Ghostly Visits, I am a 9 Percenter

I passed a milestone a little while ago that was something I never really thought about, but I guess in some manner it is an accomplishment. I have been a published writer for over 20 years now. Not that I have shaken the earth with any of my ramblings or even given it the slightest of nudges, but still it is something that not many people can boast.

Over that span of years only once has a complete stranger taken the time and effort to respond. That was after I wrote an article that described living in an old house in the oldest part of town. Strange things seemed to happened there involving missing keys, oddly stacked canned goods in the pantry and furniture that aligned itself up on its own. I then explained that I had a 2 year old child who lived in the house whose actions explained all of these events. The respondent rebuked me for, “wrecking a perfectly good ghost story with kids.” Throughout their lives, my kids have had an incredible talent for wrecking a good many things, but a ghost story is not one of them. Now that they have grown up and their curiosity level has somewhat leveled out - the mantra for much of their childhood seemed to be, “I wonder what would happen if...” - things don’t seem to break all that often.

I should have known better than to mess with a ghost story, even if it was well intentioned. According to an Ipsos-Reid survey completed in October 2006, 47 per cent of Canadians believe in ghosts, with 9 per cent of those saying that they have had a visit from a dead relative (there are times at family reunions that I am certain that number has to be higher). I wanted to compare that figure to how many people believed in a fair and balanced government, but that seems to be a top secret statistic revealed only to those who cower on bended knees to the Gods of Ottawa. I easily found out how many Canadians believed in Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, God, Satan and the percent of Canadians who brush their tongues in the morning - 55 per cent for those who are really reading this closely. But the number who believe in good government is another matter all together; I still think it will be less than those who believe in ghosts.

What brought me to this point is that I am one of the 47 per cent above and for that matter one of the 9 per cent as well (although I am not part of the 55 per cent). Living in an old city and more importantly, in an old part of an old city I have had my share of could be considered ghostly experiences. When I lived in a house on University Avenue as a student, my bedroom was at the top of a stairway, the only room on the attic level. One night I heard someone walking up the stairs with quite deliberate footfalls and then stop at the top of the stairs, which was at the foot of my bed. Thinking it was one of my house-mates trying to scare me, I rolled over quickly to catch him. There was no one there. Needless to say, my sleep was a bit disturbed that night.

A much more visual moment took place years ago when I was working at a local private hospital. I was on a midnight shift and it was just before dawn. My chin was drooping to my chest, when suddenly my eyes popped open to see a woman with brown hair and wearing a brown smock come running up to me with a smirk on her face. The sight of her shocked me, as patients were asleep at that hour and I sat upright in my chair. Just as suddenly, she was gone. I put this off due to a sleepy hallucination, but the following day I mentioned it to a person who had worked there for years and she just said, “Oh, so you saw the Lady in Brown?”

My kids stayed the night at the hospital after it closed to see if they could detect any activities. They had cameras set up, tape recorders set to automatically start with sounds. Strangely enough, among other sounds and events, they did hear and record a woman’s voice seemingly humming a tune at 3:00 am.

Shortly after my father passed away in 2005, I had a dream in which everyone in my family unexpectedly dropped by my house. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my Dad walk up to me. Characteristically, he was wearing a loud sport coat, his tie was slightly askew and his silver hair was long and swept back. When I saw him, I asked him what he was doing here, as he was dead (I guess it is a bit easier being blunt when you are asleep). He just looked at me and said, “I am fine and everything is going to be alright.” Before I even had a chance to say, “You’ve been dead for two weeks and you are still giving advice?” he was gone. And he was right. Everything has turned out to be alright.

So I guess when everything is weighed, whether these ghostly sightings are a manifestation of the mind in tired or stressful situations or they really are contact from the other side, we won’t know until we get there. Houdini tried to do that and it was the one trick he couldn’t pull off. I will happily count myself among the 9 per cent who have dead relatives visit, but hopefully they won’t stay for more than a night. From what I understand, having resident ghosts in your house just kills the real estate value.