A few days ago I turned on the radio and a show called "Coast to Coast" was on. The discussion was about ghosts. My first instinct was to laugh it off, but then I remembered a supernatural occurence of my own: When I was 15 years old my family was living in Cairo, Egypt. One night my parents and sister were out, and I was alone in our apartment. Back then I was a major Stephen King fan, and I was reading Salem's Lot, a vampire story. The paperback I was reading had on its cover the green face of a little child, and from the corner of its mouth was a trickle of blood. Anyway, I was sitting in the living room with my feet propped up on our coffee table. Immediately above the coffee table was a small chandelier, which was attached to the ceiling by a two-foot section of brass chain. I had been reading for about an hour and arrived at a particularly scary point of the book. I was pretty worked up, and I was getting scared to simply turn the page, afraid of what was to come. Then this sequence occured, very fast, all within 30 seconds to a minute: Suddenly the room became cold, and, I don't know how to explain it any other way - I felt a presence. I was certain that someone - or something - was in the apartment with me. Close to me. I slammed the book shut, and sat there for several seconds staring at the cover of that child's face with the blood trickling down one corner of her mouth. That little girl's face started to, well, throb. Like her face was trying to detach itself from the book cover and leap up at me. Horrified, I threw the book down on the coffee table. As I did so, the room got even colder. Okay, here's where it got REALLY weird: Not only did the room get cold, but a wind started to blow around me. Mind you, the windows were shut and the AC wasn't on. It was dead still in that apartment. I had the distinct impression that this chilling wind wasn't in fact a wind, but the actual shape/form of that presence that was in the room with me. I could actually make out a subtle form of something, very indistinct. When I looked at the wall where this shape was, for example, there was a distinct difference between the normal shape of the wall and the portion where this shape was. This all happened very fast. Suddenly, this shape came right at me and THROUGH me. I felt icy cold, like I had suddenly been thrown into a tub of ice water. (Now, up until this point, you could probably make several assumptions about the phenomena I'd witnessed. But you'd be wrong. First of all, I wasn't on any drugs, legal or otherwise, when this happened. I hadn't been drinking any alcohol. I wasn't sick. Assume, however, that I WAS in someway, not myself. Maybe I ate something bad for dinner, for example. In any case, it would not explain what happened next: ) A split second after that icy shape went through me, I looked up at the chandelier. I just KNEW it was going to fall. I knew it so matter of factly that I actually said out loud: "THE CHANDELIER IS GOING TO FALL." Right after those words escaped my mouth, that chandelier indeed came crashing down on our coffee table, narrowly missing my feet. Man, I jumped like the Hounds of Hell were on my tail. I ran around the apartment and turned on all the lights in every room. My heart was beating like a triphammer. Okay, now maybe you're thinking that the chandelier fell because it was old, that it was just coincidence. But no. That brass chain connecting the chandelier to the ceiling? It was shiny and brand new. Part of the chain still remained imbedded in the ceiling. The link of the chain that had been connected to the part still imbedded in the ceiling had these incredibly smooth.....cuts. Something had sliced that chain like a hot knife through butter. My parents came in the door a few minutes later, and the first thing they saw was that chandelier strewn across the coffee table. They laughed off my story but were unable to explain why the point at which the chain had detached itself was so smooth. Nor could they understand how, or why, I would have said "the chandelier is going to fall" out loud just prior to its doing exactly that. So endeth this (true) tale. I expect jokes and insults to follow, but hopefully amid all of that there will be a sharing of other TRUE experiences. I have another experience to tell of, not as exciting or dramatic as this one, but I will post it later.
"Suddenly, this shape came right at me and THROUGH me. I felt icy cold, like I had suddenly been thrown into a tub of ice water." Well, I guess that explains why you post the way you do... You're possessed by demons. "I knew it so matter of factly that I actually said out loud: "THE CHANDELIER IS GOING TO FALL."" And you're white trash living in a run-down trailer. What else is new? to
Hmmm. Maybe you're right. Watch your ass, TO, because I'm gonna be doing 360 skull rotations and spewing green slime all over your sorry ass. Yes, Cairo, Egypt is the white trash run-down trailer living center of the world.
Won't bother me one bit - I got the Devil in a little box, with my Sword tip pointing right to his ass. I'm a Christian, remember?
Have I ever had a supernatural experience? Well, I've had a few epiphanies at some shit HarryTrader has written. About half-way through a couple of his posts I've had a near-death experience. Actually, now that I think of it, once when I was a kid I was in bed dreaming a ghost was phucking me. When I woke up I saw it was just our french poodle humping my left foot. tradez
Actually, the 'assumption' I had been making was "man, is this guy talking out of his rear end or what?". I hope you can understand, hapaboy, that when I hear stories like this and discount them it's nothing personal against the teller; it's just that I have to weigh them up against what I believe is likely to be true about the world while taking into account common human behavior patterns; in short, "ghosts aren't real and people are full of shit". In contrast to days past, though, I'm no longer so quick to decide. Obviously there exists the possibility that what you (and others) report is actually what took place. If it did, then that would have major implications on my world view. Now, I don't want to discount your story simply because I find its implications uncomfortable (although I certainly do) even though doing so would be rationally 'defensible', however, on the other hand, I'm not prepared to fully believe it either. Can I ask you, what did you do afterwards? I imagine something like that happening to me would shake me up for days. Did you run around telling everyone you knew? Speak with any religious leaders? I really don't know what I'd do; I certainly wouldn't expect anyone to believe me. Also, you lived in Egypt, too? Didn't you also live in Japan? And now live in Hawaii? Not your everyday migration pattern!
Spec, I can TOTALLY understand your hesitation to believe it. This is, after all, the internet, and you don't know me, and even if you did you would have every right to be skeptical. It's one of those things that are difficult if not impossible to believe if it hasn't happened to you. All I can tell you is that it happened, and it freaked the shit out of me. I was indeed shaken up. I told my friends, of course, and they were either skeptical or freaked out as well. I didn't speak to any religious people - I have never attended church on a regular basis, and being a teenager living in Cairo I wouldn't even know where to go if I did want to talk to, say, a priest. And, as bizarre as the experience was, it wasn't like Lucifer appeared or the walls started to run with blood! Sometimes when I analyze it I believe that I may have been so worked up that I somehow tapped into something that we normally don't. Maybe it wasn't supernatural at all, but some other sort of phenomena. Again, had it not been for me knowing that damn chandelier was going to fall, saying it out loud, and having it do so, I could base the episode on nothing more than being scared out of my wits and letting my imagination get the best of me. But that chandelier did fall, I knew it would fall, I said it would. And it did. And that darned chain. It did indeed change my view of things. I don't completely discount out of the ordinary events anymore. As for living in various places, I was a government brat. My parents worked for the State Department. I was raised overseas and didn't live in the US until graduating from high school. Thanks for your post, H