(Read: ~13 minutes)
In the 1960s, the inventor of the photocopier wrote UVA a check to fund the creation of DOPS. He and the university showed guts in the face of criticism and scrutiny to study what they call memory of reincarnation type, the metaphysical equivalent of making copies. Plenty of people do a double-take upon learning there’s a group of scientists studying what DOPS’ website describes as the survival of consciousness after bodily death.
The medical school at the state’s flagship university has frequently walked along the cutting edge of both exploration and controversy. The institution once boasted an anatomy theater designed by its founder, Thomas Jefferson, who oversaw construction of the medical facility along with the rest of the university. Inside the structure, students dissected corpses, usually illegally exhumed bodies of slaves and free blacks. The young, would-be doctors often took it upon themselves to desecrate the graves in order to supply their need for study materials. A legend recounts the story of a farmer who awoke to the sound of several men digging up the body of one of his slaves buried earlier in the day. Outraged, he fired his gun at the would-be snatchers, allegedly striking one in the back. The students involved had the gall to file charges against the farmer for assault, though the local grand jury refused to issue the warrant. At the same time, the law also turned a blind eye to the students’ practice of desecrating graves in the name of research, which continued for years at the school.
The urge to examine past practices under a modern viewpoint quickly turns problematic if your goal is to understand their behavior and not to judge. Practices long considered useful and beneficial are often abandoned when contradictory information and new preferences emerge. Lives ultimately benefited from the grave-robbing activity of those men, at the expense of disenfranchised communities, further victimized. Certain aspects of history still manage to induce a worthy cringe in hindsight, progress personified by the torchbearers in front of the museum in Norfolk. In fact, the anatomy theater is the only Jefferson-designed building ever demolished at UVA.
Looking back at morbid memorabilia marking aspects of the medical school’s macabre history, I wondered if certain heinous minds took advantage of the situation to express their own gruesome personalities. Case in point, the medical school’s long-running Cadaver Society posed annually, spanning decades, for a club photograph in front of fully exposed corpses, body sections and the year’s best medical abnormalities. The men usually marked the occasion with a parody tombstone touting their athletic exploits and satirizing rivals at the university, including tug of war, circa 1893, which saw the vicious beating of the law school club in the name of science.
Perhaps the club’s humor is only a glimpse of the coping mechanisms needed to thrive amid death’s twisted force. But the researchers at DOPS now operate under a robust set of professional ethics and standards stressing patient autonomy and welfare while considering relevant cultural differences and requirements. They’re no quacks either, having trained at the country’s best schools in medicine or similar research specialties, and unlikely to push snake oil. Rather, most are fascinated by human brains and the reasons why a few push the boundaries of what’s considered normal.
An intake coordinator, typically a graduate assistant, screens all inbound cases at DOPS, collecting basic information using a standard questionnaire. The questions asked during the initial screening later help identify and weed out the obvious fakes. Most of those cases involve misguided parents and kids who go along to please mom or dad. After the intake interview, a researcher such as Dr. Gaston reviews the file to judge the merit of the case and determine next steps, if any.
A few years after he began working at DOPS, Gaston maintained a healthy skepticism about past life experiences and psychic abilities. He managed to sufficiently explain the strange occurrences he came across in his investigations in logical ways. Unbeknownst to him, his life would never be the same after reviewing the notes of a recent screening call for a case assigned to him concerning a child down in Norfolk.
He noted key details while scanning the call log. Rosa already turned eight, being older than five or six years of age raises a major red flag at DOPS. Unable to invent complicated stories, younger kids present a better case for past-life experiences. On the plus side, Gaston saw no history of reincarnation in the family’s faith tradition, eliminating a major source of claims difficult to study due to cultural influence. Gaston read how the child remembered and reacted to a death experience, but not one of her own. This was an anomaly making her case different, because if the kid remembers details about death, it’s normally about their own passing. The child may remember the place, the time of day, or the excruciating pain. Potentially, our worst moments never go away, like a collection of programs used to store, combine and reuse the way we live and die. Years later our pain still remains, stretching misery into hopelessly unending eternity.
Gaston wasn’t ready to accept such claims, since he doubted any part of human consciousness stuck around after death and questioned how human existence could repeat. Still, he noted how the story’s creator deserved kudos for originality by changing up the typical death experience with a creative angle. He also enjoyed the lost love story. Even though the child’s claims lacked compelling evidence and failed to meet several basic criteria, his gut told him to investigate the case. Gut feelings carried zero weight at DOPS. To take a case, there must be a valid reason grounded in accepted scientific principles. Instead of moving on, he reread the intake call notes again. He tapped his fingers on his desk, crinkled his nose, frowned and shook his head no. Then he followed his gut instinct and called the mother in Norfolk to talk about her daughter. Usually, if the case warrants further action, the goal becomes to talk to the kids. Under additional scrutiny, coaching by parents usually becomes obvious when the story starts to break down worse than a kindergarten recital.
