Welcome – From October 27th to October 31st, I’ll be participating in Nancy Gideon’s Haunted Open House Giveaway Blog Hop as part of Nancy’s 4th Annual Haunted Open House! Stop by Nancy’s Haunted Open House to read Halloween posts by some awesome authors, wander into the spooky Game Room or sample some of the spooktacular Halloween drinks, appetizers and desserts. And don’t forget to check out Nancy’s Tricks-or-Treats!
Do you believe in ghosts? Apparitions? Visits from the dear departed?
I do.
Naturally, it helps to believe if you have encountered one of the aforementioned spirits during your lifetime.
I have.
It also helps if you’re a child who hadn’t yet closed her mind off to the paranormal.
I hadn’t yet–as it turned out.
I was the first grandchild of my maternal grandparents. They doted on me. Even after my sister and a female first cousin were born, I remained my grandparents’ favorite–my grandfather’s especially.
I loved it. What child wouldn’t?
In my tenth year, when my grandfather was fifty-five, he underwent a hernia operation. It wasn’t a hernia that his surgeon found. It was colon cancer.
The two younger girls and I weren’t told, of course, so we thought nothing of it when everyone encouraged our grandfather to take a trip to Sicily to see his family. When he returned with gifts for everyone–I requested a huge provolone cheese of my own–he seemed perfectly fine, tanned and healthy.
Soon afterward, he went into the hospital again, but this time he didn’t come out alive. It was a sad, solemn day when we received the news of his passing. None of us could stop crying all that day. The worst of it was that the girls and I were too young to visit him in the hospital. I never got the chance to say good-bye to Grandpa.
Late that night, something roused me from a sound sleep and I sat bolt upright in my bed. At first, I thought my sister woke me, but she was still asleep in the other bed in the room that we shared.
I saw that the door to our room was open, and in the open doorway an electric blue mist began to coaslesce. My grandfather–my dead grandfather–appeared in the midst of the mist, only he didn’t appear the same way my grandfather did in life. Instead, he looked like a film negative in that mist. The features that should have been light were dark and those that should have been dark were light. He began to walk toward the foot of my bed.
How could he be in my room? He was dead. Fear unlike no other gripped me. He was a ghost! I tried to cry out for my parents, for help, but my vocal chords were unable to cooperate. I did the only thing my ten-year-old self could think of to do. I pulled the covers over my head and cried, trembling with fear, praying that it was all a bad dream and that my grandfather’s ghost would be gone when I poked my head out of the covers again.
When I finally gathered my courage to peek out, he had vanished and so had the blue mist. I lay awake the rest of the night with a night light on. I never told my parents or anyone else what I had seen. I was sure they wouldn’t believe me, but if they believed that I believed what I saw, well, I didn’t want to spend the next several years on a psychiatrist’s couch.
As I grew in age, and I hope in wisdom, I began to suspect that my grandfather did not appear to me that night long ago in order to terrorize me or to take me with him to the other side. I’m certain he came to me that night to say goodbye. After all, I was his favorite.
It bothers me to this day that I was so frightened that we didn’t get to say our good-byes, although I’m sure my grandfather understood a ten-year-old’s fear of the unknown. I believe that I’ll have the chance to make it up to him someday when it’s my turn to cross over to the other side. I know deep down that I will not be afraid when my grandfather comes to take me home.
My Treat
Let’s see what everyone else is handing out!
20 Responses to “Spirit In the Mist”
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Yes, I had several paranormal encounters,I don’t know if it’s me who attract them or just by chance.
I believe some people are more receptive to paranormal phenomena. You just might be one of them.
I got to see a ghost last year in San Antonio. I was staying at the Menger Hotel which is known for it’s ghosts. I woke up one night to see a man in a striped dress shirt and slacks sitting in a chair watching me. I had a few moments of doubt and the man didn’t go away but I couldn’t see him clearly until I turned my head a certain way… finally I said “I’m tired. You can watch over us.” And went back to sleep.
