Modern ghost stories vary. This one is of more than
passing interest. Henry_Allen
Dave Juliano's Story from
http://theshadowlands.net/ghost/story.html
It started when I was three years old. One night I
awoke to find a small child-like figure in my bed
with me. He was about 2 feet tall and had the
features of a small child, but its head was swollen
well beyond a normal size. It was wearing a blue gown
with the hands not visible at the end of the sleeves.
It was moving its mouth and talking in gibberish. The
figure was as real as I was, and it was surrounded by
a kind of glowing haze. I ran to my parents' bedroom
and woke up my dad, but, of course, he told me to go
back to sleep. So I returned to my room and now the
figure was standing on my bed. I grabbed a pillow and
covered my face and jumped on the bed. It was gone.
That started something that would last the next 26
years.
I'll condense the years up until 1990. Those
appearances, while still frightening, never really
made me feel threatened. During this period, which
included teenage years, I saw the figure with the
same frequency. My bedroom is located at the end of a
hallway with 2 other bedrooms before mine. At the
other end of the hallway is a landing that blocks the
view to the steps. From my bed I could look out my
door and down the hall to the landing and the top of
the steps. I always knew right before the figure
would appear, because the hair on the back of my neck
would stand up and I would get uncontrollable chills.
The figure would then appear either on top of the
landing or come around the base of the landing and
start down the hall toward my room. It never seemed
to pay any attention to the other rooms at all. I
would normally panic and either shut my door or run
into my parents' room and sleep on the floor. Imagine
finding your 18 year old son curled up on your
bedroom floor when you wake up in the morning. My
parents and sister didn't really fully believe that I
was seeing this apparition. I also would stay up
late, being the night person that I am, and watch TV.
In my living room, we have the stairs that lead up to
the 2nd floor. It has a wooden railing on it that
goes the length of the last 4 steps. I would often
see the figure on the steps watching me from the 3rd
or 4th step and then disappear. The only real changes
during this time period were that the figure was
losing its color and becoming more transparent.
Now things will change drastically. A neighbor, with
some knowledge of this sort of activity, told me to
confront the figure and tell it to leave and never
come back. I was to tell it that I was its power
source and I was shutting off the power. I did this
and enjoyed about a year of no sightings. Around this
time, I told the story to my girlfriend of the time.
She thought that its description sounded like a baby
with water on the brain and still wearing its gown
from the hospital. She thought that it was a lost
soul trying to contact me to help it with some task,
so that it could finally rest in peace. I started to
look into the house's history and my family's. The
house sits on land that was farmland and a dirt road
only 150 years ago. The land was owned by one man and
he had his farm and homestead around the area of my
house (the main house of his estate is one block from
my house and is still standing) My house is 40 years
old and we are the 2nd family to live in it. The
couple before us had no children that we know about.
I have a sister 3 years younger than me and no other
siblings. I have asked my parents if they had a child
that died that I was unaware of, but they didn't. So
after all my checking, I found nothing that could
explain the apparition.
After a week of thinking about the interpretation my
girlfriend had given, guilt of banishing the figure
overcame me. I asked it to come back one night and
told it I would help it. The very next night the
sightings started again , but with much greater
intensity. I can say now, NEVER do what I did, once
it's gone, let it stay gone. The sightings would
happen more frequently and sometimes they would
terrify me. The figure looked the same but something
was very different. I was sure what it was, but now
there was another force in addition to the familiar
figure. I began to see small black colored creatures
which I can only describe as imps. They were solid
black, 1-2 feet tall and ran around on all fours.
They appeared mostly in the living room and coming
from the hall closet.
Now to explain the rest of the house set up that
pertains to the story. The man that lived here before
us started to dig out a basement, but he never
completed it. All that remains is a 3-4 foot crawl
space accessible from outside the house. The hall
closet was to be the stairs down to the basement. He
had started making the stairs going down but he
boarded it all up when he stopped digging the
basement. The stairs going up to the 2nd floor are
directly over the would-be basement step and the hall
closet. So there are 2 ways from inside the house to
access the crawl space, if you really wanted to, rip
up the 3rd or 4th step of the stairs or knock out the
back of the closet. I began to make the connection
between where the figures appeared and where the
access ways were.
The sightings got more intense and sometimes they
even drove me from my house. Normally, my dog would
sense the small figure and act funny when it was
around, but now when the imps appeared my dog would
be in a very deep sleep and I could never wake him
up. I would either leave the house and stay over at a
friends. Sometimes I would be knocking on her door at
2 a.m. terrified. Other times, if I was able to get
between them and the steps, I would make a run for it
to my room or my parents' room, because, even these
creatures would not venture in the bedrooms. My
mother was noticing my moods and I had told her about
the new happenings so she told me to get her the next
time I saw the figure or imps. The next time I saw
the figure upstairs coming down the hall, I ran into
her room and woke her up. I led her out into the hall
where the figure still was. I pointed to it and it
began to back away and go down the steps. I chased it
down to the 3rd step where it vanished. While she
could not see it, she could tell by my eye movements
that I was watching something moving across the hall
and steps. I think that's when my family started to
believe a little.
I became used to these new additions because they
never did any harm but they did make me feel very
uneasy. The figure was becoming even more
transparent. Certain lamps in the house would go on
and off by themselves often with other witnesses
around. I would hear the TV go on in the middle of
the night when I knew no one was downstairs. I had
theorized that the figure needed help to appear
because it was slowly fading away. I assumed the imps
were helping him, but the figure was still fading. I
was waiting for a new addition to the cast, so the
figure could still appear, since I still hadn't
figured out what it wanted me to do.
