I have nightmares so rarely that I could probably count them on one hand. Last night was one such occasion. I awoke about 4am with a start. I had been in a house that I recognised from memory. The film that the house (in my dream) was from was called The Amityville Horror. Have you seen it? It is the story of a house (or a spirit living in the house) that terrorized the occupiers. A bit scary back in the day, not so much now. Anyway I hadn’t seen the film for years so why was it occupying my dreams or indeed my nightmare?
Let’s skip back a few hours to the evening before.
I was visiting with an old friend of mine, Rob. He’s moved to the other side of the country but was visiting his folks and had dropped me a line. I would never say No to Rob, the guy is a rare intellectual who loves to (or rather loved to) explore the paranormal. Years ago we rolled together for a few years. Anyway I met up with Rob and he told me that an old friend of his had called him up about a poltergeist haunting that was begging to be investigated. Now, I don’t do that kind of thing anymore but a few months ago I came up with some interesting theories of my own on that subject matter so I was amenable to go a ghost hunting with my ol’ pal.
Going back a few hours, we arrived in a quiet neighbourhood just as it was going dark…spooky…Me, Rob and Sylvia. I had never met Sylvia but kind-of liked her straight away she has a good aura (I think/feel). The house was a large one with 6 bedrooms and 8 rooms downstairs (inc two conservatories). The family that lived there consisted of three generations, Grandma, Mr and Mrs, and 4 children aged 22, 18, 14 and 12. As I was introduced to the family, I paid particular attention to the younger children, knowing the theories about poltergeist and pubescent children. Rob knew this too and he gave me a knowing nod as we were led into one of the living rooms.
I have had some experience with this type of ghost. Poltergeist is a well established type of ghost. For those not of a German tongue, the word means noisy ghost. Which is quite an apt name as that is what such a beastie is known for. Banging around a house, moving things, making things disappear and appear (apports). They have even been known to throw people around. A good distinction to make about such ghosts is that they have never, or very rarely known to harm people (even the ones that have thrown people around). Another important piece of research about such phenomena is that they are thought not to be the spirit of a dead person. It is more likely that they are a ball of energy that is being pushed around by the sub-conscious of a pubescent child. An excellent book on the matter is Poltergeist by Colin Wilson (it’s a bit old. 70’s I think, but is still the definitive work on the matter).
We were here to investigate whether this house was haunted and if it was haunted, by what. The suspect was a poltergeist because of the phenomena that had been observed. Examples of incidents were furniture moving, A really bad smell, glasses breaking in the kitchen, homework vanishing. As is normal with such cases many of the incidents were only observed after the fact or through the corner of one’s eye. I have a perfect example of this kind of thing from my own personal experience…
It was about 18/20 years ago when I was deep in the throws of paranormal investigations and had the fortune to investigate a really active poltergeist haunting. The house was a normal terraced house and in fact had been in the local paper as being haunted to the point of driving the occupier out of the home. That was how I had initially heard of it and was excited to investigate it….come on! Driving the householders out of their home! Definitely going there!
Anyway whilst walking around the home on my initial visit I was walking past the kitchen when I saw (felt?) some movement through the corner of my eye in the kitchen. I looked in sharply and was startled to see a column of knives and forks standing end to end on a table, making a tower of them that came clattering down as soon as I had observed them. Almost (I thought at the time) as if they had been set up by the poltergeist just for my benefit.
Rob and Sylvia quizzed the family about what kinds of experiences they had had and what times, who had been home etc, whilst I (being the only dowser in our group) wandered the rooms and hallways in search of the beastie. It is a testament to how far I have come over the years, because back in the day I would never have wandered the halls on my lonesome. Armed with a really awesome energy shield and an intuitive sense that seems to be going from strength to strength I had no worries.