I have a question...
So what do you do, if you experience something, and being a common sense logical kind of guy, you run through every possible normal/natural scenario you can think of, without even considering any *woo* stuff, but you cannot figure out the solution ?
I'll give you an example. I've only experienced a few instances in my 40 years of things which I guess could be described as paranormal/supernatural.
When I was going to college, my on campus housing happened to be in an old victorian house on the edge of campus. This is in Albany NY by the way.
So this guy Brian and I shared a room on the 2nd floor. I had known him since we were freshmen, and we'd become friends. It was a nice sized room that was more than adequate for two guy's to share, and have your own space.
We'd been living there for a few day's or possibly a week, when we had an odd occurrence.
One night, we'd been up studying, maybe BS-ing a little, and we called it a night. I'm guesstimating, but it was probably around midnight, or 1AM, possibly a smidge later. Out of nowhere, I suddenly hear footsteps walking across the floor above our room. Now typically that wouldnt be an issue.
As part of familiarizing ourselves with the house, our RA had taken us on a little tour and discussed saftey rules etc etc. One of the things he'd mentioned, was that the 3rd floor was off limits, as the rooms on the 3rd floor had not been renovated for use as dorm rooms. At the base of the stairs leading up to the 3rd floor, was a steel fire rated door. Not only was there a keyed lockset on the door, but they had installed one of those metal hasp things, and put a nice fat masterlock padlock on it.
So, the first time i heard the footsteps, i called over to him softly, asked if he was awake, did he just hear that etc. He answers in the affirmative, and we dont make much out of it.
Few days go by, and it happens again. Only this time we're still up, lights on and we both kind of look at each other like *Whiskey Tango Foxtrot*, but again we're not really too concerned about it. One of us jokes about it being a ghost, make some "woo woo" noises, share a laugh, then go back about our business.
To make an already long story shorter, over the course of two school years that i lived in that house, every so often at night you'd just hear what were clearly footsteps from the floor above. Kind of creepy because they were distinct enough, that you could hear the travel from one side of a room, and then sometimes back the other way- almost like someone pacing.
Three other young men who had rooms on the 2nd floor had experienced the same thing numerous times. At one point we got the RA involved because we were convinced there was a hobo or someone living on the 3rd floor.
Now its noteable, that 1) as mentioned, the only entrance to the 3rd floor was regularly locked off, and inaccessible, 2) there was no exterior fire escape or ladder going to the third floor. For fire egress purposes they had installed those crappy chain ladder in a box thing underneath the window sills. So there was no conceivable way for a person to get up there.
After we had bugged him about it for a while, he finally relented, after giving us the same kind of look you're probably giving me right now. He unlocked the door, and several of us went up to the third floor, at least a tiny bit wondering if we'd actually find someone up there. Of course there wasnt. What we found were similar rooms to those on the 2nd floor, but with the exception that they had not been cleaned up and repainted like the rooms downstairs. There was a centrail hallway that ran from the front of the house to the back, and the rooms were off of that. The room I stayed in downstairs, was under the front room/3rd floor, and the floor was not carpeted like the hallway.
The 3rd floor was finished off, no exposed framing or anything, and there were no signs of any good sized critters running around, no open windows or holes in the walls etc.
Look, if you've ever lived in an old wood framed house, you know what it sounds like when someones walking around upstairs, especially when you can hear floorboards making little creaky noises and "talking" as they bear weight.
I dont know how many times it happened, and I'd jump up and go out into the hall to look at that door, and make sure the lock was still on it, and that no one had gone upstairs.
It really got to me for a while, because I'd always been, and still am, skeptical when it comes to ghost stories, and paranormal stuff in general.
At some point, it just became commonplace. If I heard it, I just ignored it and went to sleep, or continued my work, or whatever I happened to be doing... There were a couple of times that it was heard during the day, but mostly/normally later at night. It's possible that's because at that point the TV/radio would have been shut off, and things were more quiet.
So, who knows... It's just something weird that happened 20 years ago at this point, and I've never been able to figure out the origin of those footsteps.
I'm not in the least embarassed to admit this, and all I've ever been able to do with this is just file it away in the "Unsolved Mysteries" folder in the old brain bucket.
It can be frustrating not being able to get to the bottom of something like that. I know its been something i've thought of and considered from time to time over the last 20 years, and it still baffles me.
-TheShadow-
