Travels and Rambles

Windwood Farm is out!

2014-04-20T20:36:00.000-04:00

I can't believe so much time has passed since my last blog entry...

Well, my latest book has been released! WINDWOOD FARM was officially released this week and you can now find it on Amazon in both Kindle and paperback. This weekend I'll be at the Mushroom Festival in Irvine, signing copies of it and my "Haunted Estill County" books. If you're interested in signing up for a free copy and have a Goodreads account, I'm hosting a giveaway over there. Just check out the widget here on the blog!

Here is the back cover:

Windwood Farm has a terrible secret–one that’s been buried for more than 75 years…

Thirty year old Taryn Magill has spent her professional life exploring historical buildings and abandoned homes. With degrees in Art and Historical Preservation, she uses her camera and oil paints to recreate the once beloved and grand structures of yesterday for her clients, showing them how the buildings would have appeared in their prime. With her latest assignment at Windwood Farm, however, she may have bitten off more than she can chew.

Commissioned by the Stokes County Historical Society to paint the once grand stone mansion before a development company turns the surrounding farm into a subdivision, the job starts like any other. Soon, however, as Taryn becomes involved in the photographing and painting of the house, unusual occurrences begin to happen.

For the first time ever, when Taryn looks through her camera, she sees more than decay and empty rooms; she’s finally able to see the past come alive as the formerly grand house begins to fill with furniture and belongings before her very eyes.

Every old house is supposed to be haunted, but this one seems to take the cake. Why does the young woman weep from the upstairs bedroom? Why is the sense of evil so strong that even vandals have stayed away for more than 50 years? What happened to the young neighbor who went missing in the 1920s and does his disappearance have anything to do with the house’s mysteries?

More importantly, will Taryn herself be able to escape with her sanity and life before the house comes down? Because now it seems like someone is trying to kill her! Using what her camera reveals to her and her wits, she’ll try to unravel the mysteries of the farm and get out before it’s too late.

And here is the cover:

Windwood Farm

2014-01-23T16:14:00.000-05:00

January 23, 2014

For the past several weeks I’ve been working on a new book. This one, called Windwood Farm, is the first book in what I am calling my “paranormal trilogy.” My protagonist is Taryn McGill, a 28 year multi-media artist who has a special kind of talent: when she looks through her camera’s viewfinder, she sees the past. She uses this skill to solve old murder mysteries.

Taryn holds a double degree in Art and Historic Preservation. In the first novel, she has been commissioned by the Stokes County Historical Society to do an oil painting of the once grand stone mansion of Windwood Farm. The mansion was designed by the same architect who designed the governor’s mansion. The mansion has been deserted for more than 75 years and part of it has caved in. Nobody knows what it looked like in its former glory and the Historical Society would like a painting depicting it as it was before a development company tears it down.

As Taryn becomes involved in the photographing, and later sketching and painting of the house, strange things start happening. Why does the young woman weep from the upstairs window? What is the shouting that appears to echo from underground? And does the young neighbor who disappeared more than 85 years ago have anything to do with the mysteries that surround the house and farm?

More importantly, will Taryn herself be able to escape with her life and sanity before the house is scheduled for demolition?

If you’re interested in seeing some of my inspiration for WINDWOOD FARM, then please check out my Pinterest Board for the book.

In the meantime, here are some of my own pictures for it.

More Tales from Haunted Estill County

2013-10-25T18:19:00.000-04:00

I'm excited to announce that the sequel to HAUNTED ESTILL COUNTY has been released. MORE TALES FROM HAUNTED ESTILL COUNTY is officially out and we're doing the launch this week, on Halloween from Thyme on Broadway in Irvine. We had a "soft" release a couple of weeks ago and sold out already but the "official" release will be on Halloween night.

I'm very excited about this book, even though it will be the last installment of the Estill County stories. Still, there are several good stories in it and I've enjoyed interviewing people and getting to hear their tales. Lots of new things on the horizon, too.

To check out the book on Amazon, go HERE.

author interview

2013-08-25T23:26:00.002-04:00

Here is a recent author interview with me.

To see the source, visit it at:http://awesomegang.com/rebecca-patrick-howard/

Rebecca Patrick-Howard by Vinny O'Hare

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.

Professionally, I have written several hundred books. As a ghostwriter though, I can’t take credit for any of them. (Let’s face it, some of the subject matters have been so strange that I am perfectly fine with that!) Under my own name I’ve had four nonfiction books published. They are: FINDING HENRY: A JOURNEY INTO EASTERN EUROPE, 50 HOMEMADE CLEANING SOLUTIONS: RECIPES USING COMMON HOUSEHOLD ITEMS, HAUNTED ESTILL COUNTY, and COPING WITH GRIEF: THE ANTI-GUIDE TO INFANT LOSS. In the fall I will have the first book of my paranormal trilogy released. It’s called WINDWOOD FARM and the series involves a photographer who sees the past when she looks through the lens of her camera. She uses that skill to solve old murder mysteries.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?

I recently had COPING WITH GRIEF: THE ANTI-GUIDE TO INFANT LOSS released. It came out last week. It was inspired by my son who died from SIDS in 2010. It’s not just my story, though. I interviewed lots of other infant loss parents and included their stories as well. After my son died I had trouble finding anything to help me through my grief. They were either too inspirational (I was angry and mad, I didn’t want to read anything uplifting), too religious (I’m not), or too clinical. The original title of my book was “My Baby Died and I’m Madder than Hell.” I decided to go with something a little less aggressive.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?

I work in the middle of the night. I stay up all night and go to bed at dawn. Sometimes, when I’m working on paranormal stuff, I even manage to scare myself. I usually have DESIGNING WOMEN or THE GOLDEN GIRLS on in the background. I love horror movies but they freak me out if I am up alone. I am sure that every sound is someone coming to kill me.

What authors, or books have influenced you?

I will read anything-even the back of cereal boxes. Honestly, the bad writing influences me more than the good writing because it shows me what NOT to do. Isabel Allende with her magical realism really inspired me although my writing is nothing like hers. I mean, she’s really good…I just try to entertain.

What are you working on now?

I am working on a historical fiction novel called FURNACE MOUNTAIN. It takes place during the Great Depression and is about a little boy who writes President Roosevelt and invites him to visit his town in the mountains of eastern Kentucky. Roosevelt responds and says that he’ll be there at the end of summer on his reelection tour. The book is mostly an adult version of the children’s book STONE SOUP and focuses on how the townspeople, who all thought they had nothing, find out they have everything when they come together and prepare the town for Roosevelt’s arrival. I’m also working on the paranormal trilogy and HAUNTED MADISON COUNTY. Because we love our ghosts around here!

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?

I have no idea. When I find one that works I will let you know. I do have almost 2,000 members on my Haunted Estill County Facebook page. But we mostly talk about ghosts and goblins in the county. I’m not sure how many sales it has resulted in. I live in a small town. Once everyone has a copy of my book there really isn’t anywhere else to go with it.

Do you have any advice for new authors?

Write. Read. Drink if it helps.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?

To take criticism with a grain of salt.

What are you reading now?

I usually have several going. Right now it’s some Wicca spell book and a Nora Roberts thing. I read a bunch of literary stuff a few months ago. I have to let my brain rest. What’s next for you as a writer? Hopefully to sell some books and find time to actually write. I have two small children. It’s like trying to herd cats sometimes.

What is your favorite book of all time?

I really love HOUSE OF THE SPIRITS. And MY ANTONIA. Oh, and VC Andrews’ HEAVEN, although that is kind of embarrassing to admit.

Coping with Grief: The Anti-Guide to Infant Loss book trailer

2013-07-17T14:53:00.001-04:00

Please be gentle...this was my first time.

Here is the book trailer for Coping with Grief: The Anti-Guide to Infant Loss. Music is public domain. Starting tomorrow I will also be hosting a month long giveaway on Goodreads. I have 5 copies to give away for free. I'll post the widget tomorrow when the contest starts. You simply have to enter it, no strings attached.

New book out

2013-07-14T17:09:00.000-04:00

I am excited to announce that I have a new book out. This one is also non-fiction and is entitled Coping with Grief: The Anti-Guide to Infant Loss. It was a long, sad process but I feel good about getting it completed and out there. I am also excited that I was able to add experiences that weren't only my own but belonged to my friends as well. I don't know that the book will be helpful to anyone out there but at least I got to say some things that I wanted to say.

Remembering Marnie

2013-06-24T01:18:00.000-04:00

Remembering Marnie

Today I learned that our dear family friend, Martha Shemwell, passed away. I was surprise when I posted it on Facebook and someone commented and said that they were sending prayers to her family because it was the first time I really realized that this woman WAS family to me. And I will miss her terribly.

Martha was the beloved English teacher to hundreds of students at Hazel Green Academy. Stern, intelligent, and sharp as a whip she had high expectations of those around her and encouraged all of her students to fulfill their true potential. Even after the Academy closed in 1983 her former students continued to come in from all over the country to see her and visit her. She was the kind of teacher with a following that others only dream of being and having.

I never knew her as Mrs. Shemwell. To me, she was “Marnie.” If I think back far enough I suppose that my first memories are of her. She lived behind us on the Academy’s campus and she was as close to me as any family member. When my nana would fall asleep for a nap I would sneak out our back door and sun across the yard to Marnie’s house where she would give me cookies, tell me stories, and let me listen to her cuckoo clock. (I thought it was a real bird.)

Marnie instilled both my love of literature and writing in me. Up until her death she still talked about the time she went to Florida with us and I made her read the same children’s book about littering over and over again. She finally made my mom hide it. Marnie, and later her sister Gladys, introduced me to such books and stories as “Little Orphan Annie”, “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang,” and “Wuthering Heights.”

She was always a fixture in my life, even after the Academy closed and she moved to Berea. We would often spend the night with her and her sister (whom I called Gla-Gla) and there was never a birthday or Christmas that went by without her sending me a card that rattled. (Even as an adult she called it my “ice cream money.”)

Marnie went to Graceland, the Opryland Hotel, and several other trips with us. She loved country music and Elvis and when I stayed with her we would watch CMT together and discuss the songs and videos.

Sometimes, we never talked at all. Sometimes we would sit there in her living room for hours, just reading and enjoying the quietness.

She loved me through all of my stages and fashion faux pas. Once, when our friend Wheeler (a preacher) earned his degree and we went to his graduation I went wearing a tight black dress, high heels, and strings and string of necklaces. With a jean jacket. It was totally inappropriate. When we got there I suddenly got embarrassed. “Do I look okay?” I asked. She patted me on the arm. “Well, it looks good on YOU anyway, my dear.”

