A question for you all...

[Antibubba]

My first girlfriend in high school lived in an older part of town-smaller houses built in the Twenties.  I had been in places where there was a "presence" before, but this place was a whole different arena.  It was a house crowded with-I don't know what.  It didn't matter how well lit the front room was, there was always a shadow in the corner of the dining room, where a floor-to-ceiling cupboard was.  I always got the impression of something behind it, trying to get out.  When I told my GF this, she said it had once been the door to a small room.  The previous owners had boarded it up after an elderly woman slowly died of a long illness.

   Besides that one, there were two other active presences.  And I do me "present".  They moved around, and they probed-they were looking for an opening-it's the only way I can describe it.  They were malevolent, whereas the shadow in the corner felt more like overwhelming sadness and pain.  My GF was 17 at the time, and she had a baby sister who was 2 or 3.  Do you understand the concept of shields?  It's possible to block your self from being touched; I was fortunate to have a set that were automatic-very convenient.  Well, anyway, baby sister had a set of shields like I've never seen!  I'd "watch" them moving towards her and get stopped about two feet away.  This kid could broadcast.  It was like a big Lexan dome (or sphere-I'm sure it went below the floor as well.)  Have you ever seen a small child talking to an imaginary friend?  Well, don't assume the "imaginary" part; kids haven't yet learned what can't possibly be real and therefore can't be seen.

   Besides those two, there were at least two, and maybe three, other distinct presences in the house.  One lived in the attic.  It was rather fleeting, and I never got much of an impression from it other than it really didn't care for people.  I only went down to the basement once.  Actually, I couldn't get more than halfway down the stairs before I fled upstairs.  I don't know what it once was, but it was always there, and if I could ascribe a color to it, it would be red.  Red and hot and smothering.  The two active ones upstairs were more like dark spots in a room, inky, if you like.

   And behind the house, on the alley, was a small garage.  I had a dreadful feeling walking up to it.  The backyard was like a graveyard.

   Six distinctly different, identifiable presences.  A lot of terrible things had happened in that house.  Later, I would learn that some of them were still going on.

   I have to admit, I was a little obsessed with her, and that house.  I used to go down to the Main Library and get out the old maps and aerial photos of the city.  Her house sat across from an elementary school on a big grassy lot with a gently hilly ridge near the street.  In 1946 it was 4 full blocks of houses.  In 1948 it was a big empty lot.  I always got the impressions of a plane crash and a huge fire, but I never found anything explaining it.

****

   See, hear, feel, smell.  I can use the words to describe things I've encountered, but the senses were jumbled-I'd feel a sound, and while I usually can't see features, I can see/feel a texture-I don't know how to explain it any better.  It took me a long time to be able to to make out features and subtler colors(?)-it was like a blind man seeing a rose with his hands.  Tell him he can't see the rose as well as you can, and he'll smile and tell you he can see it better than you can.

   Do you ever see those threads on THR from new members who ask, "Has anyone here ever shot/killed someone?"  I almost feel like someone who has pulled that trigger, that I was in a place where hundreds of seemingly random events coalesced into an event that couldn't be stopped, that had to happen.  Like I was a witness and participant at the same time.  Like I was destined to be there, then.  I don't feel proud, or ashamed.  But I see and feel these things.  They're real to me.  While the part of me that enjoys the lessons of history ("Never Again") wants to visit Auschwitz someday, I'm not sure I could even get close.  i've heard that even the most literal-minded and thickskulled visitors feel the horror of that place, burned into the very rocks..

   I don't want to leave you with the impression that everything I've seen was tragic or evil.  I've seen wonders.  I have felt the presence of G-d.  I do not fear the afterlife.  I can't even begin to describe the good things.

[Strings]

all those supprised that I post to this thread, raise your hands. anyone... anyone...?

>I constantly cause large streetlights to go out.<

My wife Spoon has the same problem. She also makes cell phones go bonkers...

 Have *I*, personally, ever experienced anything 'paranormal? Gee... where to start?

