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My Lady in White

Edmund Rydell

Virgin Islands

Blog: www.spirithoughts.com

Author of Eternity Revealed

In the winter my wife and I reside in St. John in the US Virgin Islands. I had been to St. Thomas for some minor medical work and was on my way back to St. John. It was rather late in the afternoon because my doctor had asked me to wait until he had seen his other patients before performing this simple dermatological procedure. I was walking along the street that led to the main thoroughfare along which the open-air shuttle bus that went to the ferry dock would be running. It was past the rush hour; the street was deserted. There was no one on the sidewalks, and only an occasional car would come by.

Rather suddenly I became aware of a figure making her way toward me on the sidewalk, which, strangely enough, I had not noticed before. She was actually only a few yards from me. She was not young. She was dark skinned and was wearing a long dress which completely covered her legs and feet. Her jacket was tightfitting with long sleeves. It had a row of little white cloth buttons up the front that led to a high collar. Her head was covered with some sort of headdress so that I was not aware of her hair. The whole costume was white or sort of a silver-white.

From the time I first noticed her, she was looking straight at me and continued holding me in eye contact as she approached. When she was almost abreast, she stopped walking and continued holding me in her smiling gaze. It would have been rude to walk right past her, so I stopped walking too.

I have often wished that I had memorized the exact words which she said. However, it was something to the effect of “I want you to know that what you are doing is the right course. You are on the right track.” Somehow she seemed to be just radiating love and affection. Then she flashed a bright smile. I mumbled some sort of thank you, and she went on her way.

I also continued walking along. My first rationalization—Batty old lady, dresses up at twilight and goes out and gives compliments to strangers—was quickly replaced with a more rational thought. You know, that was really strange, I thought to myself. Everything about it was quite unusual. Suddenly I wheeled around. She was nowhere to be seen.

There was no place where she could have gone in that short amount of time. The buildings on the street were commercial, not retail and were closed for the day. Moreover, they were set well back from the street, too far to reach in the time that had passed. She hardly would have had time to cross the street, but there was nothing there she could have gone to. In short, she had simply disappeared. As I began to review the circumstances, it dawned on me what this really was—an angelic visitation.

First of all, her sudden appearance when I was under the impression that the street was deserted was unsettling, and her sudden disappearance was even more so. Her persistent eye contact as she approached was extremely unusual. Local people, black or white, simply do not do this. Her stopping just in front of me was unprecedented. And her initiating a conversation with a total stranger was something I have never encountered in many years of living on the islands, or for that matter, in our home on the mainland. People simply do not stop walking and start talking like that.

And the costume! It was straight out of the century before last. It is almost inconceivable that anyone would be able to preserve such a costume in its pristine condition for such a long period.

But the message she gave me was perhaps the most unusual of all. For her to be able to say what she did, she had to know quite a bit about me. I have no evidence that she wasn't referring to the way I comb my hair or brush my teeth, but I have to assume it was far more profound than that. I have to believe she was referring to what has become my life's work in recent years—writing about spiritual matters.

Before long I had to conclude that I had been visited by an otherworldly entity—one that conveyed a message which gave me renewed hope and strength for my endeavors. How I regret not having the presence of mind to recognize this when it was happening! How I would have loved to have found out more about her message and about her!

I have so often fantasized about what I could have said. “You're not from here, are you?” I could have asked. It would have been so gratifying to experience her no doubt ambiguous answer.

I still cannot think about this encounter at length nor write about it without experiencing a rush of emotion. It created an impression that has never left me, has not diminished in the slightest, and in fact, continues to be a high point of my life. Even though I have not seen her again, I like to think that my “Lady in White” still cares about me and is still with me.