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Jack and Jill crept up

0:19

my hill to

0:21

try to steal my water. Jack

0:23

gave a squeal then screamed for Jill but

0:26

I'd already caught her. Ha ha ha ha ha

0:28

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

0:31

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partnering with KQED, San Francisco

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see, KQED podcasts have you

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covered. Search

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for KQED wherever you listen. And

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now,

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back to Spooked.

1:20

From KQED and PRX,

1:23

you've crossed over to Spooked. For

1:39

a while, it's kind of a lark. I've talked

1:42

about seeing this band, A-ha, live

1:45

in concert. You might know the

1:47

song, Take On Me. Take

1:50

me on. And

1:52

whenever I bring up seeing

1:55

them, people are all like, A-ha.

1:58

That one hit, one beat.

1:59

They still around a different Iceland

2:02

or something Norway, they're

2:04

from Norway. Where's Norway? You're corny,

2:06

dude, whatever Then

2:09

I hear they're gonna be in Napa

2:11

not too far from Oakland a new

2:13

friend Who somehow

2:16

has never heard of them either. I convinced her

2:18

to go with me

2:19

And we arrived and there's

2:22

a sea of happy as far

2:24

as I can see Filing into the

2:26

outdoor theater grinning laughing

2:28

everybody electric with anticipation

2:33

In the rumble of the bass the

2:35

shouting

2:36

stage lights flash on and Like

2:40

they're stepping out of my childhood

2:42

through the smoke. Ah ha Scrolls

2:45

onto stands and along with

2:47

five thousand of my newest closest

2:50

friends. I lose my mind I'm

2:52

jumping singing

2:55

I It's

2:59

crazy I didn't even think I knew these

3:01

songs but I know these songs every word

3:04

seared into my mind from a different age

3:07

living the boys Adventure

3:09

tale

3:10

I'm loving it. I'm reading that my friend

3:12

who's laughing at my joy at these

3:14

songs She's never heard and I

3:16

don't know why I Don't

3:19

see it coming. I Don't

3:24

They sing I

3:26

know I'll be hunting high

3:35

There's no and I'm

3:38

staggered Like

3:42

a gunshot I Feel

3:45

my legs collapse beneath me in the middle of

3:48

this concert. I'm on my knees shaking

3:51

suddenly sobbing because no This

3:55

isn't my favorite band It's

3:59

his favorite band My

4:01

brother, the only other

4:04

person in all of America who knew Aha

4:06

had 10 studio albums. My brother

4:09

who ripped his jeans to create

4:11

an outfit exactly like the guy on

4:13

stage. My brother who

4:17

should be on this lawn dancing next

4:19

to me. He said it. Somehow

4:22

he's whispered, tugged,

4:26

cajoled, led me to be

4:29

right here, right now. And

4:31

it feels like he's almost, almost,

4:35

almost

4:36

next to me on this lawn, but almost

4:38

isn't good enough. And I wail.

4:44

Raw as the day I got that phone

4:46

call I wail. It's

4:51

not running down my nose like there's no

4:53

more air left in the world. Raw.

4:56

The ocean of sadness. Raw. He

4:59

loved this song.

5:03

For you I'll be hunting high

5:07

and low. There's

5:13

no end to the lengths I'll go to. And

5:19

I can't even imagine

5:21

the spot I'm

5:23

putting my friend in. Hauling

5:25

her to this concert so I can collapse on the ground

5:27

and lose my mind. I can't. But

5:30

she is so kind.

5:33

So kind. She's like, hey,

5:36

hey, I get it. It's no problem. No

5:39

problem at all. If we need to just

5:41

go, I'm

5:43

trying to catch my breath. I

5:46

tell her now, I'm so sorry,

5:49

but right

5:52

now, this

5:55

is exactly where

5:57

I have to be. all

6:02

knew spookstars

6:16

now down

6:43

good good

7:09

repeat after me the

7:11

past is the present the present

7:14

is the past a story

7:17

comes to us from Laura Packer and many

7:19

years ago Laura realized

7:21

that her friend Kevin becoming

7:23

more than just a friend spooked

7:35

it took us a couple years

7:37

to realize that there was something else there

7:45

I remember noticing that tingle

7:47

kind of at the back of my neck when

7:50

he was talking I

7:52

had just come out of another relationship

7:55

that had ended pretty badly and

7:58

I wanted a break

7:59

There were these feelings.

