January 12, 2009

Bide One's Time

Missouri Hauntings
By Lee Prosser

How the book, Missouri Hauntings, came to be is an interesting story! It is essentially a journal of a sensitive's search for and contact with the paranormal, ghosts, hauntings, and the supernatural. A sensitive is an individual who has contact with such paranormal things. Missouri Hauntings is my journal, and I am the sensitive. It is also the journey of a sensitive who seeks out, questions, examines, and reflects on the paranormal.

The first time I saw a ghost was when I was six-years-old. My Uncle Willard explained to me at the time that this was normal because he could also see ghosts. Over the years this would give us both something special to discuss together since we shared the same paranormal gift of being sensitives.

would also say that my book is a summing up of respect for my late uncle, Willard David Firestone, and his input and guidance to my occult education while I was growing up. Over the years, we always had our paranormal secrets and haunting incidents which we shared together. Uncle Willard was a smart, quiet man, and given to being a true listener. He could figure out a person after listening to them talk for a few minutes. A kind man, he never put down anybody because he believed each person had a karma role to play and that person was expressing his or her life in the way the person choose to do so. Personal choices influenced and defined outcomes in the long run, and personal choices could be amended if that person wished to do so, and had the courage to do so. Uncle Willard was not afraid to go against all odds and take them on, whatever the situation. If he saw a wrong, he did try to right it. He seemed to have a keen insight for knowing precisely when to enter any given situation, or to walk away from it; but then, I always felt that through his personal occult practices he had the ability to walk in both worlds. He could, and oftentimes did, share the outcome of a situation while it was still unfolding. Uncle Willard had an ironic sense of humor and was one of the finest jazz stride pianists I ever heard. His only secret was being a sensitive and only a few trusted people including myself knew his secret.

I hope I was successfully able to share some insightful remembrances of Uncle Willard in Missouri Hauntings through pieces of memoir that came naturally to the writing at hand involving him and our relationship as teacher to pupil. I can think of no better mentor to have had growing up in the conservative atmosphere of the 1950s than he was to me. He taught me there was much to learn, and more to learn, outside of the state of Missouri. I found it true, and thank him for his insights!

The world is open for paranormal exploration. All you have to do is go looking for it, and soon, it will find you and come to greet you in ways you may find surprising! I have found strange happenings in California, Wyoming, Oregon, New Mexico, Washington, Canada, Old Mexico, Idaho, the eastern United States, among numerous other locales.

Everything in Missouri Hauntings is the result of my journey of inquiry. There will be more to come in the future!

The book came in a quiet, reflective way. Each investigation, occurrence, happening, or sharing of a particular story was there it seemed, simply waiting to be shared with readers in a natural, straight-forward approach! The actual walking and examining of many physical locations was the ordeal of the book, and this was because I was never sure what the location might be or offer up on any given day, and in some cases, evening. Like most people, I do see better in the day than in the night. I like to be able to see the details of a thing, so to speak, no matter how small, because it gives a fuller definition to what is being seen!

I recall humorous incidents in my journey for collecting material that would become Missouri Hauntings. There was an old abandoned barn with a sunken water well I was examining, and darkness was coming on. I stepped on what I thought was a board but instead was a board attached to another board with the end result the board came up and rear-ended me solidly in the arse! I think I jumped three feet from the shock and surprise! Another time I was examining some shadow figures and miscalculated the limb of a tree and it knocked my hat off, which resulted in my chasing down my hat across a cemetery on a wet, windy day. Yet another time, I was back for my third visit to Fassnight Park, and a voice came from behind me, saying, "Where?" I turned around and there was nothing there but the wind and a mist. I recall vividly how I nearly rolled off of a ruined embankment when I was with my wife, Debra investigating the old ghost bridge at Fair Grove, Missouri, and the photos of the bridge in the book are just as scary as the bridge was! Many oddities came my way, and there are more to come in the future as I go to other ghostly locations!

I would hope the readers of my column, "Bide One's Time," will find my Missouri Hauntings book enjoyable reading. It is now available at many sites, including Amazon.com.

Thank you for letting me share these random musings with you about the writing of my book. I thank you! I wish each of you Happy Hauntings!

Lee Prosser is Ghostvillage.com's book reviewer and a regular contributor. He is also the author of Missouri Hauntings. among other books. "Bide One's Time" is Prosser's twice-monthly column on his supernatural musings.