KNOCKIN ON HEAVENS DOOR

     Hospitals are SCARY places.  No one goes to a hospital for a vacation.  I went to the Emergency Room after I had been sick for the better part of a month.  I was not able to eat any solid food and even liquids would not stay down for long. I was also having severe abdominal cramping with nausea and all the fun things that go with it. 

     Needless to say, I was very sick.  I was admitted to the hospital that night and met with a Surgeon the next morning.  In preparation for surgery my sister took all my jewelry home with her.  The only things I still had with me were my eyeglasses and a small tablet.  I have worn a silver ring with my spirit guide, a Wolf, for 20 + years.  After I took it off,  I began noticing more "things" .  I could almost see people and shapes that couldn't be there.

WHAT IS A TALISMAN?

     I am now convinced that my ring had become a powerful talisman, shielding me from many supernatural experiences.  I am not sure how this happened.  I have never had this ring blessed by a priest or shaman and as far as I know the ring itself is just a ring.  I might have expected a crucifix,  Saint Christopher medal or even a Native Medicine Bag to have this effect.  

    I am beginning to think that the power of talismans come from within us not from any powers outside of us.  It seems to be based more on what you BELIEVE .   So if you believe that the blessings from the Priest or Shaman have power then they will.  I know that I slept better after after I got my ring back.

MEA CULPA

     I know I have been absent from the blogosphere for over two months, and I beg your forgiveness.  

     The truth is that over the last year or so I have been battling stomach and intestinal symptoms which have led to a diagnosis of Colon Cancer stage IV.  I spent most of the last month in a hospital undergoing 2 major  surgeries.  I still have a ways to go and Chemo therapy ahead,  but I will try to stay in touch and resume the Blog.  Stay Tuned

I am not a Ghost Hunter....are they Hunting Me?

     I have shared some (by no means all) of my earliest remembered paranormal experiences.  Part of me wishes I could tell you they were all in my past.  I am not afraid of them but they do keep popping up.  Where I live now is a perfect example.

Boo?

     I moved from central Florida to rural Alabama in the past year.  I needed to make a change,  clear my head, and overcome some bad decisions.  My sister offered me her spare room and I took her up on it.  Within a week of moving in, I saw a 'shadow figure' move down the hall.  Items like car keys or TV remotes disappear and then turn up in odd places.  It is not unusual to hear a strange voice call you by name.  On the surface it appears to be Typical Poltergeist activity but we have no young people living here.

Cursed?

     I am not sure I believe that every haunting is an attempt by Satan or his Demons to steal your soul.  I am not sure I believe or disbelieve in Angels or Demons even though I was educated in Catholic schools and was fairly religious in my teens.   In fact, I feel that most of the paranormal things I have seen seem more like children or puppies trying to get attention.  Maybe I feel this way because I am also Part Blackfoot Native American.  I was taught by my Grandmother not to fear spirits, some of them may be trying to help you.

"MAGIC IS JUST SCIENCE WE DON'T UNDERSTAND YET"

     I think it was  the author Arthur C. Clark who first said "magic is just science we don't understand yet".  Could there be some future explanations for the unexplained?   I would like to toss a few ideas out there and would love to here yours as well.

Mind Reading

     Some of you remember transistor radios.  For those who do not, they were small hand held AM radios with a tiny speaker that you could listen to your favorite radio stations on.  Almost everyone had one.I remember how mine would buzz and hum if you got near an electrical power source.  Each power source produced its own kind of static, small ones like extension cords just caused mild static and large ones like high voltage power lines had a unique HUMMMMM.     Our bodies produce electricity on a small scale.  When you touch something, a very small electrical impulse flows along your nerves to your brain.  The brain decodes them and you "feel" what you have touched.  WHAT IF  a mind reader is just someone who can pick up the "static" caused by someones electrical impulses and decode them????  Kind of like a biological version of radio or television.   

Ghosts

     Religion teaches us that we have two parts Body and Soul.    The body is easy enough for science to study it is a physical item, but what of the soul?  Science has not been able to prove or disprove  the existence of the human soul.  Religion and philosophy maintain that the soul is immortal, everlasting.  WHAT IF the "soul" is the "energy source" of the human body???   Science teaches us that Energy is not created or destroyed but can change form.  So is it possible that the "energy source" of the human body survives after the death of the body and transforms into the "ghosts" people see??

     

     

PSYCHIC?

     Are there really Psychics among us?  What is a Psychic? If Psychic powers exist how do they work?

     It seems you cannot have a discussion about the "spirit realm" without including Psychics.  First of all, what is a Psychic?

