miller's court spitalfields, many people have claimed to have seen a ghostly figure enter the building dressed in black, then later, a pale white face is seen looking from a window of the room where she met her death. Mary, it is said, always wore black. The building has since been demolished and the site has been redeveloped. Only time will tell if Mary's ghost has been laid to rest.
Ron Bowers is co-author and photographer of the book to the left. Click on book for a sneak peak at its contents. |
