About Me — Adrienne Daniels
How I Became an Avid Spiritual Tourist With No Return Ticket Ch 1
In a world of constant noise and distractions, the quest for meaning often leads us down many winding paths, away from the familiar and into the realms of the extraordinary. My journey began innocently enough — with a steady flow of mildly, odd childhood events that would eventually spark a curiosity that ignited an insatiable appetite for spiritual exploration. What actually started as a simple search for some basic answers to life’s mysteries became an intriguing adventure, hurling me into a throbbing core of diverse faiths, ancient wisdom, and amazing and transformative experiences.
As I searched deeper into the reasons for our existence, I found myself drawn to communities that, too, wanted more from what the world had to offer. Each destination added layers to my understanding of self and the universe, leaving me with an ever-growing desire to uncover the wisdom hidden in the world’s spiritual traditions.
In this story, I will share the experiences and revelations About Me that have made me an avid spiritual tourist who embraces the journey with no intention of returning to a singularly defined path. Join me as I recount the pivotal moments that reshaped my perspective, illuminating the magic of wandering souls in search of life’s marvelous secrets.
Columbus, Ohio 1967
Allow me to set the scene: It was Columbus, Ohio, circa 1967, a spirited little girl was born to Mr. and Mrs. Jewel Daniels. This spirited, little girl — me — an only girl was born the lone rose among two sturdy oaks — otherwise known as my brothers.
My mother, a dynamo of a woman juggled the roles of data processor by day and student by night. But she wasn’t just any student; she was a scholar of life, balancing textbooks with Bible verses. She was a God-fearing woman, who made sure the family spent their Sundays at church, where my grandfather, a dignified and well-respected deacon, also held office.
My grandfather was the patriarch of the household while he lived with us. My mother felt that it was her duty to care for her father, especially as age crept up on him and he began to need support. He was the quiet strength, the wise old owl that gave words of wisdom when needed.
Now, about my father — picture an ex-navy officer with a passion for tinkering and a gift for invention. He, unfortunately, also had a love affair with the bottle, which led to more than a few late-night, dinner table mishaps. As for me, my childhood memories of my dad often involved his face crash-landing into a plate of food, accompanied by a symphony of snoring. When he was home and wasn’t drunk out of his mind, he was a charismatic, fun-loving man who could light up a room — literally and figuratively, given his trade as a highly skilled electrical engineer who was ahead of his time with many a failed and successful prototypes and conceptualized, futuristic dreams.
I won’t say that my life was terrible because it wasn’t. Just like many other lives, filled with ups and downs, laughter and sorrow, I would say that my life was quite an average life for the most part. But there were several things about my average life, that I would like to share, that were just plain strange. And since you’re still reading my story up to this point, I’m going to go ahead and take a gamble here and say that you’re probably interested in knowing the rest of my story. So, here it goes.
Columbus, Ohio 1971
It was one of those Ohio winters in 1971, wrapped in its usual chilly white embrace. At the age of four, life was already somewhat of a mystery to me, but it was on that particular afternoon that I discovered something even more mysterious.
As the winter sun set early, casting shadows over a landscape blanketed in a half-foot of snow, I was snug in my bed, drifting in the realm of dreams. Suddenly, my peaceful nap turned into a startling vision: our family’s trusty white sedan, which had bravely weathered many Ohio winters before, was involved in a dramatic crash into a light post. I woke up abruptly, tears streaming down my face, convinced that something terrible had just happened.
I ran straight to the kitchen, where my mom was busy preparing dinner, probably one of her famous dishes that we’d so often gobble up in a matter of minutes. “Mama, Mama!” I cried, my hands gripping her legs as mine trembled in fear.“Junior just crashed the car!” I said, very confident that it was ten-year-old Junior, my big brother, who had been driving the car. My mother, confused and concerned, paused mid-chop and then began wiping her hands on a towel before kneeling to my level.
“Junior?” she asked, eyebrows knitted together in confusion. “Honey, Junior’s in his room reading comics. He couldn’t have crashed the car.” But I was adamant. Even though I hadn’t seen the face of the driver in my dream, I knew it was him who had sent our car crashing to its untimely demise.
We went back and forth, like tug of war, which felt like ages — my mother insisting that my big brother, Junior, was safely in his room, and me, hysterically holding on to the idea of the family car now being a crumpled hunk of metal. Instantly, our little tiff was immediately stifled by my grandfather’s stern yet loving voice from the living room. “Hush, Anj,” he’d often called my mom. “Let the child speak.”
With my grandfather’s permission, I quickly launched into a recount of my dream, describing how Junior was driving and had lost control of the car and crashed it. My mother tried desperately to muffle the giggles at the insanity of it all. How could Junior, not even old enough to reach the pedals, have possibly been driving?
As I finished my story, the front door suddenly flew open with a bang. In walked my father, looking more sober and serious than usual. “Well,” he said, with a look of resignation, “I totaled the car.”
Silence permeated the room. My mother’s face transformed from bemused amusement to utter shock. It turned out that the car had indeed crashed into a light post but not by the hands of my 10-year-old brother, the “Junior”, but instead by my father, the “Senior”. At the time, I couldn’t grasp its meaning, but my dream turned out to be a peculiar and unexplainable premonition. It had been the right event that had played out but for some reason, the actors were out of place.
This was just the start of the many strange things I experienced that have placed me on this eternal spiritual path I travel. If you’d like to find out more about what happens, subscribe and save this page to continue to Chapter 2.
Share a time you’ve experienced a premonition or a precognitive phenomenon.
Thank you for reading.
