Supernatural experiences

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Have you ever seen a ghost or do you know someone that is not a fruitcake that has? Would you want to see a ghost, if they exist?

I was watching a DVD of “Ghost hunters” and while I was entertained by it, I couldn’t help but think, if these guys go all over the place examining haunted places why don’t we ever see the ghosts? They had an episode where there is an alleged ghost on the top of a lighthouse on film but its blurry and dark. Yeah, I can see something moving, and it looked like it could be person, but the picture is terrible! Why don’t you use a better camera? Wouldn’t you want the clearest, tightest picture possible? These guys seem well enough funded.

People I know that claim to have seen ghosts:

My aunt in all seriousness told me she saw the ghost of my great grandfather in his old house. I was only around 17 at the time so it kind of rattled me a bit. She was completely serious and told me she wasn’t scared because she knew he only stopped in to see how his family was doing.

Another aunt had her daughter (my cousin) wire me some money out of the blue. Why? I was having hard times and didn’t have any food. But I didn’t tell them that. I was in Boston and they were in New Jersey. My cousin said my aunt was upstairs and suddenly came downstairs saying my* dead *grandmother had appeared to her and asked to send some money for food because I was too proud to ask for help. That actually spooked both my cousin and me.

I worked with a lady once who told she lived in a haunted house and she told me stories of how her cats would always be locked in the bathroom when she came home. Neither she or her roommate put them in there and locking the door from the inside is something the cats couldn’t possibly do. she then told me they asked the landlady who explained that the place was haunted by some turn of the 19th/20th century woman. My freind then told she witnessed this woman in period clothing walking down the hallway and into the bathroom one night while she was watching TV. Brrr…her description of the event gave me the chills.

A navy bud of mine told me a poltergiest story he claims happened to his family. Of course they way he told the story mad it hilarious, but he swore it really happened. His family had moved into a house where things moved on their own, they heard footsteps upstairs when no one was up there, loud bangs, etc. He said it scared his mother and sister so badly they moved into an apartment together. his dad refused to move until the lease was up, so he stayed with his dad because he didn’t want him to be alone there. The part that made the story kind of funny is that he said one night he and his father were watching TV when the loud footsteps and noises started upstairs. His father yelled out ***“Dammit, KNOCK THIS SHIT OFF! I’M WATCHING TV!” ***and the sounds suddenly stopped for the night. He did admit that neither he or his dad would go upstairs at night, though.

I think I was once followed by an invisible something in a graveyard one night, but i’m willing to admit it could have been some natural occurrence. I don’t actually think it was, but hey, I can’t be totally sure…and then theres the ouija board mess I got into when I was a young guy. But as much as it frightened me, it could have been an overactive imagination on my part.

Would you want to see a ghost?

I’ll admit, I kind have always wanted to ghost hunt. The problem is I’m really too easily startled. If you told me that if we go to X cemetery I can see the ghost of the woman that walks to a headstone and vanishes I might be up for that. (not alone, I have to add) If you tell me we can go to the Quiggley Mansion and see the headless bloody man that jumps out and screams, well, Funk dat. You’d have to invite several people before I’d consider it, and I’d probably completely lose it if something like that scared me. I hate to admit it, but yeah, that would scare the poop outta me.

Would you live in a haunted house?

Hell no. As I said, too easily startled. I’d never be able to sleep and my blood pressure is already high. The thought of random scares at abny given time would be too much for me to handle. I’d visit a haunted house depending on who I was with and the nature of the occurrences, but live in one? It’d have to be a cheesy movie situation where I’d inherit some ridiculous amount of money for stayiong there a certain amount of time. I sure as hell no my wife wouldn’t. she’s already told me before that if a ghost/ Bigfoot/ Aliens/ Vampire/ Zombies/ Pick a monster grabbed me she’d run away without even trying to help. Sure I acted incredulous, but to be honest…if a monster or ghost grabbed her I’d be miles away before she got to the “L” in “Help”.

2

I have mentioned my “poltergeist” here before. For as long as I can remember, we have had textbook poltergeist issues in the houses where I have lived. Things move on their own, you hear knocking/footsteps/random noises coming from rooms in which no one is. We call it “Bob” just for reference.

