Usually, the psychological term “uncanny” is used to describe feelings of uneasiness, even spookiness, but this is not at all how I feel about my imagined conversations with Anthony. After he died, over four years ago, I wrote several imagined conversations with Anthony and it gave me great comfort, but it also felt really real, uncannily so! Even Ming, in reading a few of those earlier imagined conversations, admitted that it was uncanny how authentic Anthony’s words seemed; it was as if the real, alive, Anthony were actually saying those thing, even though he was dead.
Before Anthony died, I experienced the anticipatory grief of knowing that he was dying. He outlived his various prognoses by several years and my constant presence in his life may have kept him going beyond expectations. Who knows?
Sometimes, words, or terms, like “uncanny” need to be cartwheeled into new meanings. For me, these imagined conversations with Anthony are absolutely, uncannily, spot on when it comes to his remembered voice in my head. But I haven’t gone mad and I know the difference between reality and imagination.
There are many more imagined conversations that I have with Anthony that I choose not to share on this blog. And sometimes I wonder why I even share some of them at all!
Anthony was almost non-verbal in the weeks before his death. And yet, now, I hear his loud, laughing voice in my head often. He loved me so much and I didn’t realise how much until now!
Uncanny.
Maybe you share because in some way it makes him feel closer and that’s a good thing
treasured memories are so valuable.
I am glad you choose to share these conversations. I feel that I’m getting to know this man and, boy, do I like him!
Have missed those imagination stories. Glad to be able to read them again