8:11

We went for a walk in the woods at about midnight

8:13

and it was very cold. And

8:20

I was standing there looking at the moon and

8:22

he walked up right behind me and I could

8:24

feel the heat of his body.

8:34

Very slowly he put his hands on

8:37

my shoulders and

8:39

I leaned back against him and

8:41

I said, I shouldn't

8:43

do this now.

8:46

He said, is there ever

8:49

a right time?

8:52

I was very still and then I said,

8:54

okay. We

8:57

held hands as we walked back to his apartment

9:01

and necked

9:03

for a really long time.

9:10

Holding him was like embracing

9:13

a tree or

9:15

a mountain.

9:18

It just felt so safe. By

9:22

then I knew that I was falling in love with him and he

9:24

was falling in love with me. It

9:31

was a really fun wedding.

9:39

I was barefoot because I don't like wearing shoes.

9:44

Kevin was wearing a pair of jeans and one of his

9:46

Hawaiian shirts. We

9:51

set our vows. We

9:54

promised to shovel snow

9:56

and shovel shit together. We

10:05

kissed and we turned and looked

10:07

at everybody and they were all laughing and crying

10:09

and cheering and that was it.

10:20

I found us a house. The

10:23

first floor was open and bright

10:25

and the second floor had a room

10:27

that would be a great office and another room that

10:29

would be a great guest room and then the third floor

10:32

had an enormous

10:34

closet with a high bar that would work

10:36

for Kevin's clothing.

10:38

There was room for this

10:41

tall man to stretch and not

10:43

feel like he was going to break something.

10:46

The kitchen fit me well. I could reach

10:48

things readily. The

10:51

only problem with it is the way the cabinets

10:53

were set up. If they were open,

10:56

the corners were at the exact height to bang

10:58

me in the eye or in the forehead.

11:03

Within a week of moving

11:06

in, I was walking into the kitchen and I

11:08

wasn't paying attention and Kevin had left the

11:10

cabinet open and I slammed

11:12

into it and got a gash

11:13

in my forehead.

11:20

I called for him and I said, you've got

11:22

to stop doing this. When you do it, I get

11:24

hurt.

11:25

He kind of smiled and he apologized

11:29

but he would forget fairly often.

11:31

I would close them and remind

11:34

him and close them and remind him. I

11:37

was very cranky about it but

11:39

he got the hang of it after we'd been there for a while.

11:42

We

11:49

had lived together before but we had

11:52

roommates living with us.

11:55

Having it be just the two of us meant that

11:57

we didn't have to worry about someone else

11:59

It wasn't like

12:02

we went out of our way to burp

12:04

and fart at each other.

12:07

It's just that we stopped worrying

12:10

about it in front of each other. If

12:13

he let one loose that was really bad, I would

12:15

usually ask him if something had crawled up his butt and

12:17

died. And if

12:20

I let loose one that was really bad, he

12:22

would usually ask me if I

12:24

was planning on fumigating the entire

12:26

house.

12:29

We moved into the house in January.

12:34

By August, he was starting

12:37

to have some back and stomach problems. And

12:40

it just kept getting worse and worse. Every

12:43

doctor we went to said, welcome to middle

12:45

age. It

12:50

was around ten o'clock at night. I

12:54

went upstairs to our bedroom and

12:56

he was kneeling on the floor writhing.

13:05

He said, don't touch me. I

13:08

knew he was in pain. I

13:11

started crying. I

13:14

said, could we please

13:16

go to the emergency room?

13:27

They sent him for an x-ray and then

13:29

they sent him for an ultrasound and then

13:32

they sent him for an MRI.

13:35

About half an hour later, two doctors walked

13:37

in and closed the door and told

13:40

us, people don't

13:43

come back from pancreatic cancer.

13:49

They said, we're going to find a bed and admit you. He

13:54

was there for three weeks.

14:02

We hadn't talked much about his dying

14:05

because he hadn't wanted to. Whenever I tried to bring

14:07

it up, he would say, no, I'm going to fight, I'm going to fight. But

14:10

by then it was really obvious. The

14:13

cancer had stolen his voice. He

14:16

could barely speak. He could kind of

14:18

whisper. I asked

14:20

him, do you believe there's an afterlife?

