Do you believe in ghosts?

I certainly don’t. Nor do I believe in the afterlife or anything like that, but something really strange happened to me today, that I cannot explain.

Its week 7 of lock down. It is fair to say that the injured leg is getting a bit sick of the bike, and is missing the swimming pool. Today was also the day that we were to find out if the government were allowing us to move down another level on the Covid alert system that we have become so famous for (the same one that Boris stole off us). I was struggling to concentrate today. It is fair to say I am feeling a bit stressed, being forced to keep my business closed for this long. So I needed a distraction and today the bike was NOT the way forwards. So I have no idea where this came from but I went hunting the house for my flute.

I needed the music to be classical, relatively simple and recognisable (to me at least!) Lets go through a few facts.

• I have played the flute since I was 6 years old – but I have not picked it up in over a decade, it might even be closer to two decades.
• I have had this flute since I was at university. This was the flute that got me through my music degree.

So, with that in mind, here’s how I did.

I remember right back at the start of my recordings of the Sanity Diaries, mentioning the flute. It totally went out of my mind again until today. Don’t be fooled. To a trained ear this performance is decidedly average but at the same time, I also quite surprised myself! Now here’s the weird part. directly in front of me as per the photo, was the computer, which was displaying the music and playing the backing track (off YouTube, thanks YouTube!!). to the left was the phone recording the performance, and to the right was the speaker connected to the computer.

Out of the corner of my eye I could see the picture being recorded by the phone while I was reading the music on the laptop. I thought I kept seeing a figure sweep behind me. It was always a slight blur. When I looked directly at the phone that was recording the video, obviously nothing was there. This happened a number of times. At the same time my cat started to behave a bit strange. She would walk backwards and forwards across the computer, in between my arms, sitting on my knee pawing at my arms and looking up at me, as if she was trying her best to make me stop playing. All the while I kept seeing this shadowy figure behind.

I stopped playing and put the flute back in its box for a while.

I have no idea why I was thinking this, but the whole time this was going on I felt like Mum was somewhere near, somewhere watching, interfering with this scene in some way. Her message was not clear to me at all though.

The weekend just gone was mothers day. in just about 6 weeks, it will be the 8th anniversary of her growing her angel wings. She never went to New Zealand. She died so soon after I arrived that she knew little about where I actually lived. Yet I felt her close to me today. Watching down as if to say she was pleased I had picked up the flute. Perhaps the shadow was her. Perhaps the cat wanted me to stop so she would go away.

Or, perhaps it was all in my imagination.

❤