GHOSTS
Do you believe in ghosts?
My grandmother Frances did. Enough to tell people that when she died, she would come back to haunt her own house. She passed away six months before I was born, but I grew up in the home that she and my grandfather built, so I felt her ghostly presence in every room.
Not long after I was born, Frances appeared several times to my nanny, but she didn’t tell my mom about the ghostly visits until a couple years later, when it happened again after my younger brother was born. She said she became aware of a presence behind her dressed in mauve and smelling like flowers. Frances’ signature perfume was a floral scent, Piaguet’s Fracas, and she loved pink, dressing in shades of lavender, rose and mauve.
Frances was drawn to the esoteric and believed in mystics of all sorts. According to my mom, Frances was attuned to her own psychic abilities, “once she visited an old stately home outside of London and got very agitated and cold and had to leave. She found out later that the place had once been used as an insane asylum.” I too, regularly have unexplained reactions to places or people that I later learn are accurate impressions. Sometimes these feelings hit me so strong that I can’t even go into an environment. For example, I’ve spent a lot of time visiting astro-archeological sites throughout Mexico, yet rarely have I swam in an adjacent cenote. Cenotes are natural pits filled with groundwater where pre Columbian Maya stored water supplies. Some cenotes were also used by the Maya to offer valuables and human bodies as a form of sacrifice to the rain god Chaac. I don’t know about you, but I don’t need to be swimming on top of a graveyard, no matter how many tourists are taking selfies against the deep blue backdrop of its cooling waters.
The Maya were heavy into astronomy and many of their impressive builds, like Chichén Itzá and Dzibilchaltun, were used to observe and predict astronomical events, the stars and change of seasons. Once, on a romantic trip to the Yucatán Peninsula which happened to coincide with the Winter Solstice, I watched spiritual tourists charge their crystals on the steps of this pyramid at Dzibilchaltun.
I’m not going to pretend that I didn’t bring my own travel bag of crystals on this trip— but I would never charge them in the sunlight on a pyramid where who knows what happened centuries ago. As I told you in Letting Go, I believe that places and objects hold energy. I’m not about to mess with spirits at ritualistic sites, whether in my home country or abroad. This is literally the premise for every franchise film about treasure seekers and bad guys trying to steal ancient artifacts to control mankind. When humans make offerings or wishes, it’s usually not for world peace and the highest good. Unlike the ancient Gods, most of us aren’t praying for rain or a bountiful harvest (though maybe we should be.) Most often, when we use “magick” we are seeking love, revenge, material possessions, power. I believe that in addition to the spirits that are hanging around sacred sites, so too are human desires, some good, some truly evil. So I try to be respectful of what might be hanging around. I have enough of my own baggage to worry about picking up someone else’s.
I’m passing along advice to tread carefully with the spirit world because I learned a number of lessons the hard way before I developed awareness of boundaries with the dead.
In many cultures around the world, the interconnection between the living and deceased is more fluid. I now live in Hawaii where spiritual tourists regularly trespass in places that are kapu (sacred, forbidden, taboo) to outsiders. Spiritual wellness influencers abound on the islands, performing made up rituals and leaving weird shit like underwear and human ashes (in plastic bags that don’t decay, no less) at sacred heiau (Hawaiian temples.) This species of influencer is my favorite to troll, aka the type of person who looks at an expensive crystal in a spiritual seeker shop as a single tear rolls down their face for effect. I am not making that up, by the way, this was an actual eyewitness account.
What many of these influencers aren’t aware of is how deeply Hawaiian culture revere ancestors (kūpuna) and the places where they have been buried. Remains, or bones (iwi) are believed to hold the mana (essence) of the person and thus need to be protected. When ancestors pass, their resting place is kept secret, lest someone desecrate or worse, try to steal their mana. Desecration of iwi kūpuna is not taken lightly, laws are in place that are meant to protect Native Hawaiian burial sites from development. These laws require state agencies to assist in preserving or relocating “discovered” burial sites. The law also requires Native Hawaiian involvement and participation in the decision-making process.
