S2 Ep5: Kids Can be Creepy, Especially your own

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Shop eBay for millions of finds. Each with a story. eBay. Things people love. Astonishing Legends Network. The views and opinions expressed by hosts and listeners on the Astonishing Dead Letter Office are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Astonishing Legends Productions, the Astonishing Legends Network, or any affiliated entities or guests. When something unexplainable happens to you, it can make you feel isolated or alone. But trust us, you're not. For over a decade, you've been sending your strange stories to Astonishing Legends. And now it's time for our fellow legenders to hear them, too. Join us weekly in Blanket Fortiana as we dig through your intriguing messages to the Astonishing Dead Letter Office. Tonight's episode. Kids can be creepy. Especially your own. I think perhaps one of the most unsettling things about parenthood, and, of course, I am not a parent, but I am speaking as a trained observer here, Scott. Yes. For the first few years, you're essentially living with a stranger who is slowly learning how to be a person. And it was Michael J. Fox who said, with toddlers especially, you're always on suicide watch. Toddlers particularly, especially when they start moving fast. They don't even have to be walking yet. They can crawl at a million miles an hour. Or, but it's true, when they first come out, they're like a blank slate, or at least that's what conventional psychology tells us. My wife and I used to joke that for the first at least four or five months, you're basically dealing with a needy blob that you must do everything in your power to keep alive. You provide the input, they provide the output. Yes, food in, poop out. Exactly. But every once in a while, you get an output that's not poop and also hasn't been programmed yet. Exactly. You know, we like to think of toddlers as sponges, just absorbing our words and habits. But then they say something, usually right before bed when the lights are low, that suggests they didn't come into this world empty-handed. They brought some luggage with them. Yeah, it's the old soul phenomenon, but taken to a literal, almost biological level. In the letter we're looking at tonight, it's not just a child with a vivid imagination. It's a child who seems to have access to the family tree before they were even a branch on it. In this case, it's the pap-pap of it all. Tonight, we're looking at a dead letter from Tim that asks a very heavy question. Do we choose our families, or do they choose us? I've been wanting to share this story with y'all for a while now, but there was never enough substance behind it for a full episode or anything. Enter the dead letter office. Perfect space to share. Plus, my kids love listening to the new, shorter show. As long as it's before dark, as dead letter ones are creepier. Clearly, I never let him listen to the Black Eyed Kids series or the Sally House take a shot. But I digress. Back in the tail end of the 20-teens, I was putting my then-toddler-aged kids to bed. Being a self-proclaimed amazing dad, I read them different stories or just made them up off the top of my head. My oldest, Mason, started randomly telling me a story one night. He said, Dad, you know I wasn't always your kid. I was intrigued by this, but also not new to these types of topics, having recently found AL and a few other OGs in what I affectionately call weird s*** podcasts. I asked him to tell me more. Yeah, I lived with a different mom and Pap-Pap. Our house caught on fire and I died and then was in mommy's belly. This caught me off guard for multiple reasons. Obviously, there was the past life reference, which was odd, but not super abnormal. What was strange was Pap-Pap was what I called my grandfather. He had passed away almost three years prior to my oldest son even being born. So I asked him to tell me more about Pap-Pap. He described my grandfather with surprising accuracy, eye color, hair, and more. I asked him if he knew his name. He said, George, my grandfather's name. Fast forward a couple of months to when we visited my grandma and Mason was in her room and says, Dad, that's Pap-Pap pointing to a picture of my grandfather. Could this have all been a coincidence? Did he just overhear us mention Pap-Pap at some point and made up a creative story in his head? Possibly. I don't recall ever telling him my grandfather's name, nor was it likely I'd even refer to him by his first name. But hey, anything is possible. Interestingly, he never changed his story until he got to about six or seven when suddenly he forgot. If you believe any of this at all, take a shot. You may have heard the theory that some type of filter turns on in our brains around that time frame that makes us generally forget our past lives, unless brought back up later by a medium. Could it have been a past life? Like I said, anything is possible. Thanks for listening to my story, Podfathers. Keep up the amazing and entertaining work. And thanks for being all-around awesome humans. Cheers. The paranormal surrounds us, and we'll dive back in shortly. Success starts with your drive, and American Public University is here to fuel it. With affordable tuition and over 200 flexible online programs, APU helps you gain the skills and confidence to move forward. Whether you're changing careers, starting fresh, or pursuing a lifelong passion, our programs are designed for people who never stop. You bring the fire, APU will fuel the journey. Learn more at apu.apus.edu. Let's continue our investigation into tonight's dead letter. So first of all, nice reading on the letter. Thank you. Also, it's somebody I was a little bit surprised to learn that we know this person, Tim, and are friends with for