By The Riverside: Magic Happens When You Follow Your Hunches

By June A. Ramsay

A faith-based love story about a woman, Shavina who got tired of facing rejection issues decides to embark on a nine-month journey in search of answers to where she belongs on a family tree. This leads her to move close to a cousin who always loved and accepted her. In her search, some harrowing discoveri

• Language: English
• Publisher: Writer Cosmos
• Release date: Nov 30, 2023
• ISBN: 9798869031792

June A. Ramsay

Writing is June's passion. He love to write! He has been writing for many years, but never published any of his work until 2010 when he published my first novel, I Said, "I Am A Nun". It is his optimum expectation that his work brings joy to 'the reader' as much as it brings joy to him.Born in British Guiana (now Guyana), South America, June migrated to the USA where he has lived most of his adult life; between New York, Dallas, and now the Baltimore/Towson area in Maryland. While working full-time in corporate America supporting high-level executives in the 'big five' accounting firms (PwC, Deloitte, EY), June returned to college and obtained an interdisciplinary bachelor's degree in communication and human development from the Empire State College, New York.

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By The Riverside

Magic Happens When You Follow Your Hunches

By

June A. Ramsay

Copyright © 2021 June A. Ramsay. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the permission, in writing, of the publisher, June A Ramsay at [e-mail].

ISBN: ​978-1-960321-97-8 (Paperback)

978-1-960321-98-5 (Hardcover)

Disclaimer

Although inspired by a true story. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any person or location is entirely coincidental.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my parents: Reginald Alfred Ramsay (1927-2012); and Sybil Edna Ramsay (1935-2007).

Mom and Dad, I cannot thank you enough for the sacrifices you made for me, my siblings, and our offspring. Your

efforts would not go in vain. I honor both of you. In the absence of your physical bodies, I feel your spiritual presence around me—rest peacefully in your eternal lives!

All my love, June

Acknowledgments

Thanks to my Heavenly Father Jehovah God. And Thank You - to all who have played a significant role in my life, including my readers and encouragers for being on this journey with me. Thank You!

Table of Contents

Dedication

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Chapter: 1

Courage to Build a Better Life

Shavina Meets the Man of Her Dreams

Quest to Find the Truth

A Mysterious Rosary

Meeting a Destitute Soul, Peter

Peter’s Story – Losing Anna

Anna’s Opportunity Abroad

Anna’s Disappearance

In Search of Anna

Returning Without Anna

Chapter: 2

Three Months on the Journey to Build a Better Life

Shavina Avoiding the Man of Her Dreams

Dining with Peter

Shavina’s Sister

Understanding Peter

Eagle Eye Kathy

Shavina’s Mother

Peter’s New Love Interest

Chapter: 3

Six Months on the Journey to Building a Better Life

Peter’s Recurring Dreams

Last Attempt to Find Anna

Shavina Finds the Answers She Was Seeking

Six-Month Juncture of Shavina’s Move

Peter’s Reason to Live Again

Peter Breaking Promises

Anna’s Parents

Chapter: 4

Nine Months on the Journey to Build a Better Life

Shavina’s Disclosure

Shavina Meets Her Mother

Nine-Month Reflection

Shavina Shares Her Life Story

Introduction

This is a nine-month journey of demolishing an old way of life that was not working—to build a new life, step-by-step, to a future that held promise; taking a chance and going on a hunch by following that still small voice within, yet remaining faithful when things did not go well or turn out the expected way; knowing all doors did not close without at least a window opening; and a journey of seeking and finding, knocking and opening doors, and asking and receiving.

***

Shavina, a woman from a middle-class family with a heart full of love, was at the corner of despair and rejection. She needed to turn that corner to find her true path in life and to find a place where she belonged. She was not properly positioned in the areas of love and family relations. Looking for these answers caused her to move to the opposite end of her country to be close to the only cousin she knew and loved, Karlie.

