Klar,
One book I would recommend that may give you some comfort in your sister looking over you is by Dr. Gary Schwartz called the Afterlife Experiments. He is a college professor who did some tests with psychics and the book has compelling anecdotes about loved ones interacting with us after they die. I think the paracast may have turned me on to this guy?? I don't remember.
Lastly, check out the blog below which I recently wrote for a popular dog blog. It's about my own father who passed away and sent me a gift of sorts
I firmly believe our loved ones still interact with us after they pass, just gotta keep your eye open or you may miss it!!!
THE DOG FROM HEAVEN??
My father passed away two years ago. Like many fathers and sons we bonded over mutual interests. For us, this was the Washington Bullets basketball team and my father’s black lab named ‘Sasha’. We spent hundreds of nights watching basketball on TV while Sasha was sprawled out on the carpet like superman flying. More often than not, Sasha was chewing on a bone with the concentration of a brain surgeon.
Six months ago my wife wanted a dog. I told her many times that I didn’t. Sasha was seventeen years old at the time and he was the only dog I needed in my life. I also didn’t want the responsibility of raising a puppy. Sasha had always lived at my parent’s house and raising a puppy for the first time in my own house would be a lot more responsibility than I wanted. It was one thing to stop by my Mom’s house to check in on Sasha from time to time. It ’s quite another to wake up at 6am every day to take him for a poop. No thanks, I’ll take a pass on that. I also knew that because of my wife’s late work schedule, I would be taking care of this new dog a lot more than she realized.
Marriage is a funny thing. You can put your foot down about something but………. if your partner is really passionate sometimes your foot is magically lifted. In other words, my wife issued an ultimatum and she was getting a dog. The day she lifted my foot, she went online to local dog rescue web sites. Each time she called about a dog she liked, that dog was already taken, often within hours of her call. It was really strange and frustrating for her. After losing out on four dogs in four days one of the rescue organizations asked if she wanted to save a stray that was scheduled for termination. The shelter staff had saved this dog on two separate occasions and his time was running out…fast.
My wife wasn’t impressed, this was not the dog she wanted. Fortunately, her sister is a dog fanatic and boldly told her that if she didn’t take this dog, she would. The next thing I know I’m on my way to pick up a dog that neither my wife nor I really wanted. I knew absolutely nothing about this dog but was now in the back seat of my wife’s car next to a small cage that shook from the enthusiasm of its occupant, a new puppy. When we got home, to my surprise it was a black lab puppy with the name
Bullet etched on his tag. This is the name the shelter or the rescue organization gave him before we even knew he existed.
My initial reaction was to pass it off as coincidence. Yes my late father and I shared a passion about his black lab and the Bullets basketball team, but to think he sent me this dog seemed a bit
out there.
A few weeks after bringing Bullet home I was at Barnes and Noble looking for a book to read on my daily metro commute. I came across a book by a University of Arizona professor I had heard earlier that week in a radio interview. I decided to buy this book on a whim,
The Afterlife Experiments by Gary Schwartz. The book documents Dr. Schwartz’s double and triple blind lab tests on “psychics”. Surprisingly, the psychics were measured as significantly more accurate in acquiring information about people than the control. In addition, the book documents anecdotal evidence that the psychics were actually in touch with the deceased relatives of the subjects being read. The psychics often claimed these deceased family members still kept tabs on their loved ones from the other side and would occasionally interact with them without them even realizing it.
Around the time we got Bullet my dad’s old black lab, Sasha, was put to sleep. Sasha was one of my best friends for seventeen years but his hips were so worn down he couldn’t sit up to eat his food. It was his time. I still plan to spread his ashes on my father’s grave later this spring.
Once Sasha passed and I finished reading the
Afterlife Experiments, I thought it was possible Bullet was sent by my father as a way of helping me get through Sasha’s passing. Honestly, what are the chances my wife would be forced by default to acquire a black lab with the name Bullet? Very small. Also, why was I compelled to buy and read this book about deceased relatives interacting with their loved ones? Was Bullet my dad’s way of giving me a new black lab to keep Sasha’s legacy and our shared passion alive?
I am now in love with Bullet a.k.a. the Bull, a.k.a. Bullman, a.k.a. Bulley Boy. Every morning he wakes me up by jumping on my stomach. He then makes sounds that I can only describe as a mix between a v
elociraptor dinosaur and a starving vampire. Who needs alarm clocks? Every weekend we go to the local dog park and every weekend I’m reminded of why we all need dogs! But I’ll save that for another entry.
I will end this post by telling you what I recently discovered. In re-reading Bullet’s file provided to us by the rescue organization that found him, Bullet was found alone wandering around the mountains of North Carolina (that’s where my brother lives!). Upon further investigation it says the exact date they found him as a stray was (drum roll please)…………. October 21, which just happens to be……… my birthday!
What are the chances of that? They found a black lab they named Bullet exactly on my birthday in the state where my brother lives. Furthermore, this dog would be rescued by my wife and brought to Maryland around the same time I’m compelled to read a book about deceased relatives helping loved ones. This also happens right around the same time my favorite dog in the world (also a black lab) is put to sleep. Is Bullet the dog from heaven? You decide!
