vituperation

October 26, 2003

We took the spud to see Miss Saigon yesterday afternoon as part of her birthday, and I’m pleased to announce that the show is still just awesome. Sad as hell, but awesome. Two thumbs up; a grand time was had by all.

Know what I hate? I hate it when I have a hankering to write something, but no real idea of what I want to write. I’m feeling like gearing up for another short story but nothing’s tickling my fancy.

Except maybe for the notion of writing a good old-fashioned ghost story. Now all I need is an idea.

Speaking of ghost stories, thanks to everyone who shared their creepy / spooky / weird stories in the comments from the last entry. I love that kind of stuff, if I haven’t mentioned it before.

Oddly, I’m fascinated by many MANY strange things I don’t necessarily believe in, like hauntings (especially the mean ones, like poltergeists), psychic phenomena, conspiracy theories, astral projection, and general weirdness. And for the record, when I say I don’t believe in them, don’t assume I disbelieve in them, either. I just think there’s no strong empirical evidence to support most of them, just anecdotal — and highly entertaining — stories. Oh, and I really enjoy James Randi’s stuff.

That said, the following is a listing of the strange things that have happened to me. The ones that I can remember right now, anyway.

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As a teenager, I once used the Necronomicon (boy, that ought to run off any religious folks who still read me) to try and raise a fire demon. In my bathroom. I don’t think I was particularly successful, but the candle I was using burned exceedingly brightly while I was reading the incantation, and the flame was close to six inches tall.

(Full disclosure: these days, I think magic(k), witchcraft, demonology, etc, is a bunch of hooey. But please don’t cast a spell on me or send a demon after me to prove me wrong.)

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I also played with ouija boards a lot in my teen years. Apparently I’m going to die in 2033, if they’re to believed.

Hint: I don’t think they are.

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When I was about ten, I saw — from the corner of my eye, mind you — a small child dressed in white walking toward me, its arms raised up for me to pick it up. When I turned to look directly at it, there was nothing there.

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When I lived in a subdivision called Hickory Hills as a boy going through puberty, there was a very small and very old cemetery in the middle of a cow pasture by the neighborhood. It was an odd place: many times we witnessed wind blowing the trees outside the cemetery while the ones inside were motionless; often the area fell preternaturally silent when someone climbed the barbed-wire fence to get in; once we heard something thumping in the distance like a great heartbeat each time we touched the wires of the fence.

The oddest experience of all — and the one incident that still has me baffled — occurred one night when two friends and I planned to go inside the cemetery at midnight. We had a flashlight, shining it around as we approached, until something caught our attention. About 50 feet away from us, a shapeless boiling thing floated over one of the graves in the oldest section of the cemetery. It was grey, not quite solid and not quite transparent.

Imagine, if you will, a tiny cloud (maybe two feet wide and four feet tall) perfectly maintained in place. That’s what it was like, and we watched it for several minutes, churning and writhing in the air.

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During that same time (Hickory Hills), I was sitting on my bed shirtless one afternoon. Without warning something slapped me on the back hard enough to knock me forward. I told my parents, and when my dad looked, there was a large red hand-shaped mark in the center of my back.

As though I’d been slapped.

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We once took a tape recorder into Maple Hill Cemetery and left it recording, face-down, on a grave. Listening to that tape was one of the creepier things I’ve done, because it was filled with almost-understandable whisperings and moanings, including one very clear "Get away from me."

Listening to EVP recordings creeps me out to this day. Especially if the room is dark.

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When a friend got his driver’s license — I was still fifteen — we drove out to a place near Hartselle called Cry Baby Hollow. Doesn’t every town have one of these? We stopped the car on the bridge, and sure as shit we heard something that sounded like a baby (or a woman) crying in the distance.

We were too scared to get out and put down a candy bar, and I was so scared by the crying I nearly shit myself.

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I saw an old man in the house one day (again at Hickory Hills; I suspect my puberty had a lot to do with all the weirdness there) when I was home alone. My parent’s bedroom was at the end of a hallway; my room was to the left just before theirs. As I walked into the hallway from the den, intent on going to my room, the man was crossing my parent’s room. I could see him striding purposefully across the room, and he turned his head to look at me as he crossed the doorway. Being the stupid adventurous sort, I went to their room and looked in (hey, he was old, so I could’ve outrun him if need be) but the room was empty.

I saw him long enough to understand that he was old, but the light wasn’t bright enough for me to see details about his face. I wonder from time to time if it was my grandfather, who’d died a couple of years before.

Then again, he was probably a figment of my imagination. Or was he?

So do you have any more ghostlycreepyspookyscary stories to share? It’s that time of year, you know, so ‘fess up in the comments. Leave your comments as long or as short as you like.