Visualize a purple light flowing from your finger as you trace a pentagram into
an object that you don't want anyone messing with.
With this pentagram I lay
Protection here, night and day.
And the one who should not touch,
Let his fingers burn and twitch.
I now invoke the Law of Three,
This is my will, so mote it be"
"This is from my own Book.
This is not a spell in the true sense of the word, but it works, its own particular brand of magic
it is a traditional way of sending out a message to a friend that you would like to take the friendship further. It is upon up to him or to respond
Now what you need is
Flour
Water
Yeast
A mixing Bowl
A work Surface
A recipe book
A Loaf Tin
An Oven
find a recipe book which tells you how to cook bread and set to work
when you have just about finished kneading the dough cave the initials of whoever taken your fancy into before giving it a last pummeling. As the bread bakes, sit by the oven visualising your friend and you have started to take a step on the road to romance, According to the Central European Tradition when such a loaf is shared between the person who has baked it and the object of his or her attraction, serious romace is an absolute certainty"
"When the Moon is in a waxing phase, prick the tip of your left finger with a sterilized
pin or needle, and squeeze out a bit of blood. Use the blood to write your initials on
a smooth white stone as you visualize being back together with you lover.
Write his or her initials next to yours and the draw three circles of blood around both initials.
Wrap the stone in a piece of pink or red velvet tied with a pink ribbon , and the bury it in the
ground or in a flowerpot with the plant ruled by Venus. If the spell is done correctly, you and
your lover should be reunited within a period of three days and nights.."
Two outlandish yet similar tales told half a century apart seem to indicate that aliens may at times appear nude. On April 19, 1897, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch printed a letter from one W. H. Hopkins. Three days earlier, near Springfield, Missouri, Hopkins encountered a beautiful nude woman standing outside a landed "airship." As he approached, a similarly clad man stepped up to protect her. Though neither being spoke English, Hopkins convinced them of his peaceful intentions. Asked where they came from, they "pointed upwards, pronouncing a word which sounded like Mars."
On March 28, 1950, Samuel Eaton Thompson reportedly met up with nude Venusian men, women, and children in a forest outside Mineral, Washington. Friendly but childlike, they spoke "uneducated" English. Whereas Hopkins' Martians were sweating in the spring temperatures, Thompson's Venusians were cold because of the respective distances of the two planets from the sun.
Over the years I have read hundreds of accounts of spirit communication through mediums. People sometimes ask me to name the most interesting case I have come across. I tell them it is the story told by Dr. Neville Whymant, a British professor of linguistics, in his 1931 book, Psychic Adventures in New York.
Whymant, who is said to have known 30 languages, was visiting New York City in 1926 and was invited to attend a séance at the home of Judge and Mrs. William Cannon on Park Ave. Whymant had never before attended a séance and was quite skeptical, even though he knew William Cannon to be a highly-respected lawyer and judge.
It was explained to Whymant that the medium, George Valiantine, was a direct-voice medium and that his vocal cords did not produce the voices or sounds he would hear during the séance. Rather, an aluminum trumpet, which was placed in the center of the circle of chairs, would be used by the spirits in amplifying their otherwise weak or whispered voices. The medium, Whymant was told, simply provided the ectoplasm from which the spirits molded vocal cords and larynxes. Whymant had heard such mediums are expert ventriloquists and was on guard for that possibility.
Like many mediums, George Valiantine apparently began losing some of his powers, during the early 1930s, after a dozen or so years of producing awesome phenomena. As a result, he was accused of being a charlatan and his reputation was thereafter tainted. It is, however, difficult to read the accounts of Valiantine's mediumship by many credible and intelligent men and believe that he was anything but a true medium before his powers began leaving him, or before low-level spirits began controlling him. It was reported that at least 14 languages, including Portuguese, Italian, Basque, Welsh, Japanese, Spanish, Russian, Hindustani, and Chinese were spoken by spirits through Valiantine. Moreover, many deceased friends and relatives spoke to the sitters in their characteristic voices and talked of things which Valiantine could not possibly have known about or researched.