Letitia answered and Gaston explained why he called and his role at DOPS. His doubts about her motives faded when he heard how relieved she sounded while thanking him for returning her call. She talked excitedly and struggled to catch her breath while describing all of her child’s claims. She finished with a raw, emotional plea for help.
The case triggered a feeling in Gaston’s gut, making him believe the child experienced valid sensations, just not past life experiences. He wanted to meet Rosa and requested the family come to Charlottesville for a consultation. Letitia agreed and thanked him. Then she told him taking time off from work might take awhile, plus she needed to put money aside to pay for bus fares.
Normally, Gaston waited until prospective clients showed up in Charlottesville. This time, he surprised himself by offering to make a house call, which he never did. A few days later, on an unusually warm winter morning, he made the roughly three-hour drive to Norfolk and Letitia’s small one-bedroom apartment.
She folded up her sleeper sofa before Gaston arrived, and after he gave a simple, awkward introduction of himself, he joined mother and daughter on the couch. Letitia sat between Rosa and Gaston and he began to ask simple questions, like what she enjoyed about going to school.
“Spending time with my friends,” she answered while leaning against her mother.
People reported sensing the visceral anxiety around La Bohème later in life, describing a cold feeling suddenly descending upon you, sucking away your energy. Most of the time, she never manifested the phenomena on purpose, only when she wanted to avoid scrutiny. Legend says the energy caused by Rosa’s apprehension gave Gaston goosebumps. In order to get out of the cramped living room, he initiated a change of scenery by suggesting a trip to the museum. He wanted to see Rosa’s reaction to the artwork firsthand and also get away from the creepy vibe.
The warm winter sunshine felt soothing walking the few blocks to the museum. Gaston shortened his stride and moved slowly to match the leisurely pace set by Letitia, who took a deep breath of the ocean air drifting over the city. Rosa ran a dozen steps ahead, turned, laughed, waited, repeating the process throughout the walk.
Working with children fell outside Gaston’s natural comfort zone. All the child psych books he read for the job bored the hell out of him, and for the most part he found their insight completely useless in terms of building rapport with children. So he picked up a few dog training books and found quick success applying several tactics and strategies. Information including how to greet dogs properly and tips on getting nervous dogs to relax around you proved particularly useful with children. Ignore them. Claim your space. Let them sniff you out. Gaston focused his attention on answering the questions Letitia asked while on the walk.
Right from the start, she peppered him with questions to figure out his angle.
“Why’s a smart guy studying past-life memories?”
Of course he avoided the real reason he worked at DOPS. Instead he explained in a soft, confident voice, another dog book tip, how everybody’s brain works differently for lots of different reasons. He wanted to find people manifesting special capabilities.
“And you think you’ve found one in Rosa?”
“Time will tell,” he answered while eying his potential subject up ahead.
“And then how will you be able to help my daughter?”
Gaston remembered a section of the dog training manual dealing with apprehension in a pet’s owner. Instead of diving into details about tests and gadgets, he focused on a simple, constructive message.
“Help Rosa understand her capabilities.”
They stepped around an area in the old, sinking sidewalk still flooded by the recent tide magnified by an intense storm. Gaston noticed a sign posted: WARNING: FREQUENT FLOODING. DO NOT DRIVE THROUGH HIGH WATER.
“Imagine how beautiful this area looked before anyone built on it,” Gaston said to Letitia, who scanned the ornate homes placed along the seawall along with the museum.
“Wetlands naturally absorb the impact of the tides and storms, shifting and reforming to changing conditions. Then people built concrete walls and cobblestone streets and built massive homes on top of it all. But nature always wins over time as the water rises and their permanent foundations wash away.”
Watching Rosa play along the cracked sidewalk leading to the museum, Gaston continued speaking on his research philosophy.
“Science and nature are not exclusive. Yet too often what is merely unexplained is mislabeled with words like unscientific and paranormal. Scientists like me build walls to block out those types of ideas. But in the end, nature will always dictate to science the true nature of reality, not vice versa. Possibly there are rare individuals with natural capabilities mislabeled paranormal due to not understanding their totally natural capabilities. The special people who lead the way forward in this exploration could be remembered forever.”
