Foretelling

It starts with a subtle pressure over the sternum. As if a person stands before me with two fingers resting in the middle of my chest. It's not an unpleasant or uncomfortable sensation. It can be easily ignored and forgotten. Then the pressure steadily grows and increases until the two fingers become an entire hand pressed flat against my sternum. The hand pushes and my whole being is centered on that push. It does not hurt nor is it alarming. Now imagine if the pressure of the hand flows outward like ripples in disturbed water. The pressure weakening as it ebbs away from the initial point. It is as if my body is humming. I feel...connected.

The pressure links me together. I become attuned to what my body is doing. The breaths I take, the blood rushing through numerous channels, the air brushing across my hypersensitive skin, and the colors and images that bombard my vision. Time slows down. My thoughts fade away. My mind sharpens, but not "my" mind. I as an individual is gone by this point. I am...I am not if that makes any sense. I cannot describe much more of what happens when I begin what I call humming. I can't because I don't fully understand. While I am humming I think I know what is going on. Perhaps it is an enhanced state of being, I don't know. I do know that when I come down from humming, once I become me again, that information rushes to my senses. I smell, hear, feel, taste, and see many things at once. I lose much of the sensations as it is impossible to discern them all. It is much like people throwing things at you all at once. I manage to catch a ball and a shoe but lose an apple in the process.

Often the sensations are so jumbled together that I cannot make any sense of it. Sometimes, however, I can put together a story. One of the earliest experiences I have had was startlingly clear. I was young, maybe seven or eight, and I was eating Thanksgiving dinner with my family when I began to hum. I must have continued eating and appeared normal because no one remarked or seemed alarmed. I have no clue as to how long I sat there, my body humming. Then the pressure decreased and with it's retreat came the screech of metal on metal. The copper taste of blood filled my mouth then disappeared. The sickening sensation of my shoulder popping and the burn of pain captured my body only to release it in the next breath. Then it was over. I sat there staring into my half eaten plate of turkey and mashed potatoes.

"Honey, what's the matter?" I look up into the concerned face of my older sister, Nadine. I realize that my own face was warm and damp with tears. As I meet Nadine's eyes I see a car dashboard rushing up to meet my face. I let out a whimper. Nadine gathers me into her arms and, while whispering words of comfort, attempts to pry the reason for my hysteria from me. I tell her I don't know why I am crying. Huddled into the shelter of her arms I can hear the gentle understanding laughter of adults around us.

That night Nadine is involved in a car crash on an isolated country road. She lived to tell the story of how she and her boyfriend, both just sixteen years old at the time, attempted to drive on the icy roads to attend a late dinner with his family. I remember seeing her a few days later. She had two black eyes and a broken nose from smashing her face into the dashboard of the passenger seat. Her boyfriend's ancient truck lacked much in the way of safety devices; including air bags. She'd also dislocated her shoulder and had almost bitten through her tongue on impact. I remember standing there, horrified, while she showed my older brothers the gruesome stitches in her tongue.

This is the exact moment when I linked the humming with foretelling. For years afterward I feared the moments when I would feel the pressure begin in my chest. Guilt would follow soon after if I failed to interpret the sensations. If there was someway I could prevent anything bad happening to anyone I would. Not all are bad. Some foretellings are even pleasant. This is probably my most powerful of my gifts.