Dreams | Giselle Roeder

Imagine receiving an e-mail from a person you have never met who lives in another country about a thousand or more kilometers away from you. The e-mail starts with an apology and the suggestion that you may not believe what she is going to ask or tell you and, if it would be her, she would not believe it either.

“Is your aunt Johanna alright? You have to warn her as her life may be in danger. Her husband Robert is abusive and one day things may get out of hand. I know she is ashamed of the abuse and she hasn’t told anyone. Please don’t think I am crazy and do warn her.”

She went on to tell me that she has psychic abilities, works for a court in XYZ (I like to protect her identity) and has once been able to tell the police of the body of a child missing for three years. She has solved other cases and is not happy about this ability but if she can pass on a warning she feels she has to do it.

I was startled by the message, stared at it and thought how weird is this? My aunt Johanna is long gone. This must be a person who has read my book “We Don’t Talk About That”. Because her husband was abusive but he is also gone, having died in WWII. There is a chapter in my book when aunt Hanni, as we called her, had come running to my mother, who was her sister and I happened to witness her breakdown and heard her sorry tale.

After sleeping and mulling it over I decided to answer this strange e-mail and asked a few questions. I thanked her for the message and stated that she must have read my book “We Don’t Talk About That”. I could not imagine otherwise. I did tell her that I also had several unexplainable psychic experiences in my life and no, I did definitely not think she is crazy. But I am curious how she would know about Johanna and her husband Robert. I suggested she read my book – if she hadn’t done so already.

I received another e-mail, quite a lengthy one. And no, she had not read my book at all. It was a dream in which she was Johanna and experienced the abuse. That’s how these ‘experiences’ established themselves within her. She knew about a gorgeous wedding dress Robert had given her and explained it in detail. She also mentioned that Robert was somehow arrogant and felt he was better than the family Johanna came from. This was also true since at my parent’s wedding he had teased my father that he was able to give Johanna a horse if he wanted to and my father could only give his bride, Johanna’s sister, a horse whip. Johanna never got a horse but surely she experienced the whip. The dream had disturbed my correspondent a lot. She went on to Google with the two names she had, Johanna and Robert as a couple, and tried to guess the year of a wedding in Germany. She did not give up and finally her search brought her to my website and my picture gallery. She had found my e-mail address and the rest is history.

Recently I wrote to her again and inquired if, by now, she had read my book. I told her that I would like to keep in touch since I am fascinated with the topic of otherworldly experiences. She answered, No, she still hasn’t read my book for several reasons. She is very busy with work and she doesn’t want to invite other possible disturbing revelations. Life has a way of going on and hers is quite full.

I understand that. But in the meantime, I have been thinking a lot about paranormal and psychic happenings or abilities. I remember after my last experience years ago, this time in a hotel room in China, I begged God to please take this ‘gift’ from me. Apparently he did because I have never had another unbelievable thing happen to me. Now I wish I did have a “Crystal ball”.

Oh, you want to know what happened in China? Okay, I’ll tell you. It was the year of 9/11. I had a single room and was securely locked in. I woke up from a dream with a start and just knew there was someone in the room. I switched the light on and checked but all was quiet and I was alone. After my heartbeat had slowed down, I fell asleep again but the dream went on. The husband of a friend who was dying of cancer in Vancouver, Canada was in my room. I screamed at him “what are you doing here?”

He started to laugh and said quite clearly: “Don’t be afraid, I just came to say good bye.”

I woke up again, switched the light on – nothing. I came home to Canada a week later. I phoned my friend to tell her I was back and asked how her husband was doing. She was slow to answer.

“He died. He had a very tough time and I am glad he is at peace.”

I was almost afraid to ask her on what date he died. Yes, it was the date when I had that disturbing dream.

It was totally dark when I woke up and I had the incredible feeling of floating over my bed. I had heard someone calling “No, don’t go, please no, no, no…” I felt for something solid and was grateful when finally touching my pillow. But it was wet, very wet next to my head. I was flat on my back. I kept lying still and tried to shake the cob webs off my mind. Who had been calling? Why would my pillow be wet? I noticed that my hair on both sides of my face was wet as well and there was moisture in my ears too. I touched my eyes. Yes, – I was crying, the tears just kept running out of my eyes, down my cheeks and it seemed that some flood gate had opened. I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t properly wake up, either. Weirdly, I knew I wasn’t really awake and I also knew I wasn’t really asleep. The dark room around me felt cold and empty. Very empty. Almost hollow. I could touch the hollow in the air above me.

