Hell by Hieronymus Bosch

This was a psychic event that happened about a year prior to Tom’s infidelity confession dream. My son had a terrible nightmare about his father which he shared with me because it was so upsetting and so real. At the time, I was surprised by the dream but wrote it off as simply a product of my son’s sometimes lurid imagination. It was only later, when I knew the truth about Tom’s life, that I realized my son’s dream was Tom showing his son something he couldn’t show me. I am sure Tom knew that if I’d had a dream like this, I’d have woken up screaming long before he got his message across. He knew his son would be able to experience the whole dream and understand its message.

In the dream, Tom told his son he’d gone to Hell. Tom showed him Hell, and it was absolutely terrifying. It was burning hot, the Devil was laughing, and the whole vast area was spinning at a dizzying speed. My son said it was a sickeningly frightening experience. His father told him he’d spent seven days in Hell, which was an eternity or perhaps as long as seventy years, because time is different on the other side.

But my son said as he looked at Hell, he could understand why God had created such a horrible place and why his father had gone there. Tom told him that he had gone to Hell and suffered because he could not forgive himself for what he’d done in life. He told his son that he needed Hell to cleanse his soul. My son said he could see that Hell was created because some souls needed it.

Could it be that Tom can’t forgive himself, even in the afterlife, for who he was; that the shame he endured was simply too great to bear. He never wanted to confront his problems in life, because he didn’t want forgiveness for himself from anybody, even from himself. Forgiveness was simply adding more burning hot coals of shame. And so, he chose Hell to thoroughly cleanse his soul.

Perhaps, when he at last escaped from hell, he was free to try to do some good for those he loved and had wronged. In some dreams, I’ve actually seen him intervene with kindness in the lives of some of the women he cheated with.

Given the chance to use spirit communication, he knew he could lighten the burdens my son and I carried resulting from his mistakes and tragic life. And he was very right about that. Once we unraveled all the ways Tom’s problems had caused him to become permanently morose and indifferent to his family, learning the truth was like digging ourselves out of Tom’s grave. It’s hard for me to blame Tom too much because obviously no one choses to be mentally ill.

We all have a story we tell ourselves to explain our life choices. Tom’s secret story got darker and sadder as he got older. He chain-smoked cigarettes in disgust with his life and himself.

When he got to the other side, I wonder if he saw all the joys he’d missed in life. He never took his son out to a park and taught him how to catch a ball or showed him what a two by four is. We took no real vacations together. He was always too busy with his secret life. Secret Tom eventually consumed all of Tom’s life and condemned him to an early grave. He could have had it all: great career, loving wife, success, happy son, and a long life. What a terrible waste of a man with so much to offer!

As I anguished over trying to work out my feelings, I alternately cursed Tom and cried over his fate, and though I continued to be furious at him, he kept sending me loving messages, which seemed very at odds with the picture I had of him as a man who had never loved or respected me. I won't bore you with all the little things that happened. But one incident validated that our wedding and honeymoon had been every bit as deeply meaningful for Tom as it was for me, even though he later regretted our marriage.

On my ancient computer, I have Amazon music on a cloud, a concept I haven't fully mastered. But I have about a hundred albums of the type of music I like, and I have also added some songs that are particular favorites of mine. Then, with the program set on random play, Amazon music provides hours of music that I enjoy.

One day, during all this soul searching, I was feeling particularly low about Tom and convinced he’d never loved me. Chores awaited my attention, so I roused my spirits by putting on Amazon music and noticed that there was a search bar. I'd never tried to use this bar, never having needed it. But on that day, I needed very badly to hear “Sous Le Ciel de Paris” a bittersweet, sentimental French love song. There was music playing as I sat down to try to figure out if I could get my song to play using the search bar. Suddenly, as I stared at the monitor, before I had even touched the mouse, a red bar appeared on the screen with some message about not being able to skip. And “Sous Le Ciel” came on. Psychics say that the dead can fool around with electronics and get messages to you. Well, this was a message to me: my Parisian love song from the man who took me to Paris for our honeymoon. And whatever Tom had done to the cloud, that was the only song that would play. The program wouldn't play the next piece or the previous piece. I listened to “Sous Le Ciel” until I was all cried out. How can you not love a man like that? We'll always have Paris.

Yes, Paris and the flu. It had taken Dr. Gorgeous to rekindle the wavering flame of Tom’s love so many years ago. Those brief, glorious days in Paris had meant much more to him than I ever suspected, especially the good-bye kiss. There it is again, that fateful goodbye kiss. Tom seems to have always been trying to kiss me goodbye.



I appreciate all he’s done for me. I really can’t complain too much. The Tom I knew was mostly fun to live with. We enjoyed each other’s company and shared a deep interest in theater.