a long time now, having listened to the show. But it's at once both pretty rare, I think, to, in my opinion, to be blessed with a story like this, because it's really a gift that gives hope, in my opinion, and is not that creepy. Although I can see why people are disturbed by it, because it will perhaps rock your belief system. But on the other hand, it is a common or seemingly more discussed common occurrence or happening with this type of story. And essentially, that's what we're talking about, past lives or reincarnation, wisdom out of the mouths of babes, or at least in this case, these cases, knowledge that they perhaps could not possibly know. And are speaking of before that fades with age. So there's a lot of common themes here that have been surfacing. And certainly, if you've been scrolling and your feeds are like mine and the algorithm is trying to guess what you like, it's chock full of these types of stories. Which, like I said, it's at once, depending on your outlook, comforting, perhaps, in a way, or very disturbing to some people. Because, yeah, there's lots of stories popping up about very strange things that their toddlers are saying to them. Yes. Yeah. I guess it's that moment of identification, first of all, or description of what happened before them, which is a little too precocious or prescient, I guess, for a child, in my opinion, to do that. Now, I've had little kids say lots of strange things to me, just goofing around, joking around, of course. But that make me laugh. But other ones, nothing this kind of startling. And that makes you scratch your head. I will relay one of our favorite anecdotes that I, early on, years ago, tried to hunt down while we were in L.A. because it was a Southern California story. Oh, yes, I know what you're going to say. I'll just tell you the story right now. Now, sadly, and not so sadly, this toddler, you know, as they do, was in an upstairs room pressing on the screen during a very warm Southern California day. And the screen gives way. And he falls out of a second story home window. There's nothing below except a concrete patio on the back. So the parents hear a little commotion. They come running out. You know, they're, of course, startled and shocked and scared. And the toddler is standing up and just fine. And the only thing he has is a tiny scratch on his forehead. Other than shock right now, because like, oh, my God, the kid just fell out of a second story window, is that he seems to be fine. And he's cheerful. He's like, I'm, you know, I'm okay. They're like, how did that happen? There should be a broken bone. There should be scrapes at least. He seems fine because nothing broke his fault. And then later, I think that day, the kid's, you know, in the house again. And he's looking at these old family photos and he said, that's who saved me. That's who caught me. And I can't remember if he said the name of the grandparent, but like, like who? And I think he did say the name. And it's like, who, don't point it out. Who, who, who do you say caught you? He said that, you know, that guy there. And it turned out to be the grandfather who had passed years before the kid was even born. And they said, same thing here. It was like, they never really discussed. He's too little to, you know, start planting out a family tree so he can understand who his ancestors were. And they never really mentioned him because it was, it was a while ago, but he knew his name. And he said, that's who caught me. And he saved me. And it's like, okay, not really a past life, but evidence, perhaps if you want to accept it as spirits and loved ones living on and still watching out for us. And so here you're getting back to the before times or describing how they passed in an earlier life and knowing the details of that. And that comes up a lot in these stories you'll see online. And also the, the switching around, I think we'll talk about here a little bit about a kid telling it's a, you know, child saying to its mother, I used to be your aunt in the before times or I was your grandmother. Okay. That's pretty trippy. What kind of concept there is that in a small child that I was a different relative in a past life than you or you were my aunt, you know, not exactly my mother. So, but here you go again, using this special familial moniker, that to me is a whole different level of evidence if you want to accept it. Yeah. By the way, I do want to say just to your point, Tim, who'd sent this in, is an old friend of the show, as Forrest said, a longtime supporter. We actually used to live in the same neck of this spooky woods in Pennsylvania, have even played blackjack together during game. Yes, where the dealer was our other mutual friend, Jerry, of the infamous What's Gotten Into You episode of Astonishing Legends. Yes, we've, we've also played, uh, online Zoom blackjack with Jerry as the dealer. Because he's such a great dealer. He's like, he's the best. He's got a great temperament for it. The house always wins. So he's- He does, yes. He'll get his turn to, to play. Anyways, circling back here though, let's talk about Mason, the little kid in this story. I want to look at the timeline. So the grandfather, George, passes away three years before Mason is born. And it turns out in the world of reincarnation research, specifically the work of Ian Stevenson at the University of Virginia, that three-year gap is actually very common. It's almost a standard kind of intermission period, which is interesting. You can enlighten me on this, Mr. Southern Gentleman. Pap-Pap is a regionalism, right? More so than perhaps other parts of the country. Now I've heard of Pap-Pap, Pap-Pap, as it was written, seems a slight variation on that. But I've also heard Pap, just depending on where you are. I think in Pennsylvania, Western