The sightings stopped again for a few months. I spoke
with a parapsychologist , but then decided to leave
well enough alone. I didn't want things getting
worse. I decided to go into the crawl space and check
out the area under the stairs. I took my dog down
there with me and I crawled to the area. There had
not been anyone under there for years before this. I
found an Old Maid playing card with not a bit of dust
on it right under the 3rd step. We have wall to wall
carpeting so this did not fall through the joints. I
hadn't seen that deck of cards for over 20 years, but
here was one. It had one corner that looked like it
had been dipped in acid, but the rest was in good
shape. I took it and put in a pocket bible and put it
in my car.
The sightings started again, only very small. I would
call my girlfriend on the cordless phone and tell her
it's happening again and then walk upstairs while
still on the phone with her. The next time was the
worst of all. The figure appeared very bright, like
it did years ago, but it didn't look very happy. The
imps appeared again but they were more bold this
time. Then a 7 foot tall man- shaped black figure
appeared. It looked like it was either made of smoke
or some liquid. It looked semi-solid and you couldn't
see through it. At the same time, the room was filled
with imps and a bearded old mans face took shape on
the wall and started mumbling. The face was about 6
foot high and 4 foot wide. The familiar figure looked
like it was sorry for doing this to me. I left the
house and sat in my car until dawn.
I knew I had to confront this new entity and try to
drive it away. I also figured that if it wanted me,
it was going to get me either way, so I had nothing
to lose. My sanity, life and maybe my soul were on
the line and I honestly believed this was the only
way to stop it before it branched out. I was the
original power source, so I was going to shut off the
power. The next night I prayed for protection and the
strength to drive this evil away. I had a bible handy
as I sat up as usual listening to my CD's. About 2
a.m., I noticed my dog was in one of those deep, deep
sleeps and I began to look around. The figure and the
Tall black figure appeared along with the rest of the
apparitions. I informed them in the calmest voice I
could get at this time, that I was taking away their
power and they had no hold on me or power over me. I
told them I, my family and house was protected by God
and they could not harm us. I walked right past the
tall figure and the imps moved out of my way. I
walked right up the steps and never looked back.
That was about 2 years ago and I have not seen them
since. We placed a bible on the stairs and a cross in
the closet to block off their entrances. I still feel
there is a presence there that tries to get me to let
in it. I still hear bumping and walking around, but
the apparitions are gone, banished to the crawl space
I assume. They will not get another portal in here so
they will remain there. We did have the house blessed
years ago, every where except the crawl space. I
think that might be the answer to end it all for
good.
Footnotes 1998:
I have learned alot since I first put my story to
paper. I now realize that many of my reactions to
the majority of the encounters were, while natural,
not necessary. The house was haunted by an
earthbound spirit and when I had asked it to leave,
it stopped contacting me, but was still there. It
never harmed me and was only trying to get my
attention. Because I didn't understand what was
happening, I reacted the way everyone else would,
with fear. I did tell it it could come back and the
way I did it caught the attention of other earthbound
spirits in the area and one non human one. The
majority of the experiences after I opened the door
back up were with human spirits, some not as friendly
as the original one who also came back. While there
was one encounter with something I believe was a non
human entity, the majority of the other spirits were
earthbound human spirits. In regards to the black
imps, let me just say that these may have been either
type of spirit, I'm still not sure at this point. I
have researched them further but I am unable to say
with out a doubt that they were evil. I believe
the tall black figure was evil though.
Updated Happenings in the Dave Juliano's House: Jan.
1997
Alot of people ask me what's been happening recently
so here is a brief account.
I moved out of my parents house last January, not
because of the hauntings, but I moved in with my
fiancé. This is the last "event" that occurred about
2 weeks before I left.
I had been doing my normal work on the web pages and
decided to go to bed about 2 am. I walked up the
stairs and down the hall. As I passed my parents
bedroom door I dropped a paper that I was carrying
and I bent over to pick it up. As I was getting back
up, the door knob of my parents room starting turning
and the door opened up about 4 inches. A female
called my name and I said "what?". I was startled at
first because it had surprised me, then I said
"what?" again and opened the door myself. Both my
parents were sounds asleep and my mother who was
laying closes to the door, was facing away from the
door. This was not the first time I had heard a
woman's voice talking to me, but this time it was
very close, like she was talking right next to me. I
got a little spooked by this simply because the
hauntings had been relatively quiet for almost a
year, with the exception of the "knocking" I had
heard in the attic on and off. I went back downstairs
to get my dog and bring him upstairs with me. He
noticed nothing and we went to bed. As I lay there I
started to notice some collectibles I had hanging
from the ceiling on fishing line began to move. The
windows were closed and no air movement in the room
enough to move these items at all. As I watched, and
my dog noticed this too, the items began to swing
wildly around the room. I was still shaken up a bit
by what happened earlier with the voice. I began to
go through my ritual of banning the spirits from
being there and sending them away. After about 10
minutes of this, it all stopped. I got the
impression that the spirits knew I was leaving
shortly and wanted to give me one last parting shot.
I hadn't been through an episode this active and
confrontational in a while , so me and the dog paid a
late night visit to my fiance and spent the rest of
the night there to insure uninterrupted sleep.
I am an eclectic person with a decidedly different take on just about everything. I am apt to discuss everything from today's politics to astrophysics to ghosts in the machine (yours, mine, ours). My posts are sometimes personal stuff, sometimes special interests, reviews of books I've read or films I've seen or places I've been, sometimes they are biting editorial opinion. Sometimes poetry. Sometimes select reprints. Subject matter? Read and find out. That, even I can't predict.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
UPDATE ON DISCARNATES
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