I never knew Marnie’s husband. He passed away from oral cancer before my mom even started the Academy so she didn’t know him anyway. Marnie never remarried. I was surrounded by strong, single, independent women in my life. I think this also helped me be independent as well. Marnie never talked about her husband or his death. I recently found her wedding veil, though, when going through our storage unit. I will neve know what feelings she harbored about her loss.

Every year she was able to Marnie would go with us to the Hazel Green Homecoming. We would either stay with our friends the Clarks or rent a hotel room in West Liberty. Being the belle of the ball on these occasions, I didn’t normally see her during the day but later that night, in the hotel room, we would gossip about who we had seen and what we had done. Sometimes, if still hungry after the fish fry, she would talk me into taking her to Ezel to the Frosty Freeze where we would get peanut butter milkshakes and cheeseburgers.

When Marnie got sick in 2000 after I returned from Europe we spent the rest of the summer staying with her at her house. That was one of the best summers of my life. Although I was a college student I would have rather hung out with her than anyone else. We fixed soup beans and cornbread, watched Lifetime, and reminisced about Hazel Green and how much we missed Wolfe County.

It’s hard for me to imagine her as the stern teacher that others do. After my nana died in 1987 she was the closest thing to a grandparent I have ever had. I went to her about boys and travels and my writing. She was very proud of me and wanted to read everything I wrote. I brought her back presents from Europe and always thought of her, no matter where I was.

In 2004 she got sick and had to be placed in a nursing and rehab center. She was not happy about this. It was the first time I had ever seen this fiercely independent woman cry. I visited her every day after work and often took her Double Deckers and Quarter Pounders. I always took her for a spin in her wheelchair and on nice days we sat in the garden or on the front porch in the rocking chairs. I got her into the show “7^th Heaven” and we spent a lot of time talking about it. We talked about the characters like they were real people.

Sometimes I would bring my pedicure kit and give her manis and pedis and do her hair for her. I called these our “spa days.”

In the past few years Marnie’s memory had begun to fade. Sometimes she didn’t know who I was. Sometimes she thought I was still a little girl. I took Sam in to see her once and I am sure that she thought Sam was me. The visits became harder for me and, I admit, I didn’t visit as often as I should have.

There are people who are put into our lives for a reason. She loved me and accepted me as if I were her own granddaughter. I honestly believe that some of the best things about me came from her.

Hospice Plus' Gala on Derby Eve

2013-05-07T00:11:00.000-04:00

On Friday night I attended Hospice Plus' Gala on Derby Eve. My friend, Angela Bailey-Davis, is the events coordinator for Hospice Plus and she coordinated this fabulous event every year. When she wrote me and asked me if I'd like to come in and be a photographer for the event, of course I was ecstatic. It offered me the opportunity to put on a formal dress, visit with old friends, and take pictures for a good cause.

Angie and I go way back. She was my boss in a former life and we even vacationed together in Ireland and England. The night was fantastic and I had a ball. If you'd like, check out some of my pictures from the event...

Hospice Plus' Gala on Derby Eve

Book release

2013-04-30T09:45:00.000-04:00

We've had a very eventful week here in the Patrick-Howard household. My book, HAUNTED ESTILL COUNTY, was released last week. It was just in time for the Mushroom Festival. We set up a booth there and had a great time talking to everyone and seeing people that we don't usually get the chance to visit with. Even more amazing was the fact that people I had never spoken to before came up to my table and told me about even MORE ghost stories that I hadn't heard. That was by far the best part of the day!

Although it was overcast and rainy, we sold out of books in about 6 hours. (Pete even sold the display copy while I was taking Iris to see the goats...) I've gotten several Amazon orders, too, so I am working to fulfill them. A new order has been placed to the publisher and I hope to have more copies in about 10 days.

Both local papers contacted me about doing an interview. I am very excited about talking to the Estill Tribune today. I am equally excited about the new cafe, Thyme on Broadway, that is opening in May. We are working together to host a reading/signing for me later in the month. I'd like to bring in a local singer to do a few songs like "Long Black Veil" and other spooky tunes while we're there, too.

I created a FB page called "Haunted Estill County" and we've had a lot of fun on it. People are adding more stories and sharing memories of some of the houses that they grew up in. It's nice to be able to communicate with people from the county on such a friendly platform.

If you're interested in checking out my website, you can find it HERE:

Rebecca's website

If you want to visit the "Haunted Estill County" Facebook page, you can find it HERE:

Haunted Estill County

My Views on George Strait's "Cowboy Rides Away" tour

2013-03-04T08:58:00.001-05:00

For my birthday this year, Pete got me a ticket to see George Strait on his farewell tour. I say “a” ticket because at $90 a pop we couldn’t afford two. So, I attended the show at Rupp Arena with nearly 22,000 other fans, although technically I was there by myself.

Now I know that artists have a tendency to do “farewell tours” and go into retirement, only to come back years later (I’m looking at YOU, Garth Brooks) but I wanted to see George. I had my reasons. For one thing, the man is 60 years old. While he might tour again in the future, he is as good now as he will ever be and he’s still kind of in his prime. I want to remember him the way that he is. I know it sounds silly, but there are some artists I love so much that I find myself having trouble seeing them do shows in their 70s and 80s because their voices aren’t the same, their stage presence isn’t the same…it just makes me sad. There are exceptions to this, like Don Williams and Kris Kristofferson. But they have always kind of been older men to me for most of my life anyway. I knew George in his younger years. He got his start in 1981 and I remember that. I have lived throughout the duration of his popularity and musical career.

At any rate, the show opened with Martina McBride, whom I have mixed feelings about. I don’t dislike her but I don’t love her. I rarely keep the station on when she comes on but she doesn’t have the effect on me like, oh say, Kenny Chesney or Jason Aldean do.

Martina probably has one of the strongest voices in country music. Unfortunately, the industry has never quite known what to do with that voice. When she first started rising in the country music world, she had the misfortune to do so at the same time that artists Shania Twain, Lisa Stewart, and Ronna Reeves came about. The misfortune lay in the fact that all four of these singers had long brown hair. Record companies were afraid that people wouldn’t be able to tell them apart. (Because, clearly, Shania’s voice sounds identical to Martina’s.) Lisa Stewart had to dye her hair blond, Martina had to hack all of hers off, Shania got to keep hers, and Ronna Reeves faded off into oblivion.

Then, what to do with Martina? She was never marketed as a sex symbol, although she’s a very attractive woman. She wasn’t marketed to teenagers because she was too old (gasp, she had to be in her late twenties at least). So who WAS she? Her early music was some of her best since she was so directionless. “Cheap Whiskey” might have been covered by Patty Loveless or one of the other soulful women of the 1980s, it was that traditional sounding. “Two More Bottles of Wine” WAS covered by Emmylou Harris although I find myself liking Martina’s better.

Then, she recorded and released “Independence Day” which turned out to be a monstrous success that I highly doubt anyone saw coming. About a woman who kills herself and her abusive husband by setting the house on fire, the video and song raced up the charts. She had a bonafide hit! Now, what to do with it?

What followed over the course of the next 20 years was a mix of other songs trying to recapture that hit status. Some might call them “issue songs.” I call them “emotionally manipulative” songs. Neither well written or tuneful, they identified Martina as the type of singer who understood real pain and real issues like abusive husbands, cancer, child abuse, neglect, teenage dramas, childhood cancer (not to be confused with the adult cancer which she also sang about), etc. etc. Songs like “God’s Will”, “Concrete Angel”, “I’m Gonna Love You Through This”, “Love’s the Only House”, and so on might have sent messages and been played to death at the time but are largely forgettable.

When she released a song from the “Runaway Bride” soundtrack called “Baby I Love You” she hit gold again. It was played to death. It was also really, really bad. I’m sorry, but I am approximately the same age she was at the time and I can’t sing a line like “baby you’re so cool” and keep a straight face. Other songs ran along the same line. (To be fair, “Happy Girl” was on a previous album, but it’s just as bad.) I blame this on the Shania Factor. Shania was making tons of money singing inane songs with simple lyrics. Others were bound to follow.

I have always secretly suspected that when she wasn’t singing songs that were being marketed to teenagers or emotionally manipulative ones, she was probably pretty good. There have been a few standouts in her career for me: Cry on the Shoulder of the Road, Whatever You Say, There You Are, Anyway, Wrong Again, and Beyond the Blue.

So then we get to the Martina part of the show.

First of all, girlfriend is frighteningly skinny. (Note to self: send Martina cheesecake or two for Easter.) Although she’s showing her age now, she is still a beautiful woman.

There is a reason why I have never tried to sign any of her songs-I can’t hit those notes. Well, neither can she, as it turns out. While her voice is powerful, it’s incredibly hard to use that much power and still go that high without going flat. She let her band and her back-up singer (Carolyn Dawn Johnson and where the hell has SHE been for the past 10 years?) carry her. A lot. But that was okay.

And it turns out I was probably right about her music. She only sang one of those emotionally manipulative songs (I’m Gonna Love You through This) and that’s probably because it’s off her new album. And not one of the inane teenager things. She stuck to the GOOD stuff and even threw in a few classics. I should say that my side of the arena did not sing along with her until halfway through when she belted out Lynn Anderson’s “Rose Garden.”

I believe she was a little surprised when she got a standing ovation for “Broken Wing” before the song had even finished. I wasn’t surprised it happened. Heck, people were probably just relieved to finally hear a woman in country music who could sing. Have you heard the radio these days?

And, I had the audacity to tear up during her high-powered version of “Anyway.” I know, it’s not like me to be so weepy but it’s actually a good message (better than the messages of the “issue” songs as if that weren’t ironic enough) and she did well with it. I wasn’t the only one.

A funny moment: Martina was singing "This One's For the Girls" and the camera was scanning the audience, looking for people to put on the big screen. The last shot got tons of cheers, which I am sure Martina thought were for her. I have a sneaking suspicion, though, it was for the dancing woman with the "Damn Strait" T-shirt on.

Now, on to George.

As mentioned before, I grew up with George. I remember the early stuff like it was yesterday. There is literally a George Strait album and song to represent every period of my life. From the early “A Fire I Can’t Put Out” (age 4 watching Hee Haw) to the “Pure Country” soundtrack (ah, the teenage years) to the rollicking Elvis-inspired “We Really Shouldn’t Be Doing This” (living in Nashville and trying to be a singer myself) and beyond. George has been there with me for a long, long time. He’s been a constant.

The stage was in the middle of the arena and it tickled me to see that off to the side there was a cluster of director’s chairs set up bearing the names of his wife, son, and daughter-in-law. After 30 years I like the fact that Norma still tours with him.

