Ghosts Among Us - James Van Praagh [15]
“Your father is here.”
“Really?” she said skeptically.
“He is telling me that he wasn’t found for a couple of days.”
“Oh, my God, that’s him.”
“He wants you to know that the last thing he remembers was checking the inventory. Do you understand?”
“Yes. He was a foreman at the Seward warehouse.”
“Is his name George?”
“Yes,” she said excitedly.
George was so happy to finally contact someone. “He says he wanted to make sure the inventory report got out in time before tax season.”
“Yes, he was in charge of the inventory report. He worked long hours to prepare it.”
“I see him climbing a ladder. He reaches over to some supplies all the way at the back of the shelf. He is trying to reach them, but he can’t. He says he lost his balance and fell off the ladder. That’s the last thing he remembers.”
I asked George, When did you know you were a ghost?
George responded to me with his thoughts. I didn’t believe it was real. It was quite a strange thing, you know. I don’t actually remember falling, but I knew I couldn’t hold on. I remember being on the ladder, looking down at my body on the cement floor. I thought I was dreaming. How could I be on the floor and on the ladder at the same time? I was fine on the ladder. I felt like I had a week’s worth of sleep. I looked down at my body on the floor and couldn’t feel anything for that person. I tried to call for help, but there was no one in the warehouse except me. Then I began to panic. If I didn’t get up off the floor, I was going to die or something. Then everything went kind of foggy.
I looked at Annie. “Do you understand what he is talking about?”
Annie was very quiet. She seemed to be mesmerized by what I was saying.
George kept sending me his thoughts, and I conveyed them as best I could to his daughter.
“Standing in front of your father was his old service buddy. He is saying they served together in Vietnam.”
I looked at Annie. “Do you know this person? Your father says his name is Marty.”
Annie shook her head.
“He says that he hadn’t seen Marty in forty years. He says that Marty was there to rescue him and to help him find his way back home. Your father doesn’t understand why Marty was trying to help him. He says Marty reminded him that when they were in Vietnam he saved Marty from stepping on a land mine. Your dad is saying that he saved Marty, and now Marty was there to save him.”
I could tell that people in the audience seemed to connect with George.
I continued. “Your father says that he saw the image of the jungle and the whole thing happening all over again as if they were right back in Nam. He is saying that it was very strange.”
George was conveying a very moving image, and it touched most of the people in the audience. Many had tears in their eyes.
“Your father is saying that Marty couldn’t save him from dying, but he wanted to help him move on. Your father still couldn’t believe that he was dead.”
I turned to Annie and smiled. “Your father is kind of stubborn, isn’t he? He has to see it to believe it.”
Annie nodded. “That’s him.”
“He says he asked Marty to take him to see you and your mother, Maggie, and instantly they were in your living room. He says the room was a terrible mess.”
“We had called the police because he was gone for two days, and we didn’t hear from him,” Annie replied.
“Your father saw you and your husband, Steve, trying to comfort your mother.”
Annie validated this to the audience. “That’s right. We were waiting to hear from the police. Suddenly the doorbell rang, and two policemen stood in the doorway. They told us there was an accident in the warehouse.”
“Your father was very confused. He knew he was standing next to you, yet no matter how much he tried to tell you he was all right, no one could see or feel him.”
I asked George if anyone else besides Marty came to bring him into the light.
Well, I was in a bit