homecoming

J: Last night after dinner, they told me about all the supposed creepy things that have happened since. Did you hear what they said?
Y: Nope. You mean they saw Ma J's ghost?
J: Something like this. One night, sis-in-law C dreamt that Ma J was lying just beside the dining table talking to her. She can't remember much about what was said, except Ma J asking her to look after Pa J. It seemed that that the next day, Pa J found a very large moth resting on the same spot!
Y: It's the season for moths again.
J: The thing is Pa J believed that it was Ma J's spirit, and so they placed a chair over the moth, in case someone accidentally trampled on it. That night, he took the moth into his bedroom. But the next morning, Pa J no longer found the moth beside him. Instead, he found the moth resting by at the telephone [Talking on the phone was Ma J's favourite past time next to cooking] - in fact, it had died. He cremated the moth.
Y: Ah.
J: Everyone now believes Ma J has come back to resolve whatever was necessary.
Y: So why are they spooked out, if they believe it's just their own mother?
J: There's more. After the cremation, Pa J went out and there was no one left at home. But it seemed that at 9.30am or so, his handphone registered a missed call from that same phone the moth had died on.
Y: Someone called and forgot about it?
J: I don't know. Do you believe in ghosts?
Y: No. Spirits maybe. At least generally that the spiritual world is real - and not quite something we understand. But not humans turning into ghosts or moths.

Like J, I only hope Ma J is not some speechless moth, who with its stillness and death attempt a romance's resolutions and reconciliations.

J's photoblog & account here.
image by J, taken with our new Ricoh GR!