By Tammy Scileppi
Young Kelly Anne was a special child. Extremely sensitive to the world around her, and perhaps to one that seemed visible to her but not to others, she grew up feeling as if she didn’t belong … here.
She couldn’t explain it; she just felt different.
And as she got older, it seemed as if she was always searching, looking for her true “home,” and for the meaning behind her strange dreams.
Sitting in a local Starbuck’s on a recent afternoon, the pretty, long-haired author and insurance agent from Whitestone talked about her new memoir, “Lost in a Dream” (Dorrance Publishing), which chronicles her difficult childhood, followed by years of self-discovery. Her journey was marked by a series of lost loves and her share of obstacles – then finally, a renewed outlook on life.
And in that respect, Kelly Sulkow isn’t special.
Set across familiar parts of Queens, the book is filled with personal journal entries penned with informal language, and written from the heart. The reader soon finds out what makes Kelly special: It’s her amazing ability to foretell some of her own real-life experiences, as well as those of others – in what she describes as ongoing precognitive dreams, which are defined as dreams that exhibit knowledge about the future that the dreamer could not have obtained through any normal channels.
Since leaving her Elmont, N.Y., home at age 13 to live with an aunt, young Kelly had to grow up fast, and by the time she was 17, already had a job and her own place in Flushing.
And all the while, she was looking for love. Though sometimes, in all the wrong places and in too many faces.
Indeed, like so many other people out there who were dealt a bad hand, life hasn’t treated the 41-year-old kindly. But not allowing the past to define her, the resilient young woman persevered and “kept going.”
It became her mantra.
When her son was 10, she left an abusive long-term relationship … by the skin of her teeth. One day, the battered young mom just said, “Enough is enough,” and “I don’t want my son growing up and seeing this.” It was a damn shame though. Sulkow recalled the happier times when she and her partner once shared a beautiful house in Beechhurst, near Whitestone, together, and owned a successful insurance company (one of the largest in Queens).
Then it all came crashing down.
When the conversation turned to her unusual dreams, the author’s clear green eyes got wider, as she explained that some things she had been dreaming about over the years had actually come true.
“It started when I was 5. I would have vivid dreams that seemed very real, and wake up feeling a heaviness, … and I’d exhale out as if my soul had left my body,” she recalled. Although that sensation didn’t make sense, she instinctively knew it meant something. In fact, she occasionally experiences those odd feelings today, after waking up from an intense dream.
Sulkow said some of her dreams may have revealed bits and pieces from her former life. She remembered seeing ladies dressed in fancy long gowns, dancing in the ballroom of a castle. She knew it was the 1800s, and she saw herself there, looking out over the scene, while leaning over a balcony. Perhaps she had been a princess?
Exploring her special “gift” in a local dream group, the author has learned how to interpret the symbols and scenarios her mind conjures up while she sleeps.
Carl Jung once wrote that he who looks inside awakens “a little hidden door in the innermost and most secret recesses of the soul.” To unlock that door, you must understand the meaning behind those hidden symbols and often distorted images, confusing messages and metaphors that pop up during REM sleep, when you’re dreaming.
Because of her unusual experiences, these universal questions — Does everything truly happen for a reason? and … Is there proof there is a God? — have taken on a whole new meaning for the author, who seems to come across as a spiritual being.
“I never planned on writing or publishing a book. For me, it’s best to write things down to help them from spinning in my head. I also write my dreams down,” Sulkow said. “I showed a few friends and they loved it. So, I had to go back to the beginning to show why this meant so much to me.
“I started writing about a guy that I met at a club on Bell Boulevard in Bayside. He
eventually disappeared. I dreamt of him before I met him, never knowing, still to this day, who or what he was.”
Another psychic dream took place in a large space located in a tall building. The author said she saw a painting of a landscape with green trees and other colors of nature throughout. Shortly afterwards, she and a friend decided to go to a popular rooftop spot called Penthouse 808 Asian Bistro & Lounge, located atop Ravel Hotel in Long Island City – and sure enough, there was the painting in the lobby.
Sulkow also mentioned a sad event that changed her life – her beloved grandmother’s death several years ago, before Thanksgiving – after dreaming that she fell in a gutter and hurt her leg, then passing from an aneurism. Unfortunately, it turned out to be how she died.
Another tragic event took place near LaGuardia Airport. Her aunt’s neighbor was badly injured during a car accident. The author dreamt that he awoke from his coma. People she knew were stunned when they found out a short time later that he was fine.
Beyond her occasional dreams and accurate readings of tarot cards, Sulkow would like to expand her psychic abilities. Studies have shown that everybody has a certain degree of psychic ability, but some are more heightened than others. About 90 percent of precognition dreams involve people who we are emotionally involved with or somebody we have close ties to. The rest could tune in on strangers you meet in your daily life or tragic events that happen around the world.
Abraham Lincoln was said to have had psychic ability and precognitive dreams. Before his assassination, he told his wife and friends about a dream he had. He was at a funeral inside the White House; he walked over to a soldier on guard and asked who was in the casket? The soldier replied, “The president of the United States of America.” One week after the dream, Lincoln was shot and killed at point blank range.
“Lost in a Dream” is available at: books
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