The audience was a mix of ages, genders, and income brackets. There were high heeled cowboy boots, fur coats (it was COLD outside), mini dresses (never let the weather be a reason for not dressing up), sequins, cowboy hats, and more blue plaid shirts than I ever seen at one time. There must have been a sale going on somewhere. (Pete sat outside in the hallway during the concert. He said the people watching was spectacular.)

I sat between two couples who were nice, quiet, and polite concert goers. They clapped where they should, stood at the appropriate times, and sang along at levels that were appropriate to the ears of those around them. I wish I could say the same about the woman who sat behind me. As she as she sat down she bellowed, “Why do our tickets have to be in ‘Old People Ville?’” I should mention that the couples on either side of me were probably in their early 20s.

She proceed to scream at ear popping decibels throughout the entire show. She talked just as loudly and had to narrate the entire concert. “I hope he sings ‘Marina del Rey’. I will go crazy if he sings ‘Marina del Rey.’ Oh God, I LOVE ‘Marina del Rey.’” So when he went into the first few notes of that song I braced myself. Sure enough, it was a screaming fit like we hadn’t heard yet and it culminated with, “If I have a daughter, I’m going to name her MARINA DEL REY!” Poor kid.

George looked fine, as always, and sang for at least two solid hours. He started with material from his early years and took on some obscure songs and some that were never released. I was happy that when he made it to the “Pure Country” soundtrack he chose “The King of Broken Hearts” and “Where the Sidewalk Ends” instead of going with the obvious “Heartland” or “I Cross My Heart.” He probably figures that on his last tour he’s going to just sing whatever he wants to because after 30 years of touring I am sure he’s tired of the same material every single night.

George brought Martina back on stage for “Jackson” and “Golden Rings.” He also stopped midway for a ceremony in which he bestowed a mortgage free house and $6,000 worth of groceries to an injured vet and his family.

With the stage in the center, he did his best to play to all four sides. He generally did about two songs per side and then rotated on to the other. Without running around in circles, I guess that was the best way to it. Of course, the big screens above the stage captured his every move, too, but I hate watching those because it makes me feel like I am just at home watching television.

I teared up for the second time during the night when he broke into “Troubadour” and flashes of the younger George appeared on those screens. I can’t think of George as being gone. When George Strait dies, it will feel like a chapter of my life has closed. When he came back for the encore and did “The Cowboy Rides Away” (also the name of his tour) I couldn’t even stay for the last few notes. That song has meant a lot to me over the years. During one of my worst teenage breakups I played it over and over every night so that I could cry myself to sleep. Not to mention the fact that I love the line “my heart is sinking like the setting sun” because I love alliterations.

It was an emotional night. It was a fun night. The chick behind me screamed so much that by the end MY throat hurt. I got drunk off the fumes of the people around me. And I am pretty sure that even though I was sitting in a section of approximately 1,000 people and was in row “o” George saw me and smiled at least once.

Making our window treatments

2013-02-15T13:48:00.001-05:00

I love to shop and I like to buy cheap things and then make stuff out of them. So a few weeks ago I came up with this idea of making our window treatments for the whole house. I had never attempted such a thing, but there's a first time for everything!

So, here is a picture of our cornices and drapes for the dining room. Well, actually the picture is just one drape and one cornice but the other looks exactly the same. I still have to purchase a tie back and we're painting the walls kind of a caramel color, which will make the drapes look less washed out.

My cornices were made out of foam board (Hobby Lobby-$8) and I used an exacto knife to cut them out. The material is is a tablecloth I bought at a flea market. The curtains are made out of material that I also got at a flea market.

After the sides and tops of the cornices were cut out, I used a hot glue gun to glue them in place, making a three sided box. I used a staple gun to hold the material in place.

To hang them on the wall, L-brackets are put in right above the window. (They're not in here in this picture-the cornice is just perched on the window frame.)

I think in total, by the time you add up supplies and such, I spent around $8 per window. Once I find an interesting tie back and the walls get painted this weekend, I think our dining room will really shape up.

Haunted Estill County-the book

2013-02-09T20:58:00.000-05:00

At the end of April, I will have a book coming out. HAUNTED ESTILL COUNTY is my collection of county-wide ghost stories. I think it will be a lot of fun!

In the meantime, here are some photos to get you ready...

Dream Job?

2013-02-09T03:08:00.002-05:00

I am copying this over from my VT page...

At one point about 7 years ago I was offered a job in the mountains of New Hampshire. Things didn't go quite as planned...

So I figured that enough time has passed and I can now talk about the Mysteries of Center Tuftonboro, New Hampshire. People close to me, and even a few not so close, know these stories. However, I have been using them to entertain the good folks here in Wales and decided at last that they belong on the web in some form. I did a random search and didn’t find anything else posted about the subject at hand so I guess I’m the first…

It started on a wet and rainy day in The Middle of Nowhere, New Hampshire. I knew that I would be living out in the country, fairly far from anything of significance, but I had no idea I would be so isolated. No telephone, no television, no neighbors, nothing. The house was a big farmhouse, about two hundred years old, and I lived in the attic. There were offices below me so during the day it was quite social with lots of people buzzing about. At 5:00 pm, however, everything shut down and I was left alone. Alone, on a mountain, ten miles to the nearest town. I thought I could handle it. I had my laptop to work on my novel, some books that I hadn’t gotten around to reading yet, and a CD player that would occasionally get in a radio station as well.

The first week was uneventful. I got to know the place a little bit, through walks and through drives in the country. I liked the fact that the lake was only a short walk down the hill from me and in the evenings it was kind of peaceful to sit on the front porch in one of the rocking chairs and watch the sky.

Week 2 was when I started going crazy.

The old wooden staircase that lead up to my room was noisy. There’s no way I could have sneaked down them at any time. A door at the bottom of the stairs was always kept shut. The hallway outside my room, leading to a storage room, was also noisy. No creeping around here. Well, one night I went to bed, read a little while, and switched off the light to go to sleep. I hadn’t been out for very long when I heard a ruckus on the stairwell. It wasn’t the soft creaking of my shoes or even someone of my size. This was “CLUMP, CLUMP.” At first I thought something had happened and someone was coming to get me. I didn’t have a phone, after all. So I jumped out of bed and ran to the door. The footsteps continued coming up the stairs. I flung open the door and switched on the light and-nothing. The stairwell was completely empty and the door at the bottom closed.

I was disturbed, but not enough to be scared so I went back to bed. I thought it could have possibly been the wind.

The next night I heard the same thing. I checked the time to see if it was happening the same time it did the night before, but it wasn’t. This time, I did not get up but lay in bed and listened. (With the light on at this point.) The steps reached the top of the stairs, seemed to pause at my door, and then went across the hall to the other room. I slept with the light on for the rest of the night.

I didn’t exactly start getting scared until the next night. I hadn’t slept well the night before, obviously, and tried wearing myself out by staying up as late as I could so that once I laid down I would be able to sleep. Once again, I drifted off, only to awaken an hour later to the footsteps. This time they were not on the stairwell, but outside my door. I listened for a moment and was about to get up when my bedroom door shook. It didn’t look like someone was trying to turn the knob; it just looked like someone hand their hands flat on the door and was pushing. This went on for several seconds and then I heard the footsteps walking away to the other room.

He next evening I closed the door to that other room. I had decided that whatever was inhabiting the upstairs seemed to like it and I didn’t want to look at it. Whenever I would have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night I would open my door and look right into that room and I was afraid that one night I would see something that I didn’t want to see.

A week went by with the same noises. By then I was sleeping with the lamp on and constantly on alert. A few other noises were added to it, and I discovered that they really started as soon as the sun went down. One night as I was taking my shower on the second floor, I heard the noises above me. Again, they stopped at my door and then went across the hallway to the other room. When I went back upstairs, the door to that room was open. I was not amused. But I DID find it interesting that I could hear the noises all over the house and not just upstairs.

The pounds and rumblings were enough to make me jittery, but when the voices started I knew I was at the end of my rope. It was about three in the morning and I had finally settled into some good sleep when the whispering started. It was quiet at first, and then gradually got louder. I could make out words know and then, but it was so soft that I couldn’t even tell if it was a man or woman’s voice. It came from outside my bedroom door. I listened to it for along time and then turned on my CD player to continuous repeat.

After a couple of nights hearing the voices, sometime the music would drown them out and sometimes not, I knew I had problems. I asked around some of the staff that worked below if anyone else had had any problems living there and everyone agreed that something was up. One guy who had lived there the year before said that a girl had lived in my room and in the middle of the night had jumped in her car and driven to his place saying, “I can’t take the noises anymore!”

So knowing that I wasn’t entirely crazy helped. That night I opened the door to my bedroom and tried talking to them. “Look guys, I’m really tired. I have a migraine, and I just want to sleep. Can you please keep it down tonight?” I was answered by a thud in what I now referred to as “the Scary Room.”

The weekend was coming up. It was Thursday night. I had played around with going away for the weekend but I hadn’t made up my mind yet. That night I went to bed as usual, with the lights and CD player on, and tried to get some sleep. A short time later I heard noises that I had NEVER heard before. Someone was pounding on the door leading up to the stairwell. I knew it had to be a person this time so I threw open my door, ran down the stairs and flung open the stairwell door to-nothing. The pounding had only stopped when I was a few steps from the bottom and I hadn’t heard anyone run off. I stood there for a moment, confused, and THEN I heard a pounding on the front door downstairs. So I ran down another set of stairs to the front door. Just as I reached the door, the pounding stopped. I stood there for a second and THEN heard the pounding on the back door. It would be physically impossible for a single person to have gotten there that fast. Pounding on all of the doors. I didn’t look this time. I went back up to my room, threw some stuff in a bag, and drove to another girl’s house that I had become friendly with. I slept on the couch.

Of course, that next day I decided to do my little weekend trip. I went to Central Massachusetts for the weekend and on my way back I stopped in Salem to see the House of the Seven Gables. I figured that since I was in Salem I might look around at some of the witchy shops and while in one of them met a Wiccan woman who had been practicing for many years. I briefly told her about my experiences and she asked me if I had ever heard anything in my room. I had already considered this and said that no, the noises were always on the stairs, in the hallway, or in the other room. She then said that something was barring them from entering and asked me if I knew what it could be. No, I didn’t know. She was fairly persistent about it and kept saying, “Think about what’s in your room. Do you have anything lucky? A talisman? Stones? Crystals? Any spices or herbs? Any black candles?” No, I didn’t have any of those. What about photographs? Yes, I did have a photograph of my (deceased) grandmother by my bed. She said that it was possible that was the barrier-that I was being protected. But just in case she recommended a type of stone to buy and told me to place them at intervals around my bed. I had tried everything else.