As I write about ghosts for you, there’s a community protest happening in my neighborhood at a construction site where iwi kūpuna are being dug up. As often happens here, mainland buyers who buy property as an investment don’t take the time to understand local customs, and find themselves up shits creek. In this case, the buyers decided to start renovations without observing the guidelines for determining whether they would be digging up a graveyard. Word is that they were planning to create a yoga retreat. Local justice operates in its own way, and three contractors have already left the project.
I believe that we all have extra sensory perception, a spidey sense that we often ignore. When something is off (but we can’t place our finger on what exactly,) it may be expressed as a sharp pang, a tightening or loosing of the bowels, an uncomfortable “sinking feeling'' — like the expression “my stomach dropped.” We also receive positive hits or ideas that we often tell ourselves are illogical but might actually be correct. Within our hearts lies an inner oracle. Often it just “knows” things our brains cannot rationalize. The 17th century French physicist, philosopher and mathematician Blaise Pascal famously wrote, “The heart has its reasons, which reason does not know… We know truth, not only by the reason, but also by the heart.”
Everyone has the ability for somatic awareness innately inside, but it is usually drowned out by mental noise and societal conditioning. Or by what other people think is “best” for us and how we are expected to behave. I get calls all the time from friends asking me to help them make decisions (they tell me it is “because you are so intuitive.”) In each and every case, when I am asked for advice, the person asking already knows what is best for them—they just need reminding to tap into and have faith in their instincts. I am not a psychic. I have learned by trial and error to tune in, and you can too. Of course, sometimes the hardest person to trust is ourself.
Since I a kid, I’ve been told I was “too sensitive.” Over time, I’ve acquired confidence in my sensitive nature and stopped worrying what other people think. At least I’m in touch with my feelings instead of ignoring them. As an adult, I’ve encountered hundreds of hyper sensitive kindred spirits (the living kind,) often other artists and creatives. A few years ago I interviewed my friend, fashion designer Alessandro Michele (then at Gucci, now at Valentino) for an episode of The Sex Ed podcast and we got to talking about our dead fathers and how they communicate to us via electricity.
Me: Do you feel them with you, your parents?
Alessandro: …Always. I completely think that the energy of people stays around us….For example, yesterday night ... It's just so strange. I don't want people to think about me as a crazy guy but I was saying to my boyfriend…”When you are not with me there is always electricity in the room, at home, the lights turn always ..."
Me: That's the ghosts.
Alessandro: I don't know why.
Me: It does in my house too.
Alessandro: Really?
Me: Yeah.
Alessandro: I mean, always…we call a lot of people to check the electricity, everything. There is nothing. Yesterday he left and, again, this is not the first time, that there is a big light in my dining room and the room ... I switch off everything and it stays...
Me: Yeah. It stays illuminated.
Alessandro:… Every time I'm alone there is a problem with the light. Everywhere.
Me: They're just letting you know that they're with you.
Alessandro: Yeah. I'm sure. I'm starting to believe. It's so strange. It's impossible that every house has this problem, every room and every single hotel, same problem... It's strange but at the end I think that we are energy. When I saw my dad when he die he was like sleeping on a bed and I thought that he was alive. I didn't see before ...
Me: A dead body?
Alessandro: Yeah. A dead body. Never.
Me: Same when I saw my father dead. It was the first time.
Alessandro: First time. That's strange. I mean, I saw him and ... I hugged him. I understood that his energy was not anymore there. I started to cry for a long time and talking to him like he was alive…I looked at him and I said to myself, "Ale, maybe he's floating I don't know where." I mean, something came out from his body. It's just like a mannequin. I felt myself happy because I understood ... more about the idea of death.
Me: Yeah.
Alessandro: It's just an empty machine and the energy is outside. It's so beautiful ... I mean, every time I think about my dad I think about something magical, they appear as a bird. He loved birds and I said, "Maybe now he's a bird."
Me: I see butterflies in my garden and I know it's my dad.