Because I’ve always had it, and my kids have always had it, and my husband has lived with it for nigh on 11 years now, we all deal with it like it’s no big deal (which it isn’t – to us). Basically, it’s like living with an invisible, mute 2 year old.

I found it funny that you started this thread today, as last night “Bob” was bored. I was sitting at my computer desk, my husband was at his, my daughter at hers and our son was watching television just on the other side of a small divider wall from our computers. The dog was in his crate beside my son. I heard a thump thump thump from the kitchen, and wondered if my son had decided to go get a drink or whatnot and called out to him. He popped his head over the dividing wall and said “yes?” At that point, we heard another thump thump thump. I said, “I guess Bob is wanting attention tonight” to which my daughter replied, “yeh, we hear him, too.”

This happens on a regular basis around our house, and has happened in front of company many times. I neither believe nor disbelieve in “ghosts” or other “supernatural” phenomena, we just call it a poltergeist because it fits the description.

3

If this is a regular occurrence, why can’t you record/video the happenings. James Randii has a cool million waiting for you.

4

It would be very interesting to see evidence of a ghost.

I have watched a couple of UK TV programs about ghost hunters.
All that happens is they wander around in the dark, say “I feel something!” and scream.
Tune in next week, folks. :confused:

Litoris, every poltergeist that has been investigated has turned out to be natural or a hoax.
Given that it would be a real first, are you not tempted to bring in a scientific investigation?

5

My mom claims to have felt the presence of a ghost, seen a UFO, and know Jesus as her personal savior. Out of these three things, I am closest to buying the UFO story. Mom’s pretty functional, though I do wonder sometimes about the cumulative effect of all that hair bleach.

I would love to see a ghost or live in a haunted house.

6

I saw a ghost once as a child.

It was in a big old house that we rented until I was about 7 or 8. My brother and I shared an extremely large room (that in adult retrospect) was converted for that use, so the attic steps were along one wall. One night, as I was going to sleep, I saw a man at the top of the attic stairs. He was transparent but visible, like heat waves.

Before anyone else can say it, yes, I’ve occasionally have had dreams while still believing myself to be awake. This occasion was utterly unlike those dreams.

7

I heard a ghost. I don’t think I believe in ghosts, but I don’t know how to account for this:

When I was very little, my older (he was my parents’ age) cousin John, always used to call me “Honey.” He’d always greet me with “Hi Honey!” and usually follow it by asking me out on a date (I know that sounds totally pedo-y, but it was sort of a family joke. Nothing inappropriate ever happened.)

John died of a heart attack when I was in my early teens. I was sad, obviously, but not hysterically so. I cried when I found out, but not at the funeral or any time after.

After his funeral, the family all gathered at his house for lunch. I arrived late, as I was with my grandma, who is slow at everything. I stayed outside for a bit, playing with another cousin’s dog. When I went inside, everyone had already sat down to eat in the dining room, which was on the other side of the house from the front door. No one saw me come in.

As soon as I came in, I heard John’s voice saying, “Hi Honey!” like he always would when I came in the door. I was to the kitchen before I remembered that he was gone.

Didn’t scare me - just seemed normal.

8

The only ghost story I’ve ever come across that seemed anything more than a hoax or overactive imagination to me was a story told to me by a coworker. She described working (as a nurse) at a previous job. She said she went into the supply room for some reason, and saw a woman walking across the room, then dissapearing. She screamed, then ran out of the room and told the other nurses that she had seen someone in the supply room, who casually asked “Oh, was it the woman or the boy?”

Her reaction was along the lines of “What the hell, do they have names, too!?” The way she told it was very much in the manner of relaying an actual occurance, if that makes sense. It didn’t ‘feel’ like she was making it up.

9

For those wondering why I don’t try to “catch” Bob – because it’s just something I have always lived with. I am sure there are perfectly normal reasons for the things that have happened, but I would be hard-pressed to tell them without a seismograph and some nice scientific equipment :smiley: Since there is no rhyme or reason to when it happens, I would have to set up a video cam in every room of the house 24/7 to catch the stuff moving with no visible force behind it – too lazy and don’t own that many cameras.

Would I allow someone to come to my house to investigate? Sure, if there were no charge. Would I call bullshit on their EMF and EVR “proofs”? You betcha! I loved Ghost Hunters when it first started, they did actually seem more apt to disprove than “prove” but now, they’re trying to prove. That pisses me off, it’s not science. Would I tell them they couldn’t come to my house? No, because I like them, they are still entertaining.

Anyone know how to get TAPS (or another “scientific” team) to come to my house? Feel free to PM me, I don’t mind being proven wrong. The funny thing about my issue is that it moves with me (from the house in which I grew up to my first own apartment to my first house and now where I live), and has been observed by non-family members as well as us. Oh, and the whole “dogs will bark if it’s really a <insert supernatural phenom>” bit? Idk – my dog never barks at Bob’s noises, but will bark at deer/turkeys/skunks/people outside or inside if it’s an unexpected noise. He never even looked up when we heard the thump thump thump last night, but barked his head off at the turkeys this morning who didn’t make a sound, but had the audacity to be in his yard. Go fig, right?

10

I have a psychologist friend who told me about this phenomenon…hearing or seeing someone close to you in the period close after their death. I forget what it’s called, but apparently it’s pretty common. My mother described it happening to her after her own mother died, when she (my mother) was 11 years old.

11

I can understand that. My grandfather was extremely proud of everything I’d do whe I was younger. (I think he really wanted to have a son, but he never did, and since I lived with my grandparents I was his “little buddy”) He really wanted me to go to college, but he died when I was 17.

I did go to college. My freshman year only a few weeks in I woke up early and I swear, in the shadows of my room I saw him in the corner waering the suit he always wore to church just watching me. I had just woke up and I was trying to focus my eyes and he kind of melted away. I think it was the only time something strange like that didn’t scare me. I told my mother about it later (and she was with the aunt I spoke about earlier, upthreadthat had the encounter with my grandmother) and they both told me “You know, Uncle Mike (which was what everyone always called my grandfather, even me) probably wanted to see you. He always wanted to see you go to college. He was just checking in to let you know he was proud of you.”.

Maybe it was just my mind playing tricks with me as I woke up…but I’d like to think that he was doing like my mom and aunt said…just checking in to say “Hey, Boy, I’m proud of you!”.

Litoris, you are braver and more patient than I. I suppose I could live with that as long as it didn’t interfere with my life in any way or do things that scared me. Though I’d probably try to find out if it wasn’t a natural thing. Maybe pipes or something. You said things get moved. Is it stuff like you find objects in places where they shouldn’t be (like you hang your keys up and find them in the bathtub later) or do you actually see things move, like a cup floating around or a book falling off of a shelf by itself? Thereis an army captain here that told me his house was haunted…he said he heard all kinds of sounds like what you describe. His family hadn’t arrived yet, and the house was down the street from a graveyard. I asked him if he still had problems when his wife and kids got here and he said no…but he said it in that kid of way that makes you think “He’s reluctant to tell mem but he still does.” I never asked his wife or kids.

There was an old man that lived across the street from me before I joined the army, Mr. H. He always said he could see ghosts, but he was never sure if they were ghost until they did something ghost like. (disappear or walk through something). I never really believed him, he seemed like the kinda guy that told tall tales. Heck, on sunny nice summer days I used to spend time sitting on his porch drinking with him. But he came over to my house one day and told me he had just seen a ghost walk down the street to the mailbox and vanish. I don’t think he was making it up…he even wanted me to walk to the mailbox with him. (yeah, like the ghost was going to leave a note saying “SEE! He isn’t lying!”. Well, I didn’t think he was drunk at the time, but as I said, he was a bit of a tale teller. Maybe he was pulling my leg. (geez, I haven’t seen that guy for almost 20 years and he was almost 70 then…scary to think that he he is most likely dead now, himself)

My grandmother’s brother, my Uncle Larney, used to scare me and my cousins when we were younger by telling us that his deceased wife would sometimes appear in his house. I think he was halfway kidding, but we were never sure. He had a room in his house that he said she would be in and he always kept it shut. When he died about 9 years ago I flew home to the funeral. My cousin Kieth and I stayed in his house for the time. (in Philadelphia…Kieth worked there, but lived in Delaware so he spent a lot of time with my uncle before he died. When I was working in DC I used to come up on weekends to spend time with him. He was really a great old guy) Anyway, Kieth would go home to do stuff in Delaware and come back later…because I was absolutely terrified to be in that house alone at night. I wouldn’t go upstairs once the sun went down unless Kieth was there…so yeah, I’m chicken. I’d sleep on the couch by the door if I had to be alone.

