Animals and the Afterlife (30 page)

George

Tera Thomas, Animal Communicator North Carolina

M
Y CAT
G
EORGE WAS THE LOVE OF MY LIFE
; it is because of him that I became an animal communicator. It was his persistence and his support that finally made me believe that I was truly “hearing” animals and not just making it up in my head. George was in poor health the last couple years of his life and he taught me many things about death. He assured me that even though his body was going to die, he was not. He told me that birth and death are both powerful initiations for a soul and that there was life in both of them. He told me that though grieving would be natural and cathartic for me, he also wanted me to celebrate and to feel the joy of freedom he would experience. He wanted me to allow all of these feelings, the pain and the joy, to coexist within myself.

George chose the spot where he wanted me to bury his ashes. He said he wanted a gardenia bush to be planted there because gardenias are my favorite flower and that seeing them and smelling them would remind me that life does not end. So I bought a big gardenia bush and set it in its pot by the grave site. It gave us luscious, sweet- smelling flowers for a couple of weeks. George and I spent a lot of time sitting on this spot that was to be his grave. He rubbed his face in the gardenia bush, sat in my lap, rolled on the ground. Sometimes we would talk and sometimes we would just sit quietly, enjoying each other tremendously.

Two months later, George left his body, and I was devastated. As much as I thought I’d been prepared, it hurt more than I could have ever imagined. The next morning I took his body to be cremated, and when I got home I went to sit by the gardenia bush to think of him and to cry. There had been no buds on the bush the day before, but now there was a gardenia in full bloom. I smelled that beautiful blossom and knew that George was with me. Everyone said, “It’s not possible; gardenias do not bloom this time of year.” But there it was. The bush produced one bloom a day for seven days. I know it was George.

Joshua

Ms. Lorna Blechynden, Preschool Teacher and Animal Center Educator California

O
UR YELLOW LAB
, J
OSHUA
, was twelve years old. He had been very ill for about two weeks and was fading fast.

He was at the vet’s office and they called to say they felt it was time to let him go. I asked them to wait until my husband and I could get there. By the time we got there, he seemed to be doing a little better. I sat with him and stroked him for three hours. I now consider that time as a gift I was given.

The next day, they did surgery and found a lot of cancer. Our vet felt the best thing was to let him go at that time, and we agreed.

The following day, I was at work and I was praying, “God, I just can’t let go. If only I knew where he was and that he is okay even though he is no longer with us.” As I looked up through my tears, my eyes fell on a poster just above me. It was a fawn lying in a beautiful meadow in exactly the position Josh often had. There were little rabbits and other creatures all around and the words read:

All things bright and beautiful
All creatures great and small
All things wise and wonderful
The Lord God made them all.

I said, “Oh, God, can this be true? Are you telling me this is where he is?”

A couple of days later, in church I prayed, “God, if that was really you speaking to me the other day, I need confirmation of it.”

That afternoon, we stopped at a friend’s house to drop off a candle she had ordered from my daughter. We used to live in that same house but had not been there since we had moved out six months prior. When we got there, our friend said, “Oh, I have something for you that came in the mail.” When I saw it was from our vet, I waited until we got home to open it. It was a handwritten note saying how sorry he was about our loss and that he believed that Joshua was now in a beautiful celestial meadow fit for a dog of his stature.

That was my confirmation. If our vet had had our new address, I would have received the card before I had prayed for confirmation, but this way I got it at just the right time. After that I had peace and was able to move on.

Some people would call all of this coincidence. I have had many such incidents over the past years whenever we have lost a beloved pet. I believe it to be Divine comfort.

I now have the poster and the vet’s card framed and hanging on the wall along with a photo pictorial of Josh’s life from puppyhood on. We have found making these pictorials to be very therapeutic, and it helps us to let go.

Timber

Story written by Kate Mucci.
Accompanying photograph taken by Richard J. Mucci.
Kate and Richard Mucci are authors, television hosts, & musicians:
www.crosswynd.com
Nevada

E
ARLY ONE
J
ULY MORNING
while vacationing in an RV resort in Las Vegas, I was walking with our dogs, Timber and Kayla (pure white wolf/malamute/husky-mix sisters). It was a clear day, sunny, with an incredibly blue sky. We were crossing a street, in the crosswalk, when a young driver, speeding and in the wrong lane, lost control of her vehicle and hit Timber, who was at the time almost ten years old. Of course, both dogs were on leashes, and when Timber was struck, I, too, was pulled down, and my arm was injured.