To begin the séance, the group recited the Lord's Prayer, and then sacred music was played on a gramophone in order to "bring the vibrations into harmony with those of the spirit world."
"Suddenly into the sound of the singing came the sound of a strong voice raised in greeting," Whymant recorded. "It seemed to rise up from the floor and was so strong that for some moments I felt convinced that I could actually feel the vibrations of the floor." The voice, Whymant was informed, was that of Dr. Barnett, the spirit leader of the circle, who opened it and closed it at will. Shortly thereafter, another voice "totally different in timbre and quality" was heard. This voice, the newcomers were informed, was that of Blackfoot, an American Indian of the tribe of that name, who was the keeper of the "spirit door." Some whispered messages to regular members of the circle from deceased relatives or friends then followed. Mrs. Whymant's father communicated in his characteristic drawl, reminiscent of the West County of England. Whymant was certain that Valiantine could have known nothing of his wife's father.
The trumpet floated in front of Whymant and he heard a "voice" come through in an ancient Chinese dialect: Greeting, O son of learning and reader of strange books! This unworthy servant bows humbly before such excellence. Whymant recognized the language as that of the Chinese Classics, edited by Confucius 2,500 years earlier. It was Chinese so dead colloquially as Sanskrit or Latin. "If this was a hoax, it was a particularly clever one, far beyond the scope of any of the sinologues now living," Whymant mused.
Although he understood the ancient language, Whymant found it necessary to respond in more modern Chinese. Peace be upon thee, O illustrious one. This uncultured menial ventures to ask thy name and illustrious style. The "voice" replied: My mean name is K'ung, men call me Fu-tsu, and my lowly style is Kiu.
Whymant recognized this as the name by which Confucius was canonized. Not certain that he heard right, Whymant asked for the voice to repeat the name. "This time without any hesitation at all came the name K'ung-fu-tzu," Whymant wrote. "Now I thought, was my opportunity. Chinese I had long regarded as my own special research area, and he would be a wise man, medium or other, who would attempt to trick me on such soil. If this tremulous voice were that of the old ethicist who had personally edited the Chinese classics, then I had an abundance of questions to ask him."
At that point, the "voice" was difficult to understand and Whymant had to ask for repetition. "Then it burst upon me that I was listening to Chinese of a purity and delicacy not now spoken in any part of China."
Apparently the communicating spirit recognized that Whymant was having a difficult time understanding the ancient dialect and changed to a more modern dialect. Whymant wondered how he could test the voice and remembered that there are several poems in Confucius' Shih King which have baffled both Chinese and Western scholars.
Whymant addressed the "voice": This stupid one would know the correct reading of the verse in Shih King. It has been hidden from understanding for long centuries, and men look upon it with eyes that are blind. The passage begins thus: Ts'ai ts'ai chüan êrh...
Whymant had recalled that line as the first line of the third ode of the first book of Chou nan, although he did not recall the remaining 14 lines. "The ‘voice' took up the poem and recited it to the end," Whymant wrote.
The "voice" put a new construction on the verses so that it made sense to Whymant. It was, the "voice" explained, a psychic poem. The mystery was solved. But Whymant had another test. He asked the "voice" if he could ask for further wisdom.
Ask not of an empty barrel much fish, O wise one! Many things which are now dark shall be light to thee, but the time is not yet...the "voice" answered.
Whymant addressed the "voice": "...In Lun Yü, Hsia Pien, there is a passage that is wrongly written. Should it not read thus:...?
Before Whymant could finish the sentence, the "voice" carried the passage to the end and explained that the copyists were in error, as the character written as sê should have been i, and the character written as yen is an error for fou. It all made sense to Whymant, and a mystery that had bothered scholars had been solved.
Whymant attended 11 additional sittings, dialoguing with the "voice" claiming to be Confucius in a number of them. At one sitting, another "voice" broke in speaking some strange French dialect. Whymant recognized it as Labourdin Basque. Although he was more accustomed to speaking Spanish Basque, he managed to carry on a conversation with the "voice."
