Doug Tales 62: Auras, Part Two

One dictionary definition of the term, “aura” is “an energy field that is held to emanate from a living being.” Doug Mendenhall learned from his youngest daughter Denise in 1999 that different colors of auras exist around people, and that some people can perceive or see them. Denise gained the ability to see such energy fields after recovering from a coma at that time. Later, her (and Doug’s) descriptions would be expanded and added to, but Doug’s first days of aura awareness included seeing in a new way the people in his life, as described in My Peace I Give Unto You (2001) on pages 92-95:

Knock, knock.

“Daddy, are you in there?” It was Denise.

“You know I am.”

Since coming home from the hospital a week and a half ago, she wouldn’t leave my side. She slept in our bedroom, she followed me around the house, and if I went into the bathroom, she sat out by the door knocking every few minutes asking if I was finished.

“Denise, what do you want?” There was no place in the house safe from her.

“Daddy, can I come in? Are you done thinking now?”

“Yes, Denise, you can come in.” I gave up trying to be alone.

“Daddy, don’t you believe me?”

“Yeah, I do.” I thought for a moment. “Would you do something for me?”

“Sure, Daddy. What do you want?”

“Come with me.” A totally unnecessary request considering her recent clingy behavior.

We walked into the kitchen where Dianne had started lunch.

“Okay, look at Mom. What color is she?” Dianne glanced at me and shrugged.

“Pretty yellow.”

“Bright or light yellow?” I responded.

“Who cares as long as it’s pretty!” Dianne joked.

“Light yellow.”

We looked around the corner at one of my sons watching television.

“What color is your brother?”

“Yellow, too.”

I turned and pointed to another daughter in the living room.

“ . . . and your sister?”

“Yellow, duh.”

“Is anybody not yellow?”

“Sure, the doctors were purple . . . oh, and one nurse was very blue.”

“Is the color all around us?”

“Uh huh.”

“Is it a thick band of color?” I punctuated my question by motioning with my hand, trying to portray the color coming out from my head to a distance of about four inches.

“Sometimes, sometimes no.” She understood my question and mimicked several thicknesses.

“Are there many colors?” I wasn’t sure how well a ten-year-old could describe different color hues, not to mention that she was still having some trouble with her selection of words.

“Uh huh.” She nodded her head. “There’s yellow, red, blue, purple, green, white.” As she said each color she checked them off on her fingers.

“Do you know what the colors mean?”

“Huh?”

“Well, if I was red and angry, then what am I when I’m green?”

“Sick.”

“What about purple, if doctors are purple does that mean that they are smart?”

“No.”

“Are all doctors purple?”

“No, not that one from the long ways away.” Frustration crossed her face. She knew the word she wanted to use but couldn’t get it out.

“You mean that nice doctor from South Africa?” I guessed that the one doctor that stood out in my memory would be the same one that stood out in hers.

“Yeah, I like him. He’s funny.” She smiled.

I wondered why wasn’t he purple like the others?

“Who is white?”

“Jesus and John, his friend.”

Why didn’t I think to ask how she knew that Jesus had a white aura? And who was John and why was he white? Those questions didn’t even cross my mind at that time. It was as if I was not to ask them.

“Okay, then it sounds like if you’re sick your aura is green. If you’re a doctor, your aura is purple. And if you’re in the Mendenhall family, your aura is yellow.” I joked.

“Daddy!” She laughed.

“Okay then, yellow is most people,” she nodded her head, “and red is me giving you a shot, uh, no, angry.” We both smiled.

“So what is purple?” I asked and she shrugged.

“Hmm, what was different about the South African doctor?”

“He was nice,” Denise said.

“He listened to us and treated us like we knew something.” I added and she nodded.

“Oh, of course, purple is pride.” I looked at her; she was confused.

“Pride is where you think you are better than somebody else.” I explained.

“That’s it.” She nodded.

“So, what is blue? . . . ”

I continued to ask her questions through the rest of the afternoon until she wouldn’t answer any more.

I was fascinated by my little girl and all that I had learned from her.

I went to bed that night in a chaotic cloud of questions and thoughts. Denise slept just a few feet from Dianne and me.