We were in the ancient port town of Rye, West Sussex, staying at the Hope Anchor Hotel up a cobbled street at the top of the town. We'd topped off our celebration with some overpriced whiskies in the small bar downstairs.
The weather was beautifully warm - almost too much so for our non-airconditioned room - and so to bed and a heavy sleep.
I very rarely have nightmares, and never one like this. It was blood, blood everywhere, a dream coloured red. It was horrible and felt significant.
When I woke next morning, shaken, I turned on the TV as much to restore banal normality as anything, and got rolling news on a suicide bombing at the Manchester Arena the night before, killing and wounding many children as well as adults.
I don't claim psychic powers, but to me the dream seemed connected; as though a signal had been broadcast, of outrage at being robbed of life so early and unexpectedly.
I remember reading that many people contacted the FBI before the 9/11 attacks, with descriptions and drawings of dreams and visions that troubled them enough to make that effort; it's hard to find links on the search engines now.
Some will hurry to discount all this; but then there are two kinds of explanations: ones where you come up with various hypotheses and test them to see which one fits best; and ones where any explanation will do and no evidence is required so long as it explains away the phenomenon, like putting St Paul's blinding light down to an epileptic fit, despite there being no reference to his ever having had another one before or since.
I just don't know.
3 comments:
JD comments:
Yes you do have psychic powers, everybody has them but they are suppressed by our culture. Russell Targ can explain it all better than I can - https://www.eomega.org/workshops/teachers/russell-targ
Do you want my own story, which shocked me even more than yours did? I'm still no nearer an explanation: In november/december of 2001 I was working in Dusseldorf and travelling there on sunday evenings to return on friday evening. A direct Lufthansa flight from Newcastle to Dusseldorf. On friday 29th November 2001 I was travelling home as usual. After the inflight meal with its small bottle of wine I was relaxing with a Drambuie in hand. That is when the plane becomes quiet with everyone dozing after the meal and just the hum of the engines and the occasional ding of a call button or other signal. I wasn't asleep nor was I awake, it was the 'twilight zone' or the hipnagogic state. And then out of nowhere a fully formed thought sprang into my head, it wasn't a voice it was a thought and it was sudden, clear and very emphatic -"George Harison's dead!" It woke me up with a start. What? No, surely not. My mind turned upside down. I had never thought of the Beatles for years but I vaguely recalled that Harrison was ill with cancer but I didn't know how serious it was. And then it was time for landing, disembark and into the terminal building. I walked round to W H Smith to get the evening paper and there it was on the front page of the Evening Chronicle "Beatle George dies at 58" It was the number 58 which hit me because my father was 58 when he died. There was no headline in any of the morning papers which were still on display so it would seem to be that his death occurred while I was somewhere 'en voyage' somewhere between Dusseldorf and home. I have tried to work out the timing between here and Los Angeles where he died and it seems about right, he died while I was in the air and snoozing after the inflight meal. How and why are questions i cannot answer.
Shakespeare knew of course - "There are more things in heaven and earth... than are dreamt of in your philosophy"
p.s. St Paul did not have an epileptic fit. I had one last week and in previous episodes I have never had a blinding flash of light, a hyperreality of colours but never blindingly so.
And yet, when we actually look at lots of data, it turns out that the 'correct' predictions in dreams are remembered better than the incorrect ones.
This wasn't a prediction and I don't generally go in for that.
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