 When I was younger, living in San Andreas, the local cemetary was reputed to be haunted. I was informed of that AFTER playing with the little girl there, climbing all over the big headstones, falling off (and landing a few feet away: THOUGHT I had fallen straight down), running around like fools. Was told by some friends that the reason they always avoided the cemetary was the ghost of the "evil girl"...

 There's a cemetary in Appleton that can get VERY lively: verify what arm's length is by a tree before going in, so you know your spacing from the tombs. Antibubba mentioned "shields": I (stupidly) dropped my shields in this place one night. Don't remember anyting until about a half hour later: I drove us home, babbling the entire way. The friend will NOT tell me what I was babbling, but she was scared to death. Picked up a "rider" for a bit off that one, and discovered tht pagans DO have a form of exorcism...

 Then there was the house in Valders. It's a fair hike out of town, no nearby neighbors, and I never made it farther than the middle of the road at night. You'ld just feel something coiling to strike. Never knew anybody able to cross the road there, either. A mile or so down either side of the road, fine. But not right there. Occultist, Marine, SEAL... didn't matter.

 Same house: the infamous "shotgun smoking" nights. Wake up REALLY late in summer, and step outside to have a smoke. Notice thick fog, hear growling, go back inside for shotgun. Never heard the growls if the night was clear, and couldn't find any tracks during the day...

 Same house AGAIN: had a VERY weird dream one night. My old man and I were some sort of investigators, and entered this old house (think the almost dungeon-like fieldstone basement walls type of place), looking for gods-only-know-what. We enter this lil' room, had a boiler of some kind in it, and the old man remembers something he needs out of the car (thanks Dad). I get the feelin' something "ain't right", draw a weapon (oddly enough, it was my first carry piece: .32ACP, Nazi marked PPK), and follow dad. Run smack into a critter: picture an "alien's" black eyes in Nosferatu's face, mounted on the body of one of the peat-bog mummies. I emptied the pistol into the thing, and it started laughing: I woke up at that point. Sat bolt upright in bed (grabbing the PPK in the process), looking around for the thing what needed killin' (or maybe it was "re-killin'"). Scary part was, I could STILL hear the bastard laughing, for about a half-hour after I woke up (the then girlfriend was freaked: I'm normally NOT susceptable to nightmares). Anybody who believes there AREN'T some form of demon in the world, is just plain crazy...

 Then there's the return to the cemetary. Word of advice: if you're going to investigate a haunted location, and a devout pagan is going with, either have them preform their protection ritual before arriveing on site, or have them stay home. A friend in the group insisted on a protection ritual RIGHT AT THE GATE. Think of a Spec ops group getting ready to infiltrate enemy territory, and stopping to set off fireworks and bringing a brass band along for kicks. Was a fun night: bushes moving (and it was a windless night), weird feelings all 'round, mutterings where there wasn't no people, all KINDS of joy. I haven't been back there since (although there are a LOT of people that want to go)...

 Then there were the weird spirits at my parent's old place. Not TOO active while mom was alive: they just didn't like being in the dark, and would plug the decorative lights back in every night. Dad finally just left 'em plugged in. Then mom died. Dad wakes up one night, and sees a figure at the foot of his bed. He gets one of "those" feelings: the one that makes you reach for your sidearm. 'Bout that time, he feels his tiger-cat on the bed, and hears her growling: the figure bolts out the door, slamming it behind him... followed by the sound of the back door slamming. Couple problems though: both doors were shut before dad went to bed, and Tiger had been dead for a couple years (her ashes were on the shelf above the bed). She HAD always been protective of the Old man though...

