Читать книгу An Angel Called My Name: Incredible true stories from the other side - Theresa Cheung, Theresa Cheung - Страница 4

About ten years ago, when I was living and working as a journalist in Dallas, Texas, I had a vivid dream. In this dream my mother was calling my name and telling me – just like she always used to do whenever I felt anxious or afraid – to follow my intuition as it would lead me to the right path in life. When I woke up I lingered in bed longer than usual reliving the dream in my mind’s eye. My mother had passed away a decade previously and I missed her wisdom and warmth greatly. She had always told me to follow my heart and I silently promised her that even though I was working in journalism now I wouldn’t give up on my dream of establishing myself as a writer of books.

That afternoon a radio interview was scheduled for me to talk about a series of articles I was writing for the local newspaper about ordinary people whose lives had been touched by the extraordinary. I was running late and as I leapt into the car to drive to the studio I soon realized that if I was to get there on time I would need to put my foot down. All was going well on the roads until I got stuck behind two massive trucks travelling at what seemed like 30 miles an hour. They were probably going much faster than that but when you are in a hurry every vehicle in front seems slow. I tried to overtake but couldn’t get a clear view of the oncoming traffic so had to settle for a frustratingly slow crawl.

Finally, we reached a junction and I had a clear choice. I could turn left and follow the trucks along a shorter route and reach the studio in the nick of time or I could turn right, free myself from the trucks and take a longer route and possibly end up a few minutes late. I was just about to turn left and chug slowly along behind the trucks in front until I reached my destination when out of nowhere my dream flashed into my mind’s eye. Once again I saw my mother calling my name and gently telling me to take the right path. Without hesitation, and not really understanding why, I turned right and predictably turned up at the studio late. I missed my radio interview. The network didn’t have another slot to schedule me in.

As I drove back that day I felt frustrated and angry at a missed opportunity and time wasted. I got even more irritated when the traffic slowed to a crawl and then a halt. My irritation soon turned to horror when I gradually edged closer to the scene of what was clearly a terrible accident. Close to the junction where I had turned right the truck I had been following had clearly swerved off the road. Three or more cars – it was hard to tell in the chaos – had smashed into the truck and each other. The car immediately behind it – which would have been my car – was a mangled wreck and the two cars behind that also looked like smashed and battered.

Later that evening, I turned on the television to hear the local news. Images of the accident flashed onto the screen. A stray dog had run into the road in between the first and second truck. The second truck driver had slammed on the brakes and caused a pile up. Although the lorry driver and the dog were unharmed there were two passengers in the car immediately behind, a recently married couple called Jane and Harry, and one in the car behind that, a retired postal worker called Sam. All three had died on impact.

By telling me to take the right path, the voice of my mother had saved my life that day. I had not expected to ever find proof of an afterlife, but I had been given it all the same through a dream and a sudden flash of intuition. But instead of feeling elated by my experience, nothing seemed to make sense to me at all. All I could think was, ‘Why should I be alive and not those poor people?’

Emotionally drained, I fell into bed that night to wake in the small hours of the morning from a restless sleep. My pillow was on the floor and the sheets and bedcovers had been pulled off the edge of the bed. ‘What did it all mean?’ I prayed. So many emotions clashed inside of me – the gratitude for living, the pain of hearing that people had died and the guilt of still being alive when they weren’t. Why did they have to die? Why wasn’t it me instead? Where were these people now? Were they all right? Still pleading for answers I fell back to sleep.

It was a voice that woke me. I heard a voice, a whisper really, calling my name. At first I thought it was my mother’s voice. I sat up and looked around my bedroom but no one was there. Then I heard the voice again. ‘Don’t feel afraid. My name is Jane and I am all right. Everything is all right for us and everything will be all right for you too.’

And that was it. The voice was gone. I only heard it for a few seconds but it was just long enough to affect the rest of my life. A feeling of peace and comfort came over me, a feeling I had not known before like a warm, soft and luxurious blanket wrapped all around my body.

I pinched myself and it hurt. I was awake. I had heard the voice. This was real. I got up and turned the light on and the feeling of peace, the comfort of knowing everything would be all right continued to envelop me. My prayer had been answered. I still didn’t know why my life had been miraculously spared on the day before but I did know that Jane and the other two people who died were okay. And I felt a new resolve to live a life that would make those who died instead of me in that terrible accident proud.