That night I talked to my mom, who probably thought I was certifiably insane by then, and she recommended a line of salt at the door because supposedly spirits can’t cross it.

I tried both and sure enough, the next few nights were relatively peaceful. On the third night, the whispers came back. This time, I could make out exactly what they said, “Let her sleep. She doesn’t feel well. Let’s just leave.” At first I thought that perhaps it was someone playing a trick on me, but before I could get up and look a deep sleep fell over me and I had the first good night’s sleep I had had in weeks.

At the end of that week I went to Boston. By then my nerves were frazzled, I was grumpy, and I was at the end of my rope. I met three girls in my hostel and in the course of the evening told them what was happening. They were confused as to why I was remaining in the house and I told them that basically I didn’t have anywhere else to go at the moment. It felt so nice to talk to people about the situation that I almost forgot there was even a problem.

Until I got back home on Sunday night, however.

It had been raining a lot and the road was unbelievably foggy. The road to the house wasn’t paved and what usually took me three or four minutes to drive took more than fifteen. I couldn’t even see the end of the car. The air was very still and not a breeze to be felt. When I finally made it to the house and got out of the car, a light suddenly flashed on in the room across the hall from me. I could see it from the parking lot. As I watched, a dark shadow seemingly stopped and looked out the window, and then the light went out. I went inside and started up the stairs, but I couldn’t do it. I heard the noises again. The walking and the whispers. As hard as I tried I absolutely could not make myself walk up those stairs to my room. At the bottom of the steps I sat down and cried and tried to ridicule myself for being such a big baby but it was hours before I could force myself to go.

I guess when I finally went I didn’t shut my bedroom door all the way. An hour later, I heard the pounding on the door only this time, my door flew open. I jumped out of bed and ran to shut it, but a pressure seemed to be built against it. Curiously, I closed it to without latching it and watched. It opened again. It didn’t force itself over like it would have in a breeze, but instead started opening and closing as if someone on the other side was playing a game with me. I watched it in fascination and then remembered my digital camera. I have the capability to record on it as well and I picked it up and started shooting. I recorded a few seconds on it and then the movement stopped.

The next night I went into Wolfeboro, a neighboring town, and had dinner at a pub. The waitress was very friendly and I had had her before. She told me that I wasn’t looking well and I told her that I hadn’t been sleeping. A little while later two women sat down at the booth next to me and began talking. They were telling ghost stories. Intrigued, I invited myself into the conversation and told them briefly about my experiences. I did not tell them where I lived or what town it was or anything like that, but several minutes into my descriptions one of the women goes, “You’re not living in Canaan Valley in Center Tuftonboro are you?” I was startled. That’s exactly where I was living. She went on to tell me that it was supposedly one of the most haunted places in the state of New Hampshire. The waitress came back and got into our conversation and told me that the lake has a lot of underground caves and tunnels in it and that it is reportedly haunted as well. I lived in the valley on the lake. Great. I was probably getting it from both sides. They left me with some advice and the waitress said that I should be all right, that I had a good energy about me.

But I wasn’t convinced.

It’s sufficed to say that I didn’t last long in New Hampshire. Only six weeks. That was probably five weeks too long. By the time I left I was a wreck. It wasn’t until I got down to Florida with Ian that I was able to sleep all the way through the night.

I did manage to get one of the staff people to tell me what they thought the noises were from. Apparently, a man had hung himself in the room across from me. I don’t know if that was true or not, but I did definitely feel like it was a male presence and not female or child.

You Know They're Here (Or Do I?)

2013-01-09T09:10:00.003-05:00

I don’t normally do book reviews, unless something really stands out to me, but I’m going to start this year out with two books that I received over Christmas because I think they warrant being discussed.

As most people know, I am a big fan of all things paranormal and love the show A HAUNTING. (Although I do think it’s funny how they are constantly slamming paganism and seem to think that most haunting are the works of demons.) Both of the following books were actually episodes on this show. The first one was called DARK FOREST and the second on called FEAR HOUSE. So, let’s get started!

Book: You Know They’re Here

Author: Paul Kenyon

Oh dear. Where to start? Okay, to begin with, I am about 99% sure that this book was self-published. If it wasn’t self-published then it was at least put out by a publishing company that had a very limited budget and therefore had to curtail certain expenses. Like editing.

The book itself is more than 500 pages. The editor in me could have easily cut out more than 250 of those. An additional 100 would have been on thin ice.

The premise revolves around Paul, a supposed night guard for an allegedly haunted house in Hinsdale, New York in the 1970s. I will get to why I say “supposed” in a minute. As far as “allegedly” goes; I don’t doubt that there were things going on there. I just doubt some of his story.

Paul is a guy in his early 20s (22 I think) whose wife works with Clara Dandy, a woman who the local paper is doing a story on, thanks to the paranormal bumps and thumps that are going on in and around her house. Looking for a good laugh (that right there rubbed me the wrong way), Paul talks his wife into inviting themselves up to the house so that he can poke around. (He has never met the family, but uses Debbie as his way in.) Although he is disdainful of the fact that dozens of people carouse the house and property, hoping to get a glimpse of something spooky, it never seems to occur to him that he is essentially doing the same thing. Over the course of the next year and a half, he spends a good amount of time at the Hinsdale house, looking for ghosts…or something.

Okay, so here’s the deal…I was expecting that eventually the Dandy family would appoint him night guard and pay him a salary. This is what the back of the book indicated. This never happens, though. In fact, he visits the house almost every night for a week at one point and the parents don’t even know he’s there! Instead, he and a buddy are poking around with their flashlight, trying to see something. Ironically, whenever they do hear or see a ghost, they analyze it to death and seem to be shocked. Why keep going if you’re not a believer?

Paul continuously invites himself over to the point where I started to feel uncomfortable. (I’m not the only one, either. Other reviews on Amazon say something similar.) He speaks from the point of the past-middle aged man that he is now, but you have to remember that at the time of the story he was a twentysomething guy who did not know this family and just kept poking around on their property, eventually calling himself a guard.

He does seem to make friends with the family. At least, they do call him and talk to him. It is not a friendship that extends beyond his visits to the house, however. For instance, they don’t visit him, they don’t go out to the local diner and grab a bite to eat, and none of them come to the hospital to visit his wife or his son even though their baby is born 8 weeks early and is in the hospital for quite a while.

How do I know that none of this happened? Because he talks about every.single.thing that happened. In fact, the haunted part of the story doesn’t really even pick up until nearly 200 pages into the book. Until that point, you get endless drivel regarding his business that he had to close, his conversations with his wife, what he had for breakfast, etc. None of this has anything to do with the supposed subject matter of the book, but there you go.

After visiting the house for awhile, Paul starts feeling things and a priest tells him that he’s psychic. Okay, the priest doesn’t really tell him that, but that’s kind of what is implied. Paul decides that he has a special relationship with Laura, the 13 year old, (I won’t even get into that one) because she is also “sensitive.” Together, they can sense when things are going to happen.

With his new-found powers, Paul investigates the hauntings by running towards things when he feels a certain amount of energy, inviting himself along on tours when the world-renowned psychic visits, making himself part of an exorcism, and making special phone calls to the priest who resides over the haunting.

He talks splendidly about the family and how they are his “friends” but I have to wonder. At one point, when he tries to take off for the tree line because he gets a feeling, Clara flat-out tells him to leave it alone. When another random guy shows up at the house and Paul tries to take him upstairs to feel the energy up there, Clara stops him. Her husband even tells him that he spends more time at the house than he (the father) does. Paul is also confused when the Discovery Channel interviews the family about their story for the show yet he doesn’t get asked to participate. Plus, even though he supposedly formed all these bonds with these folks, he doesn’t really communicate with anyone but Clara these days.

Another part that annoyed me regarded his wife. Debbie was pregnant throughout most of the story. She also worked full time. So, Paul was at home, helping her and being there for her, right? Well, no. Most nights it seemed that he was traipsing around the Dandy property with his friend, Tim, and waking their teenage son, Mike, up to ask questions or borrow things. Debbie, on the other hand, won’t go to the house unless it’s daylight. I didn’t blame her. It was no surprise to me to find out that their marriage didn’t last.

Sometimes, Paul’s sensitivity and ability to pick up on energies were just aggravating. The incidents seemed to hit at totally inappropriate times and reminded me of someone who wanted attention. (I’m sorry if that sounds harsh. I don’t disbelieve him, but I have felt things like he did before and I kept my mouth shut for the good of everyone else around.)

For instance, everyone is having a fun time at the Labor Day picnic when suddenly Paul gets his with negative energy and starts freaking out so everyone has to pack up the food and go inside. In another instance, Paul and Debbie have brought their new baby over to visit and after a little while, Paul gets hit with energy and it has everyone frantically throwing stuff in the car so that they can leave. Debbie herself even remarks that when things like that happened to Paul they all got scared even though nothing actually happened to anyone else. I felt her frustration.

Somewhere, in this book, there is a good story. The paranormal incidents were freaky. I was scared for the family. These were very negative forces at play and nothing to be joked around with. That Paul and his buddy seemingly took them lightly and played Ghostbusters made me mad. The family was at their breaking point more than once and Paul’s presence did nothing to help that.

The story about a man who had little to define himself with (he played in a band and worked part time at a sub shop) and ended up inviting himself to become involved with the local haunted house to give him some direction is an interesting story. I’m sure that’s not the way he saw himself, but it’s a way he came across.

If you are interested in the family’s version of what happened, then I recommend you checking out the episode of A HAUNTING. It’s on You Tube at the moment. Clara Dandy also wrote her own account of what happened and you can find it in a book entitled ECHOES OF THE PAST. It is a truly interesting tale and probably one of the better episodes.

In a subsequent entry, I’ll talk about FEAR HOUSE and the mess that it was.

ETA: In doing further research I discovered that Paul has a Facebook page and that some of the Dandys are friends with him and "fans" on his "fan page." So perhaps I did misread their relationship and they are fond of the guy. In that case, I think it's the author's fault that I walked away with the conclusion I reached.

Our Year in Review

2013-01-05T22:43:00.002-05:00

Happy 2013 y'all! Instead of doing a boring, newsletter type wrap-up deal, I thought I would post our year in pictures. They were the best of times, they were the...actually, this year was pretty good (all surgeries aside). So let's see what happened!

JANUARY

The year didn't start out so great, with Iris needing tests up in Cincinnati for her seizures.

Luckily, we managed to squeeze in a trip to the museum anyway to cheer everyone up!

FEBRUARY

In February, we found out that I had to have brain surgery. In other news, Iris learned to play checkers.

MARCH

March saw three birthdays (mine, Sam's, and Mom's) and our vacation to Gatlinburg. It was also, unfortunately, the month that saw my hometown ripped to shreds by a tornado (on my birthday, no less).

