—Lisa Unger
I retreated to my craftsman’s cottage to write and ended up having a vision of a mystery woman in the roses.
This was no Shade—no wispy or solitary essence haunting a particular location—no shadowy outline, fuzzy or unsubstantial image. This was a real woman and my heart was stirred.
I expected the encounter would weaken over time and gradually fade from memory, but the opposite occurred. Over the next few weeks I found her haunting me in soft powdery scents–mellow tones of light– soft touches of a summer breeze that caressed me tenderly.
I found myself aching and longing to be with her, and spent hours in the garden or staring at clouds in the wild spaces above the lake. I was obsessed.
I sensed I’d have to confide in somebody and I knew who that someone would be—Bob my friend from college—known professionally as Dr. Robert Levin.
I was unsure what his reaction would be, but I decided to invite him to dinner at The Arts and Letters Club and casually bring up the incident over drinks.
A few days later we were in the club with candles casting a glow on art-lined walls.
“Hmm…I wouldn’t have figured you for a Spectrophiliac,” Bob mused.
I almost choked on my cab sav. “You mean there’s a name for what I experienced?”
His eyes were dancing. “Sexual attraction to ghosts is not uncommon,” he laughed, “ as is sexual arousal to images in mirrors.”
“Now wait a minute, Bob—this isn’t come kind of fetish,” I said hotly.
He was convulsing with laughter and couldn’t speak for a few moments.
“I’m glad you find this amusing,” I grumbled.
“Sorry, Pal, but I find it refreshing compared to the kind of things I’m compelled to listen to in my practice. But let’s see—a ghostly lover and you, of all people, visited by a seductive entity. It’s strange.”
“You still don’t get it—she wasn’t seductive. You’re making her out to be some kind of succubus or demon who takes on a female human form to seduce men. It wasn’t like that at all.”
He smiled, “So, no sad wraith vanishing ‘as a vapor, gibbering and whining into the earth’—that’s Homer, you know.”
“Yes, I know”, I said exasperated, “but it was nothing like that—nothing scary at least. She was sunny and warm and drew me with the joy I saw in her features. It was only afterwards, in memory, that her face came back to haunt me and I began to long for her and obsess over her.”
“So I guess she didn’t fill the bill as a sad pale wraith?”
I took a deep breath, trying hard to be patient.
“A wraith? Definitely not. Her skin was rosy and her hair blonde and she was full of colour and vivacity.”
“Well then, he sighed, “it’s probably just a simple phenomenon we call Pareidolia. Sometimes it’s a trick of the light and the mind logically tries to make sense of what it sees—like seeing faces in door knobs, or a shoe lying on the floor.”
“So, it’s my over-active imagination?”
He grew somber for a moment and said, “I’d take a serious look at my life, Nick—figure out what I’m missing. We all carry ghosts in our heads—unlived wishes, failed relationships, even people we tried to leave behind but could never really lose. They all come back to haunt us.”
His words were sobering and I drove home that night feeling embarrassed and mildly depressed.
Is this where life has taken me—to a place where I see ghosts in rose bushes and obsess over something that doesn’t exist except in my head?
Thank you!