14:24

And he said, yes.

14:28

And I asked him what he thought it was

14:30

like.

14:32

And he said, some

14:34

place beautiful.

14:44

My beliefs about an afterlife at the

14:46

time were at best nebulous.

14:50

It had never really mattered to me before. But

14:52

it was mattering more and more because Kevin was

14:55

going to die soon.

15:00

By now I was crying and he was crying.

15:03

I asked him to let me know that

15:06

he was OK if he could.

15:08

He nodded. I said,

15:10

you know you're going to have to make it really obvious, right? Because

15:14

I'm tentative about this stuff. He

15:17

looked at me and he smiled, this big

15:20

smile, and he nodded. And

15:22

he said, I know. And

15:28

then he said, I can't breathe. There

15:32

was fluid filling up his heart and his lungs.

15:37

He died five days later.

15:44

Kevin had died at 6.20 PM. And

15:48

the next day, when there were lots

15:51

of people in the house, people

15:54

from his work and friends in the

15:56

community.

15:59

At about 618, I thought

16:02

that we should do a toast.

16:04

I needed to say the world now has had 24 hours

16:08

without this magnificent man.

16:19

I told everyone to get up and to stand in

16:22

a circle and that we were going to toast Kevin

16:24

with his favorite terrible liqueur, 99 bananas.

16:30

And then we passed the glass from hand to

16:32

hand to hand to hand, each

16:34

of us taking a little sip.

16:38

Profound sorrow and

16:40

extraordinary gratitude and

16:42

that's what I was feeling. It

16:52

ended up back in my hand. I

16:55

took my sip from it and

16:57

as I took the sip, I was looking

16:59

across the room at the

17:02

mantle piece over the fireplace.

17:06

There was a picture of Kevin on

17:08

the mantle piece. The

17:12

picture fell over

17:14

face down

17:15

with this little smacky sound plop.

17:19

There

17:23

was a beat after the picture fell over when

17:25

everyone was quiet. One

17:29

friend came over to me and said,

17:31

did you see that?

17:33

I think that was Kevin. I

17:36

said, whatever, someone must

17:38

have just bumped into it. The

17:41

thought of him being in

17:43

any form but alive and healthy

17:45

was not something that I could even

17:48

come near.

17:59

On the first This day of Shiva, my friend

18:01

John, wrote over on his bike.

18:07

He leaned the bike on the front

18:09

porch, leaning against the living room

18:11

window, and then came in and said, Laura,

18:13

look out the window.

18:21

I looked out the window to where John's bike was,

18:24

and there was a cardinal

18:26

sitting on the crossbeam of the bike. The

18:34

bright red male cardinal looking

18:37

into the house, tilting

18:39

its head back and forth, and

18:42

sometimes tapping on the window with its beak. And

18:47

he said, you know, people say that cardinals are visitors

18:49

from the dead. What do you think?

18:51

And

18:54

I said, yeah, it's a cardinal. Kevin's

18:57

dead. And that's how

18:59

I felt.

19:09

On good days, I was flat. On bad days,

19:11

I was throwing up because

19:13

I was crying so much. I

19:17

mostly sat on the couch and watched really

19:19

bad television. But

19:25

when I did go out, there

19:28

were always cardinals. There

19:31

were always some in the front lawn. They

19:33

were in the trees. They

19:35

were on the porch.

19:38

More than I had ever seen before.

19:47

One night, about a month later, I had

19:49

been up for a lot of the night crying. I

19:54

got up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom

19:57

and then

19:59

walked in. walked back into

20:01

our bedroom and stopped because

20:05

I didn't believe what I was smelling.

20:12

I was smelling Kevin's

20:14

farts, that

20:17

kind of rich

20:19

and unpleasant smell I used to tease

20:21

him about. But

20:24

I stood there absolutely

20:27

shocked at this aromatic

20:29

presence in our bedroom that just

20:32

filled it up. I

20:36

just knew it was his smell.

20:38

I

20:40

walked out of the room and it smelled perfectly

20:42

normal, like wood

20:46

and dust. I

20:49

walked back into the bedroom and there, it

20:52

was again. I

20:55

told myself that I was hallucinating, that

20:58

I was grieving so hard that I was just making

21:00

it up. It wasn't

21:03

real.

