Episode 277: A Voice from the Grave 2000 Years Ago! PLUS The Hand of Glory!

Enjoy as the Wizard goes way back in years to tell you a chilling and crazy story!

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM paranormal
podcast network. Now get ready for us Strange Things with
Joshua P. Warre.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Welcome to our podcast. Please be aware the thoughts and
opinions expressed by the host are their thoughts and opinions
only and do not reflect those of iHeartMedia, iHeartRadio, Coast
to Coast AM, employees of Premiere Networks, or their sponsors
and associates. We would like to encourage you to do

(00:34):
your own research and discover the subject matter for yourself.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
Ready to be by the Wizard of Weird. This is
Strange Thing with Joshua Warren. I am JOSHUAAPE Warren, and
each week on this show, I'll be bringing a brand
new my blowing content, news exercises and weird experiments you

(01:18):
can do at home, and a lot more. On this
edition of the show, A Voice from the Grave two
thousand years Ago plus The Hand of Glory? Do you
know what the Hand of Glory is? We're gonna get

(01:40):
into that. The first let me ask you a question.
Have you ever really tried to imagine what it may
have been like to live on this planet two thousand
years ago? And I mean, and I mean, even if
you've read a ton of history books and you have
the best imagination in the world, I don't think that

(02:01):
any of us can really imagine what life would have
been like two thousand years ago. I mean, just look
at technology alone. The bicycle would not be invented for
like another two thousand years, not to mention the advancements
with electricity and communications and Okay, look at it this way.

(02:26):
Instead of you trying to imagine what it would be
like to live two thousand years ago, think about how
a person who lived two thousand years ago could comprehend
what life is like for us today as we sit
here and I talk to you all over the world
and we're shooting rockets to the moon. I mean, it's
just like you can't relate. So you might think, though,

(02:49):
if somehow amazingly, amazingly, if you were able to, let's say,
hear an audio recording from someone who lived two thousand
years ago, a normal person, you might think there's no
way that we could relate to each other, really, especially
if that person we're just talking about basically, you know,

(03:12):
the way the world works, what's good, what's bad. The
philosophical aspects of life, and yet we have the next
best thing. It's truly amazing. You know a lot of
times when you say, well, somebody lived two thousand years ago,
we use Jesus as a reference. Well, about one hundred

(03:33):
to one hundred and fifty years after Jesus was born,
there was a Roman born named Marcus Aurelius. And Marcus
Aurelius was a He was the son of a Roman commander,

(03:54):
and eventually, through various family connections and whatnot, Aurelius became
the Emperor of Rome. Now, let me just say I
consider him to be a normal man only because that
he never claimed that he was a god or some
divine being, or some prophet or some mystic or anything

(04:16):
like that. He was certainly an extraordinary human being, however,
because he had the power of life and death in
his hands, and he was a guy who had a
hell of a lot of responsibility on his hands, and
so he was what is often considered one of the

(04:37):
last of the five good Emperors of Rome who oversaw
this period of time called the Pax Romana, and the
Pax Romana it was, which means Roman peace. Was this
sort of two hundred year period of relative stability, economic prosperity,

(04:59):
all that kind of stuff within the Roman Empire. So
everybody was kind of happy. It was like the good
old days. Of course, that ended at some point, but
during that period of time he was he was the
son of a military commander, and so he grew up

(05:20):
fighting all the time, and even when he was the emperor,
he was out there conducting military campaigns on a regular basis.
And when he was fifty eight years old, he was
out on a military campaign, and they believed that he
died because here there was a plague of some kind

(05:42):
that swept through his army. And so after he died,
many years went by until it was discovered that he
had been keeping a private journal throughout a good period
of his life describing his thoughts. And let's see, I

(06:09):
think the first time that this came to our awareness
there was a bishop a few hundred years later. He
was a collector of manuscripts, and he sent a letter,
this bishop to an archbishop and he said, hey, I
have this copy of Emperor Marcus's most profitable book, but

(06:33):
it's old, it's sort of falling into pieces. So I
have been able to sit down and copy all of
this and save it and put it in a new dress.
That's how he put it. And it turns out that
this collection of thoughts, this diary kept by this man

