August 27, 2005
Ghosts 101 – Part 2
To continue from last week, I wanted to take a closer look at the second type of ghost and those who interact with them.
The second type of spirit I referred to last week actually seeks interaction with living beings. These beings were unprepared for death. They may have died violently, or too young, or with unfinished business to take care of. This does not mean that everyone who passes unexpectedly will stick around to fix things later. There is a time frame at death where the spirit can pass easily to the next level but if a spirit chooses not to leave at that time, they can get caught here. Then, in order to move on at a later time, they need a jolt of energy to give them the momentum to make the passage. And during that time period they will seek out living beings with which they can communicate.
There are certain types of psychics who have an ability to easily communicate with spirits. Like the boy in The Sixth Sense or Whoopi Goldberg in Ghost, these people are like bonfires of light to the spirit world. Spirits see them glowing in the darkness and rush over to be heard. This can be extremely unsettling to the psychic on the receiving end, especially if they are unaware of their ability or have not had an opportunity to explore and use their gift. So here are a few tips for those who are chosen by ghosts. Remember that as living creatures who have our body and soul together, we can choose to interact or not.
1. Ask if they come from light. If so, then proceed. If not, then send them away. This will eliminate negative energies, or those who would choose to do mischief.
2. Ask them what they want. It seems simple and may not work with some spirits, but if they have something that needs to be said or done, this will give them an opportunity for closure.
I have a friend who went with her sister to visit their great aunt. At one point my friend was upstairs getting ready for bed while her sister used the bathroom in the basement. After quite a while, the sister returned upstairs and my friend asked her what took so long. She said she was having a conversation with their uncle who asked her to pass on some information to their aunt. The uncle had passed away many months earlier. My friend’s sister is a natural conduit to those on the other side.
3. If at any point you become uncomfortable with the interaction, you can tell the spirit to leave. If they come back again later you just tell them to leave again. It is your decision to interact with spirits or not. Spirits can be persistent, but the choice is yours and you can say no.
Most ghostly energy is usually an imprint from an earlier time and place, repeating the same dance over and over again. For those spirits who need help crossing over, we are literally a lifeline to the next level of existence.
Posted by Linda Dalton at 12:31 PM | Comments (2)
August 18, 2005
Ghosts 101
There seem to be two basic types of ghosts out there. The first one is more like an energy impression than a true trapped soul, while the second type is an actual spirit looking to find peace.
A good example of the first type is the monks at Westminster Abbey. When these monks were alive, the floor of the Abbey was about a foot lower than it is currently. So when they are seen today, the monks appear to be wading through the floor at about mid-calf level. These ghosts are walking on the floor, as it existed hundreds of years ago. These types of apparitions typically do not have any awareness of us and do not interact with the living in any way. In cases like this, the space between our world and the spirit world is thin and we are actually catching a glimpse of what was. It would be like looking at a painting of the place from that time period, except the images in the painting would be moving. The images are caught in a time loop where they appear at the same spot and follow the same routine over and over again.
The second type of ghost is more involved with our world. These spirits died unprepared to go to the next level and are looking for assistance from us. In a previous blog I wrote about Eddie, the ghost in my house when I was growing up. He is a fair example of this type of spirit. His energy was trapped in the house, waiting for attention and assistance until I came on the scene. In this case, recognizing him and interacting with him allowed Eddie to gather the energy he needed to make the transition to the next world. When a spirit dies and is unwilling to leave, that initial energy dissipates leaving them unable to cross over at a later time. Sometimes that’s all they need, an energy boost to send them on the way, and that is the basis for what ghost workers do. They give the spirit enough energy (just the same way energy is used to heal) to allow them to move on into the light
Posted by Linda Dalton at 08:00 PM | Comments (1)
July 08, 2005
Don't Go into the Room!
Have you ever watched a scary movie where the stupid girl walks blindly into the room with the nasty evil ghost? I don’t know about you, but I yell at the screen and cover my head under the pillows with the best of them. In reality I have been the stupid girl who walks into the room with the ghost. But in my case, it has never been blindly.
When I am in a house with some kind of psychic/ghostly activity it’s as if I have “spooky radar” in my head. I sense the spirits as I walk into the situation. So although I can’t “see” them with my eyes, I can certainly “see” them with my third eye. To me it looks like energy that has dissipated over the whole area of the house slowly reconnects and focuses to form the body of the spirit. And I’m watching the entire process.
Therefore, even if I am idiot enough to enter a haunted house, I’m rarely, if ever, surprised.
Posted by Linda Dalton at 07:59 PM | Comments (0)
June 09, 2005
Ghosts of the Underground Railroad
The town where I grew up, Manchester, Connecticut, was settled at the end of the seventeenth century. By the mid 1800's the Cheney family had established a silk milling industry in the town that still defines Manchester to this day. Of their many properties, several are still standing and are lovingly cared for by the Manchester Historical Society.