21:09

I finally fell asleep

21:10

a little before dawn and woke up

21:13

in the mid-morning.

21:18

I got up to go downstairs

21:21

to get some tea. And

21:23

so I went down from the third floor to the

21:25

first, turned the corner and was walking

21:27

into the kitchen and something

21:30

whacked me in the head.

21:40

I looked up and every

21:42

cabinet in the kitchen was open,

21:47

including the cabinets on top of the

21:49

fridge that I could not reach. I

21:54

started laughing and crying at the same

21:56

time.

22:00

He knew it had

22:02

to be really obvious. So

22:05

he made it really obvious. It

22:10

was kind of a turning point for me. It's

22:14

not like I stopped grieving or stopped

22:16

missing him, but things were

22:18

a little easier. I

22:22

was able to hold a

22:24

conversation with a friend. I

22:26

was able to drive

22:28

by some of the places that we had liked without

22:31

having to pull over and sob. I

22:34

knew that he continued in some way, and

22:37

that all the love that I still

22:39

felt for him was not just echoing

22:42

in an empty universe.

22:46

He died in the end of March, and

22:50

in May we had a service

22:52

in Boston. I

22:58

decided to drive from Kansas

23:00

City to Boston. I stopped in Buffalo,

23:02

New York, and visited

23:04

some friends of mine who lived there.

23:12

We were sitting out on the porch. This

23:15

woman walked by. She looked and said, Hey, how you

23:17

doing? And then

23:20

kept walking. My friend said, She never

23:22

talks to us. And

23:26

my friend said that she was a neighbor, but

23:28

not a particularly friendly one, not someone

23:30

they knew.

23:33

About an hour later, she came back,

23:37

and she walked right up onto the porch.

23:43

She was a middle-aged woman, slender,

23:47

a little hunched. She

23:49

stood right in front of me, and she said, You're not from around here.

23:52

So I wanted to come over here and find out

23:54

who you are and what you're doing

23:57

in my neighborhood. She

23:59

had such a big, big heart.

23:59

smile. I didn't feel threatened or anything.

24:02

She was just curious. She

24:04

and I started bantering back

24:07

and forth. She asked where I was from and I

24:09

said, Kansas City, and she said, they have some good barbecue

24:11

there, and I said, yes they do. And she said, but it's not

24:13

as good as

24:14

mine. And we

24:16

just went back and forth. When

24:19

it was starting to wind down, she looked at me

24:21

and she tapped her chin and she said, Kevin

24:25

says hi, and off

24:27

she went. Holy

24:37

shit! I had never

24:40

seen that woman before. My

24:42

friends swore up and down that they

24:44

had never talked with her. It

24:48

made me feel warm and loved

24:51

and happy and satisfied that he

24:53

came back to say hello. It made

24:56

me think that wherever he

24:59

was, he was probably

25:01

having a great time because

25:04

he was someone who liked playing

25:07

and liked learning new things. And I

25:09

could very easily imagine him in the afterlife

25:12

saying, so can I do this? How

25:15

do I do that? And just having

25:17

a good time.

25:23

About a month later, I was

25:26

in Atlantic City visiting my parents. I

25:34

was walking on the beach. I

25:36

was feeling really sad. Kevin's

25:39

favorite thing in the world was the ocean, and

25:42

it was the first time I had been to the ocean since

25:45

he died.

25:52

There was a family nearby. The father

25:56

of the family was whole and

25:58

broad and built like Kevin and I.

25:59

I started crying. The

26:02

mom of the family came over and

26:04

asked me what was going on, and I told

26:06

her.

26:08

My husband died a few months ago,

26:11

and he loved the beach, and I miss him. And your husband,

26:13

he looks just like my husband, and I miss him so much.

26:17

I said, I know this is really weird, but

26:19

do you mind if he gives me a hug?

26:22

And she said, oh, honey, of course. Of course

26:24

you can have a hug. And

26:26

she yelled for her husband. He

26:29

came over, and he gave me a hug, and

26:31

it was that same sensation of wrapping

26:33

my arms around

26:35

a tree or being held

26:38

by a mountain. And he held me while

26:40

I sobbed.

