paranormal activity

The Hidden Entity, Part 1

~ Tara Theresa Hill ~ 1 Comment

Thanks to Gafyn from Swansea, Wales for this story!  You can also read Gafyn’s other stories, Adventures with Ghosts and Haunted Roads in South Wales. 

Gafyn is an experienced Medium.  At the time this story took place, he had been working in the paranormal field for many years.  The trouble started when Gafyn and his partner, Angela, rented this big, beautiful house.  It was everything that they had ever wanted.  Gafyn was most interested in the garden and the garage, so he didn’t spend much time in the house before deciding to rent it.  Later, when they were unpacking, Gafyn kept getting the feeling that he was being watched.  Gafyn dismissed this because it didn’t feel particularly menacing and he felt that he would be better able to tune into whatever it was after they were finished settling in.

Ten days passed before the presence decided to make contact.  One night, after the kids were in bed, Gafyn and Angela were sitting on the couch talking and enjoying their new home.  As they turned to kiss, one of the ornaments suddenly fell off the T.V. and broke.  Despite the event, the atmosphere in the room didn’t feel foreboding.  They cleaned up the mess and sat back down, only to hear the pictures shifting.  When they turned back around, all the pictures that lined the staircase were slanted.  These were the first signs of activity.

At around 3:20am that night, Angela woke up screaming from a horrible nightmare.  As Gafyn was trying to comfort her, he heard one of the kid’s bedroom doors close.  The door was not slammed, but it was loud enough to make him decide to go check on the kids.  He looked in on them, only to find that everyone was still sleeping.  Afterward, he went back to bed.  Both he and Angela agreed that while strange things kept happening in the house, neither of them could sense anything.

The next day, Gafyn asked his friends for advice.  They set up a meeting time for 6:30pm that night.  He and his partner made sure that the kids were out of the house for this.  As they entered the house, they were met with a blast of negative energy that made the place feel unnaturally cold.  Whatever had been hiding before was definitely making its presence known now.  Despite their best efforts to warm things up, the place remained ice cold.

As Gafyn was trying to get his thoughts together for what lay ahead, Angela pointed out the window into the garden, and said that she just saw someone in their garage.  Sure enough, their garage door was open, even though Gafyn had locked it earlier.  Leaving Angela safe in the house as a lookout, Gafyn went to go check out the situation in the garden.  As he approached, he heard what sounded like someone picking up one of his big gardening tools.  Before the person could come out, Gafyn kicked the door shut and locked them in.  The lock had not been cut or damaged at all despite someone managing to get inside the garage.  Then he told Angela to call the police.

The police arrived, only to check out the garage to find it empty.  Once back inside, the officers asked, “Who is upstairs?”  When Gafyn replied that he and his partner were the only ones that were home, the police responded that they had seen the upstairs light go on when they were in the garden, so they went to check the back bedroom.  They came back down a few minutes later, commenting on the frigid temperature in the house.  After making sure that everything was secure, the officers took their leave as Gafyn’s friends arrived.  The cops agreed that there was something off about the house and were glad that the group was going to discuss what could be done.

The friends sat down to tea and talked over what was going on in the house.  During this time, the atmosphere became pleasant again and stayed that way for the next couple of days.  One of their neighbors came over and told them about the history of the home.  The prior residents had not had any issues.  However, the man who lived there before them had ended up in a psychiatry ward after jumping out one of the back windows.

Stayed Tuned for Part 2 Next Week!

Do You Have a Ghost Story?

Send me an email to theghostpostreporter@gmail.com to set up an interview.  I’m always in the mood for a good ghost story! 

Want even more Ghost Stories?

For more ghost stories, paranormal phenomena, and updates, follow Tara Theresa Hill on Facebook and on Twitter at @TaraTheresaHill. 

Also, check out The Ghost Post’s new YouTube channel for audio recordings of The Ghost Post.  It’s perfect for camping out, sleepovers, or anytime you just want to hear a ghost story on the go. 

Get Your Ghost On!

In celebration of The Ghost Post’s 1 Year Anniversary, I have launched a Café Press store featuring The Ghost Post’s official new mascot, Spook.  We’ve got awesome coffee mugs, t-shirts, and more!

Spook Giant Coffee Mug
Spook – Coffee Mug – Copyright 2017

 

 

Advertisement

Stay in Bed

~ Tara Theresa Hill ~ Leave a comment

Age eleven to thirteen was a time of great upheaval for me.  My maternal grandfather passed away and my parents separated shortly after.  I switched schools first for bullying issues and then because my mother and I moved to the Bronx so that we would be closer to her store.  That very same summer, my mother’s sister, Roseanne, was diagnosed with lung cancer.  My first week of Junior High school ended with her funeral.

