June 26, 2009

The Spirit of George Followed Me

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Sarah - Davidsville and Johnstown, Pennsylvania - August 1985 to Present

My husband and I purchased a home and moved in in July of 1985. It was a very old, and large house in an old mining town just a quarter mile down the road from a four-lane highway -- there was no exit to highway, it just bypassed our little town. The only two ways to get to this town were to turn off the main road we were about a mile-and-a-half from. There were a lot of houses on that road and three miles from the other main road with no houses on it not until you got to the next mining town. This home was so large because it was the company store and home of the store owner at the time the mines were open and men were working there. The mining company has been gone for years.

Two days after moving in, I went to the hospital for the birth of my second child, my daughter. I heard a lot of noises right after we moved in, but I thought it's just an old house, they make noise. Most of the noises were made upon my lying down in bed at night. It took a few weeks for me to realize that the noise I was hearing was my kitchen door closing. It was a homemade door, made partly of wood and partly of metal, and it made a very distinctive sound when it was closed. It also sounded as if someone were walking through the hallways.

My husband worked the 11 PM to 7 AM shift, so the only time I could get him to listen was on weekends. He would just say, "It's an old house, they make noises," so I would lie down on my bed and when I would hear the kitchen door shut, I got out of bed ran to the hallway just outside my bedroom, and it felt and sounded as if someone had just walked past me, so I followed him. He went to my son's bedroom door, to my daughter's bedroom door stopping for just a few seconds, then would turn and walk back down the hallway. He seemed to be gone as he got back to my bedroom door. I never saw who or whatever it was, but I could hear it walking and feel its presence. This happened every single night. It didn't scare me, but I would wait to hear him as he was going through his routine before I would try to go to sleep. Don't ask me why I think it's a "he," that's just what I feel. I even gave him a name, "George," it just seemed to fit.

One night while sleeping, laying on my right side, I felt someone grab hold of my shoulder and shake me pretty hard, as if maybe they were trying to wake me. Thinking it was my 5 year-old son, I said, "Yes, honey, what do you want?" He grabbed my shoulder again shaking me even harder. I quickly rolled over asking what is it you want, but no one was there. I know I wasn't dreaming, but I felt something was wrong. I got out of bed, went down the hall, checked, and both children were in bed sleeping. I turned, went down the hall, and out to the kitchen to get a drink when I saw a beam of light shining through my window. I walked out into my family room and saw a light shining into my sliding glass doors. Wondering what this was, I walked over to a window looking out and I saw two police cars along the side of the road, and a few police officers talking to one another, all of them holding flashlights. I went out onto my porch, called to the police officers to find out what was going on. The police officers told me a neighbor had called in about a prowler. Another neighbor claimed someone had slashed the tires on her car, and then ran off up the road. The police were trying to find the person. I went back into the house thinking that George wanted to let me know something was going on outside.

There was another time I was awakened from my sleep by a loud banging sound. As usual, I would go to my kids to see if they were okay, then to my window in my family room to look out. I saw several neighbors standing in front of another neighbor's house. Upon questioning the neighbors, I found that a neighbor had arrived home, was jumped by four people, and had been beaten up and left lying in his driveway. A neighbor heard his calls for help and called the police. Again I went into my house thinking George was letting me know something was going on.

I did do someone research and found that this house was a little larger years ago than it is currently. Apparently a section of the old store was removed by people who had purchased the house from the old store owner. The intention was to make the front yard larger. The door I call the kitchen door is the door that once separated the store from the living section. The room I called my bedroom was the store's office. I began thinking that at night when George made his rounds he was in fact closing the store, then going to check on his family before going to his office. I also found that the store owner did die in the house, unexpectedly. That may be why he's still there. I lived in that house for 20 years and did remodeling.

While we were gutting and remodeling the bathroom, a lot of little things happened. I would hear the cabinet doors in my kitchen open and slam shut, I would walk out to the kitchen, and no one was there. I got out of bed one morning thinking before the kids get up I'll have a cup of coffee. I made a pot and had a cup with milk. I went and took a shower, and was glad the kids were still sleeping. I went to the kitchen to have another cup of coffee, but the milk was not in the refrigerator. Thinking I put it somewhere else, I looked in the cabinets, looked again in the refrigerator, but did not find it. I remember saying, "Okay, George, it's not funny." I shrugged it off and went to get dressed. After the kids got up, I fed and dressed them, and put them in front of the TV to watch cartoons. I went to the basement to do some laundry and to my surprise I found my carton of milk sitting on the table that I used to fold my laundry on. I explained I had only been to the bathroom and the bedrooms earlier. I looked around and told George, "It's not funny, knock it off." I moved out of this house four years ago. The last time I was in that house I looked around and said out loud, "Well, George, this is it. I really hate to leave this house and you but, I have to. I'll miss you, wish I could take you with me, but I guess I can't." And I left.

Almost immediately after moving into my new house I began to notice strange little things happening. It would take a while to tell you all these little things, so I'll just stick with one big one for now. My house is a one-floor ranch style. There is a small hallway off the kitchen that leads to the bedrooms and bathroom. I had just laid down in bed when I heard a loud crash from the kitchen. I got up and went to the kitchen to see what it was. I have a hutch that my microwave sits on, and there were shelves above it where I kept things. I looked on the floor in front of the hutch and I saw an ink pen. I looked around, but saw nothing else on the floor, and thought that was a lot of noise just for an ink pen. My daughter even got out of bed to see what was wrong. I told her, she shrugged, laughed, and said it must me George. I went back to bed. My window was open, I heard a lot of noise coming from outside, like the garbage cans being knocked around. I went to another window where I could see them, and I was shocked at what I saw. I saw a bear, a very large bear, and two cubs. I called to my daughter so she could see them, woke my son out of bed too. We were all surprised to see them. We watched them for a while. When we finally went to bed I remember thinking that's my George, he got my attention so I could see there was something outside. I really do believe George came with me. I don't know why or how, but there's just too many things like that happening. Is that possible for a ghost to leave one place and go to another? I think that's more likely than my moving into a second house with a ghost in it.