July 30, 2007

Trapped Spirit in Our House

Rate this encounter:[an error occurred while processing this directive] Lana Hunt, Kokomo, Indiana, Summer 1983

I grew up in a family of 7 people: 5 brothers and sisters, mother and father. I lived in a house that had been on our street since the 1920s. A few of the elderly neighbors, who had lived in the neighborhood for over 30 years, claimed that there had been a murder in the house many years ago involving a woman and her young daughter. The things that happened in the house affected all of my family members to a point that we just ignored it... that is until time had passed and we were far enough of a distance from it to talk about it freely.

When I was 16, I remember a good deal of strange and peculiar instances that could not be explained. One night, as I could not sleep, I tried to sleep on the floor. My sister slept on the top bunk bed. As I lay sleeping on the floor I remember just as I went to sleep a surging wave rolled beneath me as if the floor were moving. It scared me so much that I woke up quickly and jumped onto the top bunk bed with my sister. I was never able to explain it. I had difficulty sleeping as a teenager after that experience.

There were many nights, while I lay dozing off when someone would knock on the door. I had everyone's door knock memorized. It sounded like my father's knock, but there was no shadow cast under the door where the hall light was. It didn't appear that anyone was outside my door. When I opened the door, I never saw anyone.

Those were my experiences. My entire family had shared that they had heard the voice of a little girl coming from the attic. Also, my father and younger brother had claimed to have seen an image of what looked like a green colored cherubim. Both my father and brother are serious people who do not embellish life with stories. It took a few years for them to confess they had seen this apparition.

As I grew up and got married only my parents were left alone in the house to experience the accelerated activity. In the late 1980s and early 90s they had problems with lights flickering on and off. The room in the original part of the house in the back did not have a raised foundation with the newer part of the house. That room was the coldest room in the house. On nights when it should not have been cold, there would be frost on the walls. This room was where all of my brothers and sisters had seen either an apparition or shared experiences.

My mother saw a very heavy and large picture fall off the wall directly over her head. She could feel a force of pressure around her head as the glass to the picture broke into pieces around her. Yet, somehow her head was untouched. She had later explained that it must have been some kind of guardian angel.

A photo was captured of my brother standing outside. In the picture red eyes can be seen in the living room as the front door was standing open. To this day I have refused to look at the photo when my family pass it around to show people.

Sadly, after my family moved out... the house met with a terrible tragedy. One night a man who lived in the neighborhood tossed a candle through the back bedroom window to send the house into a blaze of flames. It was the original part of the house that had caught fire and spread to the rest of the house to completely destroy it. When the police picked the arsonist up they discovered that he had burned over 50 structures in Kokomo. My house was the last before he was arrested. He told authorities that he had heard a voice come from the back portion of the house telling him to burn it down. As the man was an arsonist, I would imagine he thought the same with every structure he burned. But somehow it does not surprise me that he would make such a claim about the disquieted home I grew up in.

If there was a spirit there it was disquieted and trapped. The place where my house stood now looks like a little green glade or park right in the middle of the neighborhood. The trees canopy the entire front yard and serve to remind me that there were great memories in the home.

My father recently passed away at the young age of 58. My mother, brother, and sisters still return to the place my father raised us... and recount good memories. Those are the ones that I want to remember concerning him.

But the house was a place I am glad no longer stands as a trap to whatever spirit haunted it. I hope it has been released.