The Ghosts that Haunt Me - The Beginning

The Ghosts that Haunt Me

"There's a skeleton in everybody's closet
I can think of one or two in my own room
But I would like to introduce them both to you
You'd shake their boney hands and so dispel the gloom.."

"..Cause you're so kind
I know you would not mind
You'd send away the ghosts that haunt me now.."

~Crash Test Dummies

One of the more frightening chapters in my life, would have to be my own personal encounters which the paranormal.  While I have had experiences with visitations and spirits from beyond the veil of a more spiritual and loving nature. This is documenting more so strictly my experiences with ghosts, or disembodied energy while dreaming, and more importantly while fully awake.  Having an experience with a ghost, rather than with "spirit or clairvoyant" visitation, I believe are different, albeit, related.

My experiences are not the norm.  They started when I was a young child.  I may in a way be more open to these things. I have often asked myself, why me? Why have these experiences followed me throughout my entire life.  Am I crazy?   Did I make it up?  Is everyone else just close minded. It was not until adult hood when different spirit mediums confirmed to me I was not crazy, but that I was "empathic and clairvoyant," that is comes and goes, and assured me I was not going nuts.

To the skeptic: I am not here to prove anything to you or change your life.  If it does not fit into your belief system, your religious values, your science, or perhaps atheism, my experiences are just that, my experiences.  If you choose to believe I am hallucinating, lying or delusional, that is your right; but then if so, why are experiences spread years apart, and if so, why at times, have there been witnesses either with me or nearby who witnessed the same thing, sometimes only to find out years apart.  Spirits / Ghosts are something mainstream science just as yet to prove, yet they are getting very close and I do know scientists who do believe, but for the same reason fear ridicule by their close minded peers.  To me these are not experiences I wanted.  Sometimes it bothers me when I am told I am making it up for attention or deluded.  This is not something I ever talk about, but I feel should be made record of.   To me these are real experiences, just like someone who might have been in a war or molested or raped, those are experiences that happened to them, not something they asked for.  So take consideration, just because you have not seen something, or because it does not fit into your religious or non religious beliefs, or science, does not mean it did not happen, because to me it was very real.

Anyway enough of the explanation and mumbo jumbo.  Let's begin.

Early Childhood - The Buzzing Bee

Williams Grove, Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania

1979

As a young child, while I do not remember have "imaginary friends" I did have vivid dreams.  At age 3-4 I had no idea what a ghost even was let alone had not yet been exposed to religious belief.  I still remember vividly waking up several nights to hear voices in my room, often thinking it was my mom and dad in the next room, I now know it wasn't. At times it was a soothing female voice, other times very high pitched and sometimes child like.

One evening as I heard the high pitched voices, I began to hear a buzzing sound. At this age, I only thought it must be a bumble bee in my room. That alone was frightening and I began calling out for my parents.  I did not have very good luck with bees that summer, having been stung several times. Once running across the dandelions, so pretty and yellow in the nice soft grass, on my way to a friends house, only to step on 4 bees on the way through and 3 more on the way back home all over my feet.  That same summer, I went to drink my Mountain Dew, only to find 4 big bumblebees floating in it..  These images running through my mind as I am pulling blankets over my head, hiding from a big bee.

The buzzing got louder as if it was now right by my face. I heard then what I thought was footsteps and that my parents had come to rescue me from certain pain.  Because this sounded like it was the biggest bumblebee that ever existed, it had to be huge!

I pulled the blankets away, to see a yellow glowing orb about the size of a baseball floating in front of my face, buzzing and just hovering there for what must have only been seconds, but what felt like an eternity.  At first I was afraid. I was petrified .. (no I am not goin to break out into song.) But that fear was quickly replaced with awe.  In my mind I still thought this was a bumblebee though a friendly one, although it looked nothing like a bee aside from the yellow.  I felt a warmth and a curiosity, coming not only from the yellow orb, but from myself as well.  I got brave enough to sit up in bed to get a closer look, but as soon as I had done so, the orb shot away from me and out through the window (which was closed) and my room returned back to being dark.

I got out of bed and stumbled to my parents room crying and told them there was had been a huge yellow bee in my room.  My dad got up to look for it, finding nothing and had me return to sleep.

Later Childhood - My Uncle's Shadow

Kreamer, Pennsylvania. 

1981-82

Around October 1981, my family had planned a trip to Niagara Falls, Canada side and then onward to Ohio to visit some family friends.  While my mom, dad and little brother would be away for about two weeks, my uncles would be house-sittings, they were in their 20s. The family vacation went well, we had a fun time in Canada and later in Ohio on our friends farm. When it was time to return to Pennsylvania, the day we were leaving our car broke down unexplainably.  Just would not start after pulling over to get gas.  Unfortunately since it was late in the day, the gas station was closed, and we sat there for hours, trying to get hold of a tow truck.

