I’ll make this short and sweet. I don’t see ghosts every single day, but yesterday I saw one. Here’s what happened.

I’m at my Mom’s right now. She lives in East Texas on a sprawling piece of forested land with cows, rolling hills and all the rest of it. I was walking from one room to another when I glanced through the front window.

A tall man stood on the front porch right next to the window. He appeared to be looking inside. It happened so fast I walked about three more steps before I stopped and literally walked backwards to crane my neck and look again.

Of course he was gone. Ghosts always disappear quickly. But in that split second I’d seen him pretty clearly.

He was tall and I saw a bunch of BLACK. Not like he was African-American, but in all black. I didn’t see his face so much as what he was wearing. Prickly chills spread across my scalp, face, and down the left side of my body. I always get these chills when spirits show up. Where they are in relation to me determines which side of my body gets the chills…but anyway.

“Uh, Mom?” I called down the hallway, eyeing the front porch. I had the creeps. Big time.

“Ya?” she came out of the grandkid’s playroom and walked toward me, “Hey let’s go have a beer on the porch-” she paused, “What’s the matter?” She examined my face, “What did you see?”

My mother knows me well. Mind you, I had chills popping out everywhere now. And these were not warm fuzzies.

“Did you see something?”

I nodded.

“Which one?” she asked, “The little girl or the man in black?”

I just stared at her. 

And let’s just say we drank our beer on the BACK porch. She confirmed how “Mr. Black” shows up often and how several people have seen him. She asked if picked up anything on who he is/was. My intuition tells me he’s from the late 1800s and I get the same vibe from him as I do that creepy old preacher from Poltergeist 2. Blech!

But anyway I finally asked Mom about something weird that happened in our old house. Twenty five years ago, we had a house guest that pretty much left in the middle of the night and never came back. (Please read The First Icky Spirit if you don’t know what I’m talking about.)  I never knew why. Here’s what she told me this morning over coffee:

The house guest was my then-Uncle Henry. My mom got up for work super early that morning (it was still dark outside) and was surprised to see smoke coming from the sunroom. Henry was in there smoking a cigarette. In the dark. She turned on the light and asked if he was okay. He gave an excuse about always getting up that early but she knew something was up.

That night my aunt called and told my mom what happened…that Henry was asleep on the floor when something forced him awake. He described an unseen force on all fours, pinning him to the floor. He was unnerved that the only thing on top of him was a sheet and he could not get up. When the thing let go he got up, smoked a cigarette, and never came back. Ever.

That’s all I got for now. I promise to share things as they happen. Happy Father’s Day everyone.