And now for something completely different...
A ghost story!
The inquiries have not gone unnoticed, so I'll tell you the story. For whatever it's worth, I should also say up front that I used to be completely skeptical about ghost stories, especially since the place where this one happened was so littered with them that I thought it was silly... but there was really nothing else that I could describe it as when all was said and done. I leave you each to your own conclusion and opinions!
It all started when my neighbor across the hall brought her non-affiliated sorority to our campus. My college was a really small one - about 400 students at the time - and while it offered a fair amount of activities, it didn't cover all the bases and didn't have any sororities since it was all kind of one large one anyway in a lot of respects. But this neighbor, like I said, belonged to one and was in some kind of leadership position, so all of her girls would have to march in formation (sometimes wearing camo - yikes!) after her to the dining hall, etc. She was the school president and had a decent-sized room, but there was no way that all 30 girls could have fit in there to camp on the floor and I had no idea what she did with all of them.
That is, until, I agreed to fill in at Penney's (where I had an off-campus job) for someone on a Sunday, when I usually didn't work. That Saturday night, instead of being out with everyone else, I stayed home and turned in at a responsible hour and was almost asleep when people started shoving furniture around in the attic whose floor was my ceiling. Just so you can picture it: my dorm room that year was in Glen Park, the former mansion of the school's founder, Henry Wells. (Trivia: Also the founder of Wells Fargo, American Express, and a stagecoach manufacturer to boot.) My room was right at the top of the spiral staircase that went up from the entrance foyer, and if you continued to the top of the spiral, there was the cupola and the attic.
I was immediately amused and annoyed that the mystery of where all those girls were staying was solved. Of course it made sense - they were right up the stairs from their leader's room, but then there would be a lot more room for them to lay out sleeping bags. A bunch of people kept their luggage and other assorted things there along with discarded dorm furniture, so of course they would have to clear it out of the way to make space in the middle. And I remembered too hearing a neighbor complaining that someone had moved her stuff all around, so must be they at least tried to put it all back but didn't remember where everything had been.
But then it started to get more annoying - the floors up there were old and wooden, so everything was echoing and screeching and scraping horribly as they rearranged things. Anyone who has shoved something heavy across an echo-y wooden floor will know exactly what I mean. I knew there were a lot of girls to make room for up there, but it had been going on for at least half an hour and I was pissed that now I was wide awake from all their racket and would probably be just as tired for work as if I'd just gone out with everyone else in the first place.
Indignantly, I decided to do something about it. They were guests on our campus and should show a little courtesy, by golly!!! Not bothering to change (it was all women, so we often walked around in pajamas, even to the dining hall sometimes), I marched up the stairs and knocked on the attic door. The noise stopped immediately. I said, "Thanks - I was trying to sleep." No reply. No sound at all, in fact. Then I noticed that no light was coming from under the door. I opened it a crack and peeked inside - nothing. The lights were off and I could tell by the light coming in from the windows that there was no one in there. I flicked the lightswitch on anyway - no one. Windows shut and locked. No one at all. And then it occurred to me that I hadn't heard any footsteps moving back and forth across the ceiling with all of that dragging and scraping...
I scurried all the way down the stairs to hang out in the TV lounge where there were still a few other people hanging out. I calmed down a bit and went back to bed after awhile. The next day, I told my partner in crime (E) all about it. She was fascinated and wished that she could have heard it too.
A few weeks later she got her chance. E lived on the same landing as me and the sorority girl and we were hanging out one night when it started again! We listened for a few minutes, then got a flashlight and sneaked up the stairs. As soon as we put our hands on the door to open it, the noise stopped. We went in, turned the lights on, and looked around, checking much more thoroughly than I had when I was alone. No one was in there at all.
Fast forward to the next time we heard it. I wasn't really sure how much after that it was, but it was earlier on a weekend night. I remember it distinctly because we heard sounds from the other girl on the landing's room of her crew getting ready to go out that night, and I remember that E and I were getting ready and the rest of our gang were on their way over to meet up with us to go out ourselves. The noise started again - the same heavy, shuddering, dragging and screechy wood-on-wood scraping. It was so noisy that the other crew - despite having music blasting and hair dryers running suddenly decided very loudly that they were just about fed up with that racket and were going to do something about it. E and I looked at each other as we heard them run up to the top of the spiral... pause... screams!!!! And they all came thundering back down the stairs shrieking about it.
But the last time I heard it was the one that I remember the most, and it's also the one that I don't really talk about because I don't know what it means and I'm still not sure of my own reaction to it let alone opening it up to the reactions of others... but it was basically this: in a similar situation to the first time I heard it, I was once again in bed and nearly asleep when it started. At first I was afraid, but then I listened to it for a few more minutes and decided to have a conversation with that which I know as God because it is a source of existential comfort and connection for me. It's hard to put words to something that is a largely non-verbal exchange, but I wondered at the experience and knew that I couldn't know even a fraction of what God is or what things might be happening outside of my own ability to understand or observe. But then I thought about ghost stories I've heard and how they always seem to be connected to someone who is stuck somehow between existences because of something unfinished in the one they've left, and I felt pity for whatever was making the sounds, thinking that it might be sad or angry and stuck. Then I thought about how lucky I was, how Cared for I was from so many facets of my own existence - that I had more than enough to share, so if there could be any way to share my own comfort with it, could it please be so.
And then just like that, the noise stopped.
I have no idea if anyone who's lived there on that landing under the attic since then has heard it, but it never happened again while I was there. So. For as sceptical as I once was about ghosts, I really had no better way to describe whatever it was that happened. I've experienced nothing like it since then, but have talked with several relatives (without telling them this story, or at least all of it) who have claimed strange experiences of their own.
It makes me wonder.