Little did we know at this same exact time frame my uncles were at our house in midst of a very bad argument.  There was drugs involved, intoxication, and teenagers getting heated about something. It turned out to be fighting all through out the house. At the climax of the fight, my younger uncle at some point despite being drunk, was able to find my father's hunting rifle and the ammo which were both hidden.  At sometime during the argument, while it was not pre-meditated, the gun went off and shot my other uncle in the stomach, to which he later died  that evening from his wound.

Around the time the police arrived and neighbors helped take my uncle to jail, our car mysteriously started on it own, although now it was getting late.  We later found out that the car started around the same time the fight was over.  Had the vehicle normally progressed home and had not broken down that day, we would have walked right into the middle of that argument and shooting.  Could that have been some sort of 'divine' intervention, as the mechanic later could not find anything wrong with the vehicle.

Upon returning home the house did not feel the same.  The air was thick, everything felt strange like a slowed down bad dream.  There was not one drop of blood from the gun shot, as it was all internal, but there were signs all over the house, almost in every room of a fight. Broken glass, blood on walls form fists, kicked in doors.  If ever at a time in my life, I could describe what evil felt like this was it. Although I knew my uncle had not intentionally done it.  The whole scenario felt scary to the entire family.

We had the church come in and bless the home, in their attempt to rid the home of these dense negative energy that permeated it.

As months went by I began to experience paranormal activity. One night while sleeping in my brother's room I was awaken by a tapping on the headboard of the bed. I woke up to the tapping, thinking my brother was doing this only to see he had left the room to crawl into bed with my parents. I know for quite some time he made this a habit of sleeping with them. At times he was scared, other times just being a kid wanting comfort.  

I shrugged off the tapping sound only to hear it again louder.  This scared me a bit but I still thought there had to be an explanation, as this time I was fully awake. I was sure my brother had to be hiding or perhaps under the bed, but at around 3 am in the morning was an odd time to play a joke.  Still I got up and looked under the bed, around the bed and saw no one.  I turned the light off and laid back down. I heard the tapping again and was about to get up, only this time to physically feel someone grabbing my right arm tightly by my wrist and yank it through the air!

Now I was terrified as I felt and saw my arm move and there was no one there.  I cried myself to sleep, and hid under the blankets, sweating and eventually fell to sleep form exhaustion not to be bothered the rest of the night.

Around that same time period. It was mid afternoon on a weekend.  Sunny outside, everyone is out an about doing yard work or playing with friends.  I was alone in the house, and could hear my dad mowing the lawn.  My mother and brother headed to the store for something for dinner.

I was in my bedroom, listening to Weird Al Yankovic, and dancing to "Stuck in a Closet with Vanna White."  I was moving around pretty good, knocking and shaking my GI joes over on the dresser, when I spun around and looked at the hallway directly in front of my bedroom which was clearly lit by the sunlight.

There before me stood a complete solid shadow of a man, what startled me at first is that the shadow was standing still but it felt like it was looking directly at me, and I was in the middle of dancing so I knew it was not my shadow.  I then wondered if my dad came in the house, but where could he have been standing to cast a shadow, and I could still hear the lawn mower going.

It was then, it seemed as if the shadow realized I had seen it, and it literally took off running down the hallway toward the living room.  Again I knew it was not mine, because now I was completely still. I thought, "This can not be happening.. I just saw a ghost."  I must have stood there for minutes which felt like forever, debating jumping out my bedroom window - I then heard my mother pull up the driveway and come in the front door. I then had enough courage to leave my bedroom and tell everyone what I had just seen.

Not too long after that my mother was awoken in the middle of the night.  She described to me this uneasy feeling and fear as if someone was in the room.  She looked out into the hallway, in the same location I had seen the shadow, to see the same thing.  A shadow standing there looking at her, which was in the shape of her brother that had just been shot. She described as seeing the outline of his shirt and jeans and his un-mistakingly natural curly hair.  She was overcome with fear and hid under her blankets until this shadow went away.

A few years later we were moving out of this house.  Before leaving my future father-in-law, friend of the family had mentioned to my father that he had seen a man walk from my bedroom into the bathroom and never saw him again, thinking it may have been one of the movers. He asked who the man was with the white t-shirt and jeans and curly brown hair.  There had been no one there that day fitting the description.  Although it is exactly what my uncle was wearing when he died and my uncle had brown curly hair.