My poor Timber was screaming and in pain, and I tried to comfort her and calm her down. I tried to use every healing prayer, hands-on technique and everything else I could think of to save her in those few moments. However, she went into shock, and we were rushed to an animal emergency unit. Timber died there, in my arms, about one hour after the accident.

You can imagine the pain that my husband, Richard, and I felt. We have no children—Timber had come to us when we were grieving for a third miscarried baby. She taught us to love, and to hope, and a million other things. When she died, only her sister, Kayla, kept us going.

Later that day, Richard and I forced ourselves to get out of our motor home and go to the area where Timber had been hit. Kayla was with us, although she, too, didn’t want to go anywhere or do anything. She kept looking behind to see if Timber was coming.

As we stood there looking at the crosswalk and the stop sign, I happened to look up and, through tear-filled eyes, saw an incredible cloud formation above the intersection. To me, there was no doubt it was an angel with Timber. I told Richard to look up, and he, too, could see it right away. There was no doubt in our minds that Timber was jumping into the arms of an angel. Richard ran back to the motor home and took this photo:

Kim’s note:
This is the original photo used for the cover of this book.

That evening, Richard and I walked yet again with Kayla, to the very back of the large resort in which we were staying. There were no RVs in the back section of the park; it had been closed for the summer. I had walked the girls there that morning, and it was on our way back from that area that we had been hit. Timber had loved that area because there were lots of little trees, and the fence that separated the park from the desert was there. She loved to sniff at little burrow entrances and whatever.

That evening, Rich and I just wanted to get away from everybody so that when we cried, we wouldn’t make spectacles of ourselves.

I guess I should point out here that Timber hated water. She would freak whenever she got in the stream of a sprinkler. She could hear it when automatic sprinklers were about to come on, and she would run before they would ever get a chance to soak her. Timber was also very independent. When we got her as a puppy, I chose her because unlike all the other pups in the litter who clambered over to greet us, Timber just sat back looking at us—almost saying to us, “If you want me, you come and get me.” Timber also was very opinionated and stubborn. She knew exactly who and what she did or didn’t like, and she made no bones about expressing her opinion in a million ways. She also made sure she got your attention, no matter what else you might be doing. Of course, we were always delighted to accommodate!

Well, that night, as Rich, Kayla and I were walking along the fence, a little bird hopped from tree to tree in front of us. She would land on a branch in a tree ahead of us, and if we didn’t pay attention, she would start singing. We would stop and look at her, and then she would fly away again, to the next tree, stopping at each tree along the way. At the time, I said to Richard, “Do you suppose it’s Timber—trying to let us know she’s free?”

It just felt like it was her little spirit letting us know she was finally getting to do exactly what she liked—her own thing. We kind of laughed it off as Kayla pulled our attention away from the bird. Kayla had found something interesting under the fence and we had to see what she was into. Just then, that little bird flew right over to the fence and started squawking like anything to get our attention; then she flew back to the tree she had just been on. We laughed and commented that it must be Timber, because she never took “no” for an answer when it came to attention. So, we kept following the little bird, and by now, Kayla was even taking an interest. Finally, we got to a tree in which the little bird was waiting for us. We looked up and started talking to her when I could hear the sprinklers starting under the tree. That little bird squawked, took off, and flew away.

Not to another tree, not to the fence; she just flew away. That convinced us. Timber’s soul had come to that little bird and shown us that she was okay, and since we were doubting a bit, she had to prove it with the sprinklers. Anyway, that is our story.

Kim’s note:
Kate and Richard have a page on their Website dedicated to Timber’s memory. In response to the cloud photo, Kate received the following e-mail from a friend of a friend….

“Hi! I’m a friend of Tracy in Scotland. I had a letter from her the other day, and she was telling me about Timber, and your web page. I had a minute yesterday and had a look. I knew it would be sad, but I couldn’t resist. I was very moved by the photos and tribute to Timber. She was absolutely beautiful, and I am so sorry that you had to lose her in such a tragic way.

“And she had the most stunning, soulful eyes I have ever seen. My two-year-old daughter came into the office as I was looking at Timber (and Kayla’s) pictures and she said: ‘Oh doggy, Mom,’ and I told her that that was Timber—whom she called Timmer. A few minutes later as I was looking at your cloud-formation photo, she came back into the office and said: ‘Timmer fly, Mom,’ which totally freaked me right out. I definitely saw a dog and an angel. Maybe that was Timber’s way of telling you that she’s okay. But out of the mouths of babes!”