Karlie and Shavina grew up in the same family structure and were always confidants to each other in a family that was sometimes turbulent in its way of handling life’s challenges. As a young adult, Karlie moved away to orchestrate a different life for herself, leaving Shavina behind. At that time Shavina was in a serious relationship that ended, unfortunately, a few years after Karlie’s move. Shavina found herself missing Karlie terribly through the years, and it took Shavina almost ten years to make the decision to move close to Karlie. Making the move was also moving away from all that was familiar yet dysfunctional. Shavina wished for a different life and decided that if she wanted different results, she would have to make different decisions because if she stayed where she was and kept doing what she was doing she would keep getting the same results, which she did not want. So, she turned the corner to find her true path in life by moving across the country to be close to Karlie and to search for answers to her questionable life. Shavina wanted a different life; she wanted a meaningful life of quality - one she was prepared to build.

Shortly after moving Shavina met Whim, who was on a business trip in her new city. He was the perfect man! Shavina could not believe how especially suitable they seemed for each other and how without fault their encounter was, and in an instant, she felt connected to him as if she knew him ages before, and maybe she did . . . This must be my soul mate, she thought. Then about three months after meeting and spending time with him she found out an appalling truth about him that broke her open and had her in shock and disbelief and with more life questions. What Shavina found out about Whim was a life-changing truth she had to deal with; she could not walk away from it because, in the short time she had met and got to know him, they were deeply involved at a core level.

In that tragic moment of finding out about Whim’s secret, Shavina went to the River that was within walking distance of her new residence to try to quiet her mind since the River always calmed her. But instead of finding peace and calm, she had a peculiar encounter with a destitute soul that she felt a strong connection with and fell in love with almost immediately. Shavina felt that she may have lived all her life just to have this encounter. She also felt it was a test to the core of her being, and she intended to pass. After listening to the heartbreaking story of this peculiar stranger, she could not imagine how he lived for so long through so much sadness and heartache. Sadly, he was at the end of his rope and life did not make sense to him anymore; he was desperate for a change and a different reality, even if that were to leave this world. His need presented a challenging situation for Shavina, where an instant decision had to be made. She was faced with making a decision that could save a life or walk away from this stranger she just met and maybe lose hers. Within moments of meeting this stranger, Shavina’s life was changed by the encounter, and in seconds she had flashing visions of the results she would have with any decision she made. So, without hesitation, she made a decision that would not only change the direction of her life, but the direction of her destitute friend’s life also. She decided to give him just what he needed by going on a hunch, which caused her to spend the next six months of her life sorting out the situation between him and the perfect man she had met three months prior, Whim. Never did Shavina’s life hold so much meaning, purpose, and intrigue.

A few months after meeting her destitute friend, Shavina’s life was turned upside down and she learned to live in that whirlwind. She found the brutal answers to the questions she asked, which brought unbearable pain and uncomfortable challenges to work through. Then during her deepest despair, when she needed her destitute friend, who had been a constant companion, he could not be found. He disappeared to follow a hunch to find the missing link to his life, the link that had brought him despair and confusion. He needed to find that link to bring closure and move on with life, without the dangling thread of connectivity of what was and what should have been. With Shavina he got the strength to follow his hunch to find the answers to his truth, and that search brought about a new reality for him that added to the whirlwind with Shavina. They then had to collectively work out how to live through these new realities, which were tremendous, but they did it day-by-day with faith.

Without consciously calculating the time, it was nine months after Shavina’s move. She had promised herself to document her journey and evaluate her life at that juncture to see how things were. And since it takes nine months for a human being to develop and be birthed, she felt it was a good idea to revisit her life at that juncture to evaluate the progress she was making in orchestrating a new life of value and meaningfulness. It was amazing what had occurred in her life in that period. Many things were birthed: Shavina found that she had an enormous capacity to love, she knew she was where she needed to be, and she felt she belonged for the first time in her life. Despite the whirlwind she had lived through for the last six months, she found many pieces to the puzzle of her life that were missing, which had her lost in a maze of rejection, unworthiness, and isolation. One of the truths she found out about herself that caused her rejection and isolation was an issue that occurred at her own conception, which left her questioning her mother’s life decisions. Searching for the answers to her questionable life resulted in a chance to rekindle with her mother on a deeper level and to put closure to a most peculiar relationship with the hope that she could move on with peace and clarity and a relationship with her mother would be rebirthed and blossom in new ways.