 Or maybe we should discuss Richardson Brothers Furniture factory. I worked late security there: just me and the wind. figured my mind was playing tricks on me, and I was imaging weird stuf, until the site supervisor (clean-cut, no nonsence Marine type) asks me if I've ever run into anything weird there: turns out, he had an arguement with a ghost there. I never got THAT lucky: I love a good debate. The frieght elevator was possessed: it would change floors without anybody hitting a button (or any sound, for that matter, and it was right outside the guard office). You'ld see glowig spots off in the distance in the factory, but nothing there to account for 'em (not even something reflective). Step outside for a smoke, and you'ld hear glass break: run inside, check stem to stern, and find not one small shard (had a friend come out and verify that I was't loosing my mind on this). The final straw was the ferret thogh: that's the only way I can describe it. Looked like an ordinary weasle, except for the appearant size: roughly a foot or so at the shouder. It was about 200 yards away: from the next day on, I ALWAYS had the PPK with me there...

[Stand_watie]

When I was young and dumb(er), I was practicing dry firing an autoloader at a television set and the pistol somehow loaded itself.

[bermbuster]

In this house there is an invisible monster that eats socks, screwdrivers, and various other small items.

[280plus]

Then there's always my buddy Dan the Man. Dan is an ok guy but not the sharpest knife in the drawer, contrary to his own beliefs. Well Dan and his lovely wife the Vet (animal type) bought a HUGE piece of property up on a mountain in VT to build their dream home. Dan is doing all the site work and one day one of his neighbors to be came up to him while he was working and ioffered to do a "cleansing ritual" to appease the spirits of the mountain. Dan says, "I just turned my back on her and walked away." I said "DAN, this is your new neighbor. You should have let her because NOW she's probably off somewhere conjuring up evil spells on you."  Dan was like, "You don't BELIEVE in all that stuff, do you?" I said, "Of COURSE I do!" Dan's eyes got kind of wide upon hearing this. Well here it is ~ 2 years later. His OTHER neighbor adjacent to him sued him for cutting down a few trees that turned out to be on the neighbor's property. This has caused "Bad Ju Ju" with the neighbor and said neighbor has been causing so much legal misery that Dan's wife has left him for parts unknown, meanwhile the house to be remains a hole in the ground with some really nice landscaping around it and very little prospects for the future.

You make the call.

[Strings]

heh, heh...

 Read an interview with a psychologist once. He said that a curse would be FAR more effective against a modern man than against a primative. Reason? The "modern man", upon hearing that he's been cursed, will blow it off... only to have every small mischance (stubbed toes, missing keys, whatever) prey on his mind. The primative, on the other hand, will IMMEDIATELY run to his local witch-doctor/shaman/whathaveyou, an get the curse countered

 I remember a guy in "A" School that I cursed out in Italian (not "cast evil spells", but "used harsh language"). Kid showed up at my door with the OOD that night, shaking like a leaf, BEGGING me to "take the curse off". The OOD asked me what had happened, i told him, he laughed his ass off...

[Stickjockey]

While the part of me that enjoys the lessons of history ("Never Again") wants to visit Auschwitz someday, I'm not sure I could even get close.  i've heard that even the most literal-minded and thickskulled visitors feel the horror of that place, burned into the very rocks..

You said it, Skippy. Dachau still has ghosts.

[cordex]

In my experience, people who go into a situation conciously or unconciously expecting to see the paranormal will see it.

When I was much younger, I wanted to experience ghosts or something, just to have experienced them.  The only problem was, I'd never been brought up to believe in 'em or be scared of 'em.  One time, on a mothballed college campus in Pasadena, a group of friends was certain they had seen a ghost.  They took me back to where they had seen it and started pointing to every little skittering leaf and fluttering bush as evidence.  Nothing that I saw there was unusual in the slightest, but everyone else was sure that it was.

Years later, a few friends approached me about an abandoned and boarded up house that was rumored to have been a haven for ghosts or some form of paranormal activity.  Other than being off the beaten path and boarded up, we couldn't really see anything abnormal, but we had heard some "witnesses" describe very, very unusual happenings, as well as bizarre decorations within it.  We decided to check it out.