"Altogether fourteen foreign languages were used in the course of the twelve sittings I attended," Whymant concluded the short book. "They included Chinese, Hindi, Persian, Basque, Sanskrit, Arabic, Portuguese, Italian, Yiddish, (spoken with great fluency when a Yiddish- and Hebrew-speaking Jew was a member of the circle), German and modern Greek."
Whymant also recorded that at one sitting, Valiantine was carrying on a conversation in American English with the person next to him while foreign languages were coming through the trumpet. "I am assured, too, that it is impossible for anyone to ‘throw his voice,' this being merely an illusion of the ventriloquist," he wrote.
Not being a spiritualist or psychical researcher, Whymant did not initially plan to write the book. However, tiring of telling the story so many times, he agreed to put it in writing, asking that with the publication of the book that others not ask him to tell the story again.
The strangest experience of my life happened when my wife and I were staying in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The Tamil Tiger terrorists were active at the time and we were advised by our hotelier not to go out after curfew and avoid the beach in particular. But one night we had a problem getting back and in order to avoid the beach we had to take a route along the railway line.
The old steam trains normally made quite a racket- you could hear them hissing and clanking from miles away. I noticed a bright light behind us. Assuming that a train was coming I quickly pulled my wife away from the rails as a large train brushed by, almost touching us.
Even though it was an old steam train it was totally silent- not quiet, it was totally silent. The steam, the wheels, the carriages made not a single sound. We were so close that we could also see that the train had no driver, no passengers and no guard.
I'm a skeptical man- I was trained in the navy and have worked as a counselor- so I went next morning to ask the stationmaster about the incident. He insisted that no trains passed that way at the times I said. And he added that the track where we had walked had been the site of a number of fatal train disasters!
Ghost Stories: My Strange Doppelganger
Ghost Stories: My Strange Doppelganger
This story happened in the year 2000, I believe, when I was still in high school and about 17 years old. My two younger sisters (15 and 11 at the time) were in their bedroom on the second floor of our house with the door open. I was downstairs watching TV with my parents. I decided to go upstairs because it was late and I was ready for bed.
When I went into the room, my youngest sister looked at me and laughed. She asked why I was on the stairs waving at her and smiling before. My middle sister said she didn't see me, but the youngest insisted. I told her she was crazy; I was downstairs the whole time and came right up without waving to her first. She kept insisting I was there, but I told her she was dreaming and I went to bed.
A few days later, my sister told me she saw me again, this time on the third floor staircase (our great grandmother lived on the third floor). I informed her that I had not been up there all day. Once again, she insisted and I argued it, telling her to stop lying. Still, a few days later, she and my youngest male cousin (he would have been about 8 at the time) ran into my room and told me that they just saw me downstairs. I peered from behind a wall, smiled and waved, then hid again. My youngest cousin saw me first and pointed it out to my little sister. They both knew I was upstairs and freaked out. I was a little weirded out at this point, but told them to calm down; maybe it was their imagination.
About a week or so later, I came home from school at around 3 p.m., my normal time. My dad was sitting in his usual chair next to his CD rack. I threw down my book back and said, "Hey" as he looked at me funny. He said, "Where did you go?" I replied that I went to school, just as I do every day. He then told me that I came home around 12:30, bent down to get a CD and went upstairs to my room. He thought I was up there the whole time. I told him, "No... I have been in school all day." (I never played hooky; I'm a big nerd). He said he must have fallen asleep without realizing it.
I remembered that my sister and my cousin also saw me when I was not around and decided to tell my mother about these events. She thought a minute and said she remembered when I was very young my grandfather was alone in my living room talking to someone. My mother went in and asked him who he was talking to, in which he replied, "To Cindy." My mother informed him that I was in the backyard with the rest of my cousins. My grandfather looked around and said the same thing my father did -- he must have fallen asleep. My mother freaks out pretty easily, and my little sister continued to see me around the house when I was not there. My mother decided to consult a psychic, who told her to get rid of the Ouija board that I had. I gave it very unwillingly to my mother and she disposed of it.