I would love to see my family again, even in ghost form. I miss my mom and it’s been over 15 years. Someday!!!
I’d love to see my family again too. I’m the “matriarch” since the elders are gone.
I had another eerie experience, this time at Christmas not long after my mom died. My mom loved Christmas decorations and would leave them up long after the Christmas season was over. I was turning out the Christmas lights with a remote control in our lower level family room. I began to climb the stairs and the lights came on again. I thought I might have pressed the wrong button. I went back and shut the lights off again being careful to press the correct button on the remote. I turned for the stairs and the lights came on again. Now I’m spooked. I knew the remote worked just fine earlier in the evening. Something else was going on. I’m not sure why, but I thought of my mom. I said, “Is that you, Mom?” She didn’t answer. I tried a different approach. You see, she always sided with Macho Guy whenever we had a difference of opinion. She doted on him. So, I said, “Mom, you know how your darling son-in-law goes bananas when we don’t turn the lights off when we leave a room? I’m going to turn the Christmas lights off again, and this time they need to stay off. Okay?” I took a deep breath, turned the lights off and started up the stairs. At the top of the landing, I peeked over my shoulder. The lights stayed off. There may be a purely logical explanation, but I’ll always think it was a mother-in-law respecting her son-in-law’s wishes. 🙂
I firmly believe in ghosts or at least spirits that, for whatever reason (unfinished business, maybe), have not yet moved on. Yet I’ve never really experienced an encounter with one. Not really certain I want to. I’m sure your experience was frightening for a young child, but perhaps it’s been a comfort to you later to know that your grandfather wanted so much to say good-bye to you.
Looking back, it is a comfort that my grandfather came to me to say goodbye. I keep a photo of him and my grandmother on my dresser. Just seeing them every day makes me smile.
I didn’t see her, but I believe I had a visit from my mother after she passed on. I commented on it in my reply to Melissa above. It makes me wonder if perhaps the spirits of my parents and grandparents drop by occasionally to check up on me. 🙂
No thanks goodness.
It’s not for the faint-hearted, as my ten-year-old self found out. ::shudder::
I have never seen a ghost, though I have had a couple of strange dreams that I could interpret as deceased loved ones contacting me.
I’ve had a few of those dreams too, and I’m convinced they were a means of communication from deceased loved ones. When I awaken, I feel as if it really happened. It’s an eerie feeling.
Lana, thanks for participating in the Hop!! And for sharing you spooktacular story!
You’re welcome, Nancy. It was fun, although Mother Nature and her snow showers kind of put a damper on the trick or treating tonight in this part of Michigan. The little kids who came out anyway (with their moms and dads, of course) looked adorable. The older ones looked downright spooky. One was dressed as the Grim Reaper–well, I hope it was a kid in costume! =:-0
I’ve never seen a ghost or had any awareness of one.
I think some of us are contacted in some way by spirits because of unfinished business. That was probably the reason in my case.
I’ve never seen a ghost.
Not so far. You might see one some day–or night. 🙂
can’t say I’ve ever seen a ghost, but I also don’t think that means they don’t necessarily exist either
It’s good to keep an open mind. Who knows? You might be visited by a ghost one “dark and stormy night.”
I have never seen a ghost, but I did live in a “haunted” house. Motion lights would go off when no one was in the room. Strange noises kept us up at night. We also had a Mickey Mouse phone that kept ringing at about the same time every night and no one was on the line. Eventually we unplugged it, even after that it would still ring. There were so many creepy things that happened at that house. The house was old and we didn’t know it’s history. All we knew about it was that it was an old farm house that had been moved into town and a second floor and bathroom were added after the move. So many people had lived there. it was previously a rental, that it is hard to believe that someone probably didn’t die there. I guess we will never know what was going on there. My kids still like to talk about that house and the happenings there, even though we haven’t lived there for years.
A haunted house–wow! That must have been a spooky experience. You might have had a poltergeist as a houseguest!