Aunt Roseanne and I were always close.  She knew the type of clothes and toys that I liked.  She was one of the adults that actually listened to what I said when I talked.  She encouraged me in school, listened to my dreams, supported my love for imaginary play, and was always affectionate with me and my mother.  We were heartbroken when she died.

A few months after her passing, I was sitting in my room working on a short story when I suddenly caught the scent of her perfume.  This was not a flowery fragrance that can be mistaken for a scented candle or an air spray.  Aunt Roseanne always wore Chanel #5.  It was such a distinct aroma that I actually stopped what I was doing and spoke her name aloud.

Of course there was no answer, but it had broken through my concentration.  Now completely spooked and seeing how late it was, I decided to get ready for bed.  I didn’t mention the incident to my mom because this had happened to me before.

When my grandfather had first passed away a year earlier, I had smelt his cologne in the downstairs lobby of our apartment building when there was no one around.  The aroma had been centered around my person, not wafting through the hallway, as it would have been if someone wearing the cologne had passed by.  I had been so depressed over my grandfather’s death that mom had brought me to a grief counselor for a few sessions.  When I discussed this event with the counselor, she said that it was common for family members to experience this kind of phenomena after someone’s death.

Smell is one of the most powerful memory triggers.  A grieving person might believe that they smell a specific scent that they associate with their loved one because that soul could be trying to alert them to their presence.  However, some other schools of thought believe that it is actually the memory itself that is triggering the illusion of the aroma.  Growing up in a family that believes in the paranormal, I never discounted the possibility that my grandfather’s spirit could have been visiting me.  I was not consciously thinking of either my grandfather or my aunt at the time that I experienced these phenomena.  Each time the experience caught me off guard and happened when I was alone.

After I went to bed the night that I smelled Aunt Roseanne’s perfume, I felt anxious.  The event had been unsettling.  I sat up, ready to go get my mother, but something told me to stay in bed.  Lying back down, I tried to go to sleep, but couldn’t.  Again, I desired to get up.  This time, I thought I heard a soft voice say, “Stay in bed.”  Two seconds after closing my eyes, there was a loud crash.

Mom rushed into my room.  Pieces of my ceramic ceiling lamp littered the floor.  My desk chair was positioned directly under this lamp.  A half hour earlier, I had been sitting there when I had smelled my Aunt Roseanne’s perfume.  After the mess was cleaned up and I was back in bed, I told mom about the earlier phenomena and then the voice urging me to stay in bed.  Mom and I still believe that Aunt Roseanne’s spirit protected me that night.

If you have a real ghost story that you would like to share with The Ghost Post, send an email to Tara Theresa Hill at theghostpostreporter@gmail.com to set up an interview. 

I’m always in the mood for a good ghost story! 

Phantom Footsteps in the Chapel

~ Tara Theresa Hill ~ 4 Comments

Thanks to my husband, George, for this story about a haunted monastery in Connecticut!

Author’s Note: I have purposely not included the name of the monastery to protect the organization’s privacy.

Every fall, George goes to a professional conference that is held in a monastery in Connecticut.  Built in the 1950s, the monastery resides in a residential area on a property surrounded by woods.  It’s the type of place where you expect Big Foot to come lumbering out of the forest.  A labyrinth, statues of Mary, and the Stations of the Cross adorn the grounds.  All of his colleagues have reported odd sensations or strange experiences during their stays at the monastery.  Although a place of prayer that also rents out its rooms for various retreats, the monastery has a slightly unsettling atmosphere that can become eerie, especially after dark.

Most of the rooms in the monastery are small and include twin beds, a desk, and a crucifix adorning the wall.  George told me that one coworker had a spooky experience where she couldn’t sleep because she felt like someone was in her room watching her.  She has refused to stay overnight for the conference ever since.

One conference a few years back, George had arrived earlier than everyone else.  Like most Coed dormitories, the men and women’s rooms are kept separated from one another.  Being the only male that had arrived thus far, George was the sole occupant on his floor at the time.  He decided to set up his poster for the upcoming session that evening.

On the second floor is an old, masonic-style chapel with wooden chairs lining both sides of the room.  The chapel has two entrances that make it possible to use the room as a way to cut across to the other side of the building without having to go the long way around.  George carried his poster to the showroom without incident.  On the way back, he decided to take the short cut through the chapel.