(06:55):
two thousand years ago, it was never intended to be public.
And obviously now you can read it. I have a
copy of it in my hands. It's called Meditations. And
one of the things that's remarkable about this is that

(07:20):
it turns out Marcus Aurelius was quite a He was
quite a philosopher, and he was one of the proponents
of what is now called Stoicism. Now, this is an
ancient Greek and Roman philosophy that supposedly teaches virtue, reason,

(07:44):
and emotional resilience. So here are some of the tenets
managing emotions. Stoics do not seek to eliminate emotions entirely,
but to transform destructive emotions. That means irrational things, inter
rational and healthy ones. Another tenet is living in accordance

(08:06):
with nature, and this involves living rationally as a social
logical being and accepting the natural order of the universe.
Stoics believe virtue is the only good, that the highest
good in Stoicism is moral virtue, not wealth or pleasure.
And they believe in the four main pillars wisdom, justice, courage,

(08:29):
and temperance, which is moderation. They also believe in what's
called the dichotomy of control. Stoics emphasize focusing entirely on
one's own reactions and thoughts and actions, while also accepting

(08:50):
external events like misfortune or other people's behavior with some
kind of composure. You might even be able to argue
that stoicism is one of the building blocks of what
eventually became the scientific method, a more rational way of thinking.

(09:11):
One could argue that, and so it was. It's really
fascinating when you sit down and you you read what
a Roman emperor was writing in his own diary, not
for the people, not to promote himself, not to publish,

(09:31):
as he was out there, you know, essentially doing what
he had to do to maintain order, including killing people.
You might ask yourself, well, what how did he feel
about Christians? And it turns out that it seems like
he didn't particularly care for Christians. He does, he only

(09:54):
mentions them once, and he says he basically criticizes what
he perceives as their theatrical approach to martyrdom. And he
wrote the readiness for death. Quote must spring from a
man's inner judgment and not be the result of mere opposition.

(10:20):
It must be associated with deliberation and dignity. And if
others are to be convinced with nothing like stage heroics
end quote, you can take from that what you want.
He never came right out and said anything terrible about Christians,
but you know he's criticizing the Christian approach, and again,

(10:40):
you know he calls it theatrical. I have a copy
again of Meditations right here in my hands. It's almost
three hundred pages long, and it's divided into twelve books
that are all collect together. On the back of the collection,

(11:02):
here's a quote by him. If someone can prove me
wrong and show me my mistake in any thought or action,
I shall gladly change. I seek the truth, which never
harmed anyone. The harm is to persist in one's own
self deception and ignorance. Okay, fine, So what did this

(11:28):
man write down that was so significant two thousand years ago,
that was discovered after he died, that was preserved by monks. Basically,
when we come back from this break, well, I'm going
to give you some of the very specific pointed things

(11:50):
that he wrote about. And let's see what this voice
from the grave has to tell us from two thousand
years ago. Fascinating. Huh. Well, you know, there are a
lot of podcasts out there, but I think you'll agree
there is no other podcast quite like this one. So
if you like it, you find it interesting, and you

(12:11):
like these topics, and you want me to keep doing
the show, well listen, you gotta support me. It's easy.
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(12:34):
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That's me. I am Joshua P. Warren, and you are
listening to Strange Things all in the iHeartRadio and Coast
to Coast AM Paranormal podcast Network, and I will be

(12:55):
right back. Welcome back to Strange Things off the iHeartRadio

(13:34):
and Coast to coast, a m paranormal podcast network. I
am your host the Wizards of Weird, Joshua P. Warren,
beaming into your worm whole brain from my studio in
sen City, Las Vegas, Nevada, where every day is golden
and every night is silver. A giitato zume And this book,

(13:59):
which you can read, written proximately two thousand years ago,
is now known as Meditations, a collection of twelve books
containing personal, private and untitled journals written by the Roman
emperor Marcus Aurelius, and it outlines his his personal insights

(14:24):
into Stoic philosophy, his outlook on life, focusing on self improvement,
duty and virtue, and written for his own guidance rather
than for publication. It's that interesting, okay. So I am
just not going to read you some passages because he

(14:47):
doesn't write big, long stories or anything. He writes very short,
little thoughts and passages. And I'm just going to take
my time and read some of these to you. Maybe
i'll comment. Let's see what you think. Do you agree
with these tenets of Stoic philosophy and the outlook of
this man who lived that long ago. Here we go.

