Anyone have a ghost story?

[Jill]

After one of my SEO seminars a couple of years ago, a bunch of us were hanging out at the hotel bar. One of the guys who attended the seminar was with us, and proceeded to tell us how he "chased ghosts." We all sat around swapping ghost stories, and had a lot of fun. It was suprising to hear how many people seemed to have some sort of paranormal experiences in their lives.

I thought it might be fun to swap stories here in this thread, so I'll go first!

In my town of Ashland, MA we have a very old restaurant formerly known as John Stone's Inn (now called Stone's Public House). It has been said to be haunted for some time.

One time, probably 10 or so years ago, I was at a family dinner in the upstairs function room. There were probably 12-15 of us around the table enjoying drinks and dinner. At one point I looked across the table to one of the windows and saw a little girl sort of pointing in and laughing. I thought it was cute, and started to nudge my husband who was sitting next to me, but speaking with my cousin who was on his other side. When I looked back at the window, the girl was gone.

I really didn't give the incident another thought until later that night when I was laying in bed. I suddenly wondered how a little girl could be up there looking in the window. At the time, I wasn't sure if there was a balcony or what was there. I suddenly got really creeped out in my bed, but finally fell asleep. Later that week when I was near the restaurant, I took a look to see if someone could have been looking in the window. There was indeed a balcony around the outside of that floor, but the stairway up to it, seemed to be gated up. It certainly was nothing that could stop a rambunctious child if she chose to run away from her parents for a few minutes, but it didn't seem all that easy to do. (And it had been somewhat late that night, like maybe around 10?)

At any rate, I did read later that one of the supposed ghosts at the inn was indeed a little girl who has been spotted laughing!

I really do think that maybe it was a ghost, but my skeptical side will always wonder as I don't think there's any way to know for sure.

[Erin Pavlina]

I have a few ghost stories (as might be expected )

But instead of rehashing them here, I'll link to the stories which I wrote on my blog.

The Ghost in the Hall

The Flying Box (this one was so scary!)

[Jill]

No fair! I knew you'd have some!

Anyone else?

[Kindred]

Way back in my childhood I remember my friend's house seemed haunted. I never actually saw a ghost in it, and remain fairly skeptical since one's view and understanding of the world is very different when you're very young.

However it all started when we were watching a movie in the basement the first time I was over. About 40 minutes in the door that was closed opened all by itself. My friend peaked out the door and thought it was her dad or something playing tricks, we didn't care we wanted to watch the movie.

Another day we went upstairs to get cookies, and when we came back down the light down the hall had turned on and no one had been downstairs. We started getting suspicious and asked her parents if anyone had been downstairs, and they said they hadn't.

Then one of the last days I went over to her house before I moved away. We got popsicles out of the freezer in the basement and accidently left the freezer open. The lid was leaning up against a pillar at an obtuse angle and it didn't have anything to retract the lid back down. When we ran up stairs with the box of popsicles we heard the creak of the lid and it slammed down. And her parents were sitting at the table in the dining room. No one downstairs.

That's the only truly paranormal thing I've experienced in my life, still a little skeptical of what happened to this day. But I can't explain any of it. Something was doing those things and it wasn't us.

[barbesj]

I have many too, but I think my most interesting one concerns Sarah Winchester of the famous Winchester Mystery House.

My husband and I went down there for the tour, since we live in the Bay Area and its such a historical place. To see the house you have to pay for the tour, no problem= it was interesting. I didn't think I would have gotten too lost in the house,, as it didn't feel as "crazy" as the tourguide made it out to be, but the house didn't feel right to me either. I think because there was no furniture it it save for a couple of decorated and roped off rooms.

In the bedroom of Sarah which did have furniture, I noticed her wallpaper. It had classic triple goddess symbols on it, and I just blurted out loud-"Sarah Winchester wasn't crazy, she was PAGAN!!!" Well you would have thought I had mooned the group the way they all looked at me! The tour guide quickly shooed us all off to the next part of the tour.

