Auntie Bea
Let me start by saying that I'm a touch sceptical when it comes to spirits and the paranormal. This doesn't mean that I'm not capable of being spooked, I can't be the only grown man who has wished that he had curtains on the back windows after watching Halloween on his own.

When my mother moved away from the area, she asked me to go and visit an old lady, "Auntie Bea", from time to time. Auntie Bea was the mother of my mother's ex, she was in her early nineties at the time but as sharp as a big scarey knife.

I'd go and visit Auntie Bea in the evenings, once a week, we'd have a cup of tea and I'd offer to do anything she needed doing. Didn't have a car in those days, used to walk across town to visit her.

She never did need anything doing, shopping or whatever, as she was a highly regarded member of the local spiritualist church and had numerous visitors who would come for a chat, to ask advice, have a sceance, etc.

I think she was pleased to have my company but she also saw me as a "work in progress". We'd start off by discussing my faults and then it would lead on to a lecture about what I had to do on this plane if I wanted to progress through the spirit world. "You are on this plane to learn humility and you will keep coming back unto you do" was one of her comments.

"Burn your books" she said when I asked her about Aleister Crowley. "Don't listen to pop music, it is made by evil people who want to tempt you with drugs and other sin". I once played her a snippet of a rave mix tape: "It sounds exactly as I imagined it" she said, "the people who dance to that are robots serving the devil". I didn't let on that I spent most evenings in a narcotic enduced daze.

Now all of this was like water off a ducks back, OK, she didn't approve of my lifestyle. She said I had a black aura flecked with blue sparks which pleased me immensely as my mates mad hippy mum said my aura was green. Fuck green, black auras own.

What did spook me was when she'd start saying "thankyou *someone*" mid conversation. "Who are you talking too?" I'd ask. "One of my spirit guides has joined us" she'd reply. "Where are they?". "Sitting next to you on the sofa". *shiver*

I once asked her if she'd encountered any bad spirits. She had. There was one in particular who waited at the top of the stairs. He once pushed her down the stairs and broke her wrist. From that point on, not once did I ask to go upstairs and use her toilet. I'd save it up and go in an alley on the way home. A walk home that had me jumping at the sight of my own shaddow.

It still freaks me out thinking about those days and that house. If I concentrate I can still smell it. The whole place was full of very old furniture much of it from India, I think she must have lived there years ago. The walls were hung with pictures of spirits which people had drawn for her.

One thing that made me chuckle: she was telling me about a man who asked for her advice, he was concerned because his teenage son had bought a record called "Revolution". It was the Spacemen 3 12". She told him to sit with his son and play the record over and over until the boy said that he didn't want to hear it ever again. I'd love to have witnessed that particular battle of wills.
( stopmeandslapme Cometh the hour, cometh your mum, Wed 25 Mar 2009, 20:37, 2 replies)

Halloween schmalloween
Try watching Poltergeist late at night, then falling asleep and waking up to find the video's switched itself off and the screen's showing static.

I had to switch every light in the house on before I could go to bed.
( emvee cruor deo cruoris, Thu 26 Mar 2009, 13:30, closed)

I'll see your Poltergeist
and Raise you the Amityville horror.

Couple of years ago I kept finding maggots outside my back door, hundreds of them. They'd crawl up the walls trying to get back to wherever they came from. Checked the guttering, the loft. No idea where they were coming from...
( stopmeandslapme Cometh the hour, cometh your mum, Thu 26 Mar 2009, 16:19, closed)