'Til this day I sometimes wonder if my uncle was trapped in that house after his untimely death.  Was it him, was it something else entirely?  I would like to believe he made it to the other side and is with the Love and the Light and not a ghost attached to that house.

While I continued to have experiences over the years through out my teenage years they become more frequent, more vivid, and more spiritual in nature and not exactly "hauntings" or "ghosts" per say, so I will jump forward in time to when I was a young adult, and leave the other experiences to their own chapter.

Haunted Apartment

Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania

October -November 1998

I was now a young adult, about 21 years of age.  I was living in a small apartment with my girlfriend and her two young children, and just had a baby of our own in September.  During the day I was a stay at home dad, some days I was alone, other days I watched her kids.

I always felt uneasy in this apartment, especially when I was alone.  At times I felt as if I was being watched. Other times it would feel like a negative energy, sometimes even an anger permeated through me that was not my own.

One day I was alone and upstairs on the computer when down stairs I heard what sounded like several boxes falling down at once, cupboards slamming, and then footsteps.  I thought someone had broken into the apartment, or even perhaps my father in law who sometimes stopped by unannounced. I went down stairs to see no one, and no boxes or anything had fallen to make such a loud, and several loud noises within such a short time.

A few days later. I am alone again.  This time I was of all places on the toilet.  While sitting there reading a magazine I heard creaking at the bathroom door, jiggling as if someone was trying to get in. At first I thought my girlfriend was home early from work and said I would be out in a minute. The pressure on the door increased and began shaking louder.  Startled me as there was no response, normally if it was her she would say some smart ass remark like "Let me in I really have to pee, you can hold it!"

Nothing.  I then looked up at the door and the door knob started to turn.  Even though I was home alone, I liked my privacy and latched the door lock.

Suddenly the latch flew open, the door kicked open with a loud bang as if someone had forced it open with their foot. To my shock no one was standing there. Just an empty hallway. No wind, not a single sound and then the door slammed shut, as if whatever had opened it just realized I was taking a shit and left in a hurry.  First you say it, then you do it.

Not too long after that.  I was sleeping downstairs on the couch one afternoon, again home alone. I heard a noise and woke up to what sounded like someone coming into the living room.  When I looked up my dad was standing there looking down at me.  I said "When did you get here dad, why didn't you tell me you were coming?  Hold on let me get up."  As I looked at him I saw his face and he appeared to be talking, his mouth moving, but no sound coming out of it, and his eyes did not look right. They were wide, fixated as if staring through me.  I stood up to give him a hug, but he was gone, no one was there.  I sat back down on the couch in a stupor.  What the fuck did I just see?  I quickly found my phone and called my grandmother, asking her if my dad was alright, is he sick? Did he die?  She said "Your dad is sitting with me, we were just out driving in the car to the grocery store."  He was 4 hours away in Delaware.  So what did I see?  Was it a dream that I was still seeing while awake, was my dad out of body?  Was it a ghost that could "mimic" someone we know?  Either way it was creepy as hell.

Within that same time frame one weekend my step children were spending the night.  They were around 6 and 4 years old at the time.  A boy and a girl.   My girlfriend and I had just got done watching a movie with them, and said "Ok, its time for bed, get your butts up those stairs and get ready."  Sometimes before bed they would run into the bathroom at the top of the steps adjacent to the bedrooms to pee or brush their teeth quick.  I liked to pick on them and sometimes would turn the light off on them when they were in the bathroom.

As I followed my girlfriend and her kids up the stairs. I could clearly see right in front of me a young boy, blonde hair, wearing blue jeans and a red shirt with white stripes walking up the stairs. I thought this was her 6 year old son.  He proceeded to walk ahead of me and into the bathroom, and closed the door behind him.  I went to switch off the light on the wall, but when I flicked the switch no scream from the bathroom, fully expecting him to yell to turn the light back on.  I opened the bathroom door to check on him, only to find it empty and dark. I turned to look at the kids bedroom, my face white and perplexed as there my girlfriend sat asking me what is wrong as she is tucking her son into bed, who is already covered up and her daughter already on her way to sleep as well.

I stuttered for a moment.. saying.. If he is there.. who.. who just walked into the bathroom.. I went to turn the light off and no one yelled, and there is no one in there.  To avoid scaring the kids, I then went in our bedroom and told my girlfriend what had just happened.

Was this all a trick of the mind? What did I see, as it was a full color 3rd dimensional child, appeared solid, made foot steps, closed a door. I had a hard time sleeping that night.  I began to wonder if something bad had ever happened in this apartment.  Had a child been killed or hurt there?  Would this explain all the activity, and the uneasiness and feelings of anger at times.  It was not long after this we moved out of that apartment.

To be continued...