GHOSTS?

ONE

 

"A G-G-G-G-GHOST????!"

Then the cartoon bad guy would run away screaming, leaving squiggly lines behind him.

Yeah, I saw "Casper" cartoons, too. He was no ghost. He was a dweeb.

I'm here to talk about the real thing. Or, at least, my experiences.

Standish House is haunted. I'll admit it. Despite my posts in which I've doubted the existence of such things, I've experienced the things that happen here. You'll hear about them.

So let me go into the past.

I was a library kid from the get-go, and one of my fist obsessions was ghosts. I attribute this to my brothers, who would occasionally lock me into the staircase that led to the Third Floor. That's where the Ghosts lived, or so my five-year-old brain told me. IWe lived in a huge house with an uninhabited Third Floor. Not an attic; an entire suite of rooms, complete with bedrooms, a living space, and a full bath. It was devoid of inhabitenants, at least those I could see. But I KNEW they were there. I figure it MUST have been haunted. I still do.

So I'd scream until they (or my mother) would let me out.

"I'll get them ghosts!" I'd swear. There was no chance of getting my much older brothers.

The library had only a few books on ghosts, but one had ACTUAL TRUE pictures of them, and they scared the daylights out of me. I have no idea their authenticity, but I renewed this book so many times that it was dog-eared from my fingers exclusively.

Then I started my experiences in sleepwalking, where I'd wake up in the woods naked, without a clue as to what state I might be in. Not mental, but geographical.

I'll save that for another time.

So I read and experienced and grew. I WANTED to see a ghost, and after a few strange lights in the sky, I delved into the study of "The Esoteric" with fervor. I studied and experienced some truly unusual things, but I came away with two basic truths.

ONE. The universe is weirder and more wonderful than our tiny minds can comprehend.

TWO. People are absolute clotpolls. Lying, stupid, easily led and coerced by the slightest whim from another, they are simply not to be trusted.

Still, I investigated everything from giant hairy smelly skunk-apes to UFOs and, of course, ghosts. I became convinced that if there are any ghosts, they are restless spirits of living people with strong wills that either don't want to "go to the light," or are simply unaware of it.

Then I grew up (grew aware) and realized what useless tripe that ideal is.

If ghosts are spirits of the dead, why aren't hospitals filled to the brim with them? Or nursing homes? That's where most people die.

My scientist rears its formulaic head once again. So I disbelieve, and continue to do so.

Except for a couple of things…

 

My now 'ex' Connie and I always looked for the unusual while traveling, and while driving across Louisiana, we were bereft of a temporary nocturnal dwelling. Rather than settle on a motel, Connie whipped out her laptop computer (a rare thing in those days, and a wireless signal was even rarer) and found us a place.

"It's a haunted Bed and Breakfast," she said, then scowled. "Oh my god, it's three fifty a night!" I protested until she did a little more research while I dodged the alligators and airboats on the Louisiana highway. Not really, but it might have been.

"It's the most haunted B and B in the nation, according to the reviews."

We called and put down the cash.

"It had better be plenty active," I said, thinking of what I wouldn't buy when we got back to Little Rock. "I'll be pissed if I can sleep!"

I needn't have worried. I got VERY little sleep that night, and what I got wasn't good.

If you want a truly creepy experience, stay at The Myrtles. It wasn't staged, and I am cynical, scientific, and doubtful of human claims.

I'll never stay there again.

The doorknob to the porch kept turning and clicking. No one was there.

Weird noises, thumps, and smells woke me often, and Connie as well.

We did not have a good night's sleep. We both came down with terrible bronchitis upon coming home, but this was likely due to the down pillows, which can harbor some serious bugs.

Still, it was a very creepy place, and my photographs are peppered with weird images that weren't there when I shot them.

Still, I sluffed it off to other, more rational explanations. Connie wasn't so sure.

To tell you the truth, neither was I.

 

In 2012 I found Standish Farm, and the original Standish Homestead was built in 1690. It was torn down and rebuilt in 1702, according to the records, and that is where I live now. Duh. I visited here in 2012 to figure if I wanted to live in this area, and if you go back to the beginning of this blog, you'll find out what happened at that time. I guess I should do that myself; I haven't gone spelunking the past in all the time I've been writing this thing.

