Observations placeholder
With my eyes open, I saw my dead husband before me, in a suit of clothes which he had worn out a long time before. His expression was mild and calm and I smelt menthol
Identifier
025196
Type of Spiritual Experience
Inter composer communication
Hallucination
Background
I think he was there in spirit, the perfume is the clue
A description of the experience
Death and its Mystery – After Death – Camille Flammarian
The following communication was sent me from Algiers on April 27,1921:
DEAR MASTER:
Since I was twenty I have been an assiduous reader of your books! I am now sixty. I had not felt that I dared write you, but I have been assured that you will read my letter.
My husband died five years ago. I left my apartment, sold everything, and went to the home of one of my sons. Three months after my husband's death I had returned from the country, where I had spent a day; there I had hardly thought of my husband at all. I went to bed; it was dark in the room.
With my eyes open, I saw my husband before me, in a suit of clothes which he had worn out a long time before. His expression was mild and calm; it was as though his face were lighted up. His features were not bright, but were clear and distinct and seemed unsubstantial. I asked myself if it were really he.
He bent over and kissed me.
"This is an illusion," I told myself.
I also perceived an odour of menthol (when he was alive, he always had a stick of it with him, because he suffered from headaches). Again I thought that this could not be possible. Mechanically I passed my tongue over my lips and tasted something slightly bitter; I did not know whether or not it was the taste of the menthol.
“Is that really you?" I asked.
Slowly he vanished. I have not seen him since, and have rarely dreamed about him.
Was this an illusion ? I have never had any others.
V. SCHWARTZ
(Letter 4472.)