E S P

     A Psychic is someone who appears to have information not readily available through the normal senses.  By that definition all mothers are psychic because I never could get away with anything.  Someone experiencing "psychic phenomena" can include a wide variety of paranormal situations, not the least of which is "seeing dead people".  In the last few years, television shows like "Medium" and "Ghost Whisperer" have dealt with that.  Both of those programs are supposed to be based on true stories.  I have had a couple of experiences inj that realm not just in the Haunting department.

Precognition

     I was married at 21.  In the first year of that marriage, my Mother moved from Birmingham to Atlanta for work.  We maintained contact over the phone.  About six months after my Mother moved, I fell into a very deep sleep only to awaken TERRIFIED.  I had dreamed that my mother had died and I was in Atlanta for her Funereal.  The dream had been so vivid and real that I had to call and speak to my Mother even though it was the middle of the night.  I had not been to see my Mothers apartment and described to her the place I had seen.  She assured me that her apartment was nothing like the place I described and that she was fine.  Some four years later I had moved to Florida and got a call from my Mother saying she was sick.  I went to Atlanta to help care for her.  The place she lived in was IDENTICAL to the dream I had.  Within a year my Mother had passed away.   

 PARANORMAL PREDISPOSITION?

     A question comes to my mind.  Are some folks more likely to believe in the PARANORMAL?  Is it a genetic predisposition?  A mental deviation?  A overactive imagination?  An open conduit to other levels of perception?  What is it that causes some people to experience the paranormal?

The Shaman will see you now

     In ancient cultures around the world belief in the supernatural was not considered strange, it was a GIVEN.  All the members of the community or tribe had some connection with the supernatural.  The people who had the greatest talents for understanding and utilizing the other world became Shaman.  These people often had the responsibility of maintaining not just the physical health but the spiritual health of their people.  A tribal Shaman often put his own life in danger to serve their people.  Many took "journeys" into the spirit realm using a variety of consciousness altering techniques to gain access.  In these "vision quests" messages or instructions were delivered to the Shaman often to help or warn the people. In other words, these Shaman were considered powerful people.  After many centuries dawned  THE AGE OF REASON.  Science and its empirical data could not quantify the existence of a "supernatural" world so it could not EXIST.  This stance has created a schism in the collective psyche of modern people.  A mass spiritual schizophrenia if you will.   Creating generations of "rational" people that have to have tangible proof of everything...but...but....wait for it....God MUST exist right?.....I mean Heaven is real RIGHT?....but NOTHING else.....no ghosts...no spirits...no witches....none of that Crazy stuff.  

Suffer the Little Children

     I have a theory.  Children below a certain age tend to have more paranormal experiences than adults because no one has told them they CAN"T.   Have you ever talked to a very young child?  The Easter Bunny. Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus, and even the big purple dinosaur are as REAL to them as their mother and father.  They believe in magic the way you and I believe in our cup of coffee.  Most young children have an "imaginary" friend and can hold complete conversations and "play" for HOURS with them.  So it is not surprising that IF  a spiritual world exists THEN children would be able to perceive it.  My own experiences with the paranormal began when I was a boy, but they did not END there.......... 

SUPERNATURAL HOTSPOTS

II

     I asked in an earlier post about hotspots for paranormal activity.  I did find a large amount of paranormal activity in certain areas including the greater St Louis area.  I have also found just about as many theories to explain the activity.  I don't know if any are true or not, but they are worth consideration.

The Exorcist

     I found some very interesting reports of activity in the St Louis area.  The Catholic elementary school I attended is reported to be haunted by the ghost of someone who died in a fire.  Several "mansions" are reported to be haunted.  Even Six Flags over Mid America is reported to be haunted.  Probably the most famous haunting for the area is that  the novel and movie  "The Exorcist" was based on the true story of an exorcism on a young boy in a house not far from the house that I lived  in.

So What Causes It?

     Ask 10 people why this happens and you get 12 explanations.  I have heard that it is possible that "ley lines" that supposedly connect many places like Stonehenge, may channel paranormal energy to certain areas.  Another possible explanation is a paranormal  "vortex".  These are reported to be portals to the spirit world and can be positive or negative.  Yet another possibility is that certain places are built over ancient burial sites.  

ARE THERE SUPERNATURAL "HOTSPOTS"

     The house in St Louis was not the only strange thing happening in that neighborhood.  There were quite a few other "unusual" aspects of the area.  

Starting School

     I started the school year in the local public school.  One of my most vivid memories is the number of days with dense fog.  I have since lived in many places all around the country and have never seen fog like this.  It was so thick and frequent even 43 years later, I still feel the damp of it.  One particular day the fog was so thick and lasted all day into the next morning.  I even wrote a short story for my class about a boy lost in the fog.  

