Image: One of Diana Souza's beautiful title pages for a section of the book.

These stories were sent to me by e-mail from Deb Cornish, who is Case Manager for the Distant Healing Network’s Instant Response Team. She lives in upstate New York.

Hello Laurie - Three stories for you... one happened to my sister, and two to me....

My sister told me her story late one night, at my house. We both live in small towns in upstate New York. We were sitting in my living room, talking about the usual things, when she suddenly told me that something unusual had happened to her.

She said that she was getting out of the bathtub one night, and started to fall (she was alone in the house) - the tub in the house is an old Victorian clawfoot, and set up high.... she knew it would be a hard fall... she felt someone grab her and set her down on the floor unharmed. My sister is a big woman - it must have been one strong angel.

The angel saved her from certain disaster. She was home alone, and would have fallen into the wall and cracked her head. My sister is a bit of a skeptic about angels, but what happened to her was so compelling, that she admitted something had intervened, she had to believe a little bit.

I have had several encounters with angels. One was on a cold winter’s night, as I was waiting to cross a street. I was in my car, it was late at night, and I was ready to go to sleep. I was working two jobs at the time, and I was heading home from the night job at a local department store at the mall. I could see my apartment when I was getting ready to cross the street - it was that close. I started across the intersection - and it was as if someone pushed my car back to safety. The force of the push sent my 1991 Plymouth Sundance back to where it had started - at the stop sign. The road had been deserted, but a car suddenly came down the street at an excessive rate of speed - it was not doing 30 mph, that I can tell you... maybe 60, possibly 70. If I had been in the street at the time, I would have been killed. I have never felt so relieved in my life... I remember parking my car in the apartment building lot, and sitting there shaking... The push was so strong - it moved my car and me backwards.

And a small one - I had to go to the Social Security office after my father died to get some forms... he had died several weeks before, and I was still grieving a lot. A man came up to me and said - "He is fine. Do not worry about him." I said something to the effect that he would not know what I was going through.... He said, "Your father is fine and at peace" and said my father's name. I looked at him - I got the ragged looking American angel, with the bottle in the paper bag! I remember his very soft voice - and turning around to look for him again... and he was gone. Vanished? That simple message that my dad was fine, not to worry... and knowing his name - it shook me... and made me laugh, too... I guess we all want angels that are big and radiant and special, with wings... I learned that you cannot judge a book by its cover... or maybe it was about entertaining angels unaware of it? On a bleak March day in the city - very little snow, and the city looked at its worst. And I had a message from beyond. I have never forgotten that, and the comfort that it gave me... hope this helps.