I’m no mystic but I foresaw my beloved granny’s death

The answer to the question of what happens when we die is, by definition, the universe’s best-kept secret.

the uncertainty of our final destiny feeds our faith, our imagination and our fears.

It is the one conundrum that science, with its logic and wisdom and multi-million-pound Large hadron Colliders, cannot solve.

One day, we’ll all know the truth; except, by then, it will be too late.

Laugh if you like, but like so many of you, I have been gripped by the accounts of near-death and death-related experiences collated by former nurse Penny Sartori over her career working in intensive care and serialised in the Mail this week. (today’s stories from Mail readers are on pages 28-29).

there is something about her no-nonsense approach to an issue that is so often fringed with flakiness and faux spirituality that has made her testimony so compelling.

She has opened up a debate about a subject that many would consider delusional, nothing more than a branch of mysticism or the stuff of con artists and tricksters, and yet which seems to touch so many people in one way or another.

In particular, I was fascinated by what she had to say about those who claim to have foreseen the death of a loved one. It’s the kind of thing most ‘rational’ people would dismiss at best as coincidence, at worst as pure hokum.

And yet, even I, a person with about as much mysticism as Miley Cyrus’s inner thigh, believe I may have some inkling of what she’s writing about.

It was a very long time ago — more than two decades, in fact — so the details are a little hazy. I was just starting out as a journalist in London, working long hours and doing my best to get ahead. I was probably at my most selfish: uninterested in family, a bit starstruck by my new environment, full of bravado, showing off.

the last thing on my mind was my beloved grandmother, tucked away in Cornwall. She had not long before moved there to be closer to my aunt, and I had spectacularly failed to visit her.

It was one of those things that I felt terribly guilty about, not least because she and I had always been incredibly close.

I missed her terribly; but in my youthful arrogance there was always something more important to do than get on a train to truro.

then one night I had a dream she was ill. I awoke 100 per cent certain that she was going to die soon.

I didn’t know exactly when or how: I just knew. I called my aunt — or was it the place where she was staying, I can’t remember — and they seemed surprised. Yes, Granny was a bit under the weather, but nothing out of the ordinary.

And yet, I couldn’t get the idea out of my head. So much so that the same evening, I spoke to my mother in france.

‘I think you should come over,’ I said to her. ‘I think we should go and visit Grandma.’

She seemed surprised; but why? I couldn’t explain; I could hardly tell her I had a feeling Granny was about to die. My father came to the phone, berating me for upsetting my mother. As it happened, they had been planning to visit anyway.

the day they arrived in London, we had a call: Granny was unwell. the next morning it was serious. We should come, now.

We drove like the clappers down the M4. I got pulled over by the police for speeding. But it was no use: we missed her by a matter of minutes. half an hour, I think, though it was all a bit of a blur.

Now, it would be perfectly reasonable to argue she was an old lady, and old ladies are more likely to get ill and die, and that the whole thing was just a coincidence.

But I remain convinced that it was something more — something that spoke of the unique bond between us.

I have no proof, of course. then again, life and death are not exact sciences.