I believe in spirits and other realms that cannot be explained by science, but I also try to keep my feet on the ground and take everything with a big grain of salt. Hence, no crying at the sight of a gorgeous specimen of rose quartz. That said, I know that there is more to what we don’t know than what we’d call rational. While I am cautious about letting unknown spirits in too close, I am not afraid to connect with my ancestors, drawing upon their spirits as a source of inspiration and guidance.
Contemporary Halloween originates from an ancient Celtic pagan festival known as Samhain. It was celebrated from October 31 to November 1st as the Fall / Winter harvest was gathered. Samhain welcomed in the darker months of the year and was considered a time when the veils between the physical and spirit worlds were so thin as to allow humans to connect more readily with spirits, including those of their deceased ancestors. Día de los Muertos, (Day of the Dead) and the Mayan celebration Hanal Pixan, (Food for the Souls) are both traditionally held between October 31-November 2 to honor the deceased.
We can revere those who have passed away at any time of the year, whether we keep a loved one’s photo in a place of pride; light a candle in their memory; wear a treasured garment or piece of jewelry that was passed down to us.
In the 1600s, people paid homage to their dearly departed through a style of accessory that became known as “mourning jewelry” that incorporated jet, onyx, enamel, gold and strands of hair of the deceased. The hair was believed to hold the essence of a person. Mourning jewelry later became popularized by Queen Victoria of England, who, after the death of her husband Albert in 1861, spent the next forty years wearing black dresses and fabulous jewels. You might even call her an OG Goth influencer. Here’s a couple of examples below of mourning jewelry. The braided “bow” brooch looks like mesh metal, but is in fact, hair.
Some of Queen Victoria’s personal collection of mourning jewelry was sold at auction at Sotheby’s in 2021. The cross-shaped brooch below, made to honor her daughter Princess Alice, who died from diphtheria, featured a lock of Alice’s hair. It went for £25,200 ($34,578.)
I used to collect mourning jewelry as part of my overall fascination with second hand garments. I love that every piece holds undiscovered revelations about its past lives. Spirits haunt old ball gowns, spare gloves and faded velvet corsages—their voices speak to me, recalling distant times. My grandmother Frances was once a silent film actress and a model for Vogue in the 1920s. While Edward Steichen’s photographs captured her look for posterity, sadly, little of her personal wardrobe survived, save for a bright yellow coat and an enamel minaudière that still contains her red lipstick, powder and perfume. Sometimes I open it up just to smell the traces of her makeup, to remind myself that she was a real person, not just a glamorous figure in a fading photo.
I don’t need Frances clothes or makeup to remember her by, but I remain convinced that a large part of our collective interest in vintage clothes is due to wanting to inhabit the energy of the spirits that linger in their pockets and folds. Why else would there be a lucrative market for Marilyn Monroe’s dresses or Elizabeth Taylor’s iconic jewelry? During my time working for the fashion department at Sotheby’s in NYC, I produced the photography and cataloging of the clothing for the Marlene Dietrich Estate auction and mounted the costume exhibition for the Duke & Duchess of Windsor sale. The backstories I could tell you about both those auctions…something about dead celebrities truly brings out our inner freak.
As I sift through my life and detach from the ghosts I’ve encountered, I’m writing pages upon pages to share here. One of my favorite parts of releasing work in this format is receiving feedback in real time. I’d love to know what resonates with you so far and what you want to hear more about. Drop me a line in the comments and let me know.
P.S. If you want to listen to the full podcast episode with Alessandro Michele, where we talk about our erotic relationships to nature; why Rome is his mistress; moving beyond confining modes of masculinity; his passion for dressing like a 1950s granny and how he channels orgasmic energy every day, here it is:
Dearest Liz. Living in Hawaii has opened up your chi. The words, images, energy are flowing like water into your beautiful stories and are so wonderful to read. Thank you for sharing. I miss you.
I worked as an archaeologist in america and in Australia in another role along with indigenous people and also was involved a bit in researching the impact of nagpra. People buying and selling grave goods and making up rituals on sacred sites they dont understand i think brings back negativity. It is not good. Was interested to hear that John Lennon owned and displayed a full on egyptian mummy in his apartment. And Yoko ono said she was warned by multiple people with ESP he was in danger and he didnt listen to her.