Our Loved Ones Never Die

I've known for quite some time that my husband's late parents still live in this house, albeit in spirit. I've sensed his mum around me often, not least when she cooks beef stew and leaves the aroma lingering through the house. During my first lambing season after I'd moved onto the farm, I would sit in what is now our dining room but back then was Jim's sitting room. Even though we have an abundance of rooms to choose from, before I moved here it was the only room in which the family would relax. They called it "The Room". For three consecutive nights at the beginning of lambing 2002, I could smell a very distinct perfume in The Room, one that used to be quite popular in the 1980's called Vanderbilt. It was only on the third night when the aroma was so strong I knew I needed some answers. I looked frantically through the sideboard, expecting to find a bottle of perfume having spilled inside a cupboard, but there was nothing. When I asked Jim, he confirmed to me that Vanderbilt was his wife's favourite perfume. She had been dead three years.

After Jim died in May 2007, we had many parts of the house renovated because he used to smoke very heavily and had left the stale smell of tobacco throughout. His bedroom, which is now my office, was completely in need of decoration as was The Room. It took a long time to get rid of the nicotine stains but the smell of tobacco still lingers through the air and is particularly strong in my office, almost five years after his death. But along with the tobacco smell that I experience frequently, I always know when Jim visits because he leaves the aroma of TCP, something he used every day for many years. Very often, I sense someone with me and am suddenly greeted by the aroma of Vanderbilt, beef stew, tobacco smoke or TCP. Any of these aromas alert me to a presence, a spirit that once resided in this big old house. Jim lived here all his life, almost 83 years. His wife lived here for almost 50 years. It's not surprising they don't want to leave.

Jim lived in a nursing home for the few months before his death and once I remember visiting him only to find him stroking an imaginary dog. When I asked what he was doing he replied, "I'm stroking Bob." The day before Jim died, we brought Sparky home, a beautiful red and white border collie. It wasn't until a short while after that I discovered photographs of a dog that my husband told me was Jim's favourite - Bob, a red and white border collie.

Bob

Sparky

On New Years Day this year, we brought home Tanya, the most adorable kitten. Shortly after she joined our family, my husband dug out some old photos which were taken during the 1980's, of a kitten that belonged to his mum. She called the kitten Squeak. I'd heard Jim mention Squeak often and I felt the couple had a special bond towards it. It turns out that Squeak was indeed my late mother-in-law's favourite cat and lived until she was 19. She died shortly after my mother-in-law.

Squeak

Tanya

I don't believe in coincidence.