Haunted Homeless Shelter: The Final Chapter...Angels and Demons
As I have mentioned in other stories about the haunted homeless shelter, I worked there for 6 years.
During this time, the residents banded together one night, and came to me, complaining about another resident. She was, they said, performing Voodoo in her room, and they had seen objects with feathers attached in her room on the floor, and she was lighting candles, and they wanted me to make her stop, because, they said, Voodoo was evil.
Naturally, she lived in the blue wing...rotten old blue wing. Right across the hall from "The Door".
BUT...I was an employee of a homeless shelter, and the homeless shelter was funded by the State, and I could NOT discriminate against what was then and is now, a legally recognized religion.
While I did not come right out and tell them to suck it up, I may as well have done.
Instead, I took out my shiny little imaginary "Tolerance Badge", and tried to be very tolerant of this particular resident.
I'll refer to her here as Primula
Primula was bi-polar. She was subject to manic episodes late at night, and at one point, she came into the office, leaned toward me, and told me that she could jump across my desk and strangle me and there was absolutely nothing I could do about it. That particular night, there was no desk jumping, because I am a calming sort of person at times, and she and I ended up playing Scrabble, which helped her to work off the manic episode.
She came in on another night, (by that time we were sort of...friends), and told me she was jumping out of her skin and she wanted to re-arrange the furniture in the child care room, which I allowed her to do. Boy, did I get in trouble for that...馃ぃ馃ぃ馃ぃ. Anyway, it was all right, because she was also able to put everything back as it was.
I was working a night shift a few days later, and I brought my art supplies to work with me.
I was thinking about this terrible disorder my friend, Primula, had, and how Voodoo was leading her toward the dark side of things. I wanted Divine help, to be honest. I wanted, in the worst way, for a REAL Guardian Angel to watch out for this poor woman and her son, whom, I felt, she was leading down paths of hatred and negativity.
I sat there at my desk, and I began to draw a really beautiful picture of a black angel descending from heaven, coming down from the darkness of space, into the light of the heavens on earth.
I can't describe the intensity of my focus. I don't know if I have EVER poured so much of my own spirit into one of my works. There was a palpable air of intensity inside the room with me.
When I was done, I looked at my work, and it was the best I had ever done. It was museum quality. I looked at the angel in the picture, and I prayed. "Please watch over Primula. Please watch over her, and her son and keep her safe."
And just at that moment the computer, across the room from me, popped!!! A fuse blew. The room went dark. The computer crashed, and shut down completely. The lights came back on almost right away. And directly in front of my desk, (also in front of the computer), I could see a heat shimmer in the air. There was a presence to it. I could FEEL that something was there.
I didn't know what "it" was...but I spoke to the heat shimmer. I was scared. Whatever it was that I felt in that heat shimmer, it didn't feel good. But I repeated my earlier prayer. "Please watch over Primula and her son, and keep them safe."
Silently, crossing my fingers, and hoping that what I had called without intending to, was, in fact, an angel, and not a dark voodoo demon, I left the room.
Later, after I gave Primula her picture, and told her it was a guardian angel that would watch over her, I heard her saying to another resident..."Yeah, it WAS a black angel!" I surprised her, I guess. I surprised [i]myself[/i], I guess. In a LOT of different ways.
Looking over my shoulder...repeating to myself..."it was an angel. It was an angel."
During this time, the residents banded together one night, and came to me, complaining about another resident. She was, they said, performing Voodoo in her room, and they had seen objects with feathers attached in her room on the floor, and she was lighting candles, and they wanted me to make her stop, because, they said, Voodoo was evil.
Naturally, she lived in the blue wing...rotten old blue wing. Right across the hall from "The Door".
BUT...I was an employee of a homeless shelter, and the homeless shelter was funded by the State, and I could NOT discriminate against what was then and is now, a legally recognized religion.
While I did not come right out and tell them to suck it up, I may as well have done.
Instead, I took out my shiny little imaginary "Tolerance Badge", and tried to be very tolerant of this particular resident.
I'll refer to her here as Primula
Primula was bi-polar. She was subject to manic episodes late at night, and at one point, she came into the office, leaned toward me, and told me that she could jump across my desk and strangle me and there was absolutely nothing I could do about it. That particular night, there was no desk jumping, because I am a calming sort of person at times, and she and I ended up playing Scrabble, which helped her to work off the manic episode.
She came in on another night, (by that time we were sort of...friends), and told me she was jumping out of her skin and she wanted to re-arrange the furniture in the child care room, which I allowed her to do. Boy, did I get in trouble for that...馃ぃ馃ぃ馃ぃ. Anyway, it was all right, because she was also able to put everything back as it was.
I was working a night shift a few days later, and I brought my art supplies to work with me.
I was thinking about this terrible disorder my friend, Primula, had, and how Voodoo was leading her toward the dark side of things. I wanted Divine help, to be honest. I wanted, in the worst way, for a REAL Guardian Angel to watch out for this poor woman and her son, whom, I felt, she was leading down paths of hatred and negativity.
I sat there at my desk, and I began to draw a really beautiful picture of a black angel descending from heaven, coming down from the darkness of space, into the light of the heavens on earth.
I can't describe the intensity of my focus. I don't know if I have EVER poured so much of my own spirit into one of my works. There was a palpable air of intensity inside the room with me.
When I was done, I looked at my work, and it was the best I had ever done. It was museum quality. I looked at the angel in the picture, and I prayed. "Please watch over Primula. Please watch over her, and her son and keep her safe."
And just at that moment the computer, across the room from me, popped!!! A fuse blew. The room went dark. The computer crashed, and shut down completely. The lights came back on almost right away. And directly in front of my desk, (also in front of the computer), I could see a heat shimmer in the air. There was a presence to it. I could FEEL that something was there.
I didn't know what "it" was...but I spoke to the heat shimmer. I was scared. Whatever it was that I felt in that heat shimmer, it didn't feel good. But I repeated my earlier prayer. "Please watch over Primula and her son, and keep them safe."
Silently, crossing my fingers, and hoping that what I had called without intending to, was, in fact, an angel, and not a dark voodoo demon, I left the room.
Later, after I gave Primula her picture, and told her it was a guardian angel that would watch over her, I heard her saying to another resident..."Yeah, it WAS a black angel!" I surprised her, I guess. I surprised [i]myself[/i], I guess. In a LOT of different ways.
Looking over my shoulder...repeating to myself..."it was an angel. It was an angel."