Virginia, parts of the South, you just don't go by grandpa, right? So it's a specific vocalization. And if the father hadn't used that name around the kid, where does that taller then pick up Pap-Pap? The point I'm trying to make here is that if you watch regular television, or the child does, you don't often see those kinds of monikers that are region-specific. It'll be grandpa, gramps. There's a lot of nicknames. And I would say here in the South, I mean, my son and his cousins refer to their grandfather, my wife's father, as Pop-Pop. So there's a Pop-Pop, and that's a common thing I've heard. I have not heard Pap-Pap a lot, but it's not completely foreign to me. You know, there's all kinds of, and there's grandma and grandpa and grandmom. And there's so many things, different kinds of nicknames. And I do think they're regional. But it is interesting for this little kid to come up with that out of the blue. But then again, Tim was like, well, maybe I said that. But this leads to the next part of the story. Why do these kids always tell these stories like right at bedtime, right? They're like, oh, yeah, it's been a long day. But here's what the theory is. The theory is that the sensory input that they're getting all day long is kind of moving to the background. And this also, according to Ian Stevenson, who passed away in 2007 but did tons of research on this, it seems to work only when they're young. So it's like you're wired a certain way for a minute when you get here. But that window is like slowly closing from the time you're born. And eventually, it just shuts out. Often, by ages 8 to 10, we'll be the farther end of the age spectrum where these memories start to fade and the details start to fade. And I think part of that's life where, you know, the kid's much more engaged and the comprehension is greater and deeper. You get busy with other stuff. And that part of the living life starts to slowly paint over like a dry roller brush over your past memories. And also, for me personally, in my belief system, it's starting to be replaced by the more important, pertinent purpose of life, which is not to dwell in the past. Although, it's very useful often to remember these things if you can and learn from them. But the idea is to learn what you can from the life you're living now. And so that's more important that you focus on where you are now and not so much what was past. But it's a lovely thought for me to think about that. So now take, for example, then the house fire that happens. That's often what's called a traumatic exit. And in almost all these verified past life cases where basically what the toddler's saying, you know, my interpretation of that is what the toddler's saying, the young kid is saying, can be verified with facts about the family. And in cases where the previous life ended abruptly or very violently, you have these more cemented details. So it's kind of like the trauma sears the memory into the soul so deeply that the filter, Scott mentioned, can't scrub it clean immediately. It's left a scar or a fading imprint. There is that phenomenon. It is claimed that sometimes people with a birthmark on their body, if they have these past life experiences, will learn that in the past life, they had an injury in that same exact spot. A burn, a gunshot. You know, again, that ties into that traumatic ending exit. And so how does that work where the new body has a marking, which ties in with how the previous life ended? Yeah. But speaking of this scrubbing it clean idea here and that it's so imprinted, we know this because of the work coming out of the University of Virginia. And this specifically ties into research done by Dr. Ian Stevenson and now Dr. Jim Tucker. There's a statistical, quote unquote, smoking gun that's hard to ignore. In their database of over 2,500 cases, roughly 70% of the children who have these verified memories describe a previous life that ended violently or abruptly. This connects to the idea of the crisis apparition that we learned about from our friend and parapsychologist, Brandon Masulo, who's been on the show. Except rather than an apparition motivated by a crisis, you know, like a ghost you see at the same time over and over, reliving the last moments of their lives. We're talking about reincarnation connected to a traumatic exit, like you said. So it's kind of like with a trauma, you don't get a chance to log out properly. So you stay connected to this side of the veil. Yeah, and that hypothesis is connected to what others have said about, again, dying briefly and coming back in a near-death experience about how that has stuck with them. And there's some importance on that, people dying in the same manner as they did in past lives or not making that connection to reincarnation. But I remember an anecdote that our friend, medium and psychic Jim Hunt said, we had him on the show years ago. He said, you can look up that episode. But he was talking about going into quote-unquote haunted house and he was getting this visual image that was on a loop. And this is talking about crisis apparitions, not to the living, but to the psychic medium. And he saw this gentleman, basically, I think he had some kind of an attack or episode in the bathtub and was trying to get out and crawl and stumble his way. You know, he's on the top floor to get help. And then he dies. And he saw that over and over again. There's this endless loop of this guy either having a heart attack or some kind of seizure and trying to make his way out. And that's how he ended in that traumatic fashion. And I can't remember if Jim said that what he saw was not just an echo repeating itself or if it was sadly this soul just can't get over this and was repeating this action. Yeah. Then if you follow that line of logic, then perhaps that traumatic episode can be imprinted into the next life. Right. So coming back to the details about Mason's story, he's a toddler, let's say three or four. He describes eye color and hair color correctly. Now, skeptics will say standard features, but he also adds the name George. George isn't a toddler name in this day and age. Right, right. And it's not common in the 20 teens for children's characters. It's what today we might call a legacy name. All due respect to my other close friend, George, who doesn't listen to our shows anyway, so he'll never hear this. Right. But I mean, I'm just looking it up right now. Babies per million, George was at the height of its popularity in 1885. 