Mom's birthday was slightly better since she had a chicken pot pie at Hanger's.

We also traveled back to Cincy for me to get another brain scan. This was less important than the trip to the rotating restaurant on top of the hotel and Joseph Beth's.

We also (you guessed it) went back to the museum where I learned that being 4'10" (yes, that's really my height-I'm a couple of inches away from legally being a dwarf) is not ideal in helping to build a bridge.

We also visited one of our favorite places in Estill County (Aldersgate Camp) where Sam was chased by a lamb. Of course, we took plenty of pictures because nothing says good parenting like laughing while your child gets chased by a farm animal.

APRIL

In April, I saw Dwight Yokam. Do we really need to say anything else about the month? I think not.

MAY

May saw lots of excitement. Mom bought the farm. Okay, I'm kidding. But she did find A farm and it's very pretty. This is a picture of it.

We also took a trip to Holiday World since I found out that once I had brain surgery I would no longer be able to ride rollercoasters. You know, we had to squeeze in as many as we could at the last minute.

Sam and I went to a circus, too. I love having people flying around above me.

Naturally, we took long drives to random places and placating the children with McDonalds while I took pictures.

JUNE

I had brain surgery in June. That's about all I can remember of that month, thanks to a combination of anesthesia, drugs, and (you know) the fact that they cut into my head.

hardly a scar at all!

And because once wasn't enough, I went back 6 weeks later and had another surgery done.

At least the kids had fun at the museum.

That's our friend, Leslie, who met Mom at the museum with the kids.

Oh, yes, and our cat had kittens. Guess Tiger is not a boy.

JULY

In July, Hell came close to freezing over when we sent the kids to Bible School.

I also lost a ton of weight thanks to a spinal fluid leak. Best diet EVER!

Toby had a birthday.

Then Iris had a birthday.

Like father, like daughter

And somewhere in there we celebrated the 4^th of July.

AUGUST

In August, we had lots to do! For instance, we explored more old houses. Like this one.

The most important thing, of course, was the Clay Walker concert Ashley and I attended. We got a little close.

Then there was the Hazel Green Homecoming. Iris was pretty for awhile and then she decided that clothes were optional.

That's Sam on the front porch of my old house in Hazel Green

On a sobering note, we went through West Liberty. I was sad to see my old theater was gone, but appreciated their optimism.

Sam started kindergarten. There was lots of screaming and crying and begging, but eventually I calmed down and everything was fine.

SEPTEMBER

September really saw a push in our house hunting adventures. We looked at lots of places and finally put in an offer on one. It would be three more months before we would close, though. In the meantime, Iris remained happy.

Unfortunately, it was back to hazel Green for the funeral of one of our friends.

On the plus side, I did get to see Don Williams in concert.

And Sam got to play at Kidsfest.

Iris got some kind of weird rash that lasted a month.

And we visited the Amish.

OCTOBER

Thanks to Sam’s love of costumes, every day is like Halloween at our house so there wasn’t a huge change in the air in October.

Iris did learn to drive, however.

Pete learned to make BBQ pulled pork.

Sam lost his first tooth and bought a sword with a very interesting handle.

He also went on his first field trip where he picked apples in sleet.

And, of course, we all went trick-or-treating.

See how excited they are?

NOVEMBER

Being from England and all, they had Sam dress up as a Pilgrim for Thanksgiving at school.

Iris decided that the new yard was okay with her.

Pete picked me some mistletoe in our backyard, leading me to name our new place “Mistletoe Ridge”, much to his embarrassment.

And I made a few pumpkin pies from scratch. (Yep, that’s actually carving up the pumpkin. Nope, nobody has gotten food poisoning yet!)

DECEMBER

December saw lots of activity.

We visited Mount Sterling for their open houses.

Toby's grave got decorated.

The kids started a band.

Iris and Sam were not impressed with White Hall’s Victorian Christmas.

Although Iris did learn to say “cheese.”

And took herself shopping.

We attended Irvine’s jazz concert and prettied ourselves up.

Iris helped Pete cut down our tree.

Sam took a nap.

And we all dressed up like Santa.

Iris just couldn't contain herself from the excitement of Christmas Eve.

And Christmas Day saw everyone sleep in until noon. We're such party animals.

Happy New Year!

Mayan End of the World Drinking Game

2012-12-03T22:25:00.001-05:00

Those who are Facebook friends of mine know that I am always on the ball with my Election Coverage Drinking Games. I never start a debate without 40 different ways of ensuring that the majority of the members in my household are a) intoxicated or b) will become so. I realize, however, that I am getting behind in my Mayan End of the World Drinking Game.

Now that Thanksgiving is over, we can go back to worrying about how the world is going to end in just a few short weeks. Hopefully, you'll have most of your Christmas shopping done by then so you can devote all your energy to preparing for the End Times. On the day leading up to The End of the World, I invite everyone to sit back, grab a beverage of choice, and party like there's no tomorrow! Because, you know, there might not be!

Mayan End of the World Drinking Game

*Note: These rules mostly involve around the social media outlet of your choice. Feel free to use them, but give a girl some credit if you do.

Take a drink when:

* Someone posts a cartoon giving their interpretation of what the Mayans really meant.

* Take a double shot if it's the cartoon that shows the two guys hammering on the stone and one turns to the other and says, "Oops, I ran out of room. Oh well, nobody will notice!" Why? Because it's my favorite.

* Someone gives a long rant about how the world is NOT going to end and everyone else is crazy.

* Take a double shot when someone does the above and then offers the "real" explanation for the ending of the Mayan calendar.

* Someone posts a Bible verse that proves the Mayans were correct in their estimated date.

* Take a double shot if that Bible verse is so badly out-of-context that you had to read it three times to make sure it is even real.

* If a business you are friends with or follow posts an End of the World sale or promotion. It's important to cram in as much shopping as possible when the end is nigh.

* Anyone posts about stocking up on ammo, drinking water, or Twinkies.

* Someone quotes DEEP IMPACT, ARMAGEDDON, 2012, or THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW.

* Take a double shot if someone quotes or refers to THE DAY AFTER. Because that movie actually freaks me out.

* Don't do it while you're driving, of course, but save a drinking opportunity for every church sign that uses the opportunity to warn its congregation about their souls the day before.

* Someone posts about a post-apocalyptic movie marathon that's on, or even a DOOMSDAY PREPPERS one.

* Someone makes a reference to Dick Clark, TWILIGHT ending, or Hostess.

* A Christianity vs. Paganism debate erupts.

* Someone changes their profile picture to reflect the impending doom.

* An argument breaks out about the best way to fight the oncoming zombies.

* Someone uses their status to express their disappointments in human kind, urge everyone to love one another, or get in one last confession.

* Someone threatens to deactivate their Facebook/Twitter/Google + account or delete people who post about the end of the world.

* Someone quotes Woody Harrleson. Oh, heck. When someone quotes ZOMBIELAND in general.

* Someone posts a status from God's perspective.

* Someone quotes REM.

* Take a double shot if they post the video.

* Heck, finish off the bottle if they MAKE a video for the occasion.

* Anyone speculates on the exact time of the apocalypse, given the various timezones.

* You see a special from that company that offers to take care of your pets after the Rapture.

* Someone's posts look like they started playing my game just a little bit too early in the day. Cheers!

What Dreams May Come?

2012-11-25T02:42:00.002-05:00

I don't normally post dream entries but I had an interesting one last night and I think it's worth remembering. It actually played out more like a movie: sometimes I was an audience member and sometimes I was a central character.

My dreams have been kind of crazy for a long time. I have always had terrible nightmares and they've always been very detailed. My mom bought me a dream journal as a kid and I was supposed to write down what I ate before I went to bed, any medicine I took, and what I watched on television before I went to sleep. We hoped to find some sort of pattern. There wasn't one. My dreams have also been very prophetic, and not in a symbolic way, either. For years I dreamed that my cousin moved back from Oklahoma and moved into an apartment complex with a cliff beside his building and a creek at the bottom of it. I had many dreams about this location. When I was seven, he did just that. There are lots of examples like this, but I won't bore you with the details.

At any rate, in last night's dream I was with a small group of people. I couldn't tell you who they were, but I can say that they felt very familiar to me. I knew them, yet I didn't recognize them. One was a small girl. One was an older woman. There was a man or two. I think there were about five people in the group. We knew each other, but we weren't family members or close friends. I was the link between them.

The dream started off with all of us running. We were trying to get away from something; I think it was a burning building. (It could have been many burning buildings. It seems there might have been a terrorist attack.) We made it to a rope that hung down from some indiscernible structure. I took ahold of it and wrapped my legs around it. The young girl got on my back. One by one, we all attached ourselves to the rope and then we were being lifted above it and carried away.

The next thing I knew, we were in the country. There were lots of trees and fields and flowers. Everyone looked different, but I knew we were the same people. We drifted off from one another and went our separate ways, except for one of the men who stayed behind with me. We walked to a small farmhouse and went inside. I don't remember the rest of that scene, except to say that in a few moments, we were all again gathered around that rope and being lifted up into the air.

Over and over again, this happened. Sometimes, the setting was almost science fiction-scenes from a future that felt unfamiliar to me. Sometimes, it felt foreign. Once, we were plopped down in the middle of an Amish community. Another time, it was a small room that made me feel trapped and claustrophobic and I cried to get out of it. In another time, the young girl didn't make it to the rope in time to be lifted away with us and I cried and cried. She didn't make it to the next scene, but I saw her again after that.

Eventually, I woke up.

Now, I have a few interpretations of this but my favorite one today has been the reincarnation theory. I believe in reincarnation (I believe in all of it, I don't think anyone has all the answers) and the idea that we kind of travel around in groups is an interesting one to me. I think that was my group. I don't think we were always the same people to one another (in one instance, I think the young girl was my daughter and in another I believed her to be my mother) but we were always there together.

I have thought about this for years and I actually think I have a pretty good idea of who at least a couple of "my" people are. In my dream, the people were mostly faceless. I knew them by shape and size but not by any facial features. There was only a vague awareness of their gender.

Compared to some of my dreams, this one was a good one. I wouldn't mind seeing those guys again.

Why Black Friday is Good for Christmas

2012-11-23T14:57:00.001-05:00

I realize that Black Friday isn't for everyone. People are pushy, lines are long, and most of the stuff they sell as "doorbusters" aren't quality items that you would normally spend your money on. As someone who does not do well in crowds, it's kind of surprising that I really enjoy Black Friday. It's even more surprising that my husband absolutely loves it and looks forward to it every year.