Bullied

     I was never considered a coward or even small.  In this school, there was a boy 2 or 3 grades ahead of me.  He was older and larger than I was and would follow me home from school and beat me up.  He did this not because I had money or even knew him, he just took perverse pleasure in sending me home bloody and crying.  My mother tried to stop it, but the beatings were not on school grounds so the school did nothing.  The boys parents were no help either. After several beatings, I took matters in hand.  He was on top of me, and had broken my nose again.  I grabbed the first thing I could find and hit him, once on the side of the head, and I broke his nose.  His parents were FURIOUS but I was never bothered by him again

Many other examples 

     There were other things and I will tell those in the future

HAUNTED HOUSE

     I was 6 or 7 when we moved into that house in St Louis.  Too young to watch the scary movies or even much television.  I didn't read scary books or even comic books very often.  We weren't poor but we were making every penny count and comics were a not a priority.  So there were no outside influences to prejudice me towards the supernatural.  

Basement or Dungeon?

     Anyone who has live in tornado country knows how important a storm shelter or basement can be.  Getting a house that had a good sized basement area was considered a plus.  This was not a FULL basement.  You could stand up in it but it had not been dug all the way to the exterior walls. In all, it probably was half or less of the footprint of the house.  

     The first time I went into that basement was while we were moving in.  We were storing some things in the crawlspace areas of the basement.  When I first went in, I felt the musty and damp air.  Like most basements, this one was not well lit, only a single bulb hanging down and casting shadows everywhere. I went a little further back and looked over a retaining wall that was just about as tall as I was and saw a single shoe, a loafer, and from the way it was on the dirt it looked like it was LAUGHING at me.  I could almost HEAR the laughter.  I felt that bad things had happened in the basement.  I was not sure WHAT.  The feeling of dread and doom in that basement was so great that I would not go into the basement unless forced to.  My folks seemed to have the same feeling.  Anytime we went in they seemed to talk very soft and hurry out as soon as possible.  I was not a fearful child nor do I have a lot of fears as an adult, but that basement.......

A HAUNTING?

     It was St Louis in the very early 1970's.  I was 6 or 7 years old.   Strange things were happening.  

     I have already told you a little about our house in St Louis,  We Lived in the second floor and rented the first floor out.  Just after we moved in my mother converted the attic to a "play room".  When we took over the house there was some left over "trash' or junk left in the attic.  My step father was working 2 full time jobs and my mother was busy setting up the rest of the house so it was some time before they cleaned out the attic.    The first time I went in the attic I made an "imaginary" friend.  Before that house I had never had an imaginary friend, but my mother came into the attic to see who I was talking to.  

The little blond haired girl in the attic

     I was just talking away and my mother came to see just who I was talking to.  She found me in the attic playing with my toy cars and talking to thin air.  I don't remember what I was saying.  I do remember asking and ANSWERING questions.  When I found out my mother could not see my new friend I was confused, I COULD.  My mother was convinced that I had made up an imaginary friend to deal with the loss of friends that moving causes, but to me this little girl was just as real as you or me.  Some time later as we were cleaning the attic I found an old picture, possibly a school picture of the little girl.  My mother read the date on the back of the picture and was surprised at how old it was.  My "imaginary" friend looked exactly like the girl in that old picture.  My mother thought I must have found the picture earlier and made my friend look like the girl, but I don't think that was the case.

The strangest part of the story is that after I found that picture I NEVER SAW OR SPOKE TO HER AGAIN.

ARE GHOSTS REAL?

     In the early 1970's my family moved into a three story house in a working class neighborhood in St Louis Missouri.  It was my mother, sister, step-father,  and me. Being a large house and needing the money, my folks rented the first floor out and we lived on the second and third floors.  The house also had a basement which was very handy in the mid west when tornado season came around.

     It was in this house and neighborhood that I first became aware of the Supernatural.  Bear in mind I was only six or seven years old at the time and had not been exposed to scary movies or even the odd ghost story told around the campfire. In other words, I had no preconceived notions of ghosts or hauntings. 

Phantom Footsteps

     The first thing I remember happening was hearing some one walk down the hall in what sounded like heavy boots.  I was very happy to hear this as the only person I knew who wore boots was my mothers brother, Uncle Bob and if he was here so were my cousins!!  I got out of bed and ran to my parents room only to find them deep asleep and they told me that No one was coming to visit.  Disappointed and wide awake I went back to the room I shared with my infant sister.

     As I lay there trying to go back to sleep, I heard the footsteps AGAIN.  They started at the kitchen and came all the way down the hall,they paused outside the door then came in the room.  They went to my sisters crib and turned towards my bed.....the light from the hall shone into the room and NO ONE was there.  I began yelling for my folks and they came into the room.  They searched the house and found no one but us in the house at the time.  Needless to say, we all slept together in the living room.