1885, that's when the records started. It might have been more popular prior to that. I'm looking at it, the descending hockey stick, and it gets down to really, really low starting around 1995. Now, because I know Tim, and you do as well, we know that this probably happened in the 2010s or something like that. Maybe, of course, I'm sure he'll send me an email. That's not what happened. But yeah, I would say, yeah, I might be right there. I might be right there based on when we used to hang out. It's not a name that a toddler is going to pull out. Of course, people will be like. There's the counterpoint. Curious George. I was about to say. Maybe he's reading Curious George. Yeah. That's a good counterpoint to it. So I don't know. But I think it's, yeah, and I don't want to get, I feel like I could accuse myself of being too credulous here. Well, George, nobody's heard George. And then like every kid has Curious George. Well. So I'm canceling out my own argument. I know. But to that point, no, I thought about that. And it's like these easy answers that people will go to and it's understandable. But again, you'd have to look to Tim to say, does he own any Curious George books? Has he ever watched the cartoon on TV? Yeah. You know what I'm saying? And it's like, I doubt to your point, though, about if there's some social interaction preschool, did he get that from another kid? Then it seems maybe less likely. So, I mean, these are things that you can, you know, finer points that you can kind of argue over. But, and you can ask the kid themselves. Yeah. Where did you get that? And people say, well, kids, you know, I mean, this is the easiest go-to. It's like kids have tremendous imaginations and they make up stories all the time. But I'll ask you again, me just being the trained observer, you being the actual practical parent. Has your child or any children that you come across told a story that wasn't obviously fantastical that they claim was true? Has your son ever done that? And I have a point for asking this. No, my son has never told a fantastical story that I didn't believe that would line up with this, which would be interesting. He's not had a paranormal experience. You might remember when we went to the Sally house, he refused to get out of the car once he saw it. He was all excited to go in, but when we pulled up, he was like, yep, I'm not going in there. So I think he's, I think he chose wisely. And he didn't hear this though, but talk about the influence of other kids, the neighbor kids, which were on their, their, their big wheels and small bikes. We had a horror movie moment where we got out of the car. They're like, I wouldn't go in there. Yeah, that's right. Kid on a big wheel, straight out of the shining. Yeah. But has your son ever told you a story though, where you kind of questioned it? And, and, you know, we can go back to the trove of Mr. McBeavey from the Andy Griffith show. Yeah, no, I, I instantly knew that that's what you were talking about. And no, he has not beyond the normal, just, you know, how come you didn't come home 30 minutes late? Right. And what were the, what were the stories there? Are they, like I said, they're infused with things that don't make sense to you or did you know what he was talking about? No, no, that's not happened. Okay. That's not happened with him. Okay. So, so that's my point. And we've talked about the story before where a good friend of ours, strange things that kids tell you, not a past life, but the one older child in this bedroom that was years ago when they were in their rental house saying, mommy, who's that purple man standing in the corner? Yes. And then you're like, okay, so then that's my point about the imagination of like, okay, you know, she reads a lot of stories and there's a lot of fanciful colors for children. And we're just going to pass that off as a child's imagination right before bed, as you were saying. Right, right, right. And then a few years later when the, you know, the older child moves into their own room, the younger child gets that room to himself and he's like, mommy, who's that purple man in the corner? Totally unrelated. And they know they never mentioned that to the other kid or the two siblings. So it's a little bit of weird verification. Yeah. Now let's talk about this other thing here, the picture. Yes. What makes this a double blind test in a way? So Mason isn't being prompted. He's in the grandmother's room. He sees a face and the recognition is instant. So that's not a creative story. This is kind of rounding this about. It's not a story about like, oh, I'm going to incorporate the character from that picture. And I'm going to do it because I'm in trouble or I want this or I'm just trying to make dad laugh or, you know, just for fun. That's not a creative story. That's the child recognizing that face instantly. Yeah. So then my question is, if Mason was George's kid, unborn kid, I guess, in a past life, and now he's the great grandson, is there like some kind of soul circuit within families? Like maybe the energy sticks to the family bloodline? Well, I