Brownstonelit's Blog

8/27/10

My husband suggests that I should write more about the hard core research side of this process and less about the more esoteric and intuitive side and I would… but sometimes it is necessary for me to keep that portion more to myself for safety reasons. What I can tell you is that countless hours have been spent in interviews, phone calls, digging through historical documents… eons of internet research and on-location studies. It is not all just about the “hokey-pokey” as some might think.

Impressions from the psychic/medium/detective are absolutely an integral part of my research methods, but not all of it. At the end of the day I have to put things into perspective; find the appropriate correlations and connections. Leaps of faith and bigger leaps over paper trails must be made each time I sit down at my desk. Intensive scrutiny of every source of information must be made and then with each new piece of information; its value and correlation to plausible hypothesis re-examined and re-evaluated. This business is not for the faint of heart, but blessed with a seemingly photographic memory for projects of interest — I retain absolute recall and that cuts down on a lot of retracing.

Suffice it to say, those materials and ongoing research elements are just a small part. Take for instance the fact that what I started with evidence-wise was no more, and in fact a great deal less than those who gave me the materials in the first place. Why? Because they had more than just historical references for it all. They had intimate location familiarity, referenced causation, networking and resources contemporary to the crimes.

I had a handful of relevant letters, a journal, and a carload of legal papers and without proctors to assist in their meanings and references… had to plod through them alone and decipher for myself what was relevant and what was not. What proximity those before me had, may have been the biggest obstacle for them to overcome. Now 44 years and a million lies removed… I navigate these muddy waters with dogged determination and just enough smarts to be dangerous and just enough naivete to be daring.

So lest you think that all I do is toss about runes or splay cards with whimsical images to get information… or look to R to do my homework for me, think again. This is a hard core investigation and when the book comes out you will see just how hard core it all has been. I talk with and about Charley, because to not talk with or about Charley makes this about me and while I do tarry a bit on the subject of ‘my life’ from time to time… it is because Charley and I are in this together. To make it less about him is to make it more about the process than the man. And the man is the reason why this has to be done. He has a right to have his voice heard, if even through the murky waters and shifting sands of his grave.

I am reminded of a movie that is a million years old by now, if it is a day. I do not recall the name of it, but it had Ed Asner and Margaret Sullivan- the actress who once wore a T-shirt that said, “I am not James Garner’s wife!” In the film, her character was trying to decide whether to marry Ed Asner’s character or not and her response to someone when they asked what she thought about him was something like this:

‘He’s a good man. Not a great man, mind you… but a really good one and I’d be a fool to let him go.’

Charley was a good man too. Perhaps not a great man in the bloated sense of the word today; but he was a good man. Sometimes when we deal with just facts and figures we forget about the human side of an investigation and so while I do not fill these blogs with a lot of technical criminology jargon…or tip my hand any further than I know will tempt… I do fill it with a lot of soul- Charley’s soul. And after all… isn’t that part of the reason why you are all still reading this? A man lost his life. Others took it and as they are not omnipotent and powerful enough to give it back… they need to pay.
By the way… anybody seen the pretty platter with the palm tree on it? Somebody is missing it. Do you know who?

This entry was posted on August 27, 2010 at 3:30 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.