By Gerri Graves
I usually write something a little spooky for this time of year, but I decided to offer something a little different this year. Something….. unexplainable? Something a little…..woo woo (wiggles her abracadabra fingers). I’m sure every single one of us has been involved in a situation they just can’t explain…..or witnessed an event that defies logic. Rationally minded folk will most likely chalk it up to a coincidence or perhaps …..a vision malfunction?
I fall mostly into that group, but I have to admit, there are events in my life that are completely…….well, they just don’t make sense.
Nothing as shocking as little green men wearing lingerie having a cuppa at my dining room table. (Does an ex-mother-in-law count?) But I do have some weird happenings that I’ve never been able to put my finger on. I make no claims, only tell the tales as witnessed. I’ll leave it up to you to decide what to make of it.
This first one took place about 16 years ago. I was married and living on a farm planted firmly within 2,300 acres of crop fields. It was rather lonely and quiet during the winter, hella depressing.
To escape the winter blues, I read a lot and painted……on everything. This particular day, I was restoring an antique table…..with 1920s/30s Halloween images that I painted by hand. A friend of mine living in Tennessee begged me to do one for her, and I’d finally gotten around to tackling the project.
The day was cold, especially in that old, drafty farmhouse. It had been snowing most of the day, and even with the curtains pulled wide open, the light was rather dim. Dim enough to require a light source over my work area, mid-day. I had Loreena McKennitt playing in the background, and the air was scented with homegrown rosemary & garlic atop a lamb roast I had been cooking ever so slowly in the oven. We had guests over the following night, and I was preparing a shepherd’s pie, the English way, with lamb and vegetables enveloped within a wine-laden sauce. Definitely one of my favorite winter comfort foods. I enjoyed these moments I got to myself. It allowed me some creative time without interruption. Midway through the project, I allowed myself a break. Arming myself against the near white out conditions, I grabbed my winter jacket and umbrella and made my way to the back porch. These were the days when I still smoked, but never in the house. I had never tolerated the smell very well and didn’t want my kids inhaling my bad habit, so……into the cold I went. I seated myself next to a large carved pumpkin that I hadn’t gotten around to disposing of, on the third step from the top. Gazing out into the white, I noticed a black speck galloping through the winter wheat field. The snow was rather deep, so I was a bit surprised I saw anything at all. It must be relatively large to be seen this far away.
Curious now, I followed it intently. Trying, in vain, to make out what it could be. Too fast for a loose cow or a person. Too dark for a wayward pig. Shorter than a horse, I thought. The closer it got, the more I was convinced it must be a wolf, a large one at that. It was now maybe an acre away from where I sat. It quickly approached the fenced perimeter surrounding the property…….that also divided the wheat field from the soybean field.
It was getting close enough to where my senses were now in a state of heightened alert. A wolf, alone, in this weather must be on the hunt for food……if it was indeed a wolf. Still couldn’t tell. I rattled off an internal list of all the animals we had on the farm. Eyed that all doors were shut, including the hen house. The dog and cats were inside, I knew. Just me feeling a bit like lunch. As I got up to go back into the house, I looked back just in time to see this thing stand! Stand!! On two feet! It jumped the fence effortlessly and continued through the soybean field until the barn obscured it from my view.
Stunned, I stood there. Transfixed…..and not just a little scared. Something bordering on terrified.
I waited for it to come into view on the other side of the barn…..but it never did. I stood there for 15- 20 minutes, waiting. I finally coaxed myself into venturing out to investigate. Up the driveway, past the shop where the tractors were kept…..and onto the other side of the barn, which I was unable to view from where I was sitting. I crept as silently as I could. Knowing there was no way I could outrun it in this deep snow. Hugging the wall of the barn, I peeked my head around the corner. Quickly at first, so as not to be spotted…..and then went all in.
There was nothing there. Not a damn thing. I walked the whole perimeter of the barn, twice…..and nothing.