26:46

When I finally was ready to let go,

26:49

he was crying, and his wife was crying.

26:51

They hugged, and we

26:53

gave each other these awkward smiles

26:56

like you do when you cry on somebody you don't know.

26:59

They started to walk away, and then she stopped.

27:02

And she said, this is going to sound really weird, but

27:06

was your husband's name Kevin? I

27:15

burst into tears again. Her

27:18

husband looked at her and said, I told

27:20

you you had a gift.

27:21

The only way she could have known was

27:23

because Kevin told her.

27:23

Every

27:29

time one of these strange things has happened,

27:32

I feel this joy and sorrow at

27:34

the same time. This joy that

27:36

he chose to do this, and

27:39

this awe that he did it, and

27:42

then this wave of grief

27:44

that he wasn't there.

27:46

But I wouldn't turn it away. I

27:49

would never turn it away. I

27:56

don't hear from him much these days, but it's okay. Wherever

28:02

he is, he's okay.

28:05

And I get to be okay,

28:07

too. Now

28:34

you know what love smells like.

28:38

Laura Packer. She's a storyteller

28:40

in Minneapolis. You can learn more about Laura

28:42

at her website, laurapacker.com.

28:47

The original score for that piece was by Leon Morimoto.

28:50

It was produced

28:51

by Ann Ford.

29:06

Oh, it's that time. But

29:08

first, I have a request. Because

29:11

you know that in this age of modern

29:13

miracles, so many of

29:15

us are retreating back to the very oldest

29:18

traditions when it comes to questions of health and

29:20

healing. And for personal

29:22

reasons, I'm learning that plant

29:24

lore follows very

29:27

different rules than medical care

29:29

and hospital settings. Practitioners

29:32

sometimes claim to be able to hear plants

29:35

or to see in dreams

29:36

how one herb mixed

29:38

just so with the root or

29:41

flower can make long-suffered

29:44

hurts go away.

29:46

But this

29:47

is not just taking, chopping

29:50

and mixing. This is asking, singing,

29:55

touching. Medicine

29:57

built on the knowing of

29:59

that.

29:59

which grows from the earth. But

30:03

there's also the opposite. Or

30:06

maybe the twin, which is blood lore,

30:09

where it takes perhaps even a single

30:11

drop of one type of life force

30:14

is traded for the healing of another.

30:18

And if you have knowledge in

30:20

the

30:20

story of this world, please tell

30:23

me about it. Because there's nothing better

30:25

than a spooked story from a spooked listener.

30:28

Spooked at SnapJudgment.org.

30:32

And remember, if you like your

30:34

storytelling under the bright light of day,

30:37

get the amazing Stupendous Sister

30:39

Podcast Snap Judgment. It is storytelling

30:43

with the beat. Beat, beat, beat.

30:56

Spooked is created by the team that knows

30:58

all the lyrics to every single aha

31:01

song except for Mark Ristich. He

31:03

only listens to people singing

31:06

on street corners. There's

31:08

David Kim, Taeil DeCott,

31:10

Zoey Fergno, Anne Ford, Eric Yanez,

31:13

Versa Dodge, Miles Lassie, Yari

31:15

Bundy, Doug Stewart, Leon Morimoto,

31:18

The Spooked Theme Song. It's by Pat

31:20

Massimi-Miller. My name is from Washington

31:22

and we

31:24

say cavalierly that the

31:26

past is the present. And that

31:29

is certainly true as far as it goes.

31:31

But of course, things

31:33

are more complicated than that. Different

31:36

parts of what happened previously touches our

31:39

lives in different ways. And often

31:42

we pull forth and make manifest

31:45

echoes of what's gone before.

31:49

And this is a power

31:52

that's only granted to the living. And

31:55

while we can draw light, we

31:59

can also call the show. This

32:02

is an awesome force and to keep in

32:04

mind the enormity of

32:07

that which we command, I always begin

32:10

with a simple ritual. To

32:13

stay grounded despite the

32:15

darkness of this path. Listen to me when

32:18

I tell you. Never

32:21

ever never ever never

32:24

never ever ever. Throughout

32:28

the Grassy Life dead once

32:30

again. This

32:42

story was Summoned in the Dark

32:44

of Night by KQED,

32:47

and PRX.