Reincarnation – Reviewing My Past Lives

by Joelle Steele

I remember a lot of past lives. I don’t know how or why I remember them. I can’t always date them exactly, but I think I come pretty close. In every life I remember I am a woman. And, if I were to select a life for myself, I would still choose to be a woman, should that choice be available to me.

My mother said that my memories of past lives dated back to an incident in my early childhood. When I was about four to six years old, we were walking down Van Ness Avenue in San Francisco when I pointed out a little restaurant and said, “I used to live there.” I remember that moment quite clearly and how drawn I was to that restaurant. I remember that past life quite clearly too. It was in the 1920s-40s. I was the oldest of five children, and we lived in a flat above the delicatessen. The flat was rather dark and gloomy, and I shared a room with my sisters that was in the back and looked across an alley. My brothers shared another much smaller room next to us, and my parents’ bedroom was in the front next to the living room. There was a very small kitchen, but we didn’t use it much. I don’t remember a bathroom, but I’m pretty sure we had one. The eating area of the restaurant was between the front of the building and the deli counter that ran the width of the building with an opening in the center that had a cash register next to one side. From that opening, you walked straight back into the kitchen where there was a bank of commercial-type white refrigerators with big chrome and black handles. There were also racks of dry goods and there was a huge sink and two ringer washers. Outside in the back were clotheslines, and I remember hanging laundry on them and ironing tablecloths and napkins. The floors in the restaurant were hardwood and the tables and chairs were also wood, probably oak. There were drip candles in old chianti bottles on the tables, which were covered with red and white checked tablecloths. On the walls were old travel posters of Italy. I remember working in the deli with my parents, working the deli counter, waiting on customers, cleaning tables, washing dishes, sweeping the floors, and watching my younger siblings, two brothers and two sisters. I also remember that I was engaged to a young man in the military, and I remember that I became ill with some kind of lung problem. It could have been anything from pneumonia to tuberculosis, and it was what ended my life at a very early age, probably around 19 or 20.

Prior to the life above in San Francisco, I remember one that began in Paris, France (probably why I have such an affinity for that place). I was born in a small but nice old house on the outer edges of Paris, probably around 1860 or so. My father was a musician and my mother was a housewife. I had a younger sister to whom I was close. I also had twin younger brothers who died young. I did very fine needlework (which I do not do at all in my current life). I got married to a printer when I was about 22 years old, and we lived above the shop in what I believe was the Montmartre area. We did not have any children, and we were only married a few years when my husband died, and I ran the print shop on my own for about seven or eight years before I remarried. My second husband was an American widower, quite a bit older than me, with a son and daughter, both under the age of ten. We did not have any children together. My husband was somehow involved in railroading (which could in part explain my affinity for trains and train travel to this day). We left Paris just before the beginning of World War I, and went to live for a short time somewhere in Africa in a very small house near where a railroad was being built. We weren’t there long, and then we came to the United States and lived in San Francisco and later somewhere south of there, probably in the area of Hillsborough, Menlo Park, or Palo Alto. My husband was gone a lot for long periods of time. I remember both places we lived very clearly. The one in the City was a large brownstone that was raised about five feet or so above the street and had a low stone wall with a black wrought iron fence on top of it, and we lived in a large suite of rooms on the top floor. The house on the peninsula was on a woodland hill. It was white and resembled Greco-Revival architecture. It was quite large, but I wouldn’t classify it as a mansion. It had a rose garden off of a library on the first floor. I had a maid who made lace for my dresses. I remember having coffee/tea in a small solarium-type room with other women. I remember that the house was cold and drafty and that going into the city was a major trip. (I searched antique photos of building in San Francisco and surrounding areas to try to find these buildings, but had no luck).

Another life seems like it was maybe in the mid to late 17th century. I have no idea where this was. I was married to (or maybe just living with) the owner of a tavern on a coach route in a rural area. He was a brutal man, a lot older than me. I worked in the tavern, mostly cooking and occasionally waiting tables, and he treated me like a slave. I had three children, and I almost died giving birth to the last one, a boy who didn’t live long. My husband beat me and on one of those occasions, he hit me on the side of my head with a hot metal skillet. I was deaf and blind on one side of my head from then on, probably scarred too. The last I remember of that life was being with my children, still adolescents, at a small church service – possibly a funeral for my husband.