keep thinking like, wow, this is going to be, this is real woo woo. And it is for many folks who don't have this belief system. But I was always brought up to believe in reincarnation. My parents did. And my grandfather's like really not his bag to talk about that. But he, I remember probably in the tween years, that's probably when it happened, I think, is that he had a very vivid, like a waking dream, like almost like a vision where you wake up and you realize you weren't dreaming of himself. Where he could see, you know, out of the point of view of his own body was in some kind of 17th to maybe 19th century French palace of sorts, a grand mason, where he could see the velvet coat and the ruffles coming out of his sleeves. And he said it was so real. And he said, you know, the only thing I remember from that is that he was just wandering around like, where am I? Like, what is this? And he saw a servant. He dropped like a platter and some dishes broke. And he remembers telling me, oh, don't worry about that. Somebody, we'll clean that up. Don't, you're not in trouble. It's fine. But he was just wandering around. That's how it is at my house. What? It was when he breaks something and it's, or are you wearing ruffled sleeves? Servants, they tell me not to worry. Right, right. I thought it was you. And by servants, I mean the cat. That wants to play with whatever. Oh, I see. Yes. Don't worry about it. I got it. So that point is I grew up with this kind of thinking. So it's not that outrageous to me, but some of the theories out there, many people I understand will consider pretty woo and they don't believe in that at all. And that's fine. That's your choice. There are a lot of psychic mediums. And again, the people don't put much stock in them, but it's also people who, again, who aren't psychic mediums who have come back from an NDE. And then you have spiritual metaphysical teachers who all say the same thing. And this one scenario that before you were born under this earth in your soul state, you actually choose the life you want to lead and you choose the challenges you want because you were here to learn. And like some people, they'll take tough challenges in living life, hard circumstances or things that are very challenging because they are hard, not because it's the easy life, because you learn more from suffering and failure. And so that's what they want here. It's like, yeah, it's going to be miserable, but I'm signing up for this because that's what I think my soul needs. And so you get to choose the life. It's an agreement, basically a soul contract that you're going to come here on this earth in this lifetime and experience whatever challenges you set up. That's why they think some souls choose a hard life. And then the other aspect of that is that you are a part of a group of soul friends or soul relatives or loved ones, and you may switch parts during each lifetime and you play different roles, but you're somehow connected and together. And that's the case where, yeah, your grandmother may have been your daughter in a past life or your aunt or a cousin or something, but you're all relatively together. I'm not sure what that means other than it's some kind of an arrangement as well. But you, sir, have had a medium tell you that speaking of the devil, our good friend, Jerry, you knew in a past life, right? Yeah. She intimated that we had gone around once before and fought in the civil war together for the North and we survived the war and then retired to the countryside and bought neighboring farms and grew old as friends. I hope we all end up with farms that were neighbors. Yeah, that'd be nice. Churning butter and whatnot. But getting back to this other idea of inherited traits passing down, you know, maybe it's more than hair color and height. Maybe you can inherit a record of a life lived. Certainly, you've heard of the theory about some kind of memory in your DNA. You talk about the first amoeba splitting in two, somewhere that one half, like an old batch of sourdough, is out there somewhere still existing. Right. Then you think about the animal kingdom. Sometimes the babies of certain species seem to be born knowing what to do. There is an interesting concept that I was first made aware of in the William Hurt movie, Altered States, which really fascinated me. I was really into that. It really fascinated me because it's about that where you have that inherent DNA memory and with an isolation tank and some very powerful tonics from South America, you might be able to achieve going into some sort of astral travel, which manifests into a physical change where you get more primitive. Yeah. So talking about animals and being born and knowing what to do, even if their parent hasn't taught them yet, that's an interesting thing. They just seem to know what to do. I did some cursory digging around on this and found this bird in Australia. The bird is the megapode. And it's a bird that hatches underground, then digs itself out and can fly the same day. Okay. Imagine us doing that, walking. I know. And it's never met its parents. It doesn't really have a dad to show it how to hunt. It has a genetic download. And then what is the purpose of that? Well, obviously, simply to keep the species alive. Yeah. I mean, that's an evolution. It's evolved. So then when you start thinking about all those things and the reasons that might exist, could it be the same thing with this kind of information, that it's part of evolution? Right. You can also look at the monarch butterfly. These are the ultimate rebuttal to the idea that knowledge must be learned. They fly to a specific grove of fir trees in Mexico, a place they have never seen. Their parents never saw it. Their grandparents never saw it. It's a four-generation relay race. So, and