True Ghost Stories

I may be a wuss about scary movies, but I'm a sucker for real life ghost stories. As in, I know that rationally there are probably perfectly logical explanations for flickering lights, odd noises, moving objects, etc. But, somehow the idea of honest to goodness ghosts or energies or whatever just somehow makes sense to me.  I don't know, but you know how sometimes you go to a historical site, or even just someplace that seems ordinary, and from the moment you walk in, it just feels a certain way for no good reason? You feel more comfortable and familiar than you have any right to be, or you just want out as soon as possible even though nothing is wrong. It's probably nothing, or just a subconscious something or other. Still, some places just seem to have a certain energy that sticks around them, and the idea that big events or big people leave something there doesn't seem to outlandish. Or maybe (probably) this is just another of my bits of crazy.

Either way, especially around Halloween, I like to curl up and read random collections of supposedly real encounters with unexplained things. Just for a little bit it's nice to not be skeptical and just believe in what if for a while.
 
Of course, I've never actually experienced anything  much, which is probably for the best. I do occasionally chat with and say thank you to Dennis, our elevator ghost that I 20% believe in (that elevator spontaneously opens up for me way too often, especially if I'm carrying something heavy, or have had a bad day). I'll probably keep up friendly conversation at any sign of possible other occupants of places I may live, because hey worst case scenario I'm just talking to myself, best case I'm being a good roommate. (Assuming they're decent people of course. I'm not living with anyone malicious, I don't care how dead they are).

This is about the closest I come to actually having anything extraworldly touch my life. 

I grew up in a house that was built in the early 1900's. We really don't know how old it was, but apparently it was built with square nails, so we presume it was pretty dang old. As a kid whose knowledge of history almsot exclusively consisted of Pioneers, because that what a combination of growing up both as a Mormon and in Oregon does to a kid, I just assumed that my house was lived in by pioneers. It was a cool, if kind of run-down house. It also had a gigantic basement. To get into it, you crawled into this little half door at the base of the stairs between the porch and the kitchen. Down you went into a maze of boxes and half walls, the light coming from a few exposed bulbs that were always swinging and what little came in from the constantly smudged and bubble windows. In the very back of the basement, behind the water heater and right next to the exposed heating pipes that always groaned a little was a little room that could shut off from everything. There was no way in heaven or earth I was ever going to set foot in there.

I especially wasn't going to go in after my Dad told me what had happened to the little girl whose family first built the house. Back then this was just a house on the outskirts of town. The family was full of kids, and always busy. So when it was time for them to make their big trip into Portland, everyone was excited, everything was frantic. And everyone missed the little girl, trying to find her doll. After looking everywhere else, she was looked in that back basement room. Which is where she was when the family left, never missing her amidst all the hussle and bussle. And where she stayed, locked up tight, no one around. Where she started to cry when the rain came, leaking in through the window, but trapped inside with her behind the heavy door that she could not move no matter how she tried. That's where they found her when they came back, and that's where her spirit stays to this day, still crying for someone to find her every time it rains.

Of course, none of that was true. Not even remotely. But after my Dad told me that story, every time it rained there wasn't a chance on earth that I was going to set foot anywhere near that room. Even now if I were to go back, there's no way I would set foot in that back basement room. Especially if it was raining.