(15:10):
You have power over your mind, not outside events. Realize
this and you will find strength. Next, he says, dwell
on the beauty of life. Watch the stars and see
yourself running with them. The happiness of your life depends

(15:36):
upon the quality of your thoughts. Well, that's an interesting one,
don't you think, because that's basically sort of like it
borders on law of attraction type thinking. Let me repeat
that when he says the happiness of your life depends
upon the quality of your thoughts. Next, everything is an opinion,

(16:01):
not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not
the truth. Wow, that's pretty profound, don't you think. Let
me repeat that one. Everything we hear is an opinion,
not a fact, and everything we see is perspective not

(16:22):
the truth. Boy, I think he's onto something there. Let's
see here he says, waste no more time arguing about
what a good man should be be One. How he
likes that if you are distressed by anything external, the

(16:45):
pain is not due to the thing itself, but to
your estimate of it, and this you have the power
to revoke at any moment. When you arise in the morning,
think of what a privilege it is to be alive,
to think to enjoy to love. Well, I'm liking this.

(17:12):
I gotta tell you. I you know, I never thought
I'd be like h I'm into this Roman emperor all right? Uh?
He next, he says, the best revenge is to be
unlike him who performed the injury. Man, you know, if
this actually sounds a lot like stuff that Jesus was saying.

(17:34):
You know what Jesus is saying said like, you know,
be kind to your enemies or love your enemies, and
it's like pouring hot coals on their head. Let me
repeat that one. This Roman emperor said the best revenge
is to be unlike him who performed the injury. I

(17:54):
wish more people these days could just remember that, if
nothing else, that if you don't like somebody the way
they're behaving, then if you turn right around and act
the same way they do, well you're no different. You
two wrongs don't make it, right, I guess all right,
let's keep going. The soul becomes dyed with the color

(18:20):
of its thoughts. Okay, so again he's talking about your
your You're thinking shapes and colors the way your soul
is expressed. It is not death that a man should fear,
but he should fear, never beginning to live. Now, mind you,

(18:45):
this is coming from an emperor who was responsible for
untold deaths. And he says, not death a man should fear,
but fear never beginning to live. Okay. Next he says,
the things to which fate binds you, and love the
people with whom fate brings you together, but do so

(19:09):
with all your heart. Never let the future disturb you.
You will meet it if you have to, with the
same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present. Next,

(19:32):
he says, and this is a reiteration, our life is
what our thoughts make it. So boy, he's really big
into you getting your thoughts together, he writes. Next, whenever
you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself

(19:54):
the following question, what fault of mine? Most nearly symbols
the one I am about to criticize. If someone is
able to show me that what I think or do
is not right, I will happily change, For I seek

(20:16):
the truth by which no one was ever truly harmed.
It is the person who continues in his self deception
and ignorance who is harmed. I have often wondered how
it is that every man loves himself more than all
the rest of men, but yet sets less value on

(20:36):
his own opinion of himself than on the opinion of others. Next,
he writes, when you wake up in the morning, tell yourself.
The people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous,

(20:57):
and surly. They are like this because they cannot tell
good from evil. But I have seen the beauty of
good and the ugliness of evil, and I have recognized
that the wrongdoer has a nature related to my own,
not of the same blood and birth, but the same mind,

(21:18):
and possessing a share of the divine. And so none
of them can hurt me. No one can implicate me
in ugliness, nor can I feel angry at my relative
or hate him. We were born to work together, like feet, hands,
and eyes, like the two rows of teeth, upper and lower.
To obstruct each other. Is unnatural. To feel anger at someone,

(21:40):
to turn your back on him, These are unnatural. He
then says, if it is not right, do not do it.
If it is not true, do not say it. Subject
of life is not to be on the side of

(22:02):
the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks
of the insane. Very little is needed to make a
happy life. It is all within yourself and your way
of thinking. This also is a reiteration of something he

(22:26):
said earlier. The best revenge is not to be like
your enemy. I'm going to repeat that. The best revenge
is not to be like your enemy. He says, live
a good life. If there are gods and they are just,
then they will not care how devout you have been,