the science on this is pretty incredible. They have a kind of like time-compensated sun compass in their brains. So they track the sun with their eyes, but they offset that movement using a biological clock in their antennae. So it's basically a shifting algorithm that keeps them on a southwest heading, regardless of the time of day, no matter what's going on. But here's the kicker. So they have a backup. And if it's a cloudy day and they can't see the sun, they then activate a magnetic inclination compass. So what that is, is that they have these proteins called cryptochromes that literally let them see the Earth's magnetic field, provided there's a little UV light filtering through the clouds. Right. So if an insect, the weight of a paperclip, is born with a pre-programmed GPS, a solar tracking algorithm, and a magnetic backup system, why is it so hard to believe a human child could be born with a single file containing the name of a grandfather and the memory of a traumatic death, like a house fire? Right. So if you believe any of this at all, it's not really a glitch in the system. It's just a different kind of data transfer. And we're so used to learning through our ears and eyes that we forget our cells might already have the map drawn out for us. Yeah. So as we begin our final thoughts here, and first I want to apologize to our audience because my mocha coffee maker just arrived today and I made myself a Cuban coffee with the Cafe Bustalo or Cafe Bustamove, as I call it. So yeah, a little amped up. But anyway, what we're talking about here is different aspects of this in trying to figure out what's going on here. So you have the mechanics of how that might happen in a biological sense, and then you have a spiritual or metaphysical aspect of that, which is also based on principles of energy and vibration and transference of data in a sense. Right. Because as I'll point out here is even as metaphysical as you want to get, or seemingly willing to allow the woo is that there is knowledge and data that is like, take the Akashic records, for example, that never really goes away. And that's something also people say who've had NDEs is that they go, once they pass briefly, they attend some kind of live review. And it's like, okay, let's break quickly here for a little download and see what you'll learn this time. And yeah, that's Defending Your Life. For people that haven't seen the movie, you got to watch Defending Your Life. Right. Well, that comes out of not just a very talented Hollywood script writer and comedian's mind. It's actually taken from some principles that are, you know, from ancient Eastern philosophies and belief systems and also NDEs where you, yeah, you have this, you have this review because what's the point of being here is what have you learned? What should you work on? What were your mistakes? What were your accomplishments? And let's keep working on this. And so on the other hand, I think what we were talking about here, when we say the mechanics and how it works at animals is the continuation of the species. And I've mentioned this before, but I like to mention this and it's from a book called On Dreams and Death, A Jungian Interpretation by Marie-Louise Valfranz and Emmanuel Kennedy Zipolitas. It sounded right. So there was one story though. I was impressed. Yeah. So they're, they basically accounts of people who've had these very deep and penetrating archetypical dreams that are metaphorical in a sense. And they go to have them analyzed by a psychologist and they're recorded. And one that I always liked was this guy that had this recurring dream or maybe one time it impacted him so much. He always remembered it and wanted to know the meaning of it. And in the dream, he's got this worldview and he sees all these birds, you know, in flocks and, uh, they're, they're living and dying. They're doing their bird things. And in the dream, he realizes, why am I seeing this? And he can see the birds being born and living their, their bird life, then dying, falling out of the tree. And then them having more birds and eggs and they do the same thing. Then some birds are eaten, some just die naturally. And he starts to see this cycle of life, like start to speed up. And he's thinking, because the first thought of sort of, and then because the first thought in this, uh, realization dream is that, well, that seems kind of pointless. They're just growing up and you know, they're, they're birthing more birds and those all die. And then the cycles repeated, like, what's the point of all this? Like maybe it's, maybe it is pointless. It's like, they're not achieving anything. Where are the bird skyscrapers? Where are the bird great works of literature? They're just doing their thing. And it's like, is there any point to this? Where's the bird Elisa? Right. There you go. Exactly. This cycle starts to speed up in this vision dream where he sees the birds laying eggs, the eggs hatch, they grow up, they learn to fly. Uh, they live their life, they die. And this cycle keeps speeding up and speeding up. And it's like, it's very much a cinematic where he sees it speed up so much that as this cycle happens, it's like a river of birds. And you have to imagine this happening as like a videotape machine on fast forward. And the images are going so fast and it's just a flow of light and dark and shadow and substance and outlines of birds. And it's happening so fast that it becomes a blur and it's like, like was described in the dream, like a river of birds living, dying, rebirthing, having more birds. And as that sped up, what he saw in this river was this jumping bright illuminated spark that would go through the whole river of birds. Like, uh, it gets very cinematic where you have to imagine just like this super bright current