We did it right.  We had radio communication, power drills to pull the boards off, a dedicated lookout positioned in a tree about 50 yards out to warn about passing cars and such, a driver with scheduled drop-off and pick-up times, cameras and so forth.  Guess what we found?  A run-down, condemned house full of trash and beer bottles.  No ghosts showed up to keep us company.  No evidence of satanic rituals.  Nothing but what you'd expect to see inside a crappy boarded-up house.  The only excitement we had was just after the entry group had been pulled out and taken away, but before the lookout had gotten to his pick-up location a car pulled into the driveway of the house and a guy popped out and looked around a bit.  The lookout got to belly crawl a good distance to a drainage ditch to keep out of sight.

In every case I can think of, with every lost graveyard I've come across (had a friend who bought a considerable amount of land that happened to have four or five graves on site), or "real haunted house" I've gotten to go to, the people who saw ghosts were the people who had already convinced themselves, or were convinced by the fear of others.  Once or twice I got a little nervous myself, but it wasn't from the things that were happening, it was from an emotional feedback loop within the group I was in.

As for "I was sleeping and I woke up and clearly heard/saw/felt/smelled/tasted a ghost.  I was awake and it was there sure as shooting," - you were dreaming.  Waking dreams are not unusual.  I've experienced a number of them myself and am pretty sure they had nothing to do with the paranormal.  We've all had realistic dreams that hang on for a few seconds or spastically jerked when we're half asleep and we feel like we're falling - it's all the same sort of thing.  Just as you can feel like you're in free fall when you're actually securely in bed, you can think you're hearing a voice or seeing a spectre.  I've had all three happen to me personally, but they were no more supernaturally influenced then the rest of my dreams.

There are a number of ways to trick your mind into giving faulty information even when you're fully awake.  Go stand in a doorway with your arms to your side, strech them apart and upward until the backs of your hands are pressing against the doorway.  Now, press firmly against the frame and hold it there for thirty seconds.  Step clear from the doorway.  Your arms will feel lighter than air and will probably rise on their own accord.  Your arms aren't really lighter, nor are ghosts lifting them for you - it's your mind playing tricks on you (or vice-versa).

I'm not completely discounting the concept of the supernatural, but I'd wager that at least 99 times out of a hundred, the imaginations of those involved are more active than the spirits.

[grampster]

I have had things dematerialize and then return.  Pocket knife example...look in every pocket 12 times, no 20 times.  No knife.  Bitch to wife that some miserable @@#&*%@!& has come into my house and stolen my knife right out of my pocket.  
SWMBO reaches into my pocket, produces knife, rolls eyes and says, "This knife?"

[Stickjockey]

I had a friend in college who swore his microwave oven was possessed by the spirit of Blackie Lawless. It kept trying to steal his socks.

[Antibubba]

Cordex, I agree with you, mostly.  Take a group of teenagers, put them in someone's basement, light some candles, play some goth or heavy metal albums, and toss in a little pot or alcohol, and something WILL happen.  If someone brings a Ouija board, a LOT will happen.    That still isn't to say that there isn't something happening, but most of it is heightened imagination.

But for me, it happens most when I'm not looking for anything.  I don't actively seek out graveyards, Bates' motels, and Satanic altars. I'll just be walking down the down the street and see someone, and moments later they're gone, and there's nowhere they could've gone to.  Mostly, it isn't a concern.  It just is.

[griz]

Nothing with streetlights, but I can make a grocery store line screech to a halt simply by standing in it.  That, and I was abducted by aliens before I was reincarnated in this life.

[280plus]

Heh, the aliens thing reminds me of this girl I knew once.  I had always thought her pretty level headed until we were out on a dark country road at night and out of the blue she says, "I hate roads like this at night, I'm afraid I'll get abducted by aliens!"

My reply: "Well, It looks like it's about time to get you home!"

[crt360]

280plus, what a wasted opportunity.  You should have made some excuse to pull over and get out of the car - "I think a tire's going flat." "I'm grabbing a few beers from the trunk, want one?"  "I've really gotta pee." - or whatever else you can think of.  Be sure to take the keys with you.  Quietly put on the large, green, bug-eyed alien mask and gray cloak you keep in the trunk.  Stay quietly outside until she begins to think something bad happened to you, then approach the passenger side door in your new duds.  You did remember to take the keys when you got out, right?  Good, your car will still be there.  You also will need them to get back in the car.  You should have a beer or two before attempting to get back in (so she can calm down).  Then you may proceed with "Well, it looks like it's about time to get you home!"

