English Version
Last month, there was an earthquake while my wife was at work.
It was a level 3 on Japan’s seismic intensity scale, but even at home the shaking lasted for a while. I immediately turned on the TV to check the earthquake速報. In the area where I live, people often talk about the possibility of a future Nankai Trough earthquake, so whenever the ground moves, it is hard to stay calm.
That night, my wife was on the night shift when the quake hit.
Black figures running through the facility
When I later heard what happened from my wife, I was shocked.
On the night of the earthquake, while she was at work, she says she saw several black human-shaped figures rushing back and forth through the facility.
It was not just one or two. According to her, there were maybe three or four dark silhouettes, moving at incredible speed from one side to the other. They would head off in one direction, then suddenly come back the other way.
She said they looked obviously shaken by the earthquake.
I often wonder why my wife has so many strange experiences at her workplace. Many of the eerie things she sees or senses seem to happen there.
Her workplace is a special nursing home, the kind of place where quite a few residents spend their final days. My wife has also been present at many end-of-life moments.
Recently, I heard a possible reason for all this.
Apparently, there is said to be a “spirit road” running through her workplace.
If that is true, it would explain why she has encountered so many strange phenomena there. On the day of the earthquake, perhaps some disturbance—something like a distortion in space or time—caused several spirits on that path to lose their way and run through the facility instead.
My wife saw multiple black figures, but she could not make out their faces. They were moving too fast.
It felt as if the spirits had been knocked off the spirit road by the earthquake, became confused about where to go, and were desperately searching for the entrance back.
It also made me wonder: are spirits afraid of earthquakes too?
Is sensitivity to spirits inherited?
Thinking about my wife’s spiritual sensitivity reminded me of something involving our eldest daughter.
When she was in first or second grade, she and I stayed overnight at my parents’ house for the first time. My wife had work, and our eldest son did not come with us.
It was my daughter’s first overnight stay away from her mother. I wondered if she would be okay, but during the day she had a wonderful time with her grandfather and grandmother.
She showed no signs of missing her mother. That night, tired from the day, she fell sound asleep. I was relieved.
But sometime late at night, or perhaps toward dawn, she suddenly began to cry.
And this was not her usual crying.
I asked her, “Do you want to see Mom? Are you lonely?” But she only sobbed and sobbed.
The commotion woke my parents, her grandfather and grandmother, and they came to help calm her down. After a while, my daughter eventually fell asleep again as if nothing had happened.
I remember talking with my father and mother afterward, wondering what that had been.
We decided she must have suddenly felt lonely without her mother, then went back to bed.
But the next morning, the phone rang at my parents’ house.
It was just after 5:00 a.m.
My mother jumped up and answered it. She then told my father, who was still half-asleep, what had happened.
It was a call saying that my grandmother had passed away.
I remember my parents hurriedly getting ready and leaving for the hospital early that morning.
The crying that made sense later
After the funeral was over, my mother brought up that night again.
“That was… when your daughter started crying…” she said, as if the memory had returned to her all at once.
I had been thinking something similar myself.
Maybe my grandmother knew she was about to leave this world, and wanted to let someone know—perhaps my father, her son, or perhaps me, her grandson.
But neither my father nor I sensed anything.
Could my little daughter have been the one sensitive enough to feel it?
Or maybe she sensed it because she was the only one there who carried my wife’s blood.
Even now, whenever we talk about my grandmother, I remember that night.
Japanese Language
先月、妻の職場で地震があった時のことです。地震の震度は、3でしたが、私の自宅でも、しばらく揺れ… すぐにテレビをつけ、地震速報をみたものです。私の住む地域では、南海トラフ地震が囁かれているため 地震に対しては気が気ではありません。その日は、妻は夜勤で、職場で地震にあったのですが…。3～4人の黒い人影が施設を走り回る…！。。妻から話を聞いて驚いたのですが 地震があった夜勤の日、妻は職場で 黒い人影が複数、施設内を右往左往して 走り回る状況に遭遇したそうです。
ひとつ、ふたつ…ではなく、 複数の人影が凄い速さで 右に左に移動したとのことですが。。妻の話しでは 3～4人？の黒い人影 が、あっちへ移動したと思ったら こちらに戻ってきたり… あきらかに地震で動揺している感じだった といいます。なぜ…妻は職場で奇妙な体験ばかりするのか…。それにしても不思議に思っていたのは、 妻の怪奇現象？の多くは職場で見たり、感じたりすることです。特別養護老人ホームという場所では、ここで最後の日を迎える人も 少なくありません。
妻も看取りに立ち会ったことが多々ありますが…。実は先日、その原因がわかったのですが どうやら妻の職場には「霊道」が通っているらしいのです。…職場に霊道あり！。。なるほど、これまで妻が職場で奇怪な出来事に数多く遭遇していたのは 霊道があったからか…それなら頷けます。地震があったその日も、時空の歪みなどで、 霊道にいた複数の霊が、行先を あやまり、施設内を走り回った と考えられます。妻は黒い人影を複数見ていますが 顔までは、わからなかったといいます…凄い速さで移動していたからと。
地震の影響で、霊道から外れた霊たちが、行先に迷い必死に 元の霊道に戻ろうと、その入り口を探していたように思えます。そもそも…霊も地震が怖いものなのかと考えさせられますが。…能力は遺伝する？。妻の霊感で思い出したことがあります。長女が小学生、1、2年生の頃実家に、私とふたりで 初めて泊まったことがあります。この時は、妻が仕事で、長男も泊まりに来ない状態でした。長女は母親と離れての初めてのお泊り。大丈夫かなと思いましたが、日中は、おじいちゃん、おばあちゃんと 楽しく過ごししたものです。
母親を恋しがるような素振りも見せず、夜も疲れてぐっすり眠ってしまう…嬉しい誤算でした。しかし、 夜更けから、明け方にかけてでしょうか 長女が泣き出したのです…しかも、いつもと様子が違うのです。私が、「ママに会いたいの？寂しいの？」と聞くも ただ泣きじゃくるばかり。この騒ぎに、寝ていた 私の両親（おじいちゃん・おばあちゃん）も起きてきて 長女をなだめる始末…。しばらくすると、長女はいつのまにか、眠ってしまい 「何だたんだろう？」と父と母に話したものです。
おおかた、ママがいなくて寂しくなったんじゃないか？そんな話をして再び、床についたものです。ところが… 翌朝、1本の電話が実家に鳴り響きます…まだ5時を少し回ったくらいの時間です。飛び起きた、私の母が電話に出て… 寝ている父に事情を話したようで 祖母が亡くなったことを知らせる電話だった と。父と母は慌てて、身支度を済ませ早朝から病院へ向かったことを覚えています。「あれは…あのとき長女が泣き出したのは…」 。母が、そんな話を思い出したかのように話しはじめたのは お葬式も終わってからのことです。
私もそんなことを少しは思っていましたが…。もしかすると、祖母は自分がもうすぐ旅立つことをわかって 息子である父に、あるいは、孫である私に知らせたかったのかも知れません。ですが、父も私も…そんな気配はわからず、小さかった長女が敏感に感じ取ったのでしょうか。若しくは、唯一、妻の血を引く長女だから感じ取れた出来事だったのかも知れません。今でも祖母の話題になると、この日のことが思い出されます