Ghost Stories: My Strange Doppelganger
Ghost Stories: My Strange Doppelganger
This story happened in the year 2000, I believe, when I was still in high school and about 17 years old. My two younger sisters (15 and 11 at the time) were in their bedroom on the second floor of our house with the door open. I was downstairs watching TV with my parents. I decided to go upstairs because it was late and I was ready for bed.
When I went into the room, my youngest sister looked at me and laughed. She asked why I was on the stairs waving at her and smiling before. My middle sister said she didn't see me, but the youngest insisted. I told her she was crazy; I was downstairs the whole time and came right up without waving to her first. She kept insisting I was there, but I told her she was dreaming and I went to bed.
A few days later, my sister told me she saw me again, this time on the third floor staircase (our great grandmother lived on the third floor). I informed her that I had not been up there all day. Once again, she insisted and I argued it, telling her to stop lying. Still, a few days later, she and my youngest male cousin (he would have been about 8 at the time) ran into my room and told me that they just saw me downstairs. I peered from behind a wall, smiled and waved, then hid again. My youngest cousin saw me first and pointed it out to my little sister. They both knew I was upstairs and freaked out. I was a little weirded out at this point, but told them to calm down; maybe it was their imagination.
About a week or so later, I came home from school at around 3 p.m., my normal time. My dad was sitting in his usual chair next to his CD rack. I threw down my book back and said, "Hey" as he looked at me funny. He said, "Where did you go?" I replied that I went to school, just as I do every day. He then told me that I came home around 12:30, bent down to get a CD and went upstairs to my room. He thought I was up there the whole time. I told him, "No... I have been in school all day." (I never played hooky; I'm a big nerd). He said he must have fallen asleep without realizing it.
I remembered that my sister and my cousin also saw me when I was not around and decided to tell my mother about these events. She thought a minute and said she remembered when I was very young my grandfather was alone in my living room talking to someone. My mother went in and asked him who he was talking to, in which he replied, "To Cindy." My mother informed him that I was in the backyard with the rest of my cousins. My grandfather looked around and said the same thing my father did -- he must have fallen asleep. My mother freaks out pretty easily, and my little sister continued to see me around the house when I was not there. My mother decided to consult a psychic, who told her to get rid of the Ouija board that I had. I gave it very unwillingly to my mother and she disposed of it.
Ghost Stories: Ghost of the Handy Man strong>
On March 13, 2007, some time about 2:00 a.m., I was lying on the couch in the living room and could not get to sleep. In my house we have a long hallway and hardwood floors, so if you step in the hall, it will echo. I just turned the TV off, hoping that I would be able to fall asleep. I finally fell asleep around 2:13. I awoke to find my cat, Poppy, on top of me, pawing at my face. Pushing him aside, I fell back asleep.
Around maybe 2:15, I awoke to find him pawing at me again. Thinking the cats ate all their food and me needing to go fill the bowl, I sat up. About to get up, I heard a strange noise coming from the hall. I slowly got up, thinking that maybe it was an intruder. Looking down, I saw Poppy and my other cat, Oreo, scratching the hallway door. So I sneaked over to the other couch and grabbed a fireplace poker. I slowly walked over to the door, and the cats seemed to get scared because they ran from the door. By that time the strange noise had been going on for three minutes.
I slowly opened the door, ready to strike whatever or whoever was in my hallway. I saw a strange gray figure in front of the heater at the end of the hallway. It looked to be a male about 50 years of age. It looked like he was working on it. He then rose from his sitting point and it looked like he put something in what looked like a tool belt. He wiped his hands and then turned and looked at me. I was scared, but being a stubborn person I stood my ground, fearing the worst. He then looked at me and smiled. He tipped his hat and vanished.
I looked down to see the cat growling and hiding behind the door. Scared out of my mind, I ran back the couch and hid under the blanket. I was not asleep and I promise it happened. I have always known ghosts were real and have always wanted to see one. I guess you gotta be careful what you wish for.
TOY PHONE CALL
Kids love telephones. They like to imitate adult conversations on their toy phones; and of course today they have the toy cell phones. Back in 1960, however, when Sandy was five years old, her toy telephone was the old-fashioned kind. But it might have been a very unusual phone indeed.