When I was in high school I had a friend, Leslie, who lived in an old Cheney carriage house that had been converted into a family home. One afternoon Leslie asked if Vanessa and I could come out to look at her home as she had noticed some odd noises coming from her cellar.
When we got to the house she took us into the cellar where we walked until we came to a small, almost hidden room off to one side that had been rumored to have been used as an underground railroad stop during the Civil War. That was where the noises were coming from. They weren't loud or even distinguishable, almost as if the air pressure was so heavy that it made you think you were hearing things. Vanessa and I entered the cramped space and were nearly overwhelmed by a sense of abject fear, mixed in with anger and suffering. As we began to work with the energy there, a small orb of dark smoke appeared over our heads. The more we did, the bigger the ball got, and the thicker the air pressure until we couldn't take it anymore and had to leave the room.
We went upstairs and outside into the garden to get some fresh air. The ball followed us all of the way out of the house. And then the energy just dissipated into the beautiful evening sky. From then on Leslie never heard anything from the cellar again.
After experiencing those powerful emotions encased in that room, still present a century after the event, I cannot begin to imagine what the people themselves must have endured in their struggle toward freedom. God bless them and their families.
Posted by Linda Dalton at 11:21 PM | Comments (1)
May 26, 2005
Whaley House
A few years ago my husband and I visited the Whaley House in San Diego, California. The house was built by Thomas Whaley in 1857 and was later the site of the San Diego County Courthouse. And it is one of the most haunted buildings in America!
There are three main ghosts that haunt the house. The first one is thought to be Mr. Whaley himself. He is sometimes seen wearing a frock coat on the stairway landing. Visitors have commented that they feel a pressure while on the stairs as well. The second one is that of Mrs. Whaley. She appears on the settee in one of the bedrooms or on the couch in the living room. Sometimes you can smell her lavender perfume as you walk through the house. The third ghost is that of a little girl who was killed in an accident in the back yard. It is said that she usually appears only to children.
Visitors over the years have taken pictures of the rooms in the house only to have blurred images and lights appear when the photographs are developed. Many of these guests have sent copies of their photos to the house and they are on display in the old courtroom. We took a few pictures ourselves while we were there and had similar results. (See below...)
We had toured the house, taken our pictures, and, except for the feeling that spirits were there, had had no ghostly encounters. It was just before the building closed for the day that my husband and I were standing alone in the courtroom. A low barrier divides the courtroom, separating the judge's area from the spectator's area just like in a courtroom today and visitors to the house are not allowed into the judge's area. Just beyond the barrier is a large wooden table covered with those visitor's photographs that I mentioned earlier. The pictures are covered by a thick, heavy piece of glass. I was standing in front of the barrier looking at the pictures when I turned to point them out to my husband. And when I turned back the whole piece of glass had shifted, messing up all of the pictures beneath it. So much for not having any ghostly encounters!
A few months later some friends of ours also visited the Whaley House. They didn’t know that the house was supposed to be haunted, but Jenny told us later that she kept smelling lavender wherever she went in the house!
Posted by Linda Dalton at 06:21 PM | Comments (3)
April 27, 2005
Haunted Pomfret – Acceptance and Protection
Vanessa and I visited Pomfret often over the next few years – from about 1968 to 1972. While the area seemed to push us away at first, it soon came to accept us and even protect us when we were there. Instead of pushing through molasses at the entrance to the path, we started to feel an openness and even friendliness as we approached the settlement. As if they recognized us as kindred spirits.
Once, as we sat by the well at the settlement house, we heard the sound of running footsteps coming down the path from deeper in the woods. We would have gotten up to investigate but something held us in our places. As the sounds got closer we could see the path where these footfalls should have shown us people in flight. Instead we felt the earth shake and saw only puffs of dust and dirt rise up from the ground as the sound of fleeing footsteps passed us by.
Then one afternoon early in October we went to visit the cemetery and bring flowers to Abigail’s grave. I remember this incident as if from a dream. As soon as we entered the woods we both started floating, the metaphysical atmosphere of the place filled our senses until we were more a part of the spiritual plane than the physical one. This happened often to one or the other of us when we entered Pomfret, but never did it happen to both of us at the same time. Usually one of us stayed grounded to keep the other safe.
