Where to begin??
Every couple after marriage, hopes to have at least one child. In my family, I was baby #2 out of 5. Super long story short, I was under a year old, and I died. Now, being just a baby, I have no recollection of that day, I don't even have a specific day of my death, just a month. November. I was roughly 7 months old when I drowned, some time in and around thanksgiving is all I know.
Story has it, as told by my hero, my Gramma. My mom had me in the bathtub, sitting in a baby seat that suctions to the bottom of the tub. My older sister, who is 6 years and some months older than me, had a school activity that night. She was having some difficulty getting dressed and had called our mom for help. Mom thinking nothing of it, other than I will be fine for a minute, left me in the tub. Somehow the seat unfastened, it tipped, I was buckled in. Who knows how long I was under water for, but long enough to drown.
Mom came back into the bathroom, sees that I tipped over, pulls me out, I am not breathing. She panics. Does not call 911. Mom calls everyone else, Gramma, Aunts, Uncles and my Dad. By this time, minutes have passed. A lot of minutes. Gramma is the first to arrive. 911 is finally called, roughly 15 minutes go by, Gramma starts performing cpr. She continues cpr until the ambulance arrives, at which point, they take over. After several more minutes of cpr, they declare me dead. They call the time. Gramma thankfully said nope, not my baby, and attempts cpr once again,, not giving up, she brings me back to life. I've been told that it was like 27, 28 minutes that past with no oxygen, no pulse, nothing.
Fast forward several years. Still no recollection of any of it. I was told that I was seeing specialists up until the age of 7 or so. Mom and Dad were told that my memory was affected due to loss of oxygen for that long. I do not remember much of anything before the age of 11..12. You often read or hear people tell their stories of near death experiences, seeing the light, being pulled back in. Floating above their body and seeing their self laying in bed. I wish I had a story to tell like that, but I do not. lol.
I've within the last few years have been reaching out to my dads side of the family, we grew up not really knowing them. I found an Uncle on facebook, sent a friend request, he accepted. I have received a lot of information from him. He said he remembered me, he would come over to the house and visit. He would describe the house,, give an address, again, I did not and still do not remember meeting him. He told me one time my dad called him and said that I was in my bedroom, laying in bed, he came in to say goodnight, and heard me talking to someone. He came in, looked around, didn't see anyone, so he asked who I was talking to. I told him that I was talking to my friends that live in my teapot set. That, apparently was enough to raise an eyebrow lol, and so my experiences begin.
Welcome to Ridge Road
I was in grade 5 when we moved to Ridge Road. This would be our new home for me until I went off to college. We still were settling in and moving our belongings into the house. I wanna say I was about 11 or 12 when I can clearly remember my very 1st memory of anything ghostly. I was sitting in a big comfy chair in the front living room, the chair was facing the front of the house, it hadn't been placed anywhere. The back of the chair was facing the hallway entrance into the room. I was sitting there listening to my walk-man thru headphones. I feel a tap on my head, I ignore it because I thought it was one of my siblings. I continue to sit there listening to music, another tap on my head, I say "knock it off". Again, I get another tap on my head, this time it was a little harder, I was annoyed and yelled louder, "knock it off". As I'm saying this, I turn around as fast as I can to catch which ever sibling is hitting me on the head (the chair I was sitting in was clear on the other side of the living room). It literally takes me like a second to turn around. When I do, there is no one there. I know that none of my siblings were fast enough to run out of the room and around the corner without me seeing them as I turned around. I leave the room and walk into the dining room and ask if any one was just in the living room. No one came into the room with me. So who kept tapping me on the head?
When we moved into our new home us kids were excited because there was a pool in the back yard. It didn't stay, my parents had it torn down. Come to find out, the family that had lived there before us had a daughter who had drowned in that same exact pool. Mom and Dad were not taking any more chances of another drowning.
This house was pretty big, and old. Apparently this house had been one of the original houses ever built on Ridge Road. It had been other places before becoming a family home. It was built as a one room general store, dating back to horse and buggy era. Over the years it grew in size, big enough to be a home for girls. While it was a girls home, one of the younger girls had hung herself in one of the closets. That was one of the bedrooms that my oldest sister had slept in. Later on that room became my room. I did not like that closet, it gave me the creeps, I had no idea why, until years later.