One night Kieth dared me to go into the room that “Auntie Frances” was said to inhabit. I dared him the same. We got all the way down the hall to the door and we both chickened out. (and we were in our 30’s mind you).

12

Nothing to be brave about. It’s just one of those things. Kind of like how people with epilepsy might not like having seizures, but they deal with them when they happen. It’s just how it’s always been, and looks like how it will always be, y’know? As for patience, nah, spend the night with us sometime and you are likely to hear “goddammit, Bob, cut it the fuck out, wouldja?” Here’s the funny part, since Chili Dog never barks at Bob, if I hear a noise in the middle of the night, but Chili isn’t barking, I don’t bother to get out of bed to investigate.

We see things move of their own volition. Pop cans move across the counter, water bottles jump across the kitchen. The best of it was when we had a friend over. This friend was a “practicing witch” who believed in all manner of “supernatural phenomena” – he and his wife both claimed to have spoken with the dead via seances or some such nonsense. He was visiting us at our old house, which had a dining room. Since we have far more books than any normal family, and never do dinner parties, we used it as our library and had several bookshelves in there, along with a computer and some other random stuff. He had asked to borrow a book, I believe, and while we were looking at the bookshelf (from a normal distance of idk, 1 - 2 feet?), we (husband, daughter, guest and me) watched one shelf slide forward almost completely before toppling to the ground. To answer questions before they come up – the shelf did not tip forward, it was not overloaded, and no other shelf moved or was affected by this movement. It was as if one of us had reached out and pulled the shelf out and dropped it. Our friend just about shit himself and never visited us again, he was so scared.

13

When I was a teenager, one summer morning I was in my room making my bed. When I looked up after tucking in a corner of the sheets, I saw my grandmother standing right in front of me. I was so happy to see her and wondered why no one had told me she was coming to visit.

I immediately stopped what I was doing and ran towards her to give her a kiss when she vanished right before my eyes. We got a long-distance call a short time later, letting us know that she had passed away earlier that morning.

14

Yeah, that’s what a lot of people have said. I imagine that’s what happened. I mean, let’s just say that it really was my cousin’s ghost. Why would he choose to come to me, and not his sons, or my dad, who was just devastated?

But, it also seems strange that my mind would do that with someone whose death affected me, sure, but not to the point that I was out of my mind, even nearly so, with sadness.

What really interests me is stories, like above, where the person didn’t know his or her loved one was dead.

15

See, I might have visited you again after that, Litoris. I’m interested that you say this happens wherever you move. Have you ever tried to find out what or who “Bob” is? If Bob" is a poltergiest, are you the focus? Or maybe one of your children? Or is it a ghost that is attached to you somehow? I’m really interested in knowing that. Yeah, I would have wet myself most likely, like your friend did, but still…“Bob” doesn’t sound malicious or dangerous. Maybe a little disruptive but mostly playful. Have you ever tried finding anything out?

Wow. I’ve heard stories like that before. Theres a name for that type of ghost, but I can’t recall what it is right now.

Maybe it was because it would unsettle them more. I once asked my ghost seeing aunt why I didn’t see these realtives that she claims to have seen on various occassions. She told me that its because they know they’d scare the bejeezus out of me. She’s probably right. I mean, on one hand seeing my grandfather again would be nice, but then again it would probably really scare me and disturb me a lot. funny…I want to see a ghost (under my terms, hahaha…like that’ll happen…) but not a ghost of anyone I know.

16

There are a lot of theories about who or what Bob is – everything from my “guardian” to “the manifestation of my unresolved rage.” Meh, whatever. He’s been a part of my life for as long as I can remember, and much like a sibling, you just kind of accept it.

Since it has been going on my entire life, I doubt it has anything to do with either of my kids. My siblings were all glad when they moved out and the weird shit stopped happening around them, so I guess it is centered on me.

There has never been anything malicious, like you surmised, just annoying and disruptive. The best correlation is to imagine living with an invisible, mute 2 year old. Most of the time, he’s well-behaved and you don’t even know he’s there, but now and then he decides he wants attention and starts making noise and throwing things. Because I don’t know that there will ever be a definitive answer to all of the weirdness, I don’t really look for one. It’s just one of those things that I just don’t see as an issue, and besides who’m I gonna call :D, right? Even Ghost Hunters has devolved into relying on “whoa, I just felt something brush my leg, I wonder if the ghost is trying to contact me” instead of “so, I felt something weird, but there’s no data to support that it was anything other than a stiff breeze.”

17

My scariest odd experience happened earlier in the same year Princess Diana died. I’d been to visit a friend, taking with me my then 2 yr old Alsatian/Labrador cross, and had missed my last bus home. To save myself a considerable bit of walking, and to let my dog have a run off his lead with no risk of other dogs about( it was past midnight.), I decided to take a shortcut through a local park.

Once away from the main roads and within the park, the only illumination was a full moon in a clear night sky, and I was walking along a wide public pathway, as my dog ran ahead, scurrying in and out of the undergrowth. I’d been walking about 10 minutes and my dog was out of sight behind a slight bend and some large bushes, when I suddenly heard him start barking. I immediately assumed he’d spotted a fox or a squirrel, and then I heard him begin to growl like I’d never heard him growl before. As I rounded the bushes, there was a large expanse of grass and about 30 - 50 ft back from the path, there was like a forest tree-line leading back to where a boating lake was.

My dog was about 20 ft from the trees, still growling nastily as I followed the direction of his head, and there in a gap between 2 large bushes stood a figure. Straight away I shouted Bo, and said something like, “It’s okay, he won’t bite!”. (D’OH!) As I said it, I was focusing on this figure, and I can only describe it as looking like a tall person wearing a floor-length beige trench-coat with a hood on, and seemingly with a beige face! I just couldn’t determine any features on this ‘face’ despite there being plenty of light from the moon, and somehow, the entire figure seemed to have a “glow” about it. I immediately got a chill up my back and thought, “WTF?”.

Calling my dog again, I began slowly walking backwards as I waited for some sort of response or movement from the figure, and as Bo came to my side, I expected the figure to disappear back into the undergrowth, but it just stayed in that same position. Bo was now barking like a mad thing, and running back towards this figure, but never getting closer than 20 ft or so, which really struck me as strange, as my dog had never been a timid type. I’d walked about 80 yds to the nearest path leading to a park exit, and still this figure was standing there.

As you might probably have guessed from my willingness to walk through an unlit park late at night, in an area that could easily be described as “rough”, I am not exactly a cowardly type of person, but I can’t explain the sense of unease I had while gazing at this figure. I know the obvious explanation is it was another human being…but I found the thought of someone lurking in a park late at night with such odd attire very puzzling, and would like to hear some sensible thoughts on this experience.

18

Well, Ghost Hunters is on TV to get ratings. The day they actually air a program with hard evidence of a ghost I’ll be shocked. I’m not saying ghosts don’t exist, but I’ve never seen a credible picture of one. The only way you’ll ever see one is if multiple people see the ghost when the picturew is taken and theres some way of verifying their honesty.

Even if you’re trying just to prove ghosts exist for yourself I think you’d have to go a place where full body apparitions have been seen with a ton of cameras and backup power supplies and camp out there for an indefinite period of time.

