This is the story of Charles Henry Hawken, seen here with his best buddy, Harry the Hedgehog. This story is written for anyone who believes in miracles, and anyone who’s been told that they aren’t possible.
It starts in December 2018, and involves my dear friend
Luke Rymell, the Spirit Artist. It starts sadly, and ends magnificently, so don’t feel bad when you start reading.
When you finish, I hope you will have found a reason to focus on the potential for good in your life, and embrace the idea of miracles.
The sad part
Charlie came to us in 2008 as a hurt, frightened, kitten. He only had 3 legs because his first owners decided that euthanasia was a cheaper option than removal of the fractured back leg they’d allowed to get so bad it couldn’t be saved. Fortunately, the vet called the Cat Protection League, and we found him there. Over the years he thrived as a loved and adored cat, until he passed very suddenly aged 10. We were broken, but we don’t need to dwell on that.
The mediumship part
I’m a medium so when I lose a person or pet I’m lucky to be able to find out how they are. In Charlie’s case I was standing there stunned beyond belief, and in my head I could hear “Four legs mum, four legs four legs four legs”, I was devastated but he was so happy. After a couple of weeks Charlie started saying that he wanted to come back and have a full life with us. I didn’t know what to make of it so I consulted Amos, my Guide, and he said that Charlie was adamant he was coming back.
Enter the Spirit Artist
A spirit artist is a person who is inspired by spirit, rather than deciding what they want to paint, something Luke Rymell is rather spectacularly good at. Back-tracking to December 2018, Luke was given an image to draw for me for Christmas by our late cat Elly.
However, due to being unwell we didn’t see Luke until early March 2019, after Charlie had passed. When he handed me
the image he said “Please don’t be disappointed, this is
exactly what Elly asked me to draw but it isn’t her. Being in the spiritual field we both accepted that this was meant to be and we would find out why.
Elly
Elly had smooth fur compared to the cat in the picture, and golden eyes like her sister Jo-Jo.
Luke knew this as he knew her most of her life. Hence his puzzlement. But we both knew to trust what Luke was given even though it made no sense. We’re so grateful he did trust!
This is her in her favourite position ‘you may be a senior businessman in a nice suit, but I want to look out of the window!’ She had us wrapped around her paw.
The lead up
In June 2019 Charlie communicated that he was ‘squished’ and showed me an image of a pile of tiny kittens, I took that to mean that he was in the womb. A couple of weeks later he sent “not squished” and showed me an image of tiny kittens this time, staggering around. I asked Amos again if Charlie was actually coming back, and he said, “he’s back.”
Tony and I have never homed a cat for the sake of it, to us they’re living beings and should be wanted with all your heart. We’ve had 12 and every single one has turned up in an odd way, a sudden desire to have two kittens even though I was terrified of cats having been attacked by one as a child; just picking up a phone and calling a rescue centre to see what they had for no good reason other than I had to! A random look at a website intending to volunteer to help not home! That resulted in Charlie.
As we’re getting older we were intending to reduce our cat numbers naturally, so having another cat was a big thing. As you can imagine, the person Tony was relying on to get this right and find Charlie’s new incarnation, was me.
We have a local rescue centre that we’ve supported for years, but I couldn’t assume he’d turn up there, and you can imagine how desperately I/we wanted to get it right, so I asked Amos for help again.
A real Angel
Two days later this 9-year-old lady turned up art our local rescue centre; her name was Angel of all things. Her owner was sadly too ill to keep her any longer.
I showed the image to Tony and he said, “that’s what Luke painted!’ I sent a copy to Luke and he agreed.
Unfortunately in this image her eyes look gold (bit irritating), but actually they were deep green. Obviously, a visit was in order on the Monday.
The aborted London trip
This bit was really weird. The next day, Saturday, we were supposed to be going to London to an exhibition Tony’s company were attending. Long story short we were caught in terrible traffic, London was gridlocked due to three huge events on the same day, including a Triathalon, and we couldn’t get there, so I suggested that we went to the nearby Bicester Outlet Shopping Village for coffee and a wander round the shops (and a laugh at some of the prices).
I was wandering through a shop when a thought suddenly popped into my mind – “find you
mummy”. Not find me, as I would have expected; find you. It was so clear I was literally shaking. I connected to Amos and sent “please, please help me to get this right, please
give me a sign”.
Then I called Tony to see where he was and told him I needed a coffee! He said he was at the bottom by my favourite shoe shop, LK Bennett. I walked down to the end of the village, turned left, and nearly fell over!
