Sometimes I know when someone is going to die. It happened for the very first time when I was twelve years old, and it’s only happened a handful of times in my 61 years. It’s only revealed a family member once. It is an active physical phenomena, and it is a mental clairecognizant event.
The physical phenomena is accompanied by a physical “freezing” in place. For several seconds I literally cannot move. It is accompanied by a whisper that I believe is inside my head, though it could be an external whisper and I’m just not interpreting it as such. The voice says, “Look, look at this person, look again.” And I have to look, I have to stare, usually for several seconds at the individual, and I’m unable to turn away. During the handful of these experiences, the voice has always said the exact same thing.
The clairecognizant event is accompanied by a solid definite “knowing” that this person is going to die very soon.
I have never actively tried to make myself knowledgeable about such events, not even with tarot reading. I have never sought to learn how to know this thing. I have never wanted to have this knowledge; it is inflicted on me without my knowing in advance that it’s coming, and without my desire to know. It is something beyond my control. I have never tried to approach someone with this pre-cognizant knowledge, or to inform anyone in any way of my experience, or the premonition concerning them and their life and imminent death. I have spent decades of my life trying to deliberately block this information from coming through, but have been unsuccessful. I sometimes think that my attempts to block it out may be the reason that I’ve experienced it so infrequently, with only a handful of events.
Below are descriptions of three of these “events”.
The first event occurred when I was 12-years-old, and it is the only event that involved a family member, my uncle. It is also the only event that didn’t follow the “pattern” of all the subsequent premonitions. I’ve actually written about this very first life-changing event because, as a child, I didn’t understand what happened, and I believed for a very long time that I caused my uncle’s death by seeing the vision.
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Easter Sunday 1969, when I was 12…
It had been a horrendous winter. My Aunt & Uncle had been snowed in for months. We were only able to have Easter dinner with them by driving a long route and coming in from the east as opposed to the more direct west route. Even then, we had to park our car on top of a hill and walk part of the way to their farmhouse, down a hill, across a small valley, and up over the next hill.
It was after dinner. The women were still in the kitchen chatting. My uncle and grandfather were sitting in the living room listening to music, along with my sister and me. We were both perched on the edge of a long piano stool.
I looked across the room at my Uncle, who was stretched out on the sofa, one arm behind his head. As I watched, I was startled and fascinated to see the back of the sofa suddenly swing forward and close over him. I realized that I was seeing my uncle in a coffin with the lid being closed. I shook my head and blinked my eyes to rid myself of this vision. I looked at my grandfather and my sister to see what their reaction was, and I realized that I was the only one to see this thing.
Later in the afternoon, my uncle left the house to go outside and check the water levels in the driveway, where the melting snow was beginning to cause flooding. My sister and I were standing in the dining room window, watching him walk up to the house.
We turned away.
A second later we heard a muffled noise, and my Aunt came hysterically screaming from the kitchen doorway, “Mom! Mom!”…calling my grandmother.
My Uncle had stepped into the entryway off the kitchen and collapsed.
They called for an ambulance—which came in the wrong way, the way that was still blocked with deep snow banks, and they had to turn around to come in the same way we did. They also had to walk a gurney the same path we took, across the valley. It took so long for help to get there.
My uncle died that day.
It wasn’t until years later, in my late teens, while having a conversation with my grandmother, that I revealed to someone for the first time what I saw and how I believed that this vision caused the event. My grandmother emphatically told me that what I saw was a premonition, and that this vision was a foretelling and had nothing to do with causing my uncle’s death. It was at this point that I finally understood.
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The young man at the Halloween party…
It was a beautiful October evening, and my then-husband and I were guests at a friend’s outdoor Halloween Party. There was a young couple there, dressed as a bride and bride-groom, but the characters were turned around. The young woman was dressed as the groom, and the young man was wearing a wedding dress. During the first part of the party, I felt compelled to take a picture of this couple sitting together in a swing.
A buffet was set up in the garage, and I went by myself to fix a plate of food. The only other person in the garage was this young man. He had his back to me, across the room, intent on the table before him. I was just going to pick up an empty plate, when I froze, and I heard the voice… “Look, look at this person, look again.” I had to look. I looked at the dark curls of the woman’s wig he was wearing flowing to his shoulder blades. I looked at the open back of the dress, a diamond shaped cut-out revealing the center of his back. I couldn’t move, and I couldn’t take my eyes off this spot for several seconds.
