Ancestral Communication Part 1: Robert Brouk
Ancestral War Guide. He was the first. Love knows no boundaries.
I work and speak with the ancestors. Mine and other people’s. They just show up when the time is right to provide information, help me network, pass a message, or go within to do some deep healing. As a genealogical and military researcher, many would expect this is a normal thing to experience, but it isn’t for everyone.
Since birth I had some spiritual gifts, which eventually had to be hidden because I grew up in an environment where it wasn’t ok to be “different” or “weird.” My father, in January 2017, when he met my then, now late, Dutch husband, told him, ‘Jennifer has always been a strange child.’ I took this as a compliment even though I’m not positive it was meant as one. I am different and each day I embrace that a little more. I also love it when my ancestors appear to guide me or make sure I receive something.
I consciously stepped back on to my spiritual path on 21 December 2012, a day there was a mass awakening on the planet. I was already communicating with some of my ancestors that year but the shift which occurred this day opened me up even more. However it wasn’t until several years later that I fully realized that my cousin Robert Brouk, the AVG Flying Tiger, had been guiding me since I began my genealogical journey in 1996.
Sometimes our ancestors appear in such a subtle way that we don’t even realize they are communicating with us. This happened to me for years until I stepped onto my conscious spiritual path and chose to learn how to deeply connect with myself and my ancestors, angels, and spirit guides.
When my cousin Robert Brouk first came through to connect with me in 1996, I was clueless. I just thought he had an interesting and tragic war story. It wasn’t until 2012 that I began to realize the impact he’d had on my life to that point. Robert had been trying to help me create a different life and heal at the same time.
Have you ever wondered if your ancestors chose a certain life path or experience to make sure you would connect to it in your lifetime? There have been moments I believe Robert and Ginny chose to experience things they did because they knew on a soul level that I would come along and be the family healer. The family storyteller. The one to help change the world at a time when the world would go through a massive consciousness transformation.
I published my first book, To Soar with the Tigers, in January 2011, which contained Robert’s story of his AVG experience and war diary. I later published his story in my book, Stories of the Lost.
To Soar with the Tigers tells the story of my American Volunteer Group Flying Tiger cousin, Robert Brouk who served in Burma and China from spring 1941 to July 1942. My target for this book was for Robert to be remembered. Little did I know then, how much he was building the foundation for a life for me I never expected. Actually, Robert was the first of my military ancestors to appear and plant seeds in 1996. At the time, I did not realize that was what happened.
The full impact of Robert’s gift to me of those seeds did not hit me until about 2020. Isn’t that kind of normal though? Seeds are planted and we come into awareness of the gifts as we heal, as we learn more lessons, do more research, and step more into our power? Are you looking back at seeds your ancestors planted and making those connections? If not, what are you waiting for?
Near the end of his service with the Flying Tigers, Robert was wounded in China in April 1942 when he was hit by enemy fire as he landed his plane. He survived, recovered from his wounds and remained with the Flying Tigers until they were disbanded in July 1942. Robert then returned home to Cicero, Illinois to rejoin the Army Air Forces. Having fought the Japanese prior to Pearl Harbor, Robert became Cicero, Illinois’ Hometown Hero. He was asked to speak at various organizations throughout the Chicago area and was written about in the newspapers on an almost daily basis for several months.
Less than a month after returning home, Robert met Virginia (Ginny) Schaerer at the Hawthorne Works Western Electric Plant. Virginia was a Hello Charley Girl and one of two Western Electric hostesses designated to show Robert around the plant. Ginny said that Robert was so taken with her that he asked her to have a cup of Chai with him when all the hullabaloo was over. Ginny accepted.
Robert resumed his service with the Army Air Forces and was transferred to Orlando, Florida by October 1942, to train pilots. Not wishing to be apart, Robert proposed to Ginny and the two were married in late November.
Three weeks later, on 19 December 1942, Ginny sat on the hood of their car at the Orlando, Florida air base and waited for the squadrons to return from Kissimmee, Florida. Soon after they arrived, while practicing maneuvers, a plane flipped over and crashed a few hundred feet off the ground as another crashed a little farther away in a field. Ginny watched as Robert died in that plane crash. Her entire world changed in a split second. Ginny was a widow at 20 years old after only three short weeks of marriage.
Since their courtship and marriage was so short, my family lost track of her. When I wanted to learn more about Robert’s story and his widow, my family knew nothing. In 1996 when I began researching my family history, I was in contact with the Flying Tiger Association and posted queries about Robert on their message boards.
Nine years later, in 2005, Ginny’s grandson saw my post and she emailed me! She had a copy of Robert’s Flying Tiger war diary and photos of him in China that she shared with me. She also shared handwritten copies of pages about Robert and their marriage, from her life’s history she was writing after her second husband died. Virginia used writing as a way to heal her heart.
I sat on Robert’s story for five years and did nothing with the war diary and piles of research I had sitting on my desk. When Ginny contacted me in 2005, I had an almost five-year-old son and twins who were five months old, one of whom had recently had open heart surgery. I was not in a place to dig into more research and write a book. It wasn’t until 2010 that I felt it was time to live my dream of starting a genealogy business and write my book. Robert’s book was a bucket list item. I was only going to write one book. Now here I’m in 2023 and I have more than 25 books under my belt.
When I wrote Robert’s book, all my other military ancestors who had died in service showed up and told me I had to write their stories too. That began my journey into military research, teaching, and writing, accompanied by my own deep soul healing. Little did I know at the start that this journey was also going to allow me to help others heal.
Virginia’s Story & Healing
When Virginia sat on the hood of her car 19 December 1942 and watched her husband’s plane crash, she wasn’t sure she would recover. The Army told her his plane hit an air pocket. This wasn’t actually the truth. The truth didn’t reveal itself until I wrote Robert’s book. What actually happened was Lt. Kane’s plane’s wing tip, which was to the right of Robert’s as they practiced straffing the field, hit Robert’s wing and sent him upside down and crashing. Lt. Kane flew on and crashed in a field. Both men died. This truth was revealed in the book.
When I finished the book, I sent Ginny a copy and asked her to read the chapter on his death with her sister, so she wouldn’t be alone when she read it. Ginny grieved but was also relieved to know the truth. It healed a part of her.
Ginny and I remained friends and wrote letters to each other for a few years and then in 2012 I went to visit her just before I moved out with my boys and filed for divorce. That trip was life changing for both of us. We intuitively knew Robert had arranged our meeting, my work, and the healing that was taking place then and the healing that would come later. When I visited Ginny I asked her if I could write her story. You see, Ginny was 20 when Robert was killed. A few months later when she turned 21, she took up his fight and joined the Womens Army Auxilliary Corps, which later in 1943 became the Womens Army Corps (WAC). She went on to serve in Egypt in 1944.
I told Ginny I was writing a series called “Stories of the Lost” and her story could be book 2. She initially said she didn’t have a story to tell because she was behind the lines, not on the front lines. However, when I explained Lost didn’t mean I went crazy and lost my mind or lost my car keys but instead, it represented the losses felt by family and veterans because of World War II. She lost the life she and Robert began planning when they wed. She lost the opportunity to have a family with him. Just as my cousins who died overseas lost the possibility of college, falling in love and starting a family.
When I explained it this way, Ginny agreed and a few months after Stories of the Lost was released, I released her book, The Tiger’s Widow.
Robert did not disappear after I met Ginny or wrote his book and many others. He has appeared at various times through other people. In 2018, a friend of the family contacted me because he had an artifact of Robert’s Flying Tiger life that he wanted to pass to a family member. I now hold that artifact. In 2020 another family member on Robert’s mother’s side reached out and gave me films, photos, and genealogy documents for Robert, his service, the family, and his brother. I have since had those films digitized and they are family treasures. You watched a short snippet of one film above. Seeing Robert alive on film gave me an even greater sense of who he was and what kind of energy he carried. That was an incredible gift.
Even in the last few days I’ve felt Robert’s presence near me. He is helping me use my voice and gifts in a new way while supporting me from the other side. Our ancestors may be quiet for a period of time, but they are always watching and waiting for an opportunity to assist us. Sometimes though, we need to ask them for help before they will appear. Each ancestor works differently with us.
Ancestral Lessons
Robert is one ancestor who worked quietly in the background rather than more boisterously and “in my face” than my other ancestors. He often worked through other people rather than showing up. It has taken me roughly 27 years to fully understood the gifts he gave me and how each gift led to a greater transformation. Those gifts also allowed me to pay it forward and help others. Sometimes the journey we take with an ancestor is long and the gifts and awareness we receive from them comes in spurts.
Perhaps Robert’s greatest gift to me was not writing his book, but meeting Ginny. I have always believed everything happens exactly when it is supposed to and Ginny’s arrival in my life was no coincidence. Writing Robert’s story allowed both of us to heal. Ginny was never told the actual cause of Robert’s plane crash. Knowing this brought her immense closure, peace, and healing.
Ginny and I first met in person when I visited her at her home in 2012. My boys and I were a couple months away from moving out of the house that their father and I shared. A divorce was on the horizon and Ginny asked me many times over our visit if this was the right choice for me. She helped me heal pieces of my heart on that visit.
I visited Ginny several more times and wrote her story in my book The Tiger’s Widow. This story is about her life after Robert’s death. Ginny joined the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps which then became the Women’s Army Corps. She served in Utah and then Egypt during World War II. Each visit allowed us time to bond, laugh, cry, heal, and move forward. The last time I saw her in person was August 2018. Ginny had her 100th birthday in 2022 and is still alive at the time of writing.
I mentioned Robert rarely appeared for me, except one time I will share now. When I was working on the edits for Ginny’s book in June 2014, I started the process at a Starbucks I frequented. I always said, ‘You can’t cry in Starbucks!’ which made it was a good place to write the hard stuff. However, that Friday morning in June, Robert came through and I wrote some of the most powerful words and cried the entire time. It was so difficult that I had to go home and spent the rest of the weekend writing and crying until what came through was perfected.
I’m incredibly aware that if Robert had not stepped into my life in 1996 and gently pushed me to learn more about him and write his book, I wouldn’t have the life I have had since 2010. He and Ginny taught me a lot, helped me heal, and allowed me to help bring others closure and healing. Robert taught me patience, that love knows no boundaries of time and space, and that love heals everything.
Robert’s lesson of love knows no boundaries of time and space would serve me well when I met Johan, the Dutch man who became my husband for a short period of time and greatest soul teacher so far in this life.
Five Hearts Joined Together
An excerpt from Ginny’s book, The Tiger’s Widow.
Love knows no boundaries of time and space or life and death. It exists forever in our hearts as we remember and honor those who have gone before us. Through those memories we pass life lessons on to the next generation. We teach others there is light after darkness, hope after despair, and love is the glue that puts shattered hearts back together. This is a story of five hearts separated by time and space; hearts which would meet in the perfect moment. It is a story about never ending love that lived on even after death.
A famous pilot met a young beauty and the two fell in love, Robert and Ginny. Their love soared with the eagles. Their time together was brief but they lived so fully in love in the moment, it is as if nothing but death could have broken them apart. Then death knocked on their door and a plane fell from the sky in a fiery ball. One heart silenced on earth but lived forever in death. One heart shattered into a million pieces.
A year later on another continent, two brothers fought a war, Harvey and Fred. The boys grew up as orphans and wanted a heart to come home to. Fred flew a bombing mission over Austria and was lost, listed as missing for a year. Harvey feared the worst and waited for word which came a year after Fred went missing. A brother’s love lived on after death.
Less than a year after Fred went missing, Ginny found Harvey. A chance meeting and two hearts became one. Pieces of Ginny’s shattered heart started to glue back together, slowly at first and then more quickly. Harvey’s heart had finally found its home with Ginny. He was no longer an orphan or alone. They found each other during a time of war when the world around them collapsed in chaos. Together they created a new world filled with joy, love, and the memories of those lost before their time.
Almost 65 years later, another heart emerged. A young woman trying to start a new life after her heart was shattered. She and Ginny, now a widow for the second time, connected. Little did they know the impact that meeting would have.
Five hearts separated by time and space that met in perfect time, would change the lives of all they touched. Their love would span decades. Their life lessons would provide hope to others in the future.
Five hearts joined forever.