While Gaston’s approach relieved some of Letitia’s concern, Rosa seemed less inclined to accept his premise. When the group reached the museum’s front door, she blocked Dr. Gaston with her body and looked him straight in the eye.
“Why should you get to see my painting?”
Letitia had never seen her kid act so direct, almost confrontational. Gaston came to expect the exact attitude from Rosa whenever she wanted to exert her will. To deal with it, Gaston turned to another trick he picked up along the way, this one from his mother. He flattered the small child.
“I’ve heard the painting looks lovely, like you. But you are so beautiful, I’m skeptical anything can actually compare.”
Rosa considered his answer for a second before responding.
“OK, let’s go see.”
She took them straight to the painting of Lise Tréhot. Admiring the picture, Rosa repeated the claim of living the woman’s life, pointing out how she posed all the time for the artist, her boyfriend, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, a founding impressionist master.
The three of them stared at the painting for a minute without speaking. Gaston broke the silence and commented how Lise looked depressed, and he asked Rosa why.
“Pierre found Lise alluring when she pouted. He acted mean to put her in the foul moods he wanted to paint,” Rosa replied. “His attention always won our love back and he painted her picture twenty-four times, all of them beautiful. But not because of us, he was so talented.”
Gaston asked Rosa what she remembered about the rest of the impressionist art displayed around the room. She claimed to have seen most of the work before in the artists’ studios or exhibitions in Paris. Pointing at a painting by Manet, she described how the academy rejected the work from the Salon due to his lewd portrayal of the female form. Rosa spoke of the work done by Bazille, who she noted painted Lise’s picture twice, before he died in war. There too was Sisley, born in Paris to English parents, always painting outside. All of them considered the original Impressionist masters along with their friend Renoir. Gaston peppered Rosa with questions the entire time and she answered with intimate details about the men and their lives. Her bank of knowledge even exceeded his own on the topic, which he found impressive because his mother had forced the artwork upon him while he was a child.
After leaving the room which contained the portrait of Lise, the group came upon the picture of the hairy man with hooves and horns and the pale women pulling him toward a puddle. Rosa pointed and called out to Dr. Gaston.
“I remember this painting, too,” she said.
“This one?” he asked. “Nymphs and Satyr. Looks like a bunch of naked women.”
“No, the mythological nymphs are nude, not naked, according to the judges of taste at the time,” Rosa answered. “Only the impressionists were accused of being crass and painting naked, modern women.”
“By the art establishment in Paris?”
“Yes! And how hypocritical,” Rosa continued.
“Please explain,” Gaston replied.
“What do you see?” she asked incredulously.
“Women’s butts and breasts.”
“Yes, of course,” Rosa shook her head, “but there’s also a hidden meaning.” She pointed at the painting again, tracing an invisible circle around a hairy triangle formed by the legs of the satyr. “Look! Clearly meant to symbolize the hairy space between a woman’s legs …”
“Rosa!” Letitia cut her off.
Irritated at being shushed again by her mother in the museum, the kid huffed and stomped off into the next gallery.
She looked up at a man wearing a helmet, one hand upon his hip, the other grasping a remaining bit of spear. Two testicles and an uncircumcised head poked out like a turtle from between his thighs.
Seeing Rosa staring up at the statue made Letitia uncomfortable and after catching up she tried to move her daughter on. Rosa held her ground.
“Lise had a baby with Pierre. He lied and denied the child was his, then left. Our baby died and he never came back to see me again. He stayed with another woman and painted her picture instead. Tramp.”
Rosa began to cry. Gaston looked at Letitia, who looked completely mortified. He realized Rosa learned the story elsewhere. Instead of soothing the child, Gaston took the opportunity to probe her emotional reactions instead of her historical knowledge. He guessed Pierre must have been a jerk since he abandoned Lise and her baby. Then he asked why Lise still cried about Pierre’s death.
Rosa described how Lise went on with her life after Pierre, a job, a husband and his babies. Even so, she always loved Pierre and missed him the most. He made her feel special like no one else ever did.
To Gaston, the feelings fell outside the normal scope for any eight-year-old, especially a cheerful one with a normal parent. Rosa clearly possessed extraordinary capabilities to find and process this information in the first place. The way her behavior and stories made him feel surpassed any prior emotional response from the job, a development he found intriguing and impossible to explain.
Leaving the museum, Rosa took her mother’s hand and began to skip along the sidewalk next to the walled water, rising and falling with the tide day after day. Gaston asked her if she wanted to keep talking with him about Lise.
Rosa answered yes.
Arlo Gust 