I knew.
Later that evening, this couple had an argument and she left the party. He was extremely angry and upset, and he was ready to go find her. For several minutes, family members were either trying to physically prevent him from leaving, or they were trying to talk him out of it. Eventually, he got away from them and left in his vehicle. One of the ladies at the party, his Aunt I believe, grabbed my wrists and looked desperately and deeply in my eyes. “He’s going to get hurt tonight!”
I wanted to tell her, “No, he’s going to die tonight.”, but I was physically unable to do this. I felt that strange kind of “frozen” at this moment, and was unable to speak those words to her.
The next morning we learned that in the pursuit of finding his girlfriend, this young man’s car had been hit by a train. He did, indeed, die that night.
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The man in the little green truck...
For a while, my schedule coincided with his, and magickally at 3:45 pm we would meet at the top of the overpass on northern Broad Street. I always noticed the truck, one of those very small pickups, a pretty turquoise green-blue, and the driver was a young man. It became a routine expected sight, and one I didn’t think much of, except to know that when I saw this truck I was precisely on time, as was he.
The man in the small green pickup on the overpass still haunts me. I drive this route everyday, this location where one day when we meet, everything seems to start moving in slow motion, and the voice says, “Look, look at this person, look again.” , and I do, with that strange fixated frozen intensity. I can’t stop looking. I really look at the driver for the first time, seeing details, as we’re both moving in opposite directions, but in that strange slow motion.
I see a young man in his late 20s or early 30s. I see the red baseball cap and the soft brown hair around the edges of it. I see the thick-lensed black-framed glasses and the white t-shirt. I see his hands on the steering wheel and a look of concentration on his face. I stare at him until we’ve passed, and then I watch his vehicle in my rear-view mirror until he disappears over the hill.
I knew.
Up until this event in my adult life, I had never spoken about this odd sense of premonition to anyone before, but I did after this experience. I told my daughters. I told them that I wish I knew who this young man was. I told them that if I knew where to find him, I might try to find enough courage to approach him, knowing I would sound like a crazy woman. I would tell him to take a different route, at least for a while. I told them that something awful was going to happen to this young man.
And it did.
One day, on my day off, we were outside in our front yard when the neighbor came home. He got out of his pickup and approached us, looking absolutely stunned. He said he’d just come home on the overpass, and that there had been a terrible accident. He said that a white van had plowed into several vehicles at a great speed. He said there were bodies and mangled vehicles everywhere, and it was the worst thing he’d ever seen.
The over-pass is only a few blocks from our home.
We got in our vehicle and went to the edge of the highway east of our house, where we could see the overpass clearly, we were so close. And to my shock, there was the young man’s small pickup, the driver’s door flung open, sitting cross-ways in the highway. When he was hit, he had been thrown from his pickup, at the top of the overpass, and had landed on the railroad tracks below. He was one of many casualties from this accident.
I think about this young man every time I drive over this hill.
So, being able to recognize impending death, is it a gift or a curse? What good is seeing the future if you cannot altar it? Why is this knowledge revealed at all? Could the young man have been saved from his fate on Halloween night if he would’ve left that party a few minutes before or a few minutes after he did? Would the man in the pickup have listened to me if I would’ve been able to give him a warning?
- The day the beautiful tree was cut down:
I was sick about the tree—we all were. But it was the neighbor’s tree; there was nothing we could do about it. During early afternoon, I thought...why don’t I throw coats on the kids and we can run into the city and spend the afternoon at the mall. I thought it would be a better thing to do than sitting here listening to the chain saws and the wood chipper.
But I didn’t feel like going. No enthusiasm. In fact, I didn’t want to go. I was surprised that I felt this way. I thought this was odd. There has never been a time since I’ve become familiar with the city, that I didn’t like—no, love—to make a trip in to shop.
I thought—no, this is silly—throw coats on the kids and let’s go.
Vamoose! Get out of here for the afternoon.
And then something dawned on me, something tapped me on the shoulder. Something inside my head said...“Wait. Listen to your inner voice.”
I stopped dead in my tracks in the middle of the living room. The hair on the back of my neck stood up as I realized fully, in that moment, that I was experiencing an omen, a portent, or a premonition.
