Samantha and I were very close, I understood her perfectly and we were perfectly tuned to each other all the time. I am an author/journalist/poet and when she was tired of my typing, she would come and sit on the keys to stop me; that little lady had a mind of her own!

Samantha always had a wish to sit on my bedtime pillow and I would never allow that. I only had to speak to her gently and she would pause with her paw in the air and not proceed to mount the forbidden pillow. Owing to her illness, Samantha had a certain unmistakable aroma about her and was quite unable to climb in order to leave that aroma anywhere at all.

The night after Samantha had died (she passed on the night previously), I no sooner slipped into bed and settled down when suddenly this aroma of her illness assailed me with force and I knew that Samantha was there, sitting on the forbidden pillow facing me! I said gently, "Samantha, you know you are not allowed on that pillow, so get off now." (I couldn't have slept with that aroma beside me anyhow but it did tell me she was there.) I felt the movement of her body in the pillow beside me but could not see her at all and the aroma was gone immediately...but so was Samantha.

I felt terrible and asked myself WHY didn't I live with the aroma just to have her beside me again in spirit? That really hurt.

It didn't hurt our sweet little lady though, she has returned many times since then; minus the overpowering aroma and so commenced a long line of being in touch with our passed on animals, as they came in a steady stream to our home and brought their friends from the other side with them. We are not the only folk to have seen them, visitors not knowing the story have seen them as well.

Where there is LOVE there is no death and I KNOW that we don't have to wait for the Rainbow Bridge to be reunited with our beloved animal family. They come and go, wherever we are, with a new and joyous, new-found freedom.