This week, I tried a spiritualist church. Less formal than the traditional church
service and the collection is usually taken by a dead relative (joke!) If I’m brutally honest, at one point, seeing
myself stood in a drafty, soulless community centre at 8pm on a Saturday night,
I did have a bit of an epiphany – never in my life would I put myself in a
position when I would be stood in a room with complete strangers, swaying and
being forced to sing along to Cliff Richard’s Millennium Prayer on a CD
Walkman!
In my quest to reach new heights, I appear to have plunged
to new depths.
If the spirits were with us, I could feel my Mum taking the
piss. She never felt the need to ‘find
herself’ on a Saturday evening in this way; she’d always find herself in an
armchair with Noel’s house party on the TV, a cherry Bakewell and a cup of tea
and quite frankly, I could see her point!
The woman was a genius!
This spiritual evening involved two guest mediums – although
one was definitely more of a large (boom tisch). For the avoidance of any
embarrassment I will call them Pam and Shirley. Pam was a slightly weasely looking woman,
nervous as a rabbit caught in the headlights.
Mind you, I don’t blame her – Shirley looked ravenous and ready to
pounce. Her hair looked like she had
ridden and motorbike to the Hall, either that, or Elnet have a new product that
sets like concrete. I didn’t warm to
her; she seemed insincere and nobody should be that nervous stood in front of
11 women dressed primarily in velour or nylon.
If there was a sudden spark, lives could be lost. Shirley was matronly and more confident. She had a warmth to her; like an oil filled
radiator, or a Radox bath. She as
dressed in an elaborate floral ensemble – Hyacinth Bucket, the missing years.
The idea was that everyone brought a flower in from their
garden; the mediums would connect to its energy and channel a message from a
loved one. Now, I should have known that
I’d put the cat amongst the pigeons with my Bird of Paradise, but I was still
hopeful.
My positivity continued even through the second Cliff
Richard song when I swear I saw the flowers even appear to wilt and lose all
hope.
The smell of anticipation was palpable in the room – or that
may have been the gentleman in the beige slacks shoes chair ‘squeaked’ every
time he changed buttocks. Pam was up
first. Her little scared eyes darted
from flower to flower. She picked up a
beautiful passion flower and held it close, wrapping her fingers around the
delicate petals. ‘I feel travel is on
the horizon for whomever brought this specimen this evening. ‘Wednesday’ is being brought to my attention
and the number 3’. ‘Bloody Hell’ I said
to my friend, may be a little too loudly, what is this? Sesame Street?
I should have held my tongue however when the owner of the
flower announced they always get the 8 3
7 bus into town on a Wednesday! How
accurate! There were actually gasps and
a spontaneous round of applause.
I literally had to pinch myself to stop my jaw from hitting
the floor. I bet these people are always
surprised on the outcome of reality TV shows too. I thought people this gullible were extinct!
Pam picked up my friend’s flower next; a delicate
frangipani. ‘I can feel a lot of pain’
she began. I saw my friend wince and
moved my chair leg from her toe; maybe she did have a gift! ‘I can feel a lot of strain and expense, the
feeling that you are too easily taken advantage of’. Now saying that about my friend is like
saying that Hitler was a little bit mean.
Someone took advantage of my friend once. ONCE.
I think they year was 1986, but they made a full recovery following 2
months in an iron lung. Yeah…right.
Travel again was mentioned. ‘Well’, I said’ ‘you do drive to work every
day’. Again, gasps filled the room like
a Mexican Wave from the congregation.
Next Pam mentioned a close proximity to something silver. I thought my friend was having a mini panic
attack; ‘well’, she began hesitantly, ‘I was actually polishing my flute
earlier’. Well, that was it. The crowd erupted and Pam looked exhausted
with her achievement and sat down, smoothing her helmet hair with price and
passing the baton to Shirley.
Shirley had this way of doing a little shuffle whilst she
gave her reading; as if she was line dancing to a silent disco with Nut Bush
City Limits playing on loop. I found
this endearing at first, but after the 3rd flower reading, I wanted
to nail gun her feet to the floor. She
kept asking Pam if she wanted to give another reading, but she was just too
exhausted with her triumphs from earlier in the evening. If she was an iPhone, her battery would be on
8%. I hope she wouldn’t be too exhausted
and fall off of her moped on the way home; nod off on a sweeping bend, only to
be found by the third passing bus on a Wednesday…..
Anyway, by the fourth Nut Bush chorus, Shirley looked visibly
flushed, but selected my small, unassuming Bird of Paradise bloom – nearly
taking her eye out with the ‘beak’.
‘How exotic’ she began, ‘full of Eastern Promise’. She wasn’t channelling – I hate Turkish
Delight! Come on, Shirley! Whack another HRT patch on and let’s get some
action! She went very quiet, stroking
the long, angular stem of the bloom, hunting for a deeper connection. She almost entered a trance-like state. She was completely lost. Absorbed within her own thoughts. Minutes passed and the crowd searched her
face for snippets of information. She
looked so ‘in the zone’. It was as if
she’d been taken over by a higher being.
You could hear a pin drop in the cold community centre; not even the
constant dripping of the ‘boiling billy’ in the kitchen could dispel the
tension. Her eyes rolled back in her
head. He looked so tense; visibly in
pain. It felt like she’d held the room
captive for hours, when in actual fact, it was probably only a few
minutes. Even Pam look rattled; she’d
never seen Shirley quite like this before.
Perhaps she was having a turn? Does anyone have a Werther’s Original in case
she’s falling into a diabetic coma? This
sent a flurry of elderly women rummaging in their handbags; old tissues went
flying with the excitement. When suddenly
– all eyes were back on Shirley! There
was a high pitched, strange sound, like cheeks being clenched. Shirley was redder than a post box. Every eye in the room was on her when she
sighed, visibly relaxed and let out the most enormous fart and exclaimed
‘nope. I’ve got nothing! Sometimes the only useful thing the spirits
use me for is channelling their wind’.
At this precise moment, I burst into tears. I knew in that instant that she’d connected
to my Dad. I was an immediate convert.
The woman was a genius.