The next I heard was my alarm clock going off. It was 6.30 AM. A bit of grey light shone through the curtains. It took me a while to gather my thoughts. The wet pillow was a puzzle. I figured I must have had a bad dream and therefore cried. Walking to the bathroom I felt lightheaded and in a weird way very somber. Not singing or humming as I sometimes did. I had my shower, dried myself, put my house coat on and padded back to the bedroom. I dressed without thinking, choose everything black. Black pantyhose, black dress with a high collar, buttoned half way down the front with small round shiny black buttons, black pumps. When I was back in the bathroom I stared into the mirror: Why did I dress in black? I opened a drawer and pulled out my opera length large white baroque pearls and hung them around my neck. I shook my head to the image I saw in front of me and took them off again. I noticed that I was very pale and had large dark circles under my eyes.

Eventually I set off to drive to my office. For no reason at all I felt thankful that nobody had taken my parking spot. For a while I sat in my car and prayed that my secretary would not notice my eyes, still red from crying. I still had that somber feeling but as I entered through the backdoor I pasted a smile on my face when I called out “Good Morning” and hoped it sounded cheerful enough. June, my secretary was at her desk, gave me a rather serious look and said somewhat timidly “Good Morning, Giselle”. What’s with her, I thought as I walked past her and into my office. I placed my coat on the hook behind my door which was always open. I wanted to be available and approachable for all my “girls”, – I had twelve estheticians working for me. Behind my chair was a one-way window which allowed me to look out into the shop but nobody could look in. I sat down at my Jacobean desk in my Jacobean chair, folded my hands in my lap and did absolutely nothing. I didn’t see anything either. I was numb.

After maybe ten minutes June called “Giselle, telephone for you.” I picked it up and said my name.

“Hi, Giselle, it’s Chris. I am afraid I have bad news for you.”

“Yes, I know, my father died.”

“Oh, you know already”.

“Chris, – no I don’t, – what did you just say? How do you know?”

“We received a telegram this morning before the shop opened since we were the only Roeders in the telephone book close to your shop.”

Grandpa Erich and Eric

I was stunned. I hung up the phone and just sat there, my heart racing and my mind reeling. My hands were shaking and I couldn’t make them stop. Now I slowly started to understand my tears during the night, my somber mood, my disconnection with reality. My father had written a letter on February16, complaining that he didn’t feel good, that not even the cigars tasted good anymore. Since then I had not heard from home. Neither my mother nor my youngest sister had written to let me know that he was in a bad way. And today was April 7, 1983, time enough to let me know, to give me a chance to fly home and see him again before it was too late. How good is a funeral of one you love so much when you cannot be there? Oceans were between us. They lived in East Germany, had tried to escape but father had a kidney attack on the way to the train station and ended up in hospital. That was on the 13^th of August 1961. Two days later the Berlin Wall was up.

“June, my father died, Chris just told me.” I had left my office and stood in front of her desk.

“I am so very sorry, Giselle, I thought you knew.”

“No, June, I did not know. It just hit me the moment Chris said it.”

“But then, Giselle why did you dress like that?”

“I have no idea, June. I wasn’t really aware of it. I just felt kind of somber this morning. It was as if I was in a trance. I thought I must have had a bad nightmare because I had cried so much my pillow was wet…”

I walked away from her towards the open part of the shop, the elegant waiting room with the manicure tables all around the huge glass windows. I stopped at every table to greet my customers and stood a bit longer at my daughter Ingrid’s table. She lived with Chris. Her head was bent way down – she clearly did not want to face me.

“Ingrid, Grandpa has died.”

She never looked up from her work. “Yes I know. You did too, didn’t you?”

“I had no idea. Chris just phoned me a few minutes ago.”

“But then, why did you dress like that?”

My back prickled, the hair at my neck was standing up as the full force of what happened last night hit me. My father had come to say “Good Bye” and the voice calling “No, don’t go, please, no, no, no…” must have been my own.