(22:49):
but will welcome you based on the virtues you have
lived by. If there are gods but unjust, then you
should not want to worship them. If there are no gods,
then you will be gone, but you will have lived
a noble life that will live on in the memories
of your loved ones. He says, reject your sense of injury,

(23:18):
and the injury itself disappears. He writes, how much more
grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.
When another blames you or hates you, or people voice
similar criticisms, go to their souls, penetrate inside and see

(23:42):
what sort of people they are. You will realize there
is no need to be racked with anxiety that they
should hold any particular opinion about you. The first rule
is to keep an untroubled spirit. The second is to
look things in the face and know them for what
they are. Do not act as if you were going

(24:05):
to live ten thousand years. Death hangs over you. While
you live while it is in your power. Be good.
Think of yourself as dead. You have lived your life.
Now take what's left and live it properly. What does
not transmit like creates its own darkness. Here is a

(24:27):
rule to remember in the future when anything tempts you
to feel bitter, not this is misfortune. But to bear
this worthily is good fortune. Lastly, you always own the
option of having no opinion. There is never any need
to get worked up or trouble your soul about things

(24:48):
you cannot control. These things are not asking to be
judged by you. Leave them alone. Okay, wo, you gotta
take a break. We'll come back. I'm going to ask
you about the largest empires you think have ever existed,
and then we're going to get into another really cool subject.

(25:09):
I'm Joshua P. Warren. You're listening to Strange Things on
the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast am Paranormal podcast network.
I'll be back after these important messages. Welcome back to

(25:57):
Strange Things called the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM
Paranormal podcast Network. I'm your host, Joshua P. Warren, and
this is this show where the isn that usual becomes usual.
Now think about this. That man who lived around two

(26:19):
thousand years ago, a Roman emperor. He may now be
in heaven, he may now be in hell, or as
he suggested, maybe there is no such thing as an afterlife.
And he died and he is just gone, and there

(26:41):
is nothingness regardless, regardless of what happened. His voice just
traveled two thousand years into the future to speak to you,
and he didn't even intend for it to have I
don't think that's some kind of an immortality, isn't it.

(27:06):
So think about that. No matter what your beliefs are,
no matter if you know if you're an atheist, or
you believe in an afterlife or you don't, or whatever
you're thinking, just remember you know your actions can carry
forward through at least thousands of years and affect people.
And by the way, if you don't already know this,

(27:29):
every time I do one of these podcasts, you can
get a free transcript so you can go back and
you know, actually read the words if you want to
go back and sort of examine or re examine some
of those those quotes and passages. But you have to

(27:49):
listen to the show through the iHeart app or the
iHeart website. There are many different ways to listen to
the show. But if you go to strainsshow dot com,
there are links to different some of the different platforms,
and right there at the top says iHeart. If you
click that one, you'll see this show. Strange things pop

(28:11):
up at iHeart and right there where each episode is listed,
it gives you some options and one of them says transcript,
and when you push transcript, boom, it shows you every
word I mean according to AI. So it might not
be entirely accurate, but every word that was said in
this podcast. And then you know, you can copy it,

(28:33):
you can paste it into a document, you can email
it to yourself. I mean. So I think that it
might just be handy if you want to go back
and and you know, take time to dwell on some
of the things that you hear about this podcast. Every
time I speak in front of this microphone, I kind
of feel like I'm writing a book in real time,
because nowadays that's what happens. Your words get interpreted that way. Nonetheless,

(28:59):
you know, I think again, it's fascinating to think that
those are words coming from a man. So, yes, he
was a powerful man, but he didn't claim to be
a god or a prophet or a divine being or
a mystic or any of that. And that's one thing
that makes it so interesting because many of the things
that he said align perfectly with what those people who

(29:22):
claim to be prophets and whatnot have said. And you know,
people talk about the great power of the Roman Empire.
I got curious recently. I don't think I've ever brought
this up on the show before. Maybe I have, but
I wanted to go back and see, like, what are,
what were, or what have been the largest empires in

(29:45):
the history of the world to our knowledge, And I
found a list according to historians, and they say that
you know, there are obviously there are different definitions that
they try to use for this. They include a size, area, population, economy, power,