I read this story online years ago, but never forgot it because it sounds interesting. Its not ghostly proof or anything, just a rather chilling story. At least it chilled me, when I thought about seeing something like that. LINK.
My first tour in Europe, I had a buddy named Chris. He had the task of poutting some fold up chairs into a basement storage area in a rarely used building on the kaserne. The buildings were all used by the german army in WWII on the kaserne. Anyway it was around sundown when he was done. (hey we were privates back then, we always got the shit jobs) He came to me in the barracks a bit shaken up saying the whole time he was in this basement he heard footsteps in the halls and murmuring voices but no one else was there. He had the key to the place and had only unlocked one door. I laughed at him at first but Chris was a down to earth, brawler type of guy. He didn’t scare easily but he was really upset. He wanted to prove what he said by taking me into the basement and waiting to see if I heard it too. I’ll admit i was too chicken. Plus he had to turn those keys in to the Supply sergeant so its not like we had all night to keep them to go ghost hunting. That wouldn’t have been something i would have wanted to explain to the 1st sergeant. “Yeah, we didn’t turn in the keys to that building because we were down there looking for ghosts, Top. Yes, seriously. Oh…you want us to go to psych eval tomorrow…after we’re finished cleaning the latrine with toothbrushes…yeah, I guess we asked for it.”

19

I would love to live in a haunted house as long as it was a friendly spirit!

As I’ve mentioned before, I feel the most comfortable at a cemetary and are often drawn to them - I have found a few forgotten family burials, or small cemetaries when I lived in Kansas. When I had bouts of insomnia, I would go walking around the local cemetary and talk to the dead. They never answered me back - except for the time it was really hot & humid and I jokingly asked them to give me a breeze to cool off a little… out of nowhere there was a bit of a breeze cool enough to give me goosebumps. No more breezes for the rest of the night (and I didnt ask for anymore!) I would see other people there (mind you, this was between 12am-4am) from time to time, sitting on the benches or standing near a headstone. To the best of my knowledge, noone appeared in period clothing (and this was an old cemetary) so I could not say either way if any of these other visitors were ghosts.

I have investigated many cemetaries and only a few homes and have never “caught” anything! Of course, back then the recording devices were your standard cassettes and more often than not the quality of sound was ptthh.

The one thing that I would like to believe really happened was when I was driving back to NE and nearly lost control of my car on the interstate I heard my uncle’s voice tell me to calm down, gain control of the car, and everything will be ok. I also felt a hand on my shoulder, as if he was sitting in the back behind me.

I really want to pick up the investigations again, dragging Projammer along because he would be a strong debunker, but I have only found intersted others that are more into proving. ugh. Oh, and I dont have a bunch of fancy equipment.

So who’s house was it that wanted to have investigated…?

20

I dunno about other people, but the Lumbee call them “totens.” I’ve listened to a lot of their ghost stories.

I’ve told a few of my stories on here before, and I don’t know if I believe in ghosts, but they scare the ever-loving poop out of me. I love ghost stories and everything, but I freak myself out.

Two things that happened to me, personally:

When I was living on the Navajo reservation, real middle of nowhere with no electricity for miles, the woman I lived with lived near an old, tumbling-down stone building. One of my first days there, I was exploring and thought that would be a cool place to visit, so I walked over, about half a mile. I got within maybe 10 yards of the building and I just had this feeling in my gut that I should not go any closer. I ran all the way back. Found out a few weeks later that it had been a small general store on a wagon trail that had been abandoned because someone had died in it.

When I was going for my MA at NC State, I spent a lot of time in the spooky, spooky former warehouse that is the English building. Often times, I’d be the only one there. The main part of the building was a cavernous, open space filled with cubicles, with offices surrounding them. The old wood floors were warped, there was little natural light, and it was always eerily quiet. The linguistics lab was a former storage closet, so it was kinda big but closed in and tucked out of the way. A few months before graduation, I was in over-drive working on my thesis one Sunday when I hear a girl laugh, maybe five feet behind me. At first I thought it was my advisor’s daughter who came with him to work a lot, but, no, I was alone. I grabbed my stuff and ran, didn’t even turn off the computer or even save what I was doing, and I never worked there by myself again.

So, yeah, not that dramatic, most likely the result of an overactive imagination, but I still get chills. As a child, I was convinced the old, creaky house I grew up in was haunted, but I could never live somewhere that actually was, or at least had real stories attached to it. I live now in a former convent, and I’m just waiting for the day when I get up in the middle of the night to find a ghost of a nun wandering around my apartment…

Like I said, an overactive imagination.