I've only had a couple of run-ins with phenomena that could be interpreted as ghostly. One happened so long ago, that the memory is fuzzy at best. It involved a locked room in the home we were renting in Kent when I was three or four. The landlady stored some of her belongings up there, including a huge old sleigh bed. Why she would trust them to remain unharmed in a house with five children in it was beyond me. Well, she had met my father, after all. His solution to every transgression involved either a belt or worse, the silent treatment.
One day, in the long dog days of Summer when you can barely move, the heat is so bad, my sister came down the stairs all breathless and white. She was a sneaky little fucker and had broken into the locked room in the attic. I followed her to the door which she opened to reveal a bunch of boxes and a perfectly ordinary rocking chair. Only it was rocking. And no one was sitting in it. And the windows were closed so no breeze entered the room. The really creepy part was the fact that the floorboards in front of it were creaking, as if someone was sitting there pushing off with their feet. Needless to say, we went shrieking down the stairs. This is why I am the way I am today. Or it could have been the belt. It's a toss-up.
The only other time I remember, other than some freaky shit in a Brownstone in Brooklyn, was when I got an attic door slammed shut in my face by a jealous female ghost. It was in an old house in Medina that had been part of the underground railroad in the 19th century. The building had been converted into the law firm where my ex was not yet partner. They say the lady had wanted to marry someone that her mother did not approve of, so she died a spinster. You know, the usual romantic ideal of the sad gothic chick who can't make it to heaven because her doll got lost or something. Wah.
She would do the usual light flickering and object moving but I'm pretty sure that I was the first person she actually hated. A guy's gal, she was, just like Camille! So, if you have any stories you'd like to share, I'd love to hear them. Happy Halloween, everybody!