We finished the tour, and then you are allowed to roam the grounds around the house. All the buildings are completely vacant=basically nothing in this giant house or out buildings-no tools, no machines, nothing-except for the few rooms in the mansion that are roped off so you can touch anything. At one building in the back, I saw a man in overalls and a hat....but he had no feet! I told my hubby but he couldn't see him and then he faded. (I have later found out, that that spirit still carries on his work there and is seen quite frequently in that building) So, we strolled around=and went to the gift shop, bought some postcards and whatnots, stopped in their food court and bought a soda as they were closing for the drive home.

Got to the car, got in, and my husband says "Whats that you have on your sweater, is that a piece of tape?" I looked down and said "I don't know". I went to fling it off, and it was metal..... I pulled off my sweater and turned it over. It is an antique piece of metal, that looks like gold, it has an engraved monogram on it, initials of JFP

There is NOTHING this could have come off on, at the mansion and stuck to my sweater. I couldn't have leaned on anything that WAS original to the mansion because you weren't allowed anywhere more than 5 ft form them. WE both sat there stunned as to what this is!!! I pondered for a good half hour if I SHOULD go back and try to find someone in charge to return it....but, it was closing time, and Saturday and we thought they'd just throw it in a drawer and forget about it. I really agonized over it...then decided that=it was placed on me by Sarah herself.

So I thanked her for her gift and came home....I don't know who JFP is, I tried to research her and found out that Sarah's maiden name is Pardee, so perhaps its a relative?? I don't know. but I still look at it and marvel.

This happened about 7 yrs ago, and I still have that piece. I'm sitting her now looking at it and marveling about how it came to me.

Thank you again Sarah,

Barbe

[Jill]

Very cool!

[Natsu]

The story I know isn't mine, but so far is of the person I most trust in the world. When someone is absolutely honest to you during nine years, you believe whatever that person says.

Before telling my story, I must add that I'm pretty skeptical. I like to hear supernatural stories, but when a girlfriend of mine told me "I once saw my aura" and began explaining that it was a day in which she had smoked a lot of pot, I immediately disregarded her story. I only consider such things from trustworthy people, and people who don't get intoxicated with anything, right?

The person who saw what I'm going to explain was my fiancé, and I have nine years of reasons to believe him, so here we go.

My then boyfriend wen to a friend's house. The friend was a satanist-goreish-guy. His parents were selling the flat they lived in, and were planning to move soon, so the satanist kid decided to do an experiment and make "daring" ouija sessions. Well, a normal session would be:

1º. Call something. Something will probably be, at the very least, bothered for being forcibly called.
2º. Ask something whatever you want to ask.
3º. Dismiss "something", letting it go.

Well, this was the kid's version:

1º. Call something.
2º. Insult whatever they called. As hard and humiliatingly and rudely as they could.
3º. Tell them to "************ off", but NOT make any effort to let spirit go back to where it came.

It was one of these days, that my boyfriend had gone to the house to pick his friends up, and went to the room and saw two of them doing the ouija stuff, the satanist kid and another one. So, at that point, satanist kid was insulting the summoned thing. My boyfriend watched as the glass moved over the letters, and the second ouija-doer said:
'He says he's going to kill us.'
Later on: 'Eh? Going to kill us three? If there's only two of us here... Man, we got this one furious'

My boyfriend, always healthily skeptical, thought that they were trying to scare him or something. But when the wooden chair flew up and was thrown by NOTHING against the wall, he ran as he had never ran before in his life. As he says 'I'm not facing things I can't punch to defend myself'.

He has tried to reason what happened in many ways. The "eerie" feeling he got when entering the flat could be only psychological. But, the chair flying? It was wooden, no magnet could have done that effect.

To add to the story, later on, we got to know that the family had to move to the new house faster than planned. The neighbours of the building told satanist kid's family that if they didn't go, they would fire them. It seems that the kid had been doing this sort of ouija session for months, and the whole building was seeing, watching and sensing weird stuff. And, like my Mom used to say "I don't believe in ouija, but no one's doing it in my house". Specially weird were the reports of young children, who seemed to be pretty sensitive, and started saying that weird men used to thell they they were going to kill them. Well, you know, children have imagination... It could be collective hallucinations. The only thing we haven't been able to explain is the gravity-fefiant flying chair. So, I suppose that's a ghost story.

I just wonder what Erin thinks of this sort of Ouija sessions... They say that, if you want to get a physical manifestation, there's nothing like trying to get the "something" you just summoned angry. Problem is, it seems pretty dangerous.

EDIT: Just realized this ought to be in the ouija experiences thread. I would welcome it if the moderator moved it to the proper thread.

[imhnyc]

The house I grew up in was very likely haunted. Everyone in my family had a ghost experience to tell about - both my parents, my brother, my grandmother. I had experienced strange but minor things however I didn't feel it added up to much. One night, though, my experience of the house ghost had much more weight.

When I was 15 years old, my parents bought a summer home in the country and left me on my own one weekend. I had a test to study for that Monday and my grandmother wasn't well enough to go with parents. My brother went with my parents to help out. My friend offered to sleep over and keep me company. My family home was a 2 family house with my grandmother's apartment on the first floor and my family's apartment on the second floor. My mother instructions were that that every window and door was to be locked tight that night. After helping my grandmother to bed, I made sure to do as my mother said. I locked my grandmother's apartment door (she could unlock it from the inside) and then I joined my friend upstairs making sure to lock the upstairs apartment door as well. All the shades were drawn and my friend and I proceeded to chat as girls do before going to sleep. My parents' room and my brother's room were connected by two large sliding doors. I opened up the doors so that I could sleep in my parents' bed and my friend could sleep in my brother's bed. It was like one very large bedroom.

After falling asleep, I was woken up by the sound of heavy footsteps coming down the hallway toward my parents' room where I was sleeping. It sounded as if the person was wearing heavy boots and practically pounding his feet as he approached. I was terrified. I thought a burglar had gotten into the house. I thought to remain still and just let him take what he wanted and hopefully leave. But he came into the bedroom and I forced myself to feign sleep. A light was passing before my closed eyelids and I imagined the intruder was testing with his flashlight to see if I was really asleep. I desperately tried to remain still as if deeply asleep. The light went away and I chanced a peek to see what was going on. From where I was on my parents' bed I could see my friend across the room in my brother's bed. At the foot of her bed, was a tall black shadow just standing there looking at her (I assume). I then heard my friend gasp in fear and say something incoherent. I thought we were doomed. He would do us in. I shut my eyes tight and prayed to God to save us.

Somehow, I woke up the next morning having forgotten the whole thing. I woke up before my friend did and proceeded to the kitchen where I saw the $20 bill my mom had left me on the table. That's when it came back to me - burglar? he didn't take the money? was it a dream? black shadow? my friend gasping? My friend came into the kitchen and I asked her if she heard anything last night. She said, "Oh yes! I heard someone with boots running down the hall and then I had a terrible dream of a black shadow standing over me" That had been my exact experience and I was freaked out.

That definitve experience with the house ghost opened my mind up to further exploration into the paranormal and also put me on the search for the bigger picture.

[Irene]

I've lived in a couple homes with ghosts. The first place was an apartment I was living in. This was a two story apartment. After I went to sleep at night, this ghost would turn lights on downstairs. He/She also would make coffee for me. I would wake up with the alarm and smell coffee brewing. I was scared, but I would go downstairs and my coffee was still dripping so I didn't forget and leave a pot of coffee on the burner, etc. My coffee maker did not have a timer feature. I would checked all my locks on the doors, etc. Of course, the doors and windows were locked.

Once, I was still awake when the ghost turned my lamp on downstairs. My bird started talking to this identity. My cat ran into my bedroom and started freaking out. I could hear the ghost walking around downstairs. I called the police and they sent several cars over. They kept me on the phone until the police had checked outside for opened doors or windows. When the operator told me to let them in, they checked all the closets etc in my apartment. They found no one. The officer saw I had a cat and told me that is what I heard walking around in my apartment. I tried to explain the cat was in my room, and my bird was actually talking to some one. Of course, they think I'm nuts at this point. I told them I actually saw the light come on and my bird nor my cat could turn the lamp on.

I never knew why this ghost was with me. She/He was totally harmless, and actually, after a while I enjoyed having coffee ready. I have to admit the first couple times I threw the coffee out. I learned to trust this ghost, and I did drink the coffee. The ghost could make a good cup of coffee. I had one friend I trusted enough to share this story. Other than that, I've never told anyone else about this experience.

Irene