The designer shoe kitten
Charlie’s original owners had named him after a pair of
designer shoes -, Jimmy Choo. We couldn’t help but feel that when he lost a leg they didn’t want a non-designer, non-perfect, kitten.
As I turned the corner I found myself looking straight at a Jimmy Choo shoe shop. This was the second time that Amos had literally sent me a ‘sign’ as a sign.
When I went into LK Bennett I bumped into a man carrying not one but two Jimmy Choo bags. The message couldn’t have been clearer as we’d decided to get two kittens because frankly one on their own isn’t fair on them or the adults. They want to play, the adults want to chill.
Found on the Monday
Charlie’s favourite cuddling position.
On the Monday afternoon I went up to the rescue centre. I had Harry the hedgehog with me, Charlie’s favourite toy. Charlie had already made it clear that he would have black in his colouring, so I thought I was probably looking for black and white cat, but each one was a girl and I was as sure as I could be he would come back as a boy.
When we came to the last cage on the left, the lady told me that there were 4 black kittens. One was waiting at the door; we’ll call him Marcus because that’s his name now. He immediately made good his escape and hid behind a bin. I was watching them try to find him when the cat flap between the inner and outer runs literally crashed open, and this little bundle of black fur hurtled up to me and looked me straight in the eyes. I knew in that moment that I’d been found. I picked him up and he climbed up my shoulder and sat bolt upright against my neck in Charlie’s favourite position, purring his head off. He had to climb my shoulder to get high enough to push his head against my face.
The Harry test
The staff had captured Marcus and put him in beside Nero, so I thought ‘this is a good test, two kittens, one who should recognise Harry and one who shouldn’t, let’s see if either of them react.
I took Harry from the bag and put him down in front of them. Marcus sniffed Harry and walked away; Nero pushed his little nose into Harry’s hat and sniffed deeply 5 times, all the time keeping eye contact with me. When I got home I called Tony and he asked if I’d found him and I said oh yes!
Harry travelled everywhere with Charlie. He was found out in the garden on the patio, in the bath, on the stairs, and conveniently placed in this dish.
Saturday meet and greet with Tony
I’d reserved both Nero and Marcus, although we hadn’t had the name fight at that time, and on the Saturday we went along to see what Tony thought.
Again, Marcus was right at the front of the cage, and Nero came dashing through the cat flap, took one look at Tony and climbed straight onto his shoulder. Tony’s face told me everything I needed to know; we were found. He just said, “It’s him!”
Nero
Marcus
There you have it, our 2019 magic. It’s been so healing having that wonderful Charlie energy back, but I still miss the Charlie incarnation, he was so unique, funny, and intelligent. However, over time Nero has proven that they are cut from the same cloth, and shows a lot of the character of Charlie whilst being completely himself.
Marcus has turned out to be equally wonderful and surprisingly like our old cat Bruno. We can’t help feeling twice blessed, actually 12 times blessed in all. We did look at Angel, but she didn’t want to approach either of us. We do believe an animal should show a level of comfort with you, they’re not owned they’re living beings with rights.
My reality
Don’t ever let anyone tell you that magical things can’t happen in this world, they can. When we lost Charlie on that awful day we could never have expected anything like this. Even as a medium the idea would never have occurred to me. Although I do know others (not just mediums) who say that one pet is so like one they lost that it makes them wonder. In my work 2 out of 3 people I meet will tell me a story about something weird that happened to them.
I’m also not fluffy. I test things every which way to make sure I cannot explain what happens in any other way. There is simply no explaining how Luke painted Angel in the December, Charlie didn’t die until the January, and I didn’t get the picture until the March when the boys would have already been in the womb. For anyone religious or spiritual angels are a big thing too, so that name was pretty pointed. I cannot logic that out.
So my reality is – it’s a complete and much appreciated miracle. Those miracles aren’t restricted to those who ‘know’, who look at life in a different way, who believe. If you keep your eyes open, take notice of what you see, and trust when something odd happens that you can’t explain away, you will find that those miracles appear for many people. I’ll add a few more miracle stories at some point. But I just felt inspired to resurrect this today.
I can also say that although we’re mindful of and grateful for the miracle, we have loved every single one of our cats equally. We’ve had 12 favourites. Every single one of them has been unique, loved so much, and a complete blessing. Nero and Marcus just arrived in a slightly more unique way. If only humans could love each other in the same way, if we could just be love without borders, colours, genders, nationalities, religions. What a wonderful world it would be.
If you’ve ever had a miracle like this, do share.
Deb xx
Deb Hawken - Amorah 