[280plus]

Yup, that's me, a day late and an alien costume short...

Too bad an opportuntiy like that only comes around once in a lifetime.

[Antibubba]

Agreed, wasted opportunity.  Course, you should've sought to discover whether or not she would be comfortable being "probed". :evil:

[280plus]

No, all thoughts of "probing" were quickly dashed with that comment. With my luck she would have taken it seriously and then I'd REALLY have my hands full. It was funny cause we had know each other in our youth and then parted ways for about 20 years and then reunited. I had certain hopes because I had always liked her but the day she came out with THAT one I could see it could never be. I'd already had my share of nutty women and being older and wiser by then I ran like the dickens...

[Mabs2]

Many things have happened in my home to me and a few other folks.  Nothing too life threatening, but they haven't been pleasent.
My grandma's hair has been pulled a few times while she's been in bed.  She's experienced what felt like a cat jump up on her bed and walk over her legs.  She was sitting in the living room one day, and saw a shadow walk through the hallway at the opposite end of the room (her chair was facing paralell to the wall the hallway door was on, so it was at a fairly extreme angle), she got up because she thought it was my uncle, but saw no one in either direction.
And...

...[A] coconut head my Uncle brought back from New Guinea after WWII kept turning around to face the wall on it's shelf...

The exact same thing (nearly) happened to us.  For several months, there was a picture of my uncle in a small (but fairly hefty, opaque glass) frame.  Nearly every morning we'd get up and see that it was now facing the wall.  My grandma would turn it back.  This had been going on for a long time until she eventually asked me if I had done it.  I believe it's stopped now, there's a different photo in the frame.
I'd rather not discuss the things that have happened to me (Don't worry, they weren't too bad, just scary.).

The previous owners had boarded it up after an elderly woman slowly died of a long illness.

Depending on the age of the home, that could have been the room (usually just large enough for a bed) where family members would put sick relatives in.  The idea being that they stay in there and don't get everyone else sick.  Many-a-people have died in those rooms.  Bad mojo if you ask me.

[Lo.Com.Denom]

my eyes would play this sort of trick where first the whole mirror eventually becomes eye-spotted dark, and then clears to show my face, which would continually distort and change.

There's a name for that phenomenon, believe it or not. Can't remember what it is, though... Not scrying, something else.

In my experience, people who go into a situation conciously or unconciously expecting to see the paranormal will see it.

Agreed. However, discount all the stories from drunk teenagers, psyching each other up and playing with ouija boards, and there's still a whole lot of reliable testimonies, often from people with no knowlege or interest in such things.

Interestingly, I spoke with a member of a local paranormal research group a few months ago, people whom you would expect to be "true believers". However, despite showing me photos, EVP, telling of some uncanny psychic predictions and some truely weird phenomenon, he still wasn't happy that he'd experienced anything paranormal. He was permanently chasing 100% conclusive proof, all the while knowing that this was just not going to happen. You can't control absolutely every variable on a ghost hunt -- the real world is not a sterile science-lab -- so he was constantly frustrated in his efforts. He even started to doubt his own coleagues honesty, even though he knew them all very well. In the end, he came across as a rather tragic figure, constantly seeking proof, but never accepting it when he found it...

On the other hand, some members of the group had aparently gone in as total skeptics and had come away as "true believers". Make of that what you will. It seems to me that the best way to be is completely open minded, neither credulous nor cynical. Don't ask for too much and don't settle for too little.

[280plus]

Remember, Harry Houdini is STILL on the other side trying to break back through...

[Lo.Com.Denom]

Heh! Houdini was a debunker -- if he's anywhere at all, he's probably in denial.

[grampster]

Actually Harry is in de hole in de ground, not de nile.