“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(The note was from Billie, Jerry’s stepmother, who had died in 1965. Neither Jerry nor her father had seen the note before, and it had a strong emotional effect on both of them. A further puzzle was due to the fact that for some time before her death Billie could not write, so Jerry was curious as to just when the note had been written.

(Billie was the third wife of Jerry’s father, and she herself had been married once before. Jerry added many italic notes after I’d typed the session.

(Jane had been resting a hand upon Billie’s note. Now she held it up. She told us later she’d had the urge to wrinkle it up.)

This was written in 1964. (Possible. Couldn’t write approximately 2 months before death.) A connection with Billie and apples. I see a parlor, with a table with an old-fashioned beaded type lamp, with a globe, on the table. With a deeply colored scarf, with fringes (collected antiques, house full of old stuff).

Connection with initials M S, and a long car ride. The father went with Billie on a long car trip. That is, not terribly long, but perhaps 20 miles. (Orlando, FL, 20 mile trip approximately, to hospital, often.) He wore the jacket that day and the note was in the jacket, and she put it there and he didn’t know it was there.

I think Billie isn’t pleased with certain sleeping arrangements having to do with the father… Something to do with a second floor back room bedroom. (He is now in 2nd floor back bedroom. She never saw house. Moved in after Billie’s death.) She thinks he should sleep downstairs.

I feel that Billie is pretty close about. There is something about a… I seem to sense Billie at this time wearing dark-colored dress, not black, that Jerry might remember, of violet or purple color. Some kind of velvet material… A kind of soft material to the touch. It looks like velvet. At one time it had a white collar that could be detached. (Pause. Jerry doesn’t remember. She was dressy. Very.

I just picked up something about Jerry don’t do something, connected with snow. This is my interpretation: Don’t shovel snow? I’m just guessing. It takes me a while to get back in this. (Jerry broke leg, falling in snow. Billie disturbed.)

(Now Jane suddenly pounded her left fist on the table so hard that the cups and saucers and other objects jumped violently. The gesture was so rapid and violent that I too jumped. I was instantly concerned lest Jane physically injure her hand, so hard were the blows, several now in succession. It is here that Jane was someone else, at least briefly; Jerry later said she had the same feeling, and that Jane’s gestures and voice and manner, including head shaking and language, were those of Billie.

(True, Jerry said. Jane was shaking her head here again; she seemed to be trying to explain Billie’s attitude. The pace was so fast I didn’t get it down verbatim.

(The effect of the data here was that Billie seemed most concerned that we understand her true attitude toward Jerry’s father.)

Something about Linda (Jerry’s daughter—Lorinda. 5 now), that Linda is a wild one (yes, she is wild). I don’t want answers: is Linda 6? The furniture bill. Something about it coming due. Seems to be important… A bill… Either due on Jerry’s house, or for Billie’s in the past that Jerry’s father didn’t meet, or something that wasn’t paid for. I think on Jerry’s house, but I’m not sure. (He has bills and just took out another loan—Jerry unhappy here.)

She wants him to be his old self. (Pause, head down.) I seem to see a distant connection with Wisconsin (? Will ask aunt), on Billie’s part, I think… A wedding anniversary and a string of beads. (She wore beads a lot.) She was trying to get through Jerry to get to the father because she wanted him to know that she was with him as much as ever, and then she sort of laughs and says more so, probably more so.

Now I feel, Robbie, I got more but I’m going to break… I think there’s something about Vermont. (Trip to Vermont ten years ago, to funeral of good friend of Billie’s—very emotional on Billie’s part.

(Jerry said that the data echoed Billie’s fiery, hot-tempered disposition very well, and that the phrases Jane cited like “guts and gumption”, etc., were the exact ones used by Billie. Billie swore often and talked very fast, as noted in the data. Billie was dominant over her father, Jerry said; she was very insistent and wouldn’t back down in an argument.

(Jerry said that emotionally Jane acted much like Billie, that there was good contact here, and that in the fight scene she thought that Jane was Billie. Billie died at age 47. Jane rubbed her right hip as she talked, and Jerry said that Billie had a bad hip in the same area, and rubbed it also as Jane had done.

(Jerry said she didn’t see how Billie could have written the note when Jane said she did, in November 1964, since Billie died in 1965 [just two months into the year] and had been unable to write for some time before her death. As we talked however now, Jane said Billie was “still there” and that she now insisted this was the correct time re the note-writing.

(Billie was the third wife of Jerry’s father, and she had been married once before herself. She caught the father “running around,” Jerry said, and raised hell. Jerry remembered that in connection with the Tony data, the name of Billie’s first husband was Anthony. Jerry said that as far as she knew Anthony wasn’t dead, but that she would check; perhaps death had occurred.

(All the while we talked, Jane said Billie was still with us, and that she could have resumed at any time. Jerry verified other data I did not make notes on, including the Vermont and Wisconsin names. Supper time was approaching, and so the experimental session ended.