I made a quick mental assessment of everything that I told you above, and it hit me, as though someone was actually speaking inside my head. It’s hard to describe the sensation, but the answer that came to me was:
“Don’t go!”
I knew, without any doubt, that there was a reason that we shouldn’t go. At the time, I didn’t know what that reason was, but I knew my children and I were not to go to the mall this afternoon.
I’ve always preached in my divination blogs not to question the images, messages, etc. that come to you. Just go with the flow, even if the information you’re receiving doesn’t make sense to you at the moment. It was later in the day that I was to learn the meaning and the reason for these feelings, the reason behind this omen/portent/premonition.
This was not only the day the beautiful tree was cut down—this was the day of the massacre at Westroads Mall in Omaha, Nebraska.
This mall would have been our destination.
Below you'll find original older
posts from my private journals.
I had felt that an ominous message was coming for 2 or 3 weeks. I did a tarot spread one morning, before the mail came, to see if I could expect something nasty (in-law problems, long story).
An envelope from my mother-in-law arrived.
It gave me a terrible feeling of dread because the tarot spread had told me that “yes”, I could expect unpleasant news. And also, the “Card of the Day” was the 10 of Swords, never a good omen—backstabbing, surgery, illness, death...that is usually what this card brings to me. I shudder when I see it pop up in a reading.
I took the letter that my mother-in-law had sent and went to have lunch with my husband during the noon hour. I gave the letter to him, sitting there on pins and needles while he opened it...
It was information on sporting events!
(Sigh of relief)
That night my mother-in-law called...my husband’s father was diagnosed with lymphoma.
I was at the Dr.s office having blood work done for a physical. A pretty little blond woman was tending to the task. I was staring at her face and when I glanced down, that strange visual perception hit me—the black background with white words upon it:
“Westminster”
This time I made up my mind not to be silent, yet I didn’t want to just blurt out the word and sound like a crazy woman. So I began a conversation to try to find a way to introduce the word naturally.
“My parents live in Colorado,” I began, “and my sister works in Denver, although she lives in Westminster.”
“Oh, my god!” the pretty little girl began, very excited, “I recently moved here from Colorado, I’m from Westminster!”
I never said a word. I simply had wanted to confirm my own accuracy.
It was in the 1970s, my grandmother’s cheery yellow kitchen. I was a teenager. My grandmother and I, and a couple of friends and relatives, were sitting around the table having coffee.
I got up from the table, continuing to speak, and walked around the kitchen, circling the table—I wasn’t really aware at the time that I was even doing this. I wasn’t thinking.
I stopped ahead of the bright yellow wall phone and picked the receiver up and said “hello”. They all said, “What are you doing?” and “The phone didn’t even ring.”
My aunt was on the other end of the line.
She was somewhat flustered. She said that she had just dialed the number, but the phone hadn’t rang yet. I laughed and handed the phone to my grandmother.
Yesterday evening, between 6:30- 6:40, I was alone in the kitchen. I suddenly had an overwhelming sensation and thought:
"Isabella!"
A wave of memories and feelings washed over me...my daughter's little face in the hospital that first night. She looked directly into my eyes and made eye contact, her little mouth formed into a surprised , "Oooo".
I clasped my hands together and went to the back door, overwhelmed with emotion.
I wanted her home. And I wanted her home NOW!
I continued to finish fixing my lunch. I opened the fridge and was bent down, retrieving a beer from the drawer. Something inside of me said, "No-- better not, just in case you have to drive somewhere." I replaced the can of beer and poured myself a glass of chocolate milk instead.
And then...
I was sitting on the couch, eating my lunch, when the phone rang. It was between 6:45-6:55. It was Isabella on her cell phone, flustered and frantic-- She'd had an accident on the freeway coming home from the city.
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Note: Isabella and the young man who hit her were not harmed. They were lucky. It was rush hour, traffic was heavy-- virtually bumper to bumper at 65 miles an hour. A car had cut ahead of her. She had to slam on her brakes to avoid hitting it-- and then the car behind plowed into her, knocking her vehicle into the next lane, which was blessedly empty.
