Miss Inquisitive is a 78-year-old African-American woman who lives alone in her family home in Portsmouth, Virginia. Last week, I sat down with her to listen to her family stories and experiences with the spiritual sensitivity known as "second sight": "It all has to do with light. Some of us have a crown and some of us have a band and some us don't have anything. I have a band. I once met a Spanish lady who called it a caul. When I was growing up, I didn't feel like I had a top to my head. There was nothing up there-just pure blue like the sky. And ideas floated past like clouds. I was brought up Catholic, but I don't allow the church to limit my experience. Those teachings are for the general public, and not for crazy folk like me. Before I was born, my mother was hanging up sheets and she was frightened by a man. My mother never said who it was, but I think it was my uncle. He was a terrible angry drunk. This caused me to twist around in the womb-so restless. I was born premature and the placenta was all torn up. Leaving my mother was a terrible anguish for me. I was born with a hernia and they had to make me a navel. The doctor also gave my mother a ball-twin. You know, sometimes they find a ball of skin and inside is hair and blood and teeth. I think that I had a twin sister, but she didn't become a whole girl, only a ball. Second sight is an awareness of what is not. I have always had an awareness of my missing sister. When I was a baby, my grandmother would take me to all the mirrors in the house and say, 'See here. See yourself?' To this day, I don't like mirrors. They make me feel like I'm tingling, like I should go right through to the other side. When I was upset as a child, I would go to bed and dream that I was in a place that was very warm, and I was swimming. The water would become violently disturbed and I would experience anguish. Then, I would be tumbling down a tunnel and there would be this very bright light. And then I would feel like I was going to arc up, like you see Indians do in their ceremonies. During this time, I was aware, but I couldn't see. Infants and people who have been dead for a short while can see, but they can't speak. They are part of the light. I was a quiet child-very quiet, but when I went roaming my granny said, 'She has the call of the wild.' I made up a little song to sing to myself, 'Silence sings. Do you hear the music?' I would walk by myself every day and I was drawn to this glen in the woods. I was so happy there. I had the feeling that people were around, but I couldn't see them. I fell asleep in this pretty fairy place and an angel came to me. She was one of the opaque people who are beings of light. She had beautiful hands. We go for a walk in a sandy place and then cross a stream and meet with all the people on the other side. We would always come back by sunrise. That went on quite frequently, not every night, but often. When I was a girl, my father never let anyone disturb me. In extremely stressful situations, it feels like there is a rubber band around my head-too tight. When we went walking, my father put so many thoughts in my head that it hurt. Some people from my family vibrate like fine violins and seek quiet places. They said we were high strung. I don't think we were high strung, just sensitive. "
