Rant Edition One

Ghosts. Every year, as All Hallows Eve approaches, it's the same story. "Once in a Haunted Castle..." or "At summer camp, there was a...". Why can't people be more inventive than that? What about the ghost in the middle of the street, getting run over again and again. Or the ghost that lived in the attic but the most you know of it is that every so often, there's crying?

They're a topic of great interest to those around them. For me, not so much.

I view ghosts differently. They're not to be scary (unless they're polter's... Then, might wanna run away and scream and never go back again). But think about it. Here's a spirit, forever doing the same thing whether they're being shot at, mentally abused, rocking back and forth or just watching for the family and don't really know when they can stop. They're not meant to be scary - just sad. I can only relate what happened to me whilst living with my grandmother and after her death, for I don't have permission to relate others.

You see, at the age of six 'til I could live on the coast with my mother after she had moved from grandma's, I had that very definition for a ghost. It wasn't a malevolent spirit that wanted to rip me into shreds nor was it a mischievous spectator wanting to play with all the new gadgets. It was, simply, a man and, occasionally, a boy who accompanied him. Keep an open mind when reading this, please - I don't need to be told that they were probably figments of my imagination nor that I need to be put in the cuckoo barn because of this. I don't deserve that nor does anyone else who has seen or been haunted by a ghost.

The first time I saw him, like I said, I was six. I had just been roused by the sensation someone was watching me. I knew the bathroom light was on and I can't recall if it was. All I recall was a faded shadow of a man gazing into my room. How did I know he was a man? The same way I know it wasn't my grandmother or my mother - they were, at that time, maybe as big as a house to me. This guy? If they're a house, he was a tower. Both were plump, he was thin. And, regardless of anything else, they make footsteps when they walk away - he just kinda... vanished. How do I know it wasn't a brother or someone who broke in? I don't have a brother and stuff goes missing when someone breaks in. I was a very light sleeper those days so I would have known.

By the time I was ten, this had become a regular occurrence. Sadly, so had the blaring television. I'm a critic of horror movies - I see some dumb person walking towards the killer and I'm the first one to say 'hey person! Go ahead! Walk TOWARDS the killer. Go for it! You're being dumb. Oh, don't scream at me, that was you're own fault." But, like any other dumb person who walks TOWARDS the sound when you know it's gonna be scary, I walked towards the sound of the television. The top floor had a sort of cross roads - the front hall connected to the kitchen, the bedroom hall, the living room and the outside world. I remember standing in the doorway to the bedroom hall and the TV still blaring. As I took a step into the front hall, it shut off. I quickly slipped into the living room and there was no one there. Thinking 'yeah, OK. Must've been my imagination,' I put my hand on the TV to make sure. It was hot. So, surely, someone I couldn't see, hear or anything had been watching it and didn't mean to disturb me. At least, that's what I believe.

The last one happened after my grandmother's demise. It was August - my aunt's wedding. My mother and I had an air mattress in our apartment and a twin bed that I slept on since I was six. I was fourteen now and, we had agreed, we would switch beds every night. The first night, I didn't sleep early due to talking to my boyfriend at the time and finally did doze off at a quarter to six. That morning, my mother had been shocked but she didn't tell me anything. Looking back on that time, I thought it stupid that she was so shocked but, back then, I was very attuned to emotions.

That night, I had stayed up reading Blood Promise (Vampire Academy novel) when suddenly, I heard something like cats claws on a metal post. I shouted out "cat", as pet owners do when they're displeased with an action, temporarily forgetting that my cat was far away from me, out on the coast. I heard it again, only this time, that detail had returned. It sounded as though it were coming from where my mothers dining room table had been. I crept out slowly and checked. There was no sign of any such kitty but I could hear the scratching the loudest where the dining room table had been. No claw marks, no nothing. I shrugged it off and went to bed. After all, cats aren't evil by nature.

The next morning, I related the story to my mother. She nodded and laughed, saying she did the exact same thing.

So, yes, I've been haunted and lucky that it wasn't a serious ghost whose intent it was to harm me. But, on the same token, I don't believe that people who talk only about the bad spirits are understanding of them. If a person has good or bad and a spirit is a person, then why can't it be both? The man and the boy never disturbed me yet, I know they didn't particularly like men. I've heard the stories of throwing a cat on a spot and having them claw and skedaddle pretty fast. I've felt the cold spots but, if these were truly evil spirits, wouldn't they just kill everyone? Why does everything have to be black and white when it comes to the supernatural realms?

First rant is over. Thank you for taking your time to read it.