Over the past week, my newsfeed has been filled with people getting on their moral high horses, talking about how they would never participate in such commercialism and that it's not what Thanksgiving, or Christmas, should be about.

I beg to differ.

Before you start judging people on their after-dinner activities, let me show you what Black Friday has meant to us.

In my early years, we spent Thanksgiving with my aunt in Indianapolis. As a housewife from the time she was 16 until her husband passed away two years ago, she cooked and cleaned and worked for her family every day with hardly a break. On Thanksgiving, her son and his family would come over and she would cook for everyone. It was a fest fit for a high quality buffet and it started at about 4:00 am when she put the turkey in the oven.

On Black Friday, however, she was able to take a break. That was the day she could hang up her oven mitts and head to the store. For about eight hours we would go in and out of stores, laughing, shopping, and having a good time with each other. This was a woman who rarely left her house. She might go out once or twice a week, but she was a homebody. Black Friday was one of HER days. She was able to eat lunch outside of the home. She didn't have to cook for anyone or clean up after anyone. Nothing was expected out of her except to have a good time. And we did.

As an adult, I surprised my mom with a trip to a 5 star hotel on Michigan Avenue in Chicago for Thanksgiving. We ate dinner at a gourmet restaurant and spent the rest of Thanksgiving night watching holiday movies and ordering room service in our suite. The next morning, we were up a dawn, ready to hit the high-end sales at Saks and Bloomingdales. After a day of shopping, we had a fabulous dinner at Geno's Pizza and then took a horse drawn carriage ride around downtown Chicago, under the Christmas lights. It started to snow. There was no family feast or get togethers. It was just me and Mom, having a girls' weekend in one of the best cities in the country.

That next year, we went to Nashville. We had dinner at a nice hotel and were the last people to leave. They allowed the staff (servers and cooks) to come out and eat off of the buffet, too, and they ended up pulling their chairs around our table. We stayed an extra hour, talking to the people (many immigrants who were away from their families) and eating. It was not OUR family, but I couldn't imagine a nicer way to eat Thanksgiving dinner. The next morning, we got up and went shopping and while we didn't buy anything, we enjoyed people watching on our bench in Opry Mills. There were grandparents with grandchildren, couples, giggling teenagers, and sometimes entire families together. It was clear that this day had become part of some families' Thanksgiving tradition. Everyone looked like they were having a good time.

That would be the last Thanksgiving would be spent just between mom and I.

In Wales, I created my own Thanksgiving dinner amongst friends. In the second year there, my best friend and I were both pregnant. Although Lampeter didn't have Black Friday, or Thanksgiving for that matter, we both got up bright and early on Friday morning and headed to town. There, we did our own version of the crazy day. We hit the charity shops and bought a small tree and then decorated it with second hand ornaments. After putting it up and stringing lights around our rooms, we went back out and had lunch and dessert together. We sat there in the pub and talked about baby names and nursery decor and first birthdays. It would be the last time that we would ever be alone like that. I moved back to the United States a month later and I've never seen Nicky again.

On Pete's first Thanksgiving in the US, Sam was a baby. Since he was a terrible sleeper, he was already awake at 4:00 am so we hit the mall. Why not? Being out seemed to calm Sam down. The toy store in the Richmond mall that I had grown up shopping at was going out of business. It was a sad day, like part of my childhood was closing down. I had shopped in there age the age of 8 and now I was shopping in there for my own child. We bought him some Christmas toys, celebrating our first Christmas as a family, and then ate an early breakfast together in the food court, where the owner of the Silver Diner knew us all by name.

That morning, Pete went into Wal-Mart and bought me a camera. It was the first big present he had ever bought anyone. He was so proud of that camera and excited about all the pictures that I could take with it. He was afraid that I was becoming depressed since I didn't get out as much as I used to. He hoped that camera would help. It did. I still have it, even though now it takes forever to boot up and eats batteries.

And, lastly, there was the pregnancy with Toby. I was just starting to get morning sickness and felt terrible. But we didn't get out much and we wanted to try it. Wal-Mart was a madhouse. Luckily, we didn't want any of the big ticket items so we didn't have to fight any of those people. Our line snaked through the garden area, though, and it was long. We stood in it for over an hour. During that time, people gave up their seats to me whenever we would get close to a rocking chair or bench. Someone helped Pete push his buggy. Being in there with all of those trees that were decorated in different themes made me feel hopeful about our new baby and new future. How would we decorate his tree? What cartoons would he like? This time next year, he would be six months old; what toys would we buy him? Would it even be a boy at all? These were the thoughts running through my head-not the long lines or the slow cashiers or the things flying off the shelves.

That night, we stayed in a room at the Hyatt in downtown Lexington. We took Sam to watch the Christmas parade and the lighting of the tree. Afterwards, we all (including our friend Ashley) went for a carriage ride around Gratz Park. His partner had just died a few months before. He wasn't celebrating Christmas. That Black Friday was hopeful for us, and a balm for him.

For us, it has never been about the "stuff." We have gone out and never bought anything at all. We've gone out with $50 and bought nothing but $2 DVDs. Sometimes they've been for other people, sometimes they've been for us.

For Pete and I, though, it's an adventure that we go on together. We put on our comfortable shoes and load ourselves with caffeine and set out in the middle of the night, like thieves. The kids get to stay behind, something that rarely happens. In the stores, we laugh about previous shopping adventures, scratch out heads at the folk who decide that Black Friday is the BEST time to do their grocery shopping, and face disappointment as we reach a deal that has sold out. Later, we eat breakfast together and plot our next move. I am almost always ready to leave before him. Before we head home, we take a cruise down Main Street or in our favorite neighborhoods to see if any Christmas lights are up so that we can take the kids back.

Last night, we used our time out to buy presents for the two kids whose names we pulled off the Angel Tree. We always pick a little boy who would have been the same age as Toby. We might not be able to buy for our two year old this year, but at least we got to buy for a two year old. Looking at all the little boy toddler things is sad but knowing that it's going to someone else's little boy who needs them is healing, too.

We still shop locally, we certainly don't do the majority of our shopping on this day, and we've never really found great deals. But it has never been about that for us.

So, commercialism at its best? Maybe. Not promoting the real holiday spirit? I don't think so. There's good and bad in just about everything. It always seems to come down to what you want to make of it.

Halloween Ghost Story #5

2012-11-20T06:40:00.001-05:00

Yes, I know I'm a little behind times, considering that it will be Thanksgiving in two days. However, I got off track, what with two children having pneumonia and trying to pack so that we can move into the house we bought. I thought that my series deserved at least one more entry, though, and this one is a good one. We shall this story:

The Haunting By Proxy

Now, technically, the following story didn't happen to me. Although I am a character in it, and definitely played a vital link nearly 20 years later, the story isn't really mine. Because of this, I have changed the names to protect the somewhat innocent. The story itself is an insanely creepy one, and would be appropriate for any of the ghost hunting/haunting shows, but it's actually what happened years and years later that makes it even all the more interesting.

In the summer of 1991, my friend Laura moved to an old farmhouse in the country with her family. Laura was 11 years old and looking forward to her new home: the house was large and set on a lot of acreage. There were enough bedrooms for her big family and plenty of room for her and her sisters to run around in.

The property itself was located in an isolated and rural region of Clark County called Kiddville. It's well off the beaten path and though at one time it was an Indian fighting ground and an actual community, today only a handful of people live there and there are even some residents of Clark County who couldn't tell you where it was.

At any rate, Laura and her family moved in and had been there for a day or two when we went a calling. I loved the house with its big rooms, old oak trees, and stone cellar, accessible only by a trap door in the kitchen. Still, there was something a little "off" about it. Just a feeling. I was a kid and it might have just been my overactive imagination.

That night, Laura's dad told us that she could come home with me and stay for a week. We were ecstatic. They had never let her stay that long before. He said that she had worked hard during the move and she deserved a break. (This was true. Laura basically ran the household from the time she was 10, but that's another story.)

So, Laura came home with us.

Now, normally a quiet child under any circumstances, she was unusually solemn on the drive back to our house. After some prodding, we finally got her to open up. She wasn't sure she liked the new place. Why not? Apparently, although they had only been there for a couple of days, already things were starting to bother her. For instance, on the day they moved in, she and her sister had been carrying a couch up the stairs and something had pushed her so forcefully that she had been sure it was someone playing a prank on her. When she turned around, however, the stairs were empty. Later that night, they had placed a fan at the foot of their bed. She closed her eyes and moments later, felt a rush of air on her cheeks. When she opened her eyes, the fan had moved nearly six feet and was now near her face.

There had also been some strange noises, whisperings, and things like that. Nothing that couldn't be explained away, but they made her feel uneasy.

So, Laura stayed with us for a week and we had a grand time. At the end of the week, we took her home. Nobody was there when we arrived, so we walked around the house. I wasn't sure if it was because of the stories she had told me, or because I actually felt something, but the place really did give off a bit of a suffocating vibe. I peered into the cellar's window and the old stone table in the middle of the floor felt even more ominous than it had a week before. I was glad when her parents came home and we could leave. Her dad was bent over, however, and complaining of back pain. I hated that it probably meant she would have to take up more slack, but that was kind of the way it was at the time.

Back home, I missed Laura terribly. It had been like having a sister for a week and I was lonely for her. I might have cried a little. I was extremely excited, though, when just two nights later she called me. Her voice was not good, however. Crying into the phone, she begged me and Mom to come and get her. "Please," she cried. "Can you come get me? Dad drove me up to the store. He said I can come back to your house." It was nearly 8:00 pm and more than an hour's drive, but we set out to go pick her up.

When we got to her house, we were surprised to find that not only was her suitcase packed, but her 8 year old sister's was as well. She was also coming with us. Their dad was stretched out on the couch, in incredible pain. "They can stay as long as they need to," he moaned. "I'll call later."

The girls couldn't get out of that house fast enough.

On the long ride back, Laura might have been quiet, but Dixie more than made up for it. She was ready to tell everything she knew. There was a reasonable explanation as to why they had called us to come and get them: the house was haunted. As Dixie told stories about what had happened over the previous two days, Mom and I sat there in kind of stunned silence. These were no ordinary ghost tales.

Whenever the family would leave the house, they would return to find all of their crosses hung upside down on their walls.

Their Bibles had been shredded.

Their dog, an outside one, had been found one morning in the cellar, the trap door covered up by the rug in the kitchen like it always was.

Puddles of blood had inexplicably appeared in the kitchen floor. They would be cleaned up, only to reappear hours later in the same location.

Whisperings, chants, and voices could be heard throughout the house at all hours of the night. Doors slammed, heavy footsteps were heard on the stairs, and windows opened and closed on their own.

The girls didn't want any part of that.

