A strange, elderly lady repeatedly appears to a young woman with life predictions, advice, and even warnings
WHO IS THE strange old woman who keeps appearing to Raven H., both in her dreams and in her waking life? Raven doesn't know her, doesn't know her name or where's she's from, has never really met her in any personal way. Yet this woman seems to know Raven intimately, giving her messages and warnings about future events.
Who is this mysterious woman and how is any of it possible?
THE FIRST PREDICTION
The encounters began in 1989 when Raven was 15 years old. She was eating a meal at a local fast food restaurant with her older sister, who was about seven months pregnant. They chatted about this and that, sometimes speculating on whether the baby would be a boy or a girl. Raven's sister could have found out from her doctor, but she wanted it to be a surprise.
The sisters finished their lunch, cleared their table, and headed out the door. Just outside, an elderly woman was walking past - just another stranger whom neither of the girls knew. Raven happened to make eye contact with her when the woman glanced down and noticed the swollen abdomen of Raven's sister. Her eyes lit up.
"Oh, look at that!" the woman exclaimed. "You're having a little boy!" She touched Raven's arm and said, "You're going to have a beautiful nephew, young lady!"
Raven and her sister just smiled and nodded to the nice old woman and continued on their way down the street. Just a few steps away, Raven glanced back over her shoulder and the woman was nowhere to be seen. "Wow... creepy, huh?" her sister said.
It was a harmless little encounter, but the sisters were both startled by the woman's assumptions. First, how did she know they were sisters? Okay, she might have noticed a family resemblance in this brief encounter; perhaps she was just very observant. But why would she assume that the baby would be a boy? Perhaps that was just a lucky guess; after all, she had a fifty-fifty chance of being right. Most people probably would have asked if it was going to be a boy or a girl, but this woman seemed to know. It turned out she was right. Two months later, Raven's sister gave birth to a boy - a "beautiful nephew" for Raven.
THE SECOND ENCOUNTER
The incident was tucked away in Raven's mind as just one of those odd things that happen. Then, about five years later, Raven was surprised by another "chance" meeting with the woman.
Raven was attending a beauty school on the other side of town. "It was my first week on the floor," Raven says. "When you start beauty school, you spend months in the classroom learning, and then they put you out in the salon where you work on actual customers and where you are monitored by an instructor."
On this particular day, Raven was called to the front desk by the salon's receptionist. "You have a request," the receptionist said.
"Who could be asking for me?" Raven asked, puzzled. "I just started working out here."
The receptionist gestured toward the customer waiting area. "She's over there and she asked for you by name."
Raven turned and looked. Her jaw dropped when she saw it was the same elderly woman from years back who predicted the outcome of her sister's pregnancy. Raven escorted the lady back to her station and sat her in the chair. At this point, because the woman asked for her by name, Raven began to wonder if maybe she should know who this woman was. Perhaps she was a friend of her mother's that she had met long ago and had forgotten. "I felt awkward," Raven says, "like I should know who she is. I waited and waited for her to clue me in, but she didn't."
Next page: Words of warning
