We Don’t Di – Turtles and Koi – Oh My!

In last week’s blog, Mystical Motorcycles, you read about Craig, my afterlife coach who died on July 10, 2017, and how he surprised me on my birthday in 2018.   This week you will read about the mind-boggling birthday gifts he showered me with in August of 2017.

You’ll need a little background to understand how my “gifts” came to be.  On August 3, 2017, Craig had been gone for twenty-three days.  By then I had received twenty-three different astounding signs from him, as well as feeling his presence around me and hearing him call my name.

All this mystical “hocus-pocus” was new to me, but it was comforting at the same time.  So, on August 3, 2017, when my dear friend mentioned that she had just been speaking to her deceased husband, I paid closer attention.  I would have thought she had gone off the deep end had I not been getting so many unmistakable signs from Craig; so, I listened attentively and asked her to elaborate.

My friend explained she had been working through a gifted psychic medium.  I didn’t even know what a medium was, and I was leery of psychics.  But the idea of “talking” to Craig had me mesmerized.  She elaborated about the process and gave me the phone number for a woman named Marcia.  I was fortunate to get a telephone session scheduled with this medium for the very next day.  I was a complete skeptic; yet, I was deliriously hopeful at the same time.  I had never experienced what was called “a reading” from anybody.  All she inquired about were the dates of our birthdays.  Then she began.

She started translating for Craig.  It was as if Craig were sitting right next to me having a conversation. It was his vocabulary, his sense of humor; even his irreverence.  I felt like I was watching a movie with subtitles, and soon I wasn’t even noticing the subtitles.  The medium was speaking for Craig and it was so automatic, so real, so him – it was like she wasn’t even there.

Craig spoke at length, during the reading about his daughter, his best friend, and his surrogate mother and mentioned them all by name.  He wanted to know who was feeding the fish in his koi pond. He talked about his motorcycle in the garage, his sports car, and the fact that there were problems with his will. He told me that he was fine and that his crossing to the other side was easy and beautiful and he hadn’t been afraid.

He told me that after it happened he went to visit all his friends including me. He proceeded to give me a narration of all my daily activities.   All I can say is that it “blew my mind.”  He said he saw me in the flotation chamber (a salt water therapy tub) and that it was good for me: like being back in the womb.  I was flabbergasted as I did not tell anyone that I had a done that.  He also said he saw that I had ordered a stuffed koi fish online.  I had forgotten that.  It was a gift for his best friend, who was heart-broken about having to donate Craig’s koi from his backyard pond to a foundation.

Craig then wished me a happy birthday and told me to watch for feathers as signs from him.  When I hung up from that life-altering bewildering, yet reassuring call; I decided that when I left for Venice in two days, on my birthday, I would shop for something to remind me of Craig as a present to myself.  I was going to look for some sort of small cloisonné or blown glass koi or turtle.

The very next day, after the reading, at my early birthday party, I was gifted with an intricate miniature koi fish.  It was beyond anything I had imagined.  The fin on the fish raised up and housed a delicate koi pendant with three shiny diamonds on a thin gold chain.   No one knew of my desire to purchase a koi memento. I told no one.  And no one knew of the koi pond.  Was this just a coincidence?  It might have been, had Craig not mentioned it through the medium when I had my next “conversation” with him.  He commented that I must really like the koi necklace he arranged for me to receive, because he could see that I was wearing it now and wore it every day.

Since I had my koi, the only thing on my shopping list now was a souvenir memory of Craig in the form of a turtle.  It had to be the perfect turtle like the ones in his backyard.  It had to be small to fit in my suitcase; it had to be inexpensive; and it had to be dark in color.  I scoured the countries of the Dalmatian Coast, the Greek Islands, and the Italian Riviera in search of that perfect turtle.  The last stop on our itinerary was the eternal city of Rome.  When we arrived, I was still not in possession of that perfect turtle. On our final walk back to the hotel to check out and leave, I consoled myself that I had my exquisite koi necklace and I didn’t really need a turtle after all.

About a block from the hotel I saw the oddest thing.  It was so peculiar that I took a picture of it.  A miniature toy motorcycle was perched on the curb.  No children in sight, no other toys; just this suspended blue Harley Davidson motorcycle.  It was just like Craig’s, that was still in the garage of his vacated home in California.  After capturing the photo, I looked up from the quiet street to hear a distinctive Nigerian man commenting that I looked just like he did.  That was how he complimented me on my deep dark Mediterranean suntan.  Abruptly, he stated that it was his daughter’s first birthday in Nigeria and since he could not be with her and give her his gift, he wanted me to have it. He extended his hand and in it was an exquisitely carved small mahogany turtle.  It was perfect.