A spooky tale of turtles and tears...

Have you ever had anything a little odd happen to you? Anything a little... spooky? I am not a fan of ghosty tv shows or visits to mediums. That kind of thing scares me a little. Well.... when I say a little, I mean a lot.But at the same time it fascinates me. Spooky things have happened to me..... 

I suppose that when I say spooky things have happened to me I should explain... I am not claiming here to be the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter.If you are a solid, sensible minded person you will probably be able to explain away what I am going to tell you. I myself look back and find myself doubting my belief in what happened. But it did happen and at the time it touched me in a way that now seems a bit mad.

I was in Australia, on a boat on the Great Barrier Reef. My Man and I were two months into a back packing trip around the world. We had saved up, left our jobs in casinos and set off to travel for a year. From Cairns we booked a diving course and set off with about ten other people to live for five days on the boat.It was beautiful. Blue skies, crystal seas. We were incredibly happy and enjoying life.

And then, for no reason, on the fourth day I woke up and could not stop crying.There was no rhyme or reason to it. I was a mess. We were supposed to do our compass dive and I totally blew it. I panicked, cried and just could not dive. I was in danger of failing the whole course. One of the dive masters offered to take me for a recreational dive - no pressure, just pleasure. I decided to do it and eventually managed to get down and swim amongst the coral and the beautiful sealife.

As I was down there I started to feel calmer and calmer and all of a sudden the dive master pointed out into the distance. There, swimming towards us, was a turtle. It gracefully glided through the blueness and spent some time just floating around us - back and forth, instilling peace and tranquillity.None of us had seen a turtle before and the experience was so special. It didn't make me cry - it just filled me with a strength that came from nowhere, a calmness that filled my soul. It made me think of my grandad for some reason.

When I came up from the dive I was a different person. I did my compass dive and passed my PADI. That dive and that turtle turned me around.

I thought no more about it until we came back to shore a couple of days later. Waiting at our hostel was a message from home. My grandad had died.He died the day of the tears and the turtle.I had had no idea that he was ill. No idea that he would die.For me the explanation for my tears had arrived and I felt that my grandad's spirit had visited me when I needed him.