For a few days, we passed the time without talking about the house. Laura, especially, didn't want to mention it. Dixie was simply glad to be gone.

A week later, however, we received a phone call from their dad. We were not to bring them back to the house. They were moving and would be out by the weekend. He gave us their new address and told us to take them there once they got moved.

It would be several months before we heard what happened after Laura and Dixie left. And, of course, they weren't a part of it since they were with me. On one afternoon, however, their parents filled us in on the rest of the ghostly activities.

Not only did the murmurings and noises pick up, the crosses continue to be turned upside down, and the blood spots continue to appear, but their dad's back pain became agonizing and the doctor could find no cause for it. That would have been enough to make them raise their eyebrows, but one morning their three year old sister woke up, telling the strangest stories. She began reciting names that the family had never heard of and then going into detail about how they died. When she was finished, she began cackling and shouting about the blood and how she had consumed it.

Concerned, they waited an entire day, but the toddler only grew more hysterical. Afraid themselves, they had taken her to a priest. He had prayed over her, then prayed over them, and then advised them to move. So they did.

A little investigation turned up the fact that the house had once been a funeral home and that the stone table in the basement was an embalming table. The family had not known this when they moved into the house. (It was odd, too, since there were literally no houses around it and it was so isolated.)

Years went by with only mentions of the place now and again. I have to admit, I was usually the one to bring it up.

In 2007, I was working as a therapist for a non-profit company in a completely different county and town. One day, during some downtime, we were sitting around sharing ghost stories. A fellow therapist interjected and said that she had once lived in a haunted house. Surprise, since to be honest she didn't seem like the kind of person who would believe in such things, we prodded her. I was shocked as she went on to describe some of the exact same things that had happened to Laura and her family: the upside down crosses, the blood in the kitchen, the footsteps on the stairs...When she ended her story with, "And it used to be a funeral home" I knew there was no coincidence.

"Where was your house?" I asked.

"Over in Clark County, in a little place called Kiddville."

Boy, was SHE surprised when I was able to describe the house to her.

Twice in my life, I have known two totally separate families who lived there and were haunted. There's definitely some activity going on. I have never been brave enough to go back.

ETA: I have since learned that there was an Indian settlement there, too, just a few yards from the house. (There's a sign there now.) It was called Eskippakithiki, although locally it is often referred to as "Indian Fields." If you would like to learn more about this area, there is some information at http://www.kentuckyexplorer.com/nonmembers/01-04020.html

Cyberbullying-don't threaten to rape my child

2012-11-03T05:35:00.002-04:00

If you keep up with the SIDS blog, you'll know that I am currently upset about a page called "SIDS is funny because babies die." However, another page has formed to try to get that page removed. It's actually inadvertently giving that page attention. Anyway, I got on there and wrote a message to people, asking them NOT to write on the other page-that it was just giving them the attention they wanted. I also mentioned Toby and how I was a SIDS mother.

Now, my profile picture on Facebook is an image of Iris. Here is what someone wrote about her:

Yes, people are that vile. I reported it, of course, and declined to give in and comment back. This is certainly a case of cyberbullying. It's also a veiled threat, as far as I am concerned. Naturally, there's no way to know if Iris' picture was really posted anywhere.

Such despicable things slay me. Methinks people need to get a hobby.

Halloween Ghost Story #4

2012-10-30T23:02:00.001-04:00

This isn't a "scary" ghost story as much as a nice one.

Before Toby died, my grandmother's death was the cataclysmic event in my life. She died when I was seven, but she had lived with us up until that point so she was someone I was used to seeing every day. I was very close to her, as anyone who knew me can attest, and even after she died she continued to be a huge presence in my life.

A year after she died, various members of my family started getting nightly visits from her. Now, my family is very large. Nana had 11 children and most of them had several children themselves and then their children had children, etc. Mom is the youngest of the bunch and I am the youngest "grandchild." We don't often get together as a family because we're so spread out all over the country, and sometimes when things happen it takes several months (or years) for news to catch up with all of us. So, we weren't aware that we were all experiencing similar things until some time had gone by.

In our house, it started with Mom.

We were living in Inez, in Martin County, and one night while we were in bed, Mom heard the front door open. In a loud, clear voice, my nana shouted, "Brenda Gail, where are you!?" Mom sat up in bed and hollered back, "I'm down here, Mother!" It was only seconds later, after we heard the footsteps coming down the hallway toward us, that we realized that we really shouldn't be hearing anything at all. Mom jumped up and turned the light on, but nobody was there. The front door, however, WAS open.

A couple of Mom's sisters had similar experiences that same week: all woke up to hear Nana calling their voices and heard footsteps coming toward their rooms.

A few weeks later, we came home to find two loads of laundry freshly washed and hanging on the back of my bedroom door. We ignored the fact that it was Mom's clothes in my room. After all, it was the thought that counted. You couldn't expect a ghost to get everything right.

Not long after that, we were babysitting an infant. Not used to having a baby in the house, Mom was up throughout the night, checking on her. She was a good sleeper and barely moved. When Mom got up the next morning, though, she had flipped completely around in the crib, the opposite side of the blanket showing than what had been all night, and it had been neatly tucked around and under her, the way that Nana used to do me. (Mom was not then, and is not now, a blanket tucker.)

From time to time, I would hear Nana's voice calling out to me, singing to me, or just muttering. She had a distinctive voice, low and gravelly and almost mannish, and it was comforting to hear her. I took for granted that she was hanging out in our house and although she was dead, I never really felt like she was gone.

Then, one day, she was. I no longer felt her presence. It was a sudden shock to the system and I mourned her loss all over again.

Since then, there have been no more "Nana sightings" on my end, and I am assuming not from anyone else in the family, either.

This "ghost story" has been particularly important to me because while I continued to feel and sense Nana long after she departed, only once have I done it with Toby. (That was back in August when, on the anniversary of his death, a plant from his funeral suddenly produced 5 blooms-one for each of us in our family. It had not bloomed in 2 years.) I've had other parents argue with me and tell me that there probably have been signs from Toby and that I just haven't seen them, but I don't believe this. If anything, I am more prone to over-analyze and read into things than under-analyze.

I like to think that wherever Nana is off to, she is wearing her pearls, black dress, smoking like a fiend, talking to Elvis, and feeding baby piglets from bottles. Or, knowing her, she is cooking for everyone. That would be okay, too.

Halloween Ghost Story #3

2012-10-30T01:09:00.005-04:00

Many of my backpacking trips around Europe were done alone. Okay, so ALL of my backpacking trips around Europe were done alone. In the beginning, I stayed mostly in Western Europe but as I got more adventurous, started traveling further east. This story comes from my first two nights in Prague.

Prague, at night, as seen from the Charles Bridge

I had originally written this as a letter, so I am just going to use it in its original form:

It’s after two o’ clock in the morning, but I can’t sleep at all. I’m scared. I don’t mean spooked or on edge, I mean that I am honest to goodness frightened out of my mind.

Remember how I said that my hostel was kind of scary looking? It might a former grand hotel, and the marble tiles and ornate staircase might still be intact, but that's where the grandness ends. This is a rambling structure that is sure to be knocked down or renovated in the near future. The halls are wide but musty. The rooms are large with tall windows, but there are cracks in the walls and sounds of mice scurrying through the floorboards. The gray exterior is doing nothing to hide the dankness and abandoned feeling inside. It's the sort of building that wouldn't surprise me should I wake up and find that none of the inhabits are real and that I am the only guest, staying in an establishment that closed its doors long ago.

After they finally let me check in, I came up to my room and tried to make the best of it. I have, after all, stayed in worse.The hallways are massive, but not in a good, airy way. Like in a dungeon way. They must be fifteen feet tall, and I felt so small walking through them that I felt suffocated. When I entered my room, I saw that I was to be sharing it with someone, and this as a relief to me. I knew this because on one of the beds there was a nightgown laid out and I found beauty products and various other articles of clothing in the closet. I was anxious to meet my female roommate, but after about an hour I wanted to get back out into the city again. The room was big, but it closed in on me.

After a day of exploring the city, I was tired. When I returned back to the hostel, after getting lost in some of the cross-streets, I was a little surprised to see that my roommate had not returned. Nothing in the room had been touched and I just had this feeling that nobody had been in there after I left. The air didn't feel disturbed, as if only my movements had left an imprint on it.

I figured that she must be out partying somewhere, so I crawled into bed and left the lamp on for her-just in case.

I slept fitfully for about an hour. I don’t know when I have slept so badly since I arrived. I had dozens of nightmares and can swear that I woke up every fifteen minutes. Whenever I would wake up, a creepy feeling would come over me and no matter how hard I tried to shake it off, it wouldn’t leave. There is an essence to this place that I can only describe as evil. I have never felt this way about anywhere before. After the last time I woke up, I was unable to go back to sleep with my back to the room. Instead, I turned over and pressed my back far up against the cold wall, taking comfort in the hardness behind me and in that I could see everything going on in the room.

When I at last drifted off again, the most horrible dream overtook me that I am surprised I didn’t wake up screaming. I was in the hostel, in the very bed that I was sleeping in, when the door slowly began to open. As I rose out of bed, a lone figured appeared in the shadows and whispered, “murder” while pulling out a long, slender knife.

At this, I violently slipped out of sleep and really did wake up. The first thing that shot through my mind was, “Oh God, someone really did die in this room!” After the thought had entered my mind, I couldn't lose it. I could feel fear in the walls, under the bed, everywhere. I ran out of the room to the bathroom down the hall, but even the hallways started closing in on me. I tried splashing some water on my face, but nothing would help.

The hostel hallway, normally filled with voices and chattering and the sounds of movements from behind closed doors, was eerily empty. It occurred to me that I hadn't seen a single person since checking in.

Now, here I am, back in the room. The nightgown laid out on the bed next to me is creeping me out, too, and I am so scared that I can barely move. Writing to you is the only thing that is keeping me from going out of my mind. Have I already lost it? Is the pressure from traveling alone finally getting to me so badly that I am having illusions? What am I going to do? I have to get out of this place. The longer I sit here on the bed in this room, the more claustrophobic I feel. I swear I can hear whispering and things going on in the walls that I know are not coming from other hostel-dwellers.

The rational part of me knows that there isn’t anything to be afraid of. After all, I am in a hostel and if I screamed everyone on the floor would hear it. But the other irrational part of me wants to pack my bags and leave.

I guess for now, though, the best thing for me to do is to just try and get some sleep. First thing in the morning I am checking out of here.

Love, Rebecca

PS- I checked out and am now in a different hostel, this one much closer to Old Town Square. The strangest thing happened upon my checkout, however.