I took my daughter “Blossom” to Dr. Ottun’s office. As we were sitting in the exam room and he was quietly going over his records, I looked at him and opened my mouth—wanting to say, “Don’t tell me you’re thinking of retiring!!”...but I closed my mouth and said nothing.
Also, I saw in my mind green and yellow farm machinery, and a wooden or metal feed trough—long and set up off the ground. Cattle were standing there, feeding. It has taken longer to type the last sentence than the vision lasted; it was only a flash of a few seconds.
Later that week in the local newspaper: Dr. Ottun is retiring to spend more time with his family and farm and cattle! I had no idea that he farmed. My husband had no idea why I was so shocked to read that in the paper.
I have begun seeing flashes of psychic insight as quick, visual, black & white pictures in my mind. It is a black background and the message is written in white cursive handwriting. It is such a fast flash, just long enough for me to read the words, and then it’s gone, a split second.
When I was talking to my step-son on the phone-- he had called to talk to his dad who was at work—I experienced this odd vision. There it was, a quick flash in my mind, but at the same time also before my eyes:
“Someone is getting married.”
I have had a few other instances of this experience as well. It is more than a flash of intuition, it is more definite, a visual thing. It is an interesting and unusual experience.
And just for the record, I was right. My step-son called back later to tell his father that he was engaged to be married. (I had already prepared my husband for this news, but I didn’t tell him how I knew.)
At the kitchen sink last night...Suddenly, the image of a deep forest green car pops into my head. I say to my husband, “Did you ever have a forest green car?”
He looks kind of amazed and says, “Ya, it was my second car.”
“It was a loooong car.” I tell him.
“Ya,” he replies. “That just popped into your head?” he asks.
“Yes.” says I.
Just when you think you’re losing your sense of intuition because it’s been so long since you've experienced it, something weird like this will happen.
I was at the courthouse buying a new license for my vehicle. The lady behind the counter was very friendly and chatting away as I was making out the check. We were talking about children. I had my oldest daughter with me and this woman began to talk about her daughter, who had recently suffered a broken leg.
As I was writing, it just came to me; I had the overwhelming desire to blurt out:
“Your daughter has long blond hair and is very close by.”
As is usually the case, the way it’s been for most of my life, I simply say nothing. But the desire to do so is sometimes incredibly overwhelming. I don’t know why I keep silent. I suppose part of it is the fear of being wrong, and part of it is not wanting to look like some kind of a fruitcake. Most people don’t understand or respect clairvoyance.
Just as I signed the check, the lady said, “Oh my god, there’s my daughter!”
I turned toward the large double doors at the front of the office. There was a pretty slender girl with long blond hair, her left leg in a cast.
The lady says, with an incredulous voice, “How odd that we were just talking about her and there she is. Very odd indeed!”
I left with a smile on my face, because this woman had no idea how odd it really was; but I knew that my intuition, or whatever it is, was quietly working inside of me.
One December my step-son and his wife were going to come for the holidays—for the first time. I was curious about how this visit would go, so I did a tarot reading. Normally, I don’t do tarot readings for any individual(s) without their knowledge or permission. I sometimes find it so revealing that I would consider it an invasion of privacy.
With that said, I wasn’t “looking” for personal information; I just wanted to know how the tone of the visit would be and to know before hand if anything unexpected would come up.
It did. The tarot reading showed me that my daughter-in-law was pregnant.
I told my husband this and that they were coming to announce the future grandchild.
You know that overwhelming feeling I’ve spoken of to blurt out what you instinctively “know”. That first evening we took them to a Chinese restaurant for supper and I had to bite my tongue and then eventually sit on it to keep from blurting across the table to my daughter-in-law... “You’re pregnant!”
I wanted them to be able to give us the news in their own way, and they did.
Yesterday evening my 12 year old daughter “Guinevere”, and I were busy at the kitchen counter preparing salads for supper, when I heard someone softly call me. It sounded like a child right behind me. I turned, expecting to see my youngest daughter standing there, and I was just opening my mouth to respond.
There was no one there. There was no one else in the room besides Guinevere and myself.
I looked at my daughter, and was just about to open my mouth to tell her about this when she looked at me with wide green eyes and an incredulous look on her face.
“Wasn’t that WEIRD!” she exclaimed.
I was astonished.
I said, “You heard that too?”
She answered with an affirmative, “Yes!”