The end!!
The inquiries have not gone unnoticed, so I'll tell you the story. For whatever it's worth, I should also say up front that I used to be completely skeptical about ghost stories, especially since the place where this one happened was so littered with them that I thought it was silly... but there was really nothing else that I could describe it as when all was said and done. I leave you each to your own conclusion and opinions!
It all started when my neighbor across the hall brought her non-affiliated sorority to our campus. My college was a really small one - about 400 students at the time - and while it offered a fair amount of activities, it didn't cover all the bases and didn't have any sororities since it was all kind of one large one anyway in a lot of respects. But this neighbor, like I said, belonged to one and was in some kind of leadership position, so all of her girls would have to march in formation (sometimes wearing camo - yikes!) after her to the dining hall, etc. She was the school president and had a decent-sized room, but there was no way that all 30 girls could have fit in there to camp on the floor and I had no idea what she did with all of them.
That is, until, I agreed to fill in at Penney's (where I had an off-campus job) for someone on a Sunday, when I usually didn't work. That Saturday night, instead of being out with everyone else, I stayed home and turned in at a responsible hour and was almost asleep when people started shoving furniture around in the attic whose floor was my ceiling. Just so you can picture it: my dorm room that year was in Glen Park, the former mansion of the school's founder, Henry Wells. (Trivia: Also the founder of Wells Fargo, American Express, and a stagecoach manufacturer to boot.) My room was right at the top of the spiral staircase that went up from the entrance foyer, and if you continued to the top of the spiral, there was the cupola and the attic.
I was immediately amused and annoyed that the mystery of where all those girls were staying was solved. Of course it made sense - they were right up the stairs from their leader's room, but then there would be a lot more room for them to lay out sleeping bags. A bunch of people kept their luggage and other assorted things there along with discarded dorm furniture, so of course they would have to clear it out of the way to make space in the middle. And I remembered too hearing a neighbor complaining that someone had moved her stuff all around, so must be they at least tried to put it all back but didn't remember where everything had been.
But then it started to get more annoying - the floors up there were old and wooden, so everything was echoing and screeching and scraping horribly as they rearranged things. Anyone who has shoved something heavy across an echo-y wooden floor will know exactly what I mean. I knew there were a lot of girls to make room for up there, but it had been going on for at least half an hour and I was pissed that now I was wide awake from all their racket and would probably be just as tired for work as if I'd just gone out with everyone else in the first place.
Indignantly, I decided to do something about it. They were guests on our campus and should show a little courtesy, by golly!!! Not bothering to change (it was all women, so we often walked around in pajamas, even to the dining hall sometimes), I marched up the stairs and knocked on the attic door. The noise stopped immediately. I said, "Thanks - I was trying to sleep." No reply. No sound at all, in fact. Then I noticed that no light was coming from under the door. I opened it a crack and peeked inside - nothing. The lights were off and I could tell by the light coming in from the windows that there was no one in there. I flicked the lightswitch on anyway - no one. Windows shut and locked. No one at all. And then it occurred to me that I hadn't heard any footsteps moving back and forth across the ceiling with all of that dragging and scraping...
I scurried all the way down the stairs to hang out in the TV lounge where there were still a few other people hanging out. I calmed down a bit and went back to bed after awhile. The next day, I told my partner in crime (E) all about it. She was fascinated and wished that she could have heard it too.
A few weeks later she got her chance. E lived on the same landing as me and the sorority girl and we were hanging out one night when it started again! We listened for a few minutes, then got a flashlight and sneaked up the stairs. As soon as we put our hands on the door to open it, the noise stopped. We went in, turned the lights on, and looked around, checking much more thoroughly than I had when I was alone. No one was in there at all.
Fast forward to the next time we heard it. I wasn't really sure how much after that it was, but it was earlier on a weekend night. I remember it distinctly because we heard sounds from the other girl on the landing's room of her crew getting ready to go out that night, and I remember that E and I were getting ready and the rest of our gang were on their way over to meet up with us to go out ourselves. The noise started again - the same heavy, shuddering, dragging and screechy wood-on-wood scraping. It was so noisy that the other crew - despite having music blasting and hair dryers running suddenly decided very loudly that they were just about fed up with that racket and were going to do something about it. E and I looked at each other as we heard them run up to the top of the spiral... pause... screams!!!! And they all came thundering back down the stairs shrieking about it.
But the last time I heard it was the one that I remember the most, and it's also the one that I don't really talk about because I don't know what it means and I'm still not sure of my own reaction to it let alone opening it up to the reactions of others... but it was basically this: in a similar situation to the first time I heard it, I was once again in bed and nearly asleep when it started. At first I was afraid, but then I listened to it for a few more minutes and decided to have a conversation with that which I know as God because it is a source of existential comfort and connection for me. It's hard to put words to something that is a largely non-verbal exchange, but I wondered at the experience and knew that I couldn't know even a fraction of what God is or what things might be happening outside of my own ability to understand or observe. But then I thought about ghost stories I've heard and how they always seem to be connected to someone who is stuck somehow between existences because of something unfinished in the one they've left, and I felt pity for whatever was making the sounds, thinking that it might be sad or angry and stuck. Then I thought about how lucky I was, how Cared for I was from so many facets of my own existence - that I had more than enough to share, so if there could be any way to share my own comfort with it, could it please be so.
And then just like that, the noise stopped.
I have no idea if anyone who's lived there on that landing under the attic since then has heard it, but it never happened again while I was there. So. For as sceptical as I once was about ghosts, I really had no better way to describe whatever it was that happened. I've experienced nothing like it since then, but have talked with several relatives (without telling them this story, or at least all of it) who have claimed strange experiences of their own.
It makes me wonder.
The end!!