I also have quite a few rather vague memories of lives that must have been fairly short, and all were in Europe. In three of them I was born on a farm, married a farmer, lived on another farm, had children, and just in general lived the life of a farmer’s life. I remember working in fields doing weeding and also picking and harvesting. I routinely cleaned out henhouses and cowsheds. I also remember a lot of sewing and mending, all by hand (in my current life, there is just about nothing I dislike more than sewing, even though I know how to sew on a machine). I remember one farm house which was a thatched roof cottage, but I have no idea where it was. I also remember one of my children being born with a foot deformity.

I remember one life in which I was a librarian in a large library in either a university or large estate house. It was ornately decorated with a lot of carved wood. I think it was probably around 1780 to 1830 or so. I was the only female librarian there and I worked with two male librarians, one of whom was quite old and pretty much in charge of the place. I recall dusting shelves and also repairing the bindings of books that were much, much older at the time, and also binding books. I once went into an old library at a public building somewhere in eastern Canada and the smell of it brought back more details of this life, including a very well-dressed woman who caught me reading a book in the library and threatened to dismiss me if I ever did that again.

Another past life I remember is one that I’m extremely curious about, because it resembles that of a famous woman named Hildegarde von Bingen. I had never heard of Hildegarde until I was in my late 40s, and I have never been able to determine how many other women lived the same kind of life that she did, so I have no idea if this was a life that just happened to be like hers or if it was hers. Like me she was a polymath, a writer, an artist, a composer, and a teacher who went on preaching tours. She was the founder of natural history science in Germany. She wrote poetry and she also wrote extensively about botany, herbs, and medicine (all things I’m interested in and have studied and written about). My past life took place during the Middle Ages. I vaguely remember my childhood from that time. It was in a very large house and I recall playing under a very big table in a large kitchen with a stone floor covered with straw and fragrant herbs. I don’t know if this was my parents’ house or if they were servants there. I also remember playing outside and that it was a very cold and damp rural area, even when it was summer. I played by a stream/creek and I seemed to be mostly alone a lot of the time, but there were a lot of other kids around, either siblings or neighbors. When I was about 10 years old, I was sent to live at a convent (in my current life I thought of being a non-god-fearing nun until I was about 12). I was very devoted and I was very active in the church. I wrote essays, songs, poems, music, and books. I did a lot of traveling by foot. I preached. I was an avid student of scripture as well as the arts and sciences. I also milked cows and goats, and I worked in a large herb garden and I knew a lot about medicine and medicinal herbs (something I also studied and wrote about in my current life). I remember treating sick people. I did not cure people by the laying on of hands or anything like that, but I was clairvoyant. At some point I became an abbess. I have extremely detailed memories of this life, and they do parallel what little I later learned of Hildegarde. But, as I said, I will never know for sure, since I don’t even know what century this was. However, there are many parallels between her life, my past lives, and my present life..

Lastly, I have a memory of a life that does not appear to have happened in the past, unless there is an earthly past that is not currently known to the world. It is a Nordic type of life in that it appears to be set in a geographic area resembling Norway. But it looks more futuristic. All the people are fair-haired and blue eyed, wearing tunic-type attire with militaristic-type insignias on them. No weapons of any kind. They live in caves that are neatly carved from the surrounding steep mountains in a very big green valley. I lived in one of these caves, and it was very beautiful inside. The walls appeared to be polished. The furnishings were made of wood and were also carved into the walls. I was a woman and I was living with or married to a man, and we were both wood carvers. The majority of daily events in this life are not very interesting, but there is one event that is frightening, and it gets a rise out of me every time I recall it. People are running scared, running in all directions, screaming, etc., and there is a loud rumbling sound that could be a volcano erupting – or a big heard of horses stampeding. I don’t remember anything at all after that happened.

I remembered all of these past lives from early on in my childhood. Are they real or a figment of my imagination? I doubt that I will ever know for sure, but nevertheless I find these memories fascinating, especially when I see so many similarities between some of them and my current life.