(30:06):
I mean, there are a lot of different variables, but
basically that they've sort of agreed on the idea that
you can define an empire in this context as quote
any relatively large sovereign political entity whose components are not
sovereign end quote. All right, so an empire. So let

(30:31):
me ask you this, What do you think are the
top ten? Let me just start with, what do you
think is the number one largest empire, according to historians,
that has ever existed on Earth? Take a moment, think
about it, good trivia question. What's the largest empire that's
ever existed in the history of this earth? They say

(30:53):
number one is the British Empire, which peaked in nineteen twenty.
Number two, what do you think Number two is? Number
two the Mongol Empire, and you know you're talking about

(31:15):
originating in present day Mongolia. It went all over the place.
Number three the Russian Empire that peaked in eighteen ninety five.
Let's see the number four, the Qing Dynasty which peaked

(31:37):
in seventeen ninety. Next we have the Spanish Empire eighteen ten.
Next we have the second French Colonial Empire nineteen twenty.
Next we have the Abbasid Caliphate, which was an Islamic caliphate.

(32:03):
Next we have the Umayad Califate, and then we have
the Yin dynasty. And then last on this list of
number ten. The number ten largest empire the United States,
which they say peaked out in nineteen hundred. Interesting, isn't it.

(32:26):
Do you ever think of the United States as an empire?
And if you keep going down this list, the Roman
Empire is number twenty six on this list. And again
this is not according to me. This is according to
historians who study this stuff and define it. But there,
you know, that's just interesting trivia, interesting for you to

(32:48):
think about. You know, a lot of that. You always
hear about certain empires being so like gigantic and powerful,
but you start looking at you know, like the Byzantine Empire,
it's way down on the list. So anyway, it's funny
how that you know, people have always sought power for
one reason or another, and they'll do anything to get it,

(33:11):
anything to get it. And I've always been fascinated by
some of these artifacts that you can find that people
have used over time in order to try to gain power.
And I mentioned recently that I wanted to tell you
a little bit more sometimes about some of the things
and my personal collection of oddities and novelties and just

(33:35):
weird stuff. I actually have people who contact me all
the time wanting to come over and do a documentary
and that kind of stuff, and I so far I
haven't agreed to that, but at some point, you know,
maybe I will. We'll see. But one of the things
that I would like to talk about on my list
is something that people in Old Europe, very very spooky people,

(34:00):
would use to gain personal power. It's called a hand
of glory hand of glory. I actually have one of
these in my collection. At least, let me put it
this way, I have something called the hand of glory
in my collection. The hand of glory is this macabre
artifact from Old Europe, and it is the dried and

(34:26):
pickled hand of a hanged criminal, and it's used by
thieves as a magical tool. They say the preferable hand
is the left hand, which has always been considered the
sinister hand. So you cut the left hand off of

(34:47):
a hanged criminal. And then when a candle is made
from the hanged person's fat. I guess you place when
a candle is made from the hanged person's fat is
placed in it. It doesn't make sense to it, I

(35:09):
just read the definition. But anyway, basically, what you do
is you turn the hand into a candle by lighting
the fingertips or putting a candle in there, and the
candle is made from the fat of the hanged person.
There are different ways of doing this, but anyway, it's
basically a candle made from the hand of a hanged man.

(35:31):
And if you light this thing up, then supposedly this thing,
which is called the hand of glory, gives whoever holds
it amazing powers of burglary. So if you hold it,
it will unlock doors for you, and it will render

(35:52):
the people in the house immobile or asleep, and the
candle will shine a light that owns the thief can see.
There are some of these and museums out there as well.
Let's see. Here's another way of describing a hand of
glory is the dried and pickled hand of a hanged man,

(36:17):
often specified as being the left. Old European beliefs attribute
great powers to a hand of glory. The process for
preparing the hand and the candle are described in eighteenth
century documents. So, like I say, you basically you take

(36:41):
that you make the candle from the fat of the person,
and then you put the candle in the person's hand,
or you can light the fingertips of the person's hand
and turn those into a kind of five fingered candle.
And you walk around with this thing. And they say
that once you light it, the candle can only be

