The Red Chair

“France … it’s war.… I’m French … a grey, button-up coat—, it’s cold, —full- length, shoes, gloves, walking along a river and helping people. I’m hiding the French people and helping people. I’ve got a house … they’re scared. … I’m male … it’s my home. The people … I think they’re French. I have a skinny house, . you You can get under the house. That’s where they hide. I can hear the fighting nearby, shots and bombs. “I’m nineteen … I’m Anoir, and I’m married. Three boys. I’m proud, . twins Twins aged four and a little one … the kids are playing upstairs. We are hiding only three people. The soldiers are knocking on the door, . the The children are quiet, . they They would kill us all … “The men we were hiding have left and the Germans are looking downstairs but they’ve gone. We are all safe, they are safe, but the Germans hit you, . their Their presence scares me … hit me with the gun in the face but it’s alright … they got away, . they’re They’re all safe … “They’ve shot me. I’m twenty-two. I’m rising above it. Oh no, I’m not leaving … I have to. The kids are crying … they love me, crying over me and Georgia holding me in her arms and saying, ‘don’t die.’. Shot in the stomach, below the heart. Shot for hiding people … other men. They’re shooting them … they’re all dead. I couldn’t protect them.” As I brought Judy out of the trance, I was concerned that she might be distressed by her past past-life experience, ending with Anoir’s violent death and the murder of his family. Awake now, Judy opened her eyes, paused a moment, and then, as only Judy she could, looked over to me and said, “What the fuck? …yYou didn’t tell me that I could be male!” She’d had assumed that if she had experienced a past life, she would have been female.