of spark and going through the river of birds going through their life cycle. And then he realizes what the purpose is. It's not so much the birds themselves, although, you know, they're important to themselves or the process and the dying and the importance of it. What's important here is the continuation of the cycle of life and that river of spark going through and that connection to birds that lived a million years ago to ones that are yet to be born. And it's that river that's, that's the meaning of life, the continuation of it. So getting back to our point here is that what's the purpose of that or how does that work, perhaps if it's a biological phenomenon that's in our DNA, it's part of the continuation of the species and of life itself and that spark of life continuing and getting you more chances for success. As we've often mentioned in Charles Hoy Fort's book, Wild Talents, knowing, getting that sixth sense of when something's watching you and when you're in danger and keeping out of the cave that has the saber-toothed tiger in it, that's all helped to preserve the species and to not make the same dumb mistakes over and over again. And so that alone, that having that sixth sense is a natural, although kind of a spooky action at a distance of past lives and that continuation of the river of life. So that's maybe part of the mechanics. But then there's the softer side to this dead letter, and I don't want us to forget that either. Yeah, the pap-pap of it all. That's right, exactly. And if this is just a biological leak, why does it happen within the same family? Why then does Mason come back as his own great-grandson? So as I said at the beginning, there's a comforting, if slightly eerie idea there that we just don't disappear into the ether, or we're not just in the cold, cold ground, we loop back, we check in on the people we loved this last time around. Well, maybe the reason Mason forgot the story when he turned seven isn't just because a biological filter clicked on, maybe it's because he didn't need the memory anymore. He had successfully re-anchored himself in the family again, he recognized George in the photo, he signaled to his dad that he was back, and then he got on with the business of being a kid. By the way, I wanted to tell you, I haven't talked to this guy, Tim, who sent this story in in months since last year, but I did text him a few minutes ago while we were recording this. He said they did not have Curious George in the house anywhere. There you go. If he had heard the name George, he would have had to have overheard it in a story, which he said he concedes was possible. But the other thing he said too, I asked when it happened, he said it was probably 2016 or 2017. So I guessed right on the time period there. Okay. So it's not really that long ago for those of us that are of a certain age, but I think it's interesting. So I did want to say a shout out to Tim, by the way. Yes. Again, thanks for sending this in. Yeah. Hello, Tim. And I like uplifting stories and that's the way I find this. Why is this happening and why is this allowed to happen? Is this just some slop, you know, some leftover gunk that happens within this process and a few slip through the cracks or why are people allowed to, you know, if it's such a big mystery from the other side, why are people allowed to come back with near-death experiences and describe what they have seen? Now, the person who's, uh, doesn't believe in any of this at all would say like, well, that's just what happened when you die. We discussed all these ideas when we did our NDE series way back when with, uh, Dr. Richard Haddam. That's near-death experience for people that don't know our acronyms. Right. But it's becoming more and more popular now and, and okay to talk about. The taboo is lifted. And part of that you can thank to platforms like TikTok and Instagram where people share these stories. And that's what I love about it is that when you share these stories, the taboo and the stigma goes away a little bit. And I believe that these stories are allowed to happen and people are allowed quote unquote from a higher power to talk about what they'd experienced, even though the rest of it is meant, as I said earlier, to be focused on the life you're living now. Why do children experience these things up to a certain age and only a small, very small amount of children do, but why is that allowed to happen? Is that just like, again, just some leaks out of the paper bag? Well, I think these things happen as do paranormal things happen because the purpose is to allow a little bit of questioning and mystery into your life and that your belief systems aren't so tightly packed and constructed and concrete is that you're meant to question and you're meant to keep exploring and keep learning and have a purposeful life rather than like, I got it figured out. I'm just going to forge on with this because maybe that's not the route you're supposed to be taking. So these things are little nudges and little cracks and like, maybe you don't know everything that you think you do. And children don't, you know, as you talk about children and being raised, I think when you get to the teenage years, it's like, I got this all figured out. I am 14 and I've been around a long time and I know everything they're going to say. And then of course, what happens, Scott? They get humbled when something happens. Like, I didn't see that. And the parent says, no, I told you that was going to happen. You just didn't listen to me. I told you exactly that was going to happen because guess what? That happened to me when I was your age and you have to go through it yourself. You don't believe, I don't believe it. I don't believe it. Go on outside without your shoes on. Go ahead. Yeah. It just snowed, but