We never said a word to each other as we floated down the path picking late flowers for the cemetery. We were about half way to the gravesite when we came across two men in beige uniforms. This in itself was unusual, as we had never seen anyone else in these woods before. As Vanessa and I floated past them, one of them asked us what we were doing. I couldn’t speak, so Vanessa said, “Gathering flowers.” Then he asked where we were going. Vanessa pointed to the right and said, “To the cemetery.” Which was actually off to the left. The other man said, “Beware of fire.” Vanessa said, “Of course.” And we floated away to the cemetery. We didn’t stay long; in fact we felt an urgent need to leave the woods as fast as possible. If we floated up the path, we flew back down again. Although it had only been a few minutes since we had seen the two men, there was no one to be found on our trip back through the woods to the car. And there was no other car or any indication that anyone else was in the area when we got back to the road.
On our way home, Vanessa and I started to compare notes. Where had these men come from if there was no other car parked on the road? Where had they been in the woods and where did they go? It was then that we realized that we had been in a potentially dangerous situation, two young girls alone in the woods being stopped and questioned by those two men. And there was something very strange about those men. They were in uniforms but the badges on their hats didn’t match the badges on their shirts. There was something about the way that they spoke that was strange and disjointed; even the words they used were cryptic. It was as if they didn’t really belong in the woods, outsiders being affected by the spirits there. To this day I believe that those same spirits took over and kept us from great harm that afternoon.
Posted by Linda Dalton at 06:34 PM | Comments (0)
April 21, 2005
Haunted Pomfret - Abigail
Shortly after we found the settlement at Pomfret I began having visions. I kept seeing a young woman named Abigail running through the woods. There was a fire somewhere in the area and she was trying to get to the well by the first settlement house. With each vision, her fear became stronger and stronger. I could feel her running down the path, through the woods, trying to escape. I never got the feeling that fire killed her, only that fire was a very dangerous entity at Pomfret.
Over the next few weeks we began exploring the area beyond the settlement house. The trail ran deeper into the woods, away from the road and civilization. At one point the trail split. We took the right fork and eventually found the bridge where the man from the newspaper article photographed the ghost children. The area around the bridge is eerily quiet, yet peaceful. There is nothing around to remind you that you are only a few miles away from a gas station or an antique store. There the air was still and the feeling serene. As we listened to the murmuring brook we could almost imagine the light sounds of children laughing. And still the visions of Abigail kept getting stronger, to where she was in my mind almost all of the time.
One afternoon we decided to try the other fork off the path. Instead of going straight back into the woods, that path lead off to the left, away from the settlement houses. As we began down the trail Vanessa and I began to rise into the ethereal plane, to the point where we would have sworn that we floated instead of walked. Suddenly I felt Abigail very close by. I caught a scent of warm flowers that lead us up over a rise in the path to a small area enclosed by a low fieldstone wall. At one end there was a small opening in the wall where we could enter. There before us was a graveyard with perhaps a dozen or so old, crumbling gravestones, all from the previous centuries. I floated through the cemetery until I came to a grave that was in a bit better condition than some of the others. On it was the name Abigail Higginbotham, dead at the age of 19.
Posted by Linda Dalton at 07:34 PM | Comments (1)
April 14, 2005
Haunted Pomfret - Part 2
We spent a summer searching the back roads around Pomfret until we finally found the right obscure path, off the right backcountry road, just past the right brook in the woods that led us to the abandoned settlement mentioned in the newspaper article. We were happy to have found the place, but Pomfret was not happy to see us. Once we left the road and began walking into the woods, Pomfret began its subtle attack. At first it just felt like we were walking through molasses to advance down the path. After we passed deeper into the woods the thick air let up but the woods became very quiet and still, almost as if they were listening to us. Then the attack became more pronounced. We found ourselves tripping over roots and rocks that disappeared when we went back to look for them. Branches dropped out of nowhere to slap our faces and scratch our arms. We continued into the woods and the attacks seemed to stop.
After walking for about a mile we came across a small standing stone with a hole carved into the top. It rested in front of the opening to a man-made stone enclosure that appeared to have been built for livestock. Moving further along the path we found the remains of what was once a settlement home, but all that was left was a large square hole in the ground. Within the hole was a smaller square stone area built up to what would have been floor level. This would have held the fireplace within the house. To the side of the house there was a large flat rock covering an open pit that looked like an old well.
This was as far as we got on our first visit. It was getting dark and we didn’t want to get lost in those woods after the sun went down. We turned around and started back down the path. As difficult as it was for us to enter the woods, it was much easier to leave. Instead of hindering our progress, the energy in the woods seemed to push us faster and faster down the path, and out of the woods. Without meaning to we found ourselves running through the woods to the road. Once we passed through the “molasses barrier” near the road we turned around to look back at the path. The area by the path seemed to shimmer, as if it was trying to hide its entrance. If we hadn’t known the path was there we might not ever have noticed it. We might not ever have found it again.
After that trip, the visions started…
Posted by Linda Dalton at 09:15 AM | Comments (2)
April 09, 2005
Haunted Pomfret
Pomfret is a beautiful little town in northeastern Connecticut about 45 minutes drive from where I grew up. When I was 14, my friend Diane (who was 16 and could drive!) found an old newspaper article dated back to the late 1950’s. The article was about a man who had been taking photographs of an old footbridge by some abandoned homesteads in the woods surrounding Pomfret. Later, when he developed the film he found images of children on the prints – children who had not been there when he took the pictures! So Diane, Vanessa and I decided to try to find these woods and do some ghost hunting. The newspaper article only gave vague directions to the area – follow this country lane, cross three creeks, look for a small path leading into the woods. It took us an entire summer, scouring the woods outside of Pomfret to find the right area.
One evening, a day before we were planning a Pomfret excursion, I got a vision. I saw the four of us (Diane’s boyfriend often came with us) going to Pomfret, but we were in a different, larger car with another couple that I didn’t know. When we got to Pomfret and chose a search area, the new guy said that we should split up to cover more ground. He wanted to put Vanessa in one group and me in the other group, as we were the psychics. It was nearly dark and we didn’t have any flashlights, but we went ahead and split up anyway. At this point in my vision I saw Vanessa walking by some brush when a large root shot out, grabbed her leg and broke her ankle.
Then my mother called me for dinner and the vision stopped.
The next morning I told Vanessa about the vision and then promptly forgot about it.
That evening Diane and her boyfriend showed up to take us out for our Pomfret search. They arrived in a different, larger car and they brought two other friends with them. No sooner were we in the car and on our way to Pomfret than Vanessa poked me in the side and reminded me of my vision. Vanessa and I were always able to communicate without talking, so we made a silent agreement not to say anything to anyone until we saw what would happen. We found an area to search that we hadn’t been to before, but looked like the area from my vision. It was getting dark by then and we didn’t have any flashlights with us. Then the new guy said, ”Let’s split up and put Vanessa in one group and Linda in the other.” At that point both Vanessa and I spoke up and told them about my vision. Whether the foliage was going to attack Vanessa or she was just going to fall and hurt her leg, we all decided that we had been warned not to attempt the search that night – and certainly not to split up the group.
What was even stranger about that night was that the new guy turned out to be a wood lore fanatic. He knew that you didn’t explore unknown woods at night without proper light and you would certainly never split up a group under those circumstances. He didn’t know why he, of all people, made the suggestion to separate Vanessa and I. He said it was as if something else entered his head and spoke those words.
This was just the beginning of our Pomfret experiences!
Posted by Linda Dalton at 11:29 AM | Comments (17)
February 28, 2005
The Ghost in My Bedroom
I grew up in a small town in Connecticut and when I was 12 we moved into a Cape Cod style house that my parents had bought. Unlike most of the houses in our town, this type of house didn't have an attic. Instead it had a small crawl space that was used for storage running behind the two upstairs bedrooms. My room was on the right at the top of the stairs and the head of my bed rested against the crawl space wall.
Shortly after moving into the house, I began to hear knocking coming from the crawl space behind my bed. At first I thought it was just the noise of the house settling, or maybe trees brushing against the side of the house. But then the knocking began to make a pattern. I would start at one side of the crawl space, knock by the head of my bed and continue on the other side. Soon I started to get the sensation that there was someone there and every once in a while I would feel something touch my arm. There were also a few times when things would fly off my desk and roll around on the floor.
A few nights later my friend, Vanessa, came over to spend the night. We got out my Ouija board to see if we could learn anything about the house. We put our hands on the pointer and immediately it flew across the board to the letters. E, D, D, I, E, it kept repeating those letters faster and faster until the pointer flew off the board completely. After several attempts we determined that this Eddie had died young in my room many years earlier.
I finally asked my parents about the family who lived in the house before us. As it turned out, they had a son named Arthur Edward who they called Eddie. He died of Leukemia in my bedroom when he was 19 years old.
Most of the time Eddie let us know he was around by making loud noises. One day I had come home from school and no one else was home. I was sitting in the living room when I heard a huge bang from the kitchen. I thought my sister had come home and had slammed the kitchen door, but when I went into the kitchen, nothing was out of place and no one else was home.
My room was my sanctuary where I practiced my art. I didn’t share the space with anyone. One night I went to spend the night at Vanessa’s house and I told my sisters not to use my room while I was gone. But they didn’t listen to me. One of my sisters decided to sleep in my room that night. Apparently no sooner had she gotten into bed when all of a sudden the windows flew open and the blinds started banging against the window frames. The bed started to shake and the blankets were torn off the bed onto the floor. She ran out of the room and stayed out. I guess Eddie didn’t want to share my room with my sister either!
Posted by Linda Dalton at 07:46 PM | Comments (5)