“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(The 63rd envelope experiment was held during the session. The object was two sections of a red ribbon taped to a piece of heavy Bristol board. I found the ribbon in the bed of our cat on about June 20. I knew nothing of its history consciously, and hoped Jane and Seth could help out. As it developed Jane was somewhat hard- pressed to identify the ribbon, did so eventually, and with Seth’s verification. We regard such objects, where we know little of the history, as being like objects furnished by others.

(This was our first session since June 29,1966. Jane said she had no idea of what Seth would talk about. She began as usual at 9 PM, her eyes closed, sitting down, in a good voice and with pauses.)

(Break at 9:30. Jane was dissociated as usual. Midway through the delivery her eyes began to open often. She resumed in the same manner at 9:40.)

(Break at 10:00. Jane was again out as usual. Her eyes had been open most of the time. Her manner had been active, she had smoked, sipped wine, etc. Resume at 10:08.)

(“Yes.” At 10:14 Jane took the sealed double envelope from me for our 63rd experiment, without opening her eyes. She pressed it to her forehead in a horizontal position. Before tonight’s session we agreed to hold envelope experiments on Mondays only.)

(Break at 10:28. Jane out as usual. Her eyes had remained closed, her pace good. She said she had images within only when Seth “said so”. She was not unduly nervous at the idea of an experiment after our vacation.

(See the tracing on page 270 and the notes on page 271. As stated I picked the red ribbon used as object from the bed of our cat on about June 20, with little idea of its history. It developed that Jane had to think hard in order to tentatively link the object with a hand-knit sweater she had received from her mother as a birthday present. Jane’s birthday is May 8, but she received the package sometime after this; we located a letter from Jane’s mother dated May 10, in which she discusses mailing the sweater to Jane soon. [This session was held on July 18.]

(“Parallelogram, or something parallel, rather emphatically so. Like roads with white markings, and with fairly large areas between, and with darkness around or outside also.” It is interesting to note that Jane said after the session that she doesn’t know what a parallelogram looks like. The ribbon arrangement on the Bristol of course is an X shape rather than parallel; both shapes are geometrical. The dictionary assigns this shape to a parallelogram,

(Nor did Jane know the diagram for parallax. We believe she was on the right track in spite of her semantic difficulty, however, with the roads data and the white markings, areas between, etc. Jane’s personal idea was that Seth used parallelogram to lead up to the rest of the data here. In this respect see page 274, where Seth mentions Jane’s associations.

(Jane located the inside box in which the sweater was packed, and remembered this box being inside another. The ribbon from which the object was taken was around the outside box, she felt; she also remembered a note with the sweater, but we could not locate it. We did find her mother’s letter of May 10th however.

(“Connection with a nurse, or nursing.” Jane’s mother is a bedridden arthritic in a nursing home at Middle Grove, NY. A nurse friend at the hospital there runs her errands for her, etc., and mailed the sweater to Jane shortly after May 10,1966. Jane’s mother mentions the name of the nurse, Fran, specifically in the letter of May 10.

(“Scripts.” Seth, after break, reinforces Jane’s idea that a note was enclosed with the sweater, but we cannot find the note and so can’t demonstrate this.

(“A distant connection with the country.” We believe this data and the parallelogram data are related, since the latter developed into the mention of roads. The nursing home or hospital in which Jane’s mother is cared for is also actually in the country, outside the small town of Middle Grove,NY. The ribbon which served as envelope object of course helped wrap a package coming from Jane’s mother. Seth confirms the data relationship also.

(“The word seisograph comes to mind. Or marks like earthquake marks on a graph. Printing I believe at the lower center, outside of a margin, or implied margin. Very small, the printing very small, perhaps D E L. Part of the word delivered, I do not know. Perhaps a connection with some item delivered.” Again, see Seth’s comments on page 274, concerning his use of Jane’s associations. We think the above block of data is a good example of his attempts to have Jane talk about the delivery of a package to our door. Seth and Jane here seem to permit the use of such association in a much freer manner than in the past.

(We think the above data also leads into the next: “And with music, or marks that suggest notes. A note, you see.” Again the use of free association… “This was to lead us to the word note.” As stated, Jane remembers a note being enclosed with the sweater sent to her by her mother. We could not find the note however. Jane believes the note was actually written on the back of a birthday card. We located the letter of May 10 from Jane’s mother, concerning the mailing of the sweater to Jane, but do not believe the above data refers to that letter exclusively, although there is evidently some connection.

(“Something to do with a dying out or fading away, as a score.” There is a possible connection with this data and the letter to Jane from her mother on May 10,1966. This letter too is written on a card. The front of the card contains a picture of three cherubs singing. One of them plays an accordion, the other two hold sheets of music on which the scores are clearly visible. Note the mention of music also in the data on pages 274 and 276. Besides telling Jane about the sweater, Jane’s mother wrote in the May 10 letter of the death of a family friend, Father Ryan, and enclosed a news clipping account of the funeral, which was to be held shortly. Father Ryan died of leukemia and his death was expected; it could correspond to “dying out” or “fading away”.

(Had we not found the May 10 letter we wouldn’t have thought of the connections immediately above; even as it is I would hesitate to claim them without further data from Seth. Jane thinks they are legitimate.

(Jane resumed in a quiet manner at 10:52.)

(End at 10:57. Jane was dissociated as usual, her eyes closed.)