have fun. Yeah, that's right. And so there's lessons like that. I'll be here in about 60 seconds when you come back to get your shoes. Yeah. The thing is you can have lessons like that. Then often they end with you having to go take the child to minor emergency. Now that's interfered with your day. Yeah, you got to be careful. You got to weigh the whole, like, let them learn it themselves or stop them from grievous harm. So like when I tried to put car keys in an outlet, apparently, while I was still in diapers. Yeah. It's, it's that thing that everybody does. And I hope that as you get to enter adulthood, you start to figure that out because what's most frustrating about some friends we've had talking about that is that they keep making the same mistakes over again, but Hey, that's your own path. You're going to have to figure that out. And so it's that old saying, we are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience. Yeah. So if that's true, then Mason's digression, as our listener, Tim put it, is actually the most honest moment of his life. And that, you know, it's a brief window where the curtain was pulled back a little bit before the play really began. And you have to really dive into the game of life. Well, whether it's a genetic fluke, a past life, or just a very strange coincidence in the middle of a bedtime story, it leaves you with the vibe that the universe is a lot more crowded and a lot more connected than we give credit for. And maybe next time your kid says something weird at 2 AM, you might want to listen a little closer because they might be trying to tell you who they used to be. The Astonishing Dead Letter Office is hosted by Scott Philbrook and Forrest Burgess and is executive produced by Tess Feifel. The show is edited and mixed by Sarah Voorhees-Wendell at VW Sound. The theme is based on the Astonishing Legends theme by Judson Crane at Founder Music, arranged by Alan Carissia, who composes all the other music in the show. Tommy Beaver Design created the logo. The announcer is John Bolton. That's me. Stories are lightly edited for length, content, and readability, but otherwise presented as they're sent to us. We're always looking for more dead letters, so if you have a story of your own you'd like to share, email it to deadletteroffice at astonishinglegends.com. Please include how you would like to be credited. First name only? First name last initial? Anonymous? A pseudonym? Let us know. Due to the number of emails coming in, we often cannot respond, but we do read them all. No part of this show may be reproduced anywhere without permission. Copyright Astonishing Legends Productions. Ever notice that feeling your worst also seems to happen at the worst time in the worst places? Like sudden nausea at 9pm when you're out of town. Really? Now? Fortunately, with Hartford HealthCare's HHC 24-7 app, you can get answers, diagnosis, prescriptions, even speak live with clinicians anytime, anywhere. So maybe there's never a good time to be sick, but at least the best care's always there. Download the app at your app store or hhc247.org. Success starts with your drive, and American Public University is here to fuel it. With affordable tuition and over 200 flexible online programs, APU helps you gain the skills and confidence to move forward. Whether you're changing careers, starting fresh, or pursuing a lifelong passion, our programs are designed for people who never stop. You bring the fire, APU will fuel the journey. Learn more at apu.apus.edu. Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. They go perfectly with music, podcasts, and welcome back to the show. Even nature sounds. Oh, and the thing where someone crinkles tissue and whispers at you. Hello. Look, I'm not here to judge what you listen to. I'm here to judge you for not eating Reese's while you listen to it. Reese's. Ashley, go back to the nature sounds. Nice. Yeah, it's really nice. I'm U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. The sound of a seatbelt. It's one of the most important sounds in our car. It means everyone is ready and everyone is safe. The more our kids see us put on our seatbelts, the more natural it is for them to put theirs on too. Make it a priority. Buckle up every time. Hear the sound? Make it a habit. Paid for by NHTSA. With the power and endurance of Toyota trucks, you can go to the most incredible places, like this valley, where the Echo does different voices. Hello. Hello. We know what we're made of. Toyota trucks. Ever notice that feeling your worst also seems to happen at the worst time in the worst places? Like sudden nausea at 9 p.m. when you're out of town. Really? Now? Fortunately, with Hartford HealthCare's HHC 24-7 app, you can get answers, diagnosis, prescriptions, even speak live with clinicians anytime, anywhere. So maybe there's never a good time to be sick, but at least the best care's always there. Download the app at your app store or HHC247.org. Success starts with your drive, and American Public University is here to fuel it. With affordable tuition and over 200 flexible online programs, APU helps you gain the skills and confidence to move forward. Whether you're changing careers, starting fresh, or pursuing a lifelong passion, our programs are designed for people who never stop. You bring the fire, APU will fuel the journey. Learn more at apu.apus.edu. I'm U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. We all seem to be in a rush these days, from work to driving our kids around. But when you're behind the wheel, please, do not speed. A few minutes saved by going faster is never worth the risk. So follow the speed limit, enjoy the drive, maybe bring some snacks for the kids, and know that along the way, you're getting quality time with your family. Paid for by NHTSA.