Even more confused, I walked over to where I approximated he leapt over the fence, hoping the barbed wire had snagged some of his fur, but I never found anything. Even in the subsequent days that followed, I never found anything. Not even the thing that gave me full-body chills. The fence came to bust level…..and I’m 5′.8″ and some change. There was just no way someone could jump that height, in this deep of snow.
I had asked my husband if he had ever seen anything like that, as he had grown up on this farm. He shook his head no and carried on eating his dinner.
I’ve never been able to explain what happened that day, nor has the event ever repeated itself in the years that followed.
Second story I have for you is just as astonishing……but rather beautiful. This took place about 20 years ago in Middleton, Idaho.
Bean was two years old and some change, and put the word menace in the dictionary. Luckily, our property was gated. Which we needed for our little terror. Morgause had been gone for maybe three years then, but her death was still tearing me apart. I used many of my hobbies to keep me from lingering in the sorrow and employed my little man to help me plant some pumpkins in the back half-acre. He was so into it, which was surprising. Not sure he quite understood what it was that we were doing, but he was all in. Every day, we’d walk out to the back half-acre and water our pumpkins. His little arms struggled to carry the watering can, but he insisted on being the one to heft it.
He was beside himself with glee when one little pumpkin poked its head through the soil. Jumping and clapping. Screaming, “Wow!”. Couldn’t wait until the rest of the mounds showed a little green, too! When our little plants started to produce real pumpkins, he just had to love on them. Some, to death…..but no blame here. It was absolutely joyful to watch him run through the vines searching for another one.
When the few were big enough, we spread straw and cut plywood to place each pumpkin baby on. He kissed each one and gave the toddler words of growth encouragement.
Every morning, from then on….was ‘kiss all the pumpkins’ time. Before breakfast and sometimes before I got up. I’d hear the back door open and the giggles as he ran out for pumpkin love. Spent a few mornings plucking pumpkin splinters out of his lips, which bothered him not at all. He got up to do it all over again the next day.
It was on such a morning that I heard the routine backdoor lock being turned over…..and him squealing as he ran out to the pumpkin patch. I got up and quickly grabbed some clothes. The sorrow was particularly bad that week, and I felt like doing nothing but cry. I’d been struggling with her being alone out there somewhere. She must be so scared. It was the laughter from my son that brought me out of my thoughts, and I followed him out to the back half-acre to see what was going on.
As I rounded the corner of the hedge that blocked the view of the pumpkin patch, I was stunned into silence. There, amongst thousands of white butterflies, was my son laughing and dancing amongst them. I fell to my knees and began to weep. See, the symbol of Morgause’s disease was a butterfly……and in every photo we’d ever had of her, she was in white. Antiqued white, little, cotton dresses with hand-tatted lace trims. She couldn’t wear any poly blends, had to be all cotton…..and I had begun to dress her in these little antique white dresses that I found here and there. We buried her in one too.
I recognized this scene for what it was. She was telling me she was okay.
Maybe a month later, I went to a friend’s house for dinner. It was quite the event, and about 20 ladies were in attendance. As we sat around the table chatting, one of the ladies said to me, “I’ve been wondering how to approach this with you……so I guess I’ll just say it. There’s a little girl, all in white …..just above your left shoulder. She’s been with you all night. She’s been trying to tell you that she’s alright…..she wants me to tell you that she’s alright.”
I didn’t know this lady. No mention of my daughter was ever uttered that night. I left crying and went home…..and I never saw her again. I don’t even know her name. I don’t know what to make of this except that it’s completely unexplainable. Just another question mark that I’ll never have an answer for……or maybe it’s what I needed to hear, at that moment in time.
A bit of a woo-woo story…..but we all have at least one of them in our lives. It feels appropriate to share as we approach the day for honoring our dead.
Wishing you all a safe and happy All Hallows and Dia De los Muertos. Stay Spooky!