Concerned that my elusive roommate had never returned to the room, I inquired about her at the front desk. The clerk looked at me in surprise and shrugged. "Ma'am, that room has been empty for over a month. It was cleaned before you checked in. We haven't had anyone stay in it for weeks."

Halloween Ghost Story #2

2012-10-28T20:38:00.004-04:00

It was a dark and stormy night...

Actually, it WAS a dark and stormy night, but I am getting ahead of myself.

In 2004ish I had the pleasure of watching what would eventually become one of my favorite horror movies-SESSION 9. SESSION 9 combines some of my favorite topics-ghosts, mental hospitals, and abandoned buildings. That, alone, would be enough to hook me but the acting and plot are actually pretty good, too. The abandoned mental hospital used in the movie is a real one and exists in Danvers, Massachusetts. It is often referred to as "Danvers Hospital" although it has held other names.

In the summer of 2005, while I was working in New Hampshire, I drove down to Harvard, MA (not to be confused with the university) for the weekend and stayed in a hostel on a farm. Driving back up to NH, I saw a sign for Salem and knew I had to take some time and explore. After visiting the House of the Seven Gables (after Graceland, my favorite historical home in the country) I continued my exploration and headed on into Danvers.

Despite the fact that most of the witch trial history is associated with Salem, many of the most important events actually occurred in Danvers. Today, Danvers has kind of leaked into Salem and it's hard to tell where one starts and the other stops. They are both part of the Greater Boston area and very built-up. Lots of heavy traffic, developments, gas stations, etc. There is still quaintness to be found, of course, but this isn't the 18th century anymore.

It didn't take me long to find the mental hospital.

At this time, the hospital was still abandoned. I belong to several urban explorer groups and had done my research on the hospital. For those unfamiliar with urbexes, we're a couple of principles short of criminals, with only our intentions setting us apart. We love finding old buildings (houses, churches, factories, etc.) that have been abandoned. When we can get permission, we get it. In most cases, however, the known owners of such structures are obscure. In those instances, we shimmy through windows, doors, or whatever openings we can find. Intrigued with history and architecture, we come armed with cameras, long pants, and flashlights. Our findings are documented and speculated over.

Many an urban explorer had aimed for Danvers-kind of the Holy Grail of horror movie loving, ghost hunting, urbexes. I had waited my turn for some time. I knew that it was difficult to get through to, thanks to increased security. I also knew that with the dwindling daylight, I wouldn't have much time to find an opening and make my way in. There are many things that scare me, but exploring old places does not. Still, I'm no fool. Even I knew better than to creep around an abandoned mental hospital in the Boston area, alone, after dark.

The hospital is situated upon a hill, overlooking what was once probably farmland. It's hidden from the main road below and there were no signs pointing the way as I wound up the broken road. Of course, there were other signs: No Tresspassing, Keep Away, Stay Out, etc. We urbexes tend to take these as a challenge.

Suddenly, through the trees, I caught the color of red brick peeping through the branches. Then more, and then more. As I turned the corner, there was the Kirkbride building before me, towering into the sky like a majestic, glorious castle. With its turret like towers, multitude of windows, and wings that spanned the acreage like a giant bat, it resembled a palace more than a hospital. Indeed, despite its boarded up windows, cracked sidewalks, and the ragged weeds that poked up through the asphalt it was one of the most stunningly gorgeous pieces of architecture I had ever seen.

I slowed my car to a standstill and quietly opened my door and got out, camera already booting up. Despite the busy road below me, it was deadly quiet up there on the hill. The sky was beginning to darken and a chill had filled the air, the breeze ruffling my hair. I skirted the edge of the building, snapping as I went, and headed first to the abandoned cemetery. The headstones were difficult to see due to the undergrowth, but there were there, some decrepit and pocked and others crumbling and on their sides like dominoes.

I was totally alone. I knew that others found their way up there almost every day and I half expected to meet another explorer, but there was non doubt that I had the place to myself. The air was so deathly still that I think I could have heard the hitch of a breath on the other side of the complex.

Picking up my speed, I turned and went back to the Kirkbride building. There was no possible way for the movie to have depicted the grandness or sheer size of it. It took me more than 20 minutes just to skirt the perimeter, all the while snapping my camera in anticipation. The windows were boarded up tightly, like eyes closed against the world. If there was anything inside, it didn't see out.

I knew how to get in. I was going to get in! Soon, I found the hidden entrance. Not hesitating, I pushed the board aside and stepped in. With the closed windows, I expected it to be pitch black inside, and it was. Standing still to collect my bearings, I waited. Above me, the sounds of mice scurrying across the floors and larger animals thumping against forgotten doors filled the air. The outside might have been still, but the interior was alive.

Soon, my eyes adjusted to the light that seeped in around the boards. It was pale, but I could see the hallway, strewn with papers and letters and garbage. This was not the rubbish of people like myself, but what had been left behind from the hospital's closing.

Mindful not to be disrespectful and step on anything important, I walked to the first door and peered in. It was an office, a desk still haphazard in the middle of the floor. A chair was turned on its end. The light was too dark to snap a picture, but I could look.

It was unusually warm inside the building, especially considering the outside temperature which had been chilly over the weekend. I took my jacket off, feeling beads of sweat on my forehead. Back in the hallway, the air was thicker, closing in. I turned to try the next door, when a creak that was so loud it appeared to open the door to another universe stopped me. It could have been three feet away from me or on the other side of the building-the sound in there was deceiving and the acoustics played tricks. In fact, my own footsteps seemed to be a beat behind, echoing long after I stopped walking.

I was no longer alone.

There were no footsteps, no further creaks, no other noises, but I knew without a doubt that someone or something was aware of my presence and taking note of it.

Turning, I headed back to the entrance in which I had shimmied in through. The feeling of a thousand eyes was on me and invisible fingers clawed at my back, rustling my shirt and pulling at the strands of my hair. The darkness was thick, almost touchable. Through it, I moved in slow motion.

Once outside, I headed to my car. The sun was down and gone. Inside, I locked the door and started pulling away. I was promptly stopped by a policeman. Rolling down my window, he admonished me. "Ma'am, you don't want to be up here," he chided.

"Just taking a few pictures," I smiled, showing him my camera.

"I'm up here every day, and this place stays with you. I wouldn't be here unless you had to be."

I left him without getting into any real trouble and headed on down the drive. Again, I drove slowly, the towers looming behind me. This time, although the windows were still boarded up, it felt as though the eyes were open.

A few miles outside of Danvers, the sky broke open and the strongest thunderstorm I had seen in years struck the road. Bolts of lightening slashed through the sky like swords while the rain pounded my car, forcing me to pull over into a rest area across the New Hampshire line. When it lifted, I drove the rest of the way home in a fog so thick that I was unable to see the end of my car. I might have left Danvers, but I had the distinct feeling that Danvers had not left me.

Four years later, I would return. This time, the complex had developed into condos.

To see some truly mesmerizing photos of the interior taken around the same time I was there (maybe a year or two earlier) go HERE.

Halloween Ghost Story 1

2012-10-28T06:33:00.003-04:00

I thought I would try something fun and post some "real life" ghost stories that have happened to me. I'll try to post one a day leading up to Halloween.

Most of my "ghost stories" involve noises, objects moving, and pale figures-you know, things that go "bump" in the night. There is one, however, that stands out as an anomaly in my life and I can find no explanation for it. Others have their own theory but I'll leave it up to your interpretation.

I was 10 years old and we lived in a small house in Powell County, Kentucky. There were two entrances to our house: a front door and a back door. We rarely used the front door. At the time of this story, it was blocked by a piece of furniture. My bedroom was in the back of the house, down a hallway. To get to the back door, you had to walk past the bathroom, down the hallway, through the dining room, through the family room, and out the door. Although my bedroom had two windows, the house was situated on a hillside and there was a steep drop from the windows to the concrete driveway below. I would say it was a good 20 foot drop-maybe more.

It was a Saturday morning and several of my friends had spent the night with me. We were all getting up and heading out to a basketball game. As usual, I was the last one to get ready. My best friend, Lori, was with me that day.

Ushering everyone else out of the house, Mom called to me and said that they would wait for me in the car. I was in the bathroom, fixing my hair. I hollered back and told her I would be there in a minute.

When I finished getting ready, I stepped out of the bathroom and something in my bedroom caught my eye. I stopped, and walked to the door. There, on the other side of my room, was Lori. She was sitting on the floor at an odd angle. She didn't look at me.

"Lori," I called out to her. "Are you ready?"

She nodded.

That feeling suddenly came over me. You know the feeling...the combination of cold dread in the bottom of your stomach and an itchiness in your feet. For whatever reason, it hit me hard. Quickly, I turned on my heel and shouted over my shoulder, "I'll see you at the car!"

I ran the length of the hallway, feeling eyes on my back. Our house was not large but I still covered the length of it in a matter of seconds. Without stopping to shut it behind me, I flew out the back door, down the walk, and only stopped when I got to the car.

There, inside, was my mom, my friends, and Lori-all waiting for me. She had been with them the entire time.

I was stunned. I couldn't even go back to the house to lock the door. Mom did that for me.

Since then, I have, on occasion, seen the manifestations of people (living and otherwise) that I know in places where they couldn't possibly have been. Normally, however, this has been during one of my solo ventures in Europe, usually accompanied by illness or sadness and on the verge of sleep.

That was not what this was.

The Lori that I saw was completely separate from the Lori that I knew. The two were not one of the same.

Of all the scary things that have happened to me, including my six week entrapment of hell in a farmhouse in New Hampshire, this is by far the only thing that continues to give me chills, more than 20 years later.

this is Lori and me on my wedding day, 16 years later

Goodbye, Sidney

2012-10-23T21:01:00.001-04:00

Over a year ago, I made (online) friends with a woman named Sidney. She was helpful, gracious, funny, and compassionate. Reading her posts and getting emails and messages from her was always a highlight of my online experience. She never judged, always had a good word for everyone, and was often our biggest cheerleader, even though she had never been directly faced with the things that we were being challenged with.

Yesterday, her boyfriend of 14 years posted on her blog. She had passed away from a heart attack. Sidney was my age, in her early thirties. I am stunned. This was a vibrant, energetic woman who was loved by MANY people. In one of the comments posted to the blog entry, a reader says that the world will never know our loss and they won't. She was a champion fighter and advocate for all of us and she will be missed. I am not sure that I could be sadder if I lost a friend that I knew offline.

Here is her birthday "cake" to me this year.

Here is Greg's letter to her readers and friends:

And here are some of the comments that her friends left:

A couple of weeks before she died, she had actually broken up with her boyfriend. In fact, one of her last blog entries had been hopeful about the future. For the first time in a long time, she was hopeful and excited about her future. Some of her last words to us were her best.