(37:02):
put out with milk. Okay, when we come back from
this break, I'm going to tell you specifically what the
instructions are that go back all the way back to
at least seventeen twenty two about how exactly you're supposed
to make a hand of glory. I'm going to tell
you a little bit about the hand of glory that

(37:23):
I have and then and then we're going to close
up the show with some mental manna, weird stuff I
like to talk about, and maybe some listener emails. I'm
Joshua wa Pee Warren. You're listening to Strange Things on
the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal podcast Network,

(37:43):
and I'll be right back. Welcome back to the final

(38:24):
segment of this edition of Strange Things on the iHeartRadio
and Coast to Coast AM para normal podcast network. I
am your host, Joshua P. Warren, And this is how
you supposedly make a hand of glory. According to one
of the old texts. Take the right or left hand,

(38:47):
preferably left of a felon who is hanging from a
gallows or a gibbet beside a highway, Wrap it in
part of a funeral paul and squeeze it well. Then
put it into an earthenware vessel with niter, salt and
long peppers, all powdered. Leave it in this vessel for

(39:11):
a fortnight. Then take it out and expose it to
full sunlight during the dog days that's the hot days
of summer, until it becomes quite dry. If the sun
is not strong enough, put it in an oven with
the fern and verveine, which is a type of herbaceous wood. Next,

(39:31):
make a candle from the fat of a gibbeted felon
with sesame wax, and use the hand of glory as
a candlestick to hold this candle when lighted. And then
those in every place into which you go with this
baneful instrument shall remain motionless. Now look the thing that

(39:54):
I have in my collection that is called a hand
of glory. Is it a real hand of glory? I'm
not gonna say, but it looks like it looks like
an old Decrepit dead hand and each one of the
fingers can be lit like a candle. It looks amazing.
Uh and again, is this a real hand of glory?

(40:19):
It's when I bought it, it was called a hand
of glory, and I know you can light it. I'll
never light it. But I actually bought two of them.
At some point, I'll show you a picture. I bought
two of them. And uh, spring cleaning is coming up
for me soon, so I'm gonna be cleaning out some

(40:41):
of things that I just cannot fit in my collection
and stuff like this where I have like two of them.
So I plan to sell one of my hands of glory.
And that means if you, if you're interested, then maybe
you could you could win the auction on my second
hand of glory. Just be sure you sign up for

(41:01):
my free e newsletter at Joshuapewar dot com and you'll
find out when I start selling and auctioning off some
of the things that I need to get out of
my collection. I have three storage units full of stuff
packed from side to side Florida, selling strewn across this country,

(41:22):
and I mean, and it's not doing any good just
sitting there. So I'm gonna be selling, you know, a
decent amount of stuff soon that are like unique one
off items before we run out of time. Let's go
to some listener emails and stuff like that. Oh, you know,
just recently, we had a terrible storm, a winter snow

(41:47):
and ice storm that spread across the United States here
majority of the country. As a matter of fact, I
believe it broke records because I think I saw that
there were more winter storm warnings in counties across this
country at one time than ever before in all of history.

(42:09):
And a lady posted this on a group online. And
listen to this, she says. Even though I was skeptical,
I ordered a tepaphone manifestation device from Joshua Warren, so
I tried it out on the mega ice and snowstorm

(42:30):
affecting the USA. I decided to start small with my city.
We have in the past experienced days of outages from
ice storms, and I did not want to face that again,
especially with the weather so cold. Since I live in
a suburb of Memphis, I concentrated on Memphis and the
surrounding suburbs getting sleet and snow rather than freezing rain,

(42:53):
which is by far the worst for power lines having
power operating continuously, et cetera, and lo and behold, this
area was in the middle of it. But we absolutely
dodged the freezing rain which affects power lines. In fact,
I looked at the power outage map and exactly ten
homes were without power. That is way fewer than normal

(43:16):
weather because our grid is old. As you can see,
we definitely dodged a bullet. Look at the map, and
then she actually placed the weather map there to prove
what she was saying. Isn't that crazy? I see these
tepaphones again. If you go to my website, you'll see

(43:38):
right now. They should still be available in the Curiosity Shop.
But I got this email from a listener named David.
At one point I talked about on the show that
supposedly a lot of scientists have said that you can't
really start forming memories until you're like two or three
years old. But I actually mentioned that I had memories