​In the end, Shavina, her destitute friend, and the man of her dreams, Whim, may not have received what they thought they were searching for desperately, but they were able to see that God had a better plan for all their lives and that His plan was working. Amid the pain Shavina endured in the nine months since her move to be close to her cousin Karlie, Shavina was enjoying her new life while coming to the realization and acceptance that a good life is not one without bumps and sometimes boulders on the road and challenges to work and grow through. With perseverance and determination, Shavina worked through her life issues and turned those bumps and boulders into gravel, where she was able to move comfortably through the new life she now had. Trusting God completely on the hunches she had, she settled into a life that was making sense after she understood her true purpose; she was now placed in a position of acceptance. Rejection and displacement were now distant memories. Never was Shavina so content. She had to break down the walls of a life that was not working and then painstakingly rebuild it, one block at a time. She wanted different results in her life so she did what she had never done, since doing the same thing would only bring more of the same results. Shavina was now on purpose, living a life with true meaning—she was now living the life she always longed for, the life that seemed to happen for all except her. She decided to make the changes she secretly longed for and live from her heart. The heart never lies—because that is where God resides.

Chapter: 1

Courage to Build a Better Life

Shavina put down the phone in disbelief and fell slowly to the sofa. While slouching at the end of the sofa her heart was pounding; the room got dark and appeared to be spinning. She held her head in her hands and eventually pulled her legs up to her chest in the fetal position, then placed a pillow on her head. She did not want to think. The room was silent, but the information she was processing was like the loud sound of thunder. She wanted quiet and only she could give that to herself, but how? She sobbed until she was hysterical, but somehow despite those hysterics, she fell into a deep sleep.

Hours later she woke, and the sadness consumed her again. In that sad state of affairs, she decided to go to the River, where she always found peace and tranquility. Moving around in a daze, not knowing her left foot from her right, she thought she could not take any more disappointment because she had had enough. She said, The River flows to the sea, and at the River I shall leave my issues this day. Let the River take them to the sea and that will free me.

Shavina loved waterfronts, beaches, rivers, and lakes— wherever the water flowed was a good place for her, and being this close to the River where she lived was just what she needed. It was gratifying to be in a place where she felt a deep connection to her consciousness, a place where she found strength to face any challenge. However, the issue she faced was beyond her.

Finally, after much effort, Shavina went to the River to deal with the devastating phone call she received the evening before, which had revealed information relating to her search for answers to the missing link in her life that had bothered her continuously.

It was three months since she moved to be close to her cousin, Karlie, to start a new life that she hoped would be different from the one to which she was accustomed. After feeling that she was constantly misunderstood and that she did not belong anywhere or to anyone, she wanted to know why, and that search brought up other issues she never anticipated or could wrap her conscious mind around.

While planning her move to be close to her cousin, she decided to set aside six months to settle into her new environment before going back to work. In those six months, she was going to contact a private investigative firm to help her find answers. Now, three months after her move, she got her answers from the private investigative firm.

At this time, when she should have been settling into her new environment and ready to start thinking of resuming work, she was astonished at the information she received about her life. She was sitting on the floor after rolling off the sofa, where she spent the night crying hysterically. She did not know how to elevate her thoughts above the shock and despondency she felt.

Shavina Meets the Man of Her Dreams

After her move, Karlie invited her to a cocktail reception she felt would get Shavina away from the boxes and unpacking and help her meet a few new faces in her new city. It was a lovely event. At the event, while Shavina was trying to find her way around as Karlie introduced her to everyone she knew, Shavina saw someone who dazzled her and stopped her in her tracks. She was reluctant to look at this gorgeous man too strongly, so she would look at him on the sly or when he was not looking. His physical looks were captivating: he had the perfect manly structure and a serious face that she liked. His eyes were penetrating and questioning, yet soft and accepting. She saw all that she liked in a man, things she had not found in any of her previous relationships. In her mind, she always thought men like this were out of