It was a cloudy, rainy day.  The overhead electric lights were off and the illumination coming from the windows was dim at best.  As George was walking, he suddenly became aware of footsteps following him in the chapel.  “Click clack, click clack,” went the steps.  George was wearing sneakers, so he knew it wasn’t his shoes making the noise.  He paused and the sound of footsteps continued for a few seconds before fading away.  George had felt the presence of someone walking behind him, but turning around, saw that no one was there.  No one else had arrived for the conference yet.  After a few moments, George continued on his way, but thankfully didn’t hear the phantom footsteps again.

George is not one to spook easily and unlike me, he doesn’t purposely seek out ghosts, cemeteries, or haunted places.  He doesn’t have much interest in the paranormal.  Nevertheless, since this occurrence, George only uses the chapel as a shortcut when he is with a group of people.

A Ghostly Interlude

~ Tara Theresa Hill ~ Leave a comment

This happened to me when I was a teenager growing up in the Bronx.  My family lived on Campbell Drive in the second floor apartment of a two-family house.  Built in 1942, it even still had the original glass doorknobs and other structural furnishings from that era.

From the beginning, Mom and I sensed that the place was haunted.  We’d see shadows moving out of the corner of our eyes.  The hallway lights that were activated by motion sensors would come on when no one was around.  Sometimes late at night, we’d get the feeling that there were people talking in the living room.  It was that kind of elevated energy vibe that you experience whenever you are at a party or in a restaurant.  The second we stepped into the living room, the atmosphere would return to normal.

One night, I was waiting for my mother to get home from work.  I was sitting on the couch deeply engrossed in a book when I suddenly heard piano music.  Before that moment, ghosts were the furthest thing from my mind.  The neighbors weren’t home, so it wasn’t a radio or someone else’s television.  The music was coming from our old, out of tune piano that we almost never played.

Steadying myself, I looked over to my left.  Just as I expected, the piano was closed and no one was sitting there.  I stared at it as the eerie music continued to flow beneath the invisible musician’s hands.  The tune was unfamiliar to me.  After another minute, there was a loud jarring sound as if someone had purposely banged on the keys, then the music stopped as quickly as it had begun.

I swallowed once or twice, the oppressive silence roaring in my ears.  Nodding, I got up and said, “Well, so much for watching the electric bill!”  Then I turned on the television, switched on all of the lights, and waited for mom to get home.

 

The House that Never Sleeps

~ Tara Theresa Hill ~ Leave a comment

Thanks to Renee for contributing this story!

On Englewood Avenue in Teaneck, New Jersey there is an old, white house with high levels of paranormal activity.  Renee states that her family has known very little peace since buying the house in 1960.  The spirits are particularly disturbing at night.  After everyone has gone to bed, you can hear doors opening and closing and sounds of a loud party going on downstairs.  However, if you brave your fears and check below, the noise stops.  Family members have reported seeing dark shadows walking around and incidents of waking to find ghostly figures standing by their beds.

Built in 1917, the house was part of Dr. Gaylord’s extensive property.  The original house included six bedrooms, four bathrooms, a powder room, and a kitchen.  Renee’s family built on additional rooms.  Most of the negative activity takes place in the newer parts of the house.

One account that Renee shared with me happened when she was a child.  She and her siblings were playing outside.  A little boy appeared and asked if he could join in their game.  After a while, Renee’s mother went into the yard and called for her kids to come inside.  They turned to say goodbye to their new friend, only to see him vanish.  They never saw him again.

A man resembling President Ulysses S. Grant has been said to appear inside of the house or on the grounds.  The scariest part is all that you see is his head floating by as if he is walking, but there is no body attached.  The family has found flags and bullets on the property.  While the former president could not have been in the house being it was built after his death, there is evidence that he knew the Gaylord family and perhaps had visited their estate before.

Big bursts of activity usually occur around the holidays.  One Thanksgiving, Renee’s sister saw the face of a red-headed man and she screamed.  Later on that same night, she was carrying a bowl of gravy when a portrait suddenly fell off the mantel, causing her to drop the platter she was carrying and scald herself.  Renee’s aunt was visiting and mentioned that she wanted to see a ghost.  The red-headed man must have taken this as a challenge because she woke up to see his face leering above her bed.  Unable to get back to sleep, she went to stay in a hotel.

Unlike other places where the spiritual phenomena fluctuate, this house continues to have a high level of activity.  It would seem that both the living and the dead residents are constantly vying for space.  Thankfully, most hauntings are not as intrusive as this one.