(44:00):
of being a baby and laying there in the crib
before I could even speak, And I said, I don't
know how unusual that is. By the very first thing
I ever remember seeing in my life was cookie monster
because I opened my I don't know at one point,
I just know that I guess I had a stuffed
cookie monster, you know, like a muppet in the crib,

(44:23):
and I just remember sitting there with this big blue monster.
So the first thing that I remember comprehending in this
life was something that was a fantasy creature. That may
explain a lot. But I got an email from David.
He said, memories from the crib. He said, me too.
I remember being in the crib, he said. I could
not talk yet, but I did understand what my parents

(44:46):
were saying. It was frustrating as I struggled trying to
make my thoughts into spoken words. No doubt, just babble
came out, and I could tell my parents did not
realize that I understood them. That's interesting, don't you think? So?
I wonder how many other people are like me and David.

(45:08):
You know, it's funny speaking of childhood and you know,
youthful memories and stuff like that. As I sit here
talking to you, I look over and I have this
letter opener and when I I'm going to be fifty
this year, and when I was in elementary school. Uh,
it was right in the heart of the DARE program.

(45:32):
Dare It's Drug Abuse Resistance Education DARE to keep kids
off drugs, and they would have a deputy. A deputy
would come and talk to us about drugs and how
bad they were. And I'm you know, I'm sure DARE
is still around. But I have this letter opener that
I got an elementary school, and I'm holding it in

(45:55):
my hand right now, and it says DARE to keep
kids off drugs. And I just realized I have moved
all over the place. I have moved from Asheville to
numerous places in North Carolina, to Puerto Rico, Texas, Las Vegas.

(46:15):
I don't know how many houses I've lived in. And
you just can't keep up with anything. You lose everything
or stuff ends up in storage. But somehow, this little
letter opener has followed me since I was a kid.
Isn't that weird? Do you have some little weird object
and you're like, how has this followed me for decades?

(46:36):
And it looks almost pristine? I mean, I don't know
what to make of that. Do you have something like
that in your life brings back memories? Here's a mental
mana for you. That's what I call just off the
wall stuff that I talk about sometimes as I look

(46:57):
at this little little letter open that I had when
I was in elementary school. You know, obviously I was
destined to become a writer, so I was always into
books in the library. And at one point when I
was in elementary school, we had library time and they
kind of set us all loose. I don't know what
grade I was in, but they set us all loose,

(47:19):
and a friend of mine named Chris, he said, Josh, Josh,
come here, look at this. And I walked over and
he had found this big book that he pulled off
the shelf and he opened it up and it was
full of all these sketches of naked women. This was

(47:40):
an art book, okay, but I'd never seen anything quite
like that, and neither had he. So we were just
sitting there, chuckling and looking through this thing, and all
of a sudden, this great looming shadow appears behind us
and we turn around and it's the librarian. I won't
tell you her name, and she jerks that book out

(48:03):
of our hands and she glares at us and she said,
this is not funny. This is not funny. And I
don't know if I've ever laughed harder in my life,
because it was funny, and I don't know why, but

(48:26):
I still think it's funny and it tells It creates
some kind of image between I don't know, some kind
of intellectual education class and the reality of being a
kid and the confusing situations you end up in sometimes
in these situations that they call educational. Oh well, that's

(48:48):
a mental manner for you. All right, folks, we're at
the end of the show. If you can close your eyes,
take a deep breath. Here is the good Fortune tone.

(49:19):
That's it for this edition of the show. Follow me
at Joshua P. Warren Plus, visit Joshuapwarren dot com to
sign up for my free e newsletter to receive a
free instant gift, and check out the cool stuff in
the Curiosity Shop. All at Joshuapwarren dot com. I have

(49:39):
a fun one lined up for you next time, I promise,
So please tell all your friends to subscribe to this
show and to always remember the Golden Rule. Thank you
for listening, thank you for your interest and support, Thank
you for staying curious, and I will talk to you

(49:59):
again in soon. You've been listening to strange things on
the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal Podcast Network.

Speaker 2 (50:23):
Well, if you like this episode of Strange Things, wait
till you hear the next one. Thank you for listening
to the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal Podcast Network.