But one thing was sure; I knew the very first day I was here that a female presence existed in the Far Room of the 'attic,' or as I like to call it, the second floor. I felt her as soon as I ascended the stairs to that very unused part of this very small house.

 

The ships-ladder that is the staircase to the second floor. Note the original roof sheathing, random-width pine 1x peppered with nails from many shingles long since gone. Known up here as 'roofers,' these boards are nailed to sawn 3x4 rafters set on mote or less 24" centers. Many three hundred year old houses up here, despite being framed from hand-hewn timbers, are finished out with sawn studs, lath, and some smaller frame members, such as rafters. The up-and-down saw marks on these trim and frame parts come from old-style saw mills that could be found on nearly every local stream with enough fall and feed to run one.

It didn't bother me one bit.

Still, I avoided that room every time I visited the Farm before I bought it.

And I NEVER went into that room after the sun went down.

Not in the night. Not in the dark.

 

Approaching The Room above the living room

"Are there any ghost stories associated with this house?" I asked Jim, the youngest son of Chet and Bertha, the matriarch and patriarch of the Izbickis. It was those two that had bought and restored this house in 1938 while raising four kids here.

"No, none that I know of," he answered. I thought that was weird, since the house dated back to 1702 and the site was inhabited by English folks since 1690.

I always wondered what the Natives thought of this place. After all, it must have had something to attract one of the Standish clan. They could have had any pick of the bottomland around here, but they chose this windswept ridge. But the Human Beings had long walked its path, which is the road in front of this house now. I'm sure there was commerce between the Standish clan and the Original Inhabitants.

I did not venture into the Far Attic at night, as I call that room, for almost two years. Well, I stored things there. But I never stayed long.

 

Not in the night. Not in the dark.

But as time went by, I realized that I was being looked after.

Oh, I know what you're thinking. Screw loose. Idiot. Believes in spirits.

But I don't now and I never did.

Yet…

I lose that conviction when talking about HER.

 

This house should have blown sky-high, taking the dogs, all my writings, and everything that matters to me up in a ball of fire three weeks after moving in. The gas line to the water heater disintegrated, and propane gas poured out, filling the cellar, then the house. I freaked upon coming home; the dogs were outside, and the house was brimming with explosive fumes.

The gas should have ignited the pilot light, which was undoubtedly still going when the leak occurred. Yet it BLEW OUT the pilot. Then it filled the house and cellar, which I emptied by opening windows and manually fanning the fumes.

I lost three hundred gallons ($900.00) of propane in one day. And I couldn’t afford such a loss.

But I didn't lose the house.

Okay, that could have happened anyway.

Sure.

I have no problem going into the Far Attic now. So I'm either Over That or She is cool with me.

SHE?

A month after moving into the house, Jim Izbicki pulled up in his car. He didn't walk well, and always stayed in the car while we talked. I came out, covered with plaster dust.

He rolled down the window.

"So," he said jovially. "Have you seen the spook yet?"

I looked at him suspiciously.

"You shit!" I smiled. He smiled back a grin I'd come to know only too well. "You said there weren't any ghosts!"

"That was when you were only a PROSPECTIVE buyer," he smiled. "Now you own the house. You should know."

I told him I already did, and that I'd sensed a woman from day one. He grinned even more broadly.

"Have you seen her?" he asked. "She lives in the attic, above the living room. I saw her at the foot of the bed when I lived there, in the long room beyond."

I admitted that I never saw her, but figured she was in the room he mentioned, and that my bedroom was in the one he described, but I thankfully hadn't had the pleasure of her visible company.

"Don't worry. You will."

Great. Just Fracking GREAT!

 

 

I won't touch the granny boots. This room has wainscot sporting early 20th century wallpaper and a closet. There's no sign of anyone having actually LIVED up here other than those details, and considering how cold it is in the winter and sweltering in the summer (no insulation or nail holes from removed lath, plaster, or interior sheathing), it seems unlikely to have been used for dwelling. Still...

 

But there was one thing I actually SAW, and that was back in 2012, in another house in Preston…