My first memory of “signs” was hearing my mom and aunts talking about pennies. Apparently my aunt Maureen always picked up pennies when she saw them, so whenever they would find one, they would think of her. They’d often find them on happy, ordinary days, like when we’d be out shopping on a Saturday, but sometimes they’d be going through something difficult or they’d having a bad day, and that penny would let them know that she was right there with them. I remember being in the car with my mom, she was driving and I was in the passenger seat, she went to put her sun visor down and a penny fell out and landed on the floorboard. 🤯 There have been other scenarios like this as well. My mom has a pair of wooden candlesticks she bought only because when she picked them up to see how much they were, and there was a penny in the bottom of each of them. Some people think it’s coincidence or maybe being a little too observant, but once you lose someone you love and things like this start happening, it will change your mind forever.
Mom told me this story about a sign when I was older. When my Aunt Maureen passed away, my mom and aunts went shopping to buy an outfit for her to be buried in. I don’t remember where they bought her outfit (it was probably a department store in the mall), but mom chose a red sweater and a black skirt for her. Mom said she prayed and prayed for God to send her a sign that Maureen was with him. Mom had talked with Maureen when she was in the hospital about Jesus and that when she died she would go to heaven and be relieved of all her pain. Before Maureen’s services, mom made a random appointment with Debbie, my sister’s now mother-in-law, to get her hair cut. My mom was not one of those women who have standing hair appointments every 8 weeks. She randomly went and had it done, and would get whatever haircut she felt like or maybe get it colored or highlighted; she had no routine, it was whatever she felt like. Mom said Debbie cut her hair, and at the end she took her apron off, and she was wearing the same sweater she had bought for Maureen. Mom was in shock. She doubted herself so much she asked our minister, Kevin, if that was indeed a sign. He basically told her it was definitely a sign, could it be any more obvious.
I started dating Anthony in 2019. He lost his Pap, his mom’s dad, when were in fifth grade together. I went on vacation with Anthony and his mom’s side of the family that August. His mom and his aunts talked about pennies, and how they were a sign from their dad. I know pennies are a common sign for many people, but I hadn’t met anyone else who did the same thing my family did. It made me feel connected to them through this sign we all get from our loved ones.
The jar in the middle is for our special coins we find, and it sits beside Mom’s urn.
After Anthony and I had been dating a while, I started staying at his house during the weekend. One Friday night at 2:00 am, the smoke detector went off, but there was no smoke. The battery wasn’t dead either. There was no reason for it to go off. Then it happened again the next night around the same time. It happened again the next weekend and for many weekends after that. I told him it was probably my aunts, Maureen and Rhonda, just messing with us. He didn’t think it was funny.
Rhonda and Maureen as teenagers.
The next summer, we went on vacation with his family again. Our vanity lights in our bathroom kept flickering. I asked Anthony’s sister, Morgan, and her boyfriend, Collin, if any lights in their room we’re doing that, they said no. Then I would sit in the living room and the lamps would flicker, but only if I was there. I think everyone got a little concerned after that. I told them it was probably my aunts and that they play with the smoke detectors at our house. Later in the week we went to play mini golf at a place really close to our rental. On the way back, Anthony bent down to pick up a penny. When we got back home, Anthony told his mom he found a penny. She asked where he found it, and he pointed over to the mini golf place. It was right behind the mini golf building and above the spot was a light on the side of the building that was flickering.
Mom knew the flickering light story, and I had told lots of people about the smoke detectors in our house, mainly because I thought it was funny. Mom passed away very early on a Monday morning. Once it was closer to 7 am, my sister and I went to my grandparents house to let them know she had passed. When we knocked on the door they knew why we were there. We sat down at the kitchen table and stayed for a while and talked about everything we had to do later that day. While we were sitting at the kitchen table, the porch light outside the side door of the house started flickering. I made a face at my sister, and she told Pop Pop that the light was flickering. He complained and said it’s never done that before and quickly flipped the switch to turn it off. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had never told Kasey about the lights flickering at the beach. When we got in the car I filled her in. She’s a big believer in signs so I didn’t have to convince her. She knew it was mom telling us she was okay.
I wrote previously that my mom wanted some of her ashes scattered at her three sisters’ graves, but my sister, my dad, and I also thought we should scatter some at her infant sister’s grave as well. We made the three hour trip out to Covington last July. We had asked our grandparents about where in the cemetery she was buried, but they only remembered she was on the edge of a tall hill. We looked over that cemetery for what felt like an hour, in the humid July heat. Luckily we went on a weekday, and the cemetery had an office with a staff member present. We told her who we were looking for and after she told us about ten times that she was probably in “Baby Land” she found a map listing exactly where she was. By the way, we had never heard of an area like “Baby Land” but it was as described, a place
for all the infants to be buried together. It came across kind of callous, but also heartbreaking to us. It could definitely use a new name. Regina was buried up on the hill - there was an entire second half of the cemetery up the mountain that we hadn’t even seen. We followed the lady in our truck up a steep, windy road to the other part of the cemetery. Tucked up beside a piece of woods and literally on the edge of the mountain was a little brass placard that said Regina Reynolds beneath a bow, along with her dates of birth and death. Dad cleaned off her placard with some windex he had in the truck and Kasey laid some flowers on her grave that she found from being blown into the woods. Kasey sprinkled some of mom’s ashes on Regina’s placard. We felt pretty proud of ourselves for taking the time to go all the way out the there and find her grave. That night as I was laying in bed to go to sleep I was thinking over our day. The motion detector light outside our bedroom window started flickering like crazy. It did it for about 30 seconds and stopped. After a few seconds it did it again. Anthony noticed it and said, “There’s your people.” Mom always made an effort to talk about Regina to make sure she was never forgotten. I know she would have been elated to know not only did we remember her, but we knew she would want her ashes there just as much as with her other sisters. Those flickering lights confirmed that for me.
This old photo and that our grandparents said Regina was buried up on hill was all we had to go off of.
This past April I went to Savannah with friends for my bachelorette trip. We did a ghost tour since I like that stuff
and the city is historic and probably haunted. Luckily everyone else was into it as well. Before the ghost tour we passed a psychic, but she wasn’t answering when we rang her doorbell. After the ghost tour we looked up another psychic, who had good reviews, and walked to their office. It was late so they were closed, but we went back the next day. We found out his name was Brian, he was a medium and a psychic, and he had openings for all of us if we wanted a reading. Brian told each of us so many things, so that will have to be another post, but he told me something that stood out. He connected with Maureen and after she came through he asked me if I felt like family members show up at my house all the time and weird things were going on. I was like whoa. 🤯 He told
me Maureen said there is another aunt who is older that’s doing all these things in my house. She never came out and said it was my aunt Rhonda, but she said it’s not me, it’s the one who would be trying to get your attention. So I assume it’s my aunt Rhonda who’s playing in our house. She hasn’t done it in a long time though. I just picture Maureen being like, “It’s not me!” every time I blame these things on my aunts. 😂
My Uncle Chris, Rhonda, and Maureen at Rhonda and Chris’s wedding.
I’ll post a Signs II soon.
BeST,
Brittany
Comments
Post a Comment