Before I moved into that front bedroom, lets go back a few years. In the back of the house were 2 little rooms that connected to each other. This would become a bedroom that me and my younger sister just under me, would share. I remember there was a glow in the dark light switch cover that had a name of a girl on it, I do not remember the name. Come to find out, this was the little girls room who had drowned in the pool, eventually we outgrew this little room. Originally mom and dad had the attic as their bedroom. My older sister had the master bedroom because there was a bathroom attached to the room. When she moved out, mom and dad moved into that bedroom and me and my sister were sent to the attic. That kind of sounds creepy.. like we were sent to live in the attic like the movie Flowers in the Attic.. lol. So at the top of the stairs on either side of the stairs, was 2 small loft areas, they became a room for my youngest sister and brother.
I remember as a family we always ate dinner together and on Sundays, mom would make a big huge breakfast, which we all ate together. Anyway, one night dinner was done, mom had me go up to the attic to get dad for dinner, so I did. I walk into the attic and he is watching a movie called The Exorcist. That movie scared the shit out of me!! It just so happen to be at the part when Raegan was in her bed, her face had already changed to that gray and crackly colour, and the priest was talking to her. Well.. if you're familiar with the movie then you know that one of the scenes is when her head starts turning around and she projectile vomits green puke every where. That was enough to scare me. I ran out of that room so fast, heart racing a mile a minute. Mom asked what happened, I told her what I saw, she was a bit upset but then again, it was her fault for sending me up there right?? I hadn't seen that movie until I was in my late 20's, and even then I was scaredy cat to watch it and I watched most of it with my eyes closed. I cried, that's how scared I was. lol
I'm not the only one who had seen things while at Ridge Road. My Aunt Lorraine was special like me, she could see things as well. She had a daughter, and they were over to visit. My cousin was in the front living room and my Aunt came in, she said she saw a little girl standing in front of my cousin who was sitting on one of the couches. My cousin was wearing a new pair of sneakers, they were the velcro type. My Aunt saw this little girl holding my cousins foot up and inspecting the shoe, perhaps she hadn't see velcro shoes before? The little girl didn't seem afraid, just curious, she then turns to look at my Aunt who looked shocked at what was happening and the little girl just disappeared right in front of her eyes.
Another time my Aunt had something happen to her while over to the house, she said she came into the kitchen and all the cupboards were open. She closed them all and as she was closing them, she said she saw a little person sitting in one of the cupboards. It scared her. I know if I was grown and saw a little person that I had no idea who it was and sitting in my cupboard, I'd be freaked out. After she closed the cupboards, she sat down at the dining room table and minutes later she said she saw half of a person. A Native man, just the bottom half and that he was kind of transparent. He was wearing tan leather leggings that had fringe on them and a pair of beaded moccasins with blue beads. He didn't stop, he just walked right passed her.
I have a cousin Roger who use to come over and we would just chill. One night we were sitting in the front living room talking and laughing. Out of the blue he says "aren't you gonna answer your phone"? I said what?, the phone isn't ringing, we sat and listened, no phone rang. Minutes later he said again, "you're phone is ringing". I got up to show him that the phone was not ringing, I answered it, just a dial tone. He swore that the phone kept ringing, although none of us could hear it but him. After that, he stopped coming over.
There were plenty of incidences that occurred in this house. Had another cousin, Sharon Ann that would come over and spend the night sometimes. She would say that there was a little girl that kept peeking around the corner looking at us in the living room. Every time we would look, we never saw anyone or anything. It got to the point where me, my sister and my cousin all slept on the pullout couch in the living room, with her in the middle. Eventually she stopped spending the night too.
One time I had stayed home from school because I wasn't feeling well, I think I had the flu or something. I was laying on the couch in the living room all tucked under the blanket. I felt someone sit at the end of the couch by my feet, I could literally see where the couch was indented as if someone was really sitting there. I could feel the warmth. I felt as if someone was rubbing my shin, as if to comfort me. It didn't last long and as fast as it had happened, it ended. I wasn't afraid. I later told my mom, sometimes I wondered if she thought I was making things up, but she did say, "well maybe your Gramma Jonathan came to visit you", we left it at that.
When I moved into the front bedroom that was previously used by my older sister, I could 'sense' that there was someone in there. At the time I didn't know if it was a boy or a girl or how old they were, but I would talk to them. Ask them if they were ok or how their day was. Often I would just pick up a book and start reading it out loud to them. I was never really afraid to be in there, but the closet was a different thing. I did not like the closet in that room. This was not the only closet that I was afraid of, there was one more closet that I will get to later.
There was this one time and I'm not sure I would even classify it as paranormal but I have no other explanation for it. My dad had called all of us siblings into the dining room/kitchen area, we had no idea why. He had us look at the floor board. Although the kitchen and dining room were basically all one room, there were black wrought iron decorative twisty rods that came from the ceiling to the floor. There was 2 of them and they connected together by what I would describe as a fence ?? using the same black iron rods and twisty design except it went across, connecting one side to the other, with smaller rods in between like a fence. The board underneath this area was full of staples, big heavy staples, not like the staples to hold papers together, but from a staple gun. Dad had asked all of us who did it. Of course we all said it wasn't me. So one by one, dad gave us this big staple gun and had us put a staple into the wood, so he could compare how the staple went in. After we all had put our staples into the floor, he found his stapler. It was me. I swore it was not me, I clearly would know if I had put staple after staple after staple into the floor. Why would I even do that, like what purpose would I have to do that? None, but every. single. staple I had put in the floor, looked just like all the other staples that were put in the floor. Not all the way in and a little crooked. How was it even possible for me to do that and not remember doing that, insane right?
Attic Space
I had mentioned how me and my sister shared the attic for awhile, she had one side and I took the other side. At night I would hear scratching inside the wall, by my bed. Most of the time I would ignore it, it didn't happen all the time just occasionally. Some times it was little scratches up by my head, other times it was long scratches dragging side ways inside the walls. I don't think I ever mentioned to anyone about the scratches.
Now plenty of times I would wake up in the middle of the night to see a tall black shadow figure standing at the foot of my bed . He always wore a hat, not a cowboy hat but similar, just more rounded on top and the brim wasn't curved up. He also wore a long coat, the kind that went past the knees, it was always opened. He would just stand there, didn't move, didn't say anything. Now that I think about it, it happened quite often lol. I didn't mention that to my parents but I did mention it to my sister who I shared the room with. As far as I know she never had him stand at the foot of her bed. To this day, I have no idea why this man would come and stand there and it only happened at Ridge Road.
Now I know the next part, I told my parents about but not until much later and not until after I mentioned to my sister, and even then, it was a couple weeks before I mentioned to her. Apparently we both were afraid to mention it.. lol
Ok, so this part seemed to only happen at night and it was only after I woke up in the middle of the night. In the centre of the room, a bright green fluorescent square shape would just sit and float in the middle of the room. It didn't change colour, it didn't spin or move, it just sat there, every night. One day I mentioned it to my sister, I don't remember how I brought it up to her but after I told her, she said she had been seeing it too but didn't wanna say anything. So this green box would just float in the middle of the room, totally normal right? Eventually we decided to tell our parents.
There was a closet that was built in the attic, not the type of attic that went into the wall, this closet was built in the corner. Who ever built it only had to put up two more walls and throw a door on it. Both me and my sister did not like this closet, we were legit scared to even open the door. Silly right?... wrong, and I'll get to the reason later. Anyway, we would take turns on who had to put something in the closet or take something out, yes, take turns. One turn I would open the door on the count of 3 and she would grab what ever or throw something in there. Next time, she would open the door and I would literally throw what ever clothing item in there. One time it was my new favourite red leather Michael Jackson Beat it jacket.. yep, as much as I loved that jacket, I was too afraid to stay in the closet long enough to put it on a hanger and hang it properly, so I just whipped it in there. lol I wonder what ever happened to it, it just sort of disappeared.
Ridge Road: Part II
..Don't get me wrong, I loved our house, it just wasn't a normal house. How many people do you personally know that can tell you just one thing that was some what creepy about their house? I have many countless creepy and unusual things that have happened there.
One time we had some cousins over, if I remember correctly we were playing a game we made up that consisted of badminton racquets, apples, pears and pine cones. lol. We had several apple/pear trees on our property and of course pine trees. So we would split up into teams, one team would have to hide from the other and try not to get pegged off by our choice of ammo.. lol. We would climb up onto the roof of the house, quietly scale the peaks in hopes of finding a hiding enemy, if you got hit, you were out. Plain and simple, good wholesome fun, lots of laughs. After our game was done, we all gathered in the back yard because one of us saw "something", a couple of somethings. We had never seen anything like it in real life, just on tv, and there was more than just one something, there was like 3 somethings. They didn't have any legs or arms, they floated above the ground, about a few feet off the ground. They were dark puffy clouds with red eyes. We were not sure what they were and was like what the heck are those things? We picked up our racquets and started hitting pears and pine cones at them, every...single...one of them... went straight through them. These things did not disappear, they just stayed there. We ran into the house because we were scared, we didn't know what was happening, what were these things and what did they want? Why did they have red eyes? We never got any answers, other than to stay away from them because it was bad medicine. I am Native American and sometimes, not always, there are other Natives out there who will try to do harm to other families for what ever reason, and when they did, it was called bad medicine. This was one of those times. They eventually went away and only came that one day that I remember.
One time me and my brother hopped on our bikes to go to Stone Mill quarry to go fishing. At one point this place was open to the public, they had horse riding trails, you could fish, take your canoes and paddle around on the water etc. This day we chose to go, it had been shut down and sat empty for quite some time. There was a rundown Longhouse that people would go in and party. They made firepits and spray painted the inside and out, left trash and empty beer bottles everywhere. It was sad. Once I stepped inside and started exploring, I got a weird feeling and I said to my brother, we should go, we shouldn't be in here, we left and found a fishing spot. Way up on top of the quarry pit we set up our poles, we fished for awhile, a couple hours at least. Not very many people know about this day and what took place next. As we sat fishing, we could hear what sounded like a lady screaming, screaming like she was being killed or something, I don't know, I can't quite describe the sound exactly, but it was chilling to the bone. I acted like I didn't hear it at first, until the sound got louder and seemed like it was getting closer. My brother asked what that noise was, I said I don't know, but lets start packing up and head home. As we are reeling our lines in, the sound definitely got way closer, I'm pretty sure we ended up leaving all our gear there and hopped on our bikes. The quarry was a good 10 miles away from home. As we rode our bikes out of Stone Mill and made our way to the actual road, the sound of the screaming lady followed us. We were only on 3 roads.. Stone Mill to Nigh, then Nigh to Ridge Road, Nigh being the longest road, with no street lights and hardly any houses, mostly trees and thick brush, it had already started to get dark by this time. We peddled as fast as we could, me yelling to my brother to hurry up. The whole way home, this eerie sound of a lady being murdered and screaming for her life was all we heard. The sound kept pace with us, we dare not stop to take a break or catch our breath, who knows what would of happened if we did. Finally we hit Ridge Road, we turn right, and several houses down was our house. Not once did we look back after we left. We ride up in our front yard, jump off our bikes and run into the house, slamming the door and locking it. We don't know what it was that chased us out of there and followed us all the way home, all I know is that to this day, like 30 years later, my brother still refuses to talk about it.
One night at home, it was just me and my next youngest sister. We were on the phone with our cousin Roger because as you read earlier he stopped coming over because of what happened the last time he was there. As with any house with lots of kids, you had more than one phone in the house. While I was on one phone, my sister was on the other phone, we thought it would be funny if we played a prank on him. I don't remember how we did it but we made some type of sound, he would ask what that noise was, of course we would say we didn't hear anything. The noises made were crackling and clicking sounds as he talked, we would say hello? I can't hear you, even tho we could. He got scared and hung up, tried calling back but when we started talking we would hang up as if the line was cut off... lol it's funny now that I think about it, obviously not to him. I wanna say later that night we got scared because things started acting up in the house. We were hearing really loud bangs and knocks, and sounded like windows slamming. I know, pay back right? We got so scared that we left the house and sat across the street until my mom came home, I don't think we ever found out what the noises were or where they were coming from.
This next incident is kind of funny, at least I think so, my brother, on the other hand did not and still to this day does not think so lol. He liked G.I. Joe and had some action figures and a jet or something that shot missiles. One day while we were in the back living room, (mostly for us kids to hang out and watch tv and what not) we were playing with his guys, the jet made noises and had lights that lit up. After we were done playing with them he laid them on the floor, he said or did something stupid and I don't quite remember what I did but he didn't like it. He had this stuffed brown teddy bear, it was cute, had a smile on it. The bear right after this incident went from smiling to frowning, right before our eyes, then the jet lights started flashing and the missiles started shooting. No one was holding it, you literally have to be holding it by the trigger handle and push the trigger button to shoot the missiles. He stopped playing with both those toys.
I do know that there was a little girl spirit who liked to stay on the stairs that led up to the attic. I would see her peek around the door, she just like to see what we were doing lol. She also did not like to have the stair light on, every time we turned it on, she turned it off. She also didn't like the door closed, every time we closed it, minutes later it would open on its own. She was pretty harmless.
Attic Space: Part II
One thing that I remember about the attic that to this day, I find very cool, was how much activity I heard one night. So, this particular night I had fallen asleep on the couch in the front living room. I woke to a lot of noise coming from upstairs in the middle of the night. Foot steps walking all around up there, lots of loud laughter coming from male and female. I could hear music playing, not music from that current time and era, but from waaaay back when lol. I could hear glasses clanking as if they were doing "cheers". I could smell cigarettes, cigars and pipe tobacco. I just lay there taking it all in. Finally curiosity got to me, I sat up, looked towards the stairs, I hadn't crossed thru the door frame yet, but when I did, everything stopped. No music, no laughter, no smoke smell, nothing. I turned and went and laid back on the couch, just as I was starting to fall back to sleep, I could hear the laughter, music and smell the smoke, I don't know why but it made me smile. Again, I got up and start walking towards the stairs except this time as I crossed the door frame everything stayed as it was, it didn't disappear. I put one foot up on the next step, it stopped. lol. It was like a game. I laid back down and fell asleep, woke back up to the party still going on upstairs. I head to the stairs, cross the door frame, put one foot up on the stairs, then another and another. I was able to go up a few steps more, I made it half way up, once again everything stopped, back to the couch I go. I'm telling you they were messing with me but I still thought it was cool. One more time, I make my way up the stairs, only this time they let me make it all the way up!! I slowly walked to the door, I could feel my heart beating and feel it racing. I reach for the door knob and they stopped, I waited for what seemed like forever but was probably only like a minute lol and that was it, the end, nothing returned, ever again. I am grateful they allowed me to get as close as I did, but I have to think why? I wonder what would of happened if I was able to open the door and actually see them. Wonder what they looked like, I tend to picture them dressed in like saloon style clothing. The men in boots, hats and vests, like from the movie Tombstone lol and the women like barkeep style clothing, that would be really cool to see. I will never know.
Ridge Road: Part III
Ok so this is where it kind of starts to involve other people outside of the house, non family members.
My Aunt who I mentioned earlier, had a friend who kept dreaming of a house, she had no idea who's house it was or even where it was. She was talking to my Aunt about this recurring dream, my older sister I'm pretty sure had a part in this section as well. As my Aunt is listening to her friend describe this house, my sister says, that's my house. This lady describes everything, right down to the refrigerator that sat on the porch. I'm not quite sure what was said about her having the dreams but apparently not good. Not long after my Aunt told my parents and grandparents about our house, a phone call was made to British Columbia to a couple that I only remember as Toni and Rocky.
Toni and Rocky hop in their car and make the drive from B.C to Ontario, arriving at our house. They were also special people. They were greeted and welcomed into our house. They had already knew way more stuff about our house before being told about the happenings. They do a walk thru of the house, go into every room, every closet, including the crawl space above the lofts outside the attic. They walk around the property, making their way around the back of the house and under the house. They enter thru the cellar door, which is just a dirt floor and only a small section where you could stand up without hitting your head. There was a time where we were asked to step outside as they stayed inside the cellar. We make our way back into the house, and they continue to do a walk thru by themselves. Some rooms they stay longer, the whole process took hours. Without anyone saying nothing about anything, she knew it all. She knew about the teddy turning from happy to sad, she knew about the girl who hung herself and what closet. She knew that I spoke to the spirits and that I would read to them, they told her they liked when I read to them.
The biggest part of their walk thru and the part that took the longest, even tho for her, it only seemed minutes, was the attic. There was a lot of activity up there. The reason there was a lot of activity and the reason why me and my sister were afraid of the closet was because that closet was a portal. Yes, a portal that spirits entered and exited, all kinds of spirits, from all over. The wall that you would see directly in front of you when you opened the closet, was a big hole, in front of that hole was a piece of wood paneling that covered the hole, it just laid against the wall. She was able to move the wood, and sat inside the hole, so much energy was felt in there.
After a while they made their way back down stairs and into the dining room where we were all waiting. She explained about the portal and how she could close it and cleanse the house. They had made what looked like tea but it did not taste like tea, there was some type of Native medicine mixed in with it, good healing medicine. Everyone of us inside the house had to drink a cup of this tea. After everyone drank their tea, we stood in a circle and one by one we all took our turn stepping inside with her as she smudged us. For those that are not familiar with smudging, it is a form of cleansing our body from any negativity using sage and/or sweetgrass or a combination of both. Finally my turn came to step in the middle of the circle. I remember her fanning her eagle feather from top to bottom, front to back, then bottom back up to top, saying what ever she needed to say as she did this. I start coughing, I was handed a napkin, as I'm coughing I was told that I needed to spit out what was coming up. I put the napkin to my mouth and spit out a bunch of black stuff, this stuff is not good, she tells me to keep coughing it up. After I finish coughing up all this bad stuff, a spirit is seen stepping out of my body. She takes my napkin and does one more smudge. I step back to my spot and my Grampa steps in, she repeats the smudging process. Same as me, he too starts coughing and is handed a napkin, he spits up black stuff as well. Out of the people there, me and my Grampa were the only 2 who were really affected by the tea, I guess we really needed it. She also had done a walk thru and smudged every room of the house, making sure to leave windows and doors open so that the spirits could leave and not be trapped inside, after all, we wanted them to leave. Before leaving the house, they left more tea that we were to continue drinking until it was gone. I will never get that taste out of my mind. In the end, our house was cleansed and I do not remember anything else happening there again. My brothers teddy bear returned back to normal, with a smile and being happy. I graduated high school, took a year off from school before going on to college. My dad passed away while I was in college, after his funeral, I moved to the states, where activity started back up.
WELCOME TO NIAGARA FALLS; NY
Prior to moving to Niagara Falls, I had lived in many other places and other states. I lived out west for a bit, I decided one day that I didn't want to be in NY anymore and hitch hiked across the country. I started from Buffalo NY and made my way to Grants Pass; Oregon, took a few weeks, but Oregon is where I ended. I took a job with a traveling amusement park that went up and down the west coast to Cali and back, I fell in love with the west. I met someone, we married, had 2 beautiful daughters, one born in N.F and one born in Oregon. We lived in Portland, Canby and Pacific City (my favourite because the Pacific Ocean literally was my front yard). Later we moved to Southern California, Hemet to be exact, then San Luis, Colorado before landing in Niagara Falls, for the second time. The first time was in 1995, with the birth of my 1st daughter. When we came back years later, we rented a house from a cousin of mine who owned a house in the city, full basement, 2 floors and an attic, 3 bedrooms, fenced in yard, it was nice and cozy... in the beginning.
Before moving in we had to wait, there was a family of Aztecs from Mexico living there. They were very colourful people, every wall in the house was a different colour, pink, yellow, white, light blue etc. The day came when we could move in. The front of the house had a porch that was as wide as the house. The front door once opened, you step into a small room, I'm assuming a mud room?? Another door that led into the living room which was opened to the dining room, then the kitchen, which was pretty small. There was a hallway between the kitchen and the dining room. The bathroom was off the hall, just on the other side of the kitchen, nothing special, tub, toilet and sink. Across the hall and down a few feet was a door that led to the basement (I'll come back to the basement in a bit). Another door that led upstairs was off of the dining room. When you first open the door to go upstairs, right in front of you was a large window, almost floor to ceiling, it had previously been broke so it was covered with a sheet of plywood.
Once you reached the top of the stairs you see a small bedroom, we used that room as an office. We set up a desk and chair, a small cabinet and a computer with a printer. Next to this room was a bedroom, my bedroom. Lastly, a much larger room, except the ceiling was A frame shaped, so it had a slanty ceiling. The floor was carpeted and this became the girