I remember at some point in high school I recognized that every time I heard Over the Rainbow, I would instantly have a big yawn. When I took psychology, I recognized this as a Pavlov response. My dad used to sing lullabies to my siblings and me to fall asleep. He would oftentimes have such a huge yawn which would then cause me to yawn. One of these lullabies would be from his favorite movie, The Wizard of Oz. So I had been trained from a very young age to yawn whenever I heard this song. I still do today.
I think I always knew this was a special bond I had with my dad, but I don’t think I realized that this would be the biggest way we communicate with one another now that he passed away. After I read The Light Between Us, I was more open to receiving signs. For this post, I went back and did some chronological research to make sure I got this all right. I read through The Light Between Us on around May 1st, 2018. On May 19th I remember distinctly driving back home from the movies. I had just gone and rewatched Avengers: Infinity War with my sister and brother-in-law. As I was driving back, I was at an intersection and I looked over and saw this bright rainbow. My gut reaction was, ‘Dad, did you send this rainbow to me?’. And then I quickly discredited it. A rainbow is seen by way more than just me. How could a natural phenomenon that is so large be made for just me? That didn’t seem right or possible.
When I turned into my neighborhood, my heart started to beat really quickly. The rainbow looked like it was coming directly out of my house. Like I was following the rainbow home. I still just assumed that I was just trying to read into it. Once I got home, I took a picture of it, and then it completely vanished. I know that I did not know what to think about this at the time. So many things seemed too coincidental for me to think it was all chance. I am already a tough sell on coincidence. I remember finding out after I sent the image that May 19th, was exactly 3 months after my dad passed away, and also the first ‘montherversary’ after what would have been his 66th birthday.
Since that day, I have seen an absurd amount of rainbows. They popped up everywhere, especially within that first year. While physical actual rainbows are not as frequent for me, I still see rainbows all the time in flags or on cars, or even in songs. I even took such an amazing picture with a bright beautiful rainbow over my company’s building, that now it is displayed in the office rotating on a computer screen. A lot of the times I walk by that screen, the image shows up.
I always take pictures of the rainbows when I see them:
May 19th, 2018 Rainbow:
July 26th, 2018 Rainbows – This is the first time this happened to me. I am not sure how common it is to see rainbows disappear and reappear in the same direction. I am sure it has a very scientific reasoning behind it. I did some brief research for it and could not find anything. Anyway, this rainbow was visible to me when I got onto the freeway to work and when I got off the freeway/ at work. In between the exits, the rainbow was not visible.
August 7th, 2018 Rainbow – Very faint, but hanging around in my neighborhood.
August 13th, 2018 Rainbow – This was a cool one. I saw a little bit of the rainbow from work and as I drove home it got more and more intense. It also was leading me back to my house. As I got out of my car it became a double rainbow.
September 5, 2018 Rainbow: Captured on the way home from work.
September 8th, 2018 Rainbow: Captured on the way to grab some food.
November 30th, 2018 Rainbow: This rainbow was also special. First of all, it was the largest rainbow I have ever seen in terms of the width of the bands. Also, I saw this when I went to the UK for the second time. Before going to the UK, I decided I would go down to Liverpool and see as many of the Beatles locations as possible, as they were my dad’s favorites. While I saw this rainbow days before I was in Liverpool, it helped remind me of my connection to my dad. Additionally, when I was walking back to my hotel when I saw this rainbow when I was sitting down for food, I heard the couple next to me say, ‘That is the biggest rainbow I have ever seen!’. Altogether, I knew this was an important one.
December 20th, 2018 Rainbow: Found another one out shopping for Christmas presents over a golf store.
April 1st, 2019 Rainbow (Lens Flare): Okay, I know this is not a rainbow exactly. However, this became a reminder to me that natural rainbows are not the only way to see a rainbow. This was among a few favorite pictures from my honeymoon in Greece.
June 11th, 2019 Rainbow: Found another one out back in my neighborhood.
June 13th Rainbows: Similar to above, this rainbow was visible both at my exit at my house and the exit at work. I only included one picture here because the first one was very faint and I could not really see it after I transferred to my computer.
July 15th, Rainbow: On my way home from a late day at work.
July 18th, 2019 Rainbow: Captured looking over my office building late after work one evening.
July 25th, 2019 Rainbow:
July 29th, 2019 Rainbows: Again, two rainbows in different areas. One is very faint so I’ll just include the one:
July 31st, 2019 Rainbow(s): This is the most special rainbow I have received. Firstly, I got it after staying very late at work (8 pm). So it was a particularly hard day, and I stepped outside to see the tallest rainbow I have seen. Also, a double rainbow. I tried to take some candid pictures with my company’s building underneath it. Also, as I drove home, the rainbow was once again pointing me back to my house. Hard for me to believe this was just one rainbow.
After I took them, I was amazed at how wonderful they turned out. I knew if my dad were alive, he’d tell me to send them into HR. So I went ahead and did so for him. A few months later, Marketing asks me if they could use it for their Instagram account, and then after that, Marketing added it to their photo reel by their department. Now whenever I walk by it or I am in meeting rooms, I see this image pop up on a screen. Dad found a way to be inside my corporate office building.
August 5th, 2019 Rainbow: Early morning into work seeing a rainbow opposite of the building.
August 15th, 2019 Rainbow: Another early 7 am Rainbow facing away from work.
October 26th, 2019 Rainbow: Very faint rainbow right over the treeline.
There were maybe 2 that I was unable to get a picture of, but for the most part, those were all of the ones I have seen in the past few years. Now, based on my logic and rationalization of my experience, I would assume that rainbows occur more frequently in the same locations. Considering the weather at these times, I know it is oftentimes rainy which also leads to rainbows. I also know that my eyes are trained now to find these rainbows. However, even before my dad passed away, rainbows would catch my eyes and I would point them out to anyone I was riding with (if I saw it in the car). However, I have never seen the number of rainbows in a year previous to my father passing away. Maybe we could look back and see that rain in my area was particularly high that year. I guess at that point, I’d be looking for just as much reason to have this proved false as believing that these have been signs from my father.
Regardless of that debate, my amazement is not the ‘how’ of these rainbows. It’s the ‘when’. I am happy to say that science did its thing and now there are more rainbows available to be seen. However, the thing that impressed me most was that they (or I) were there at the exact right time. They would sometimes disappear just as fast as I was able to quickly glance at them.
I won’t ever know exactly how, when, or why I saw so many rainbows (almost once per month for that first year). Whatever the reason I was definitely in the right place at the right time to experience a few great moments focused around a singular memory of a psychologically significant moment with my dad. That alone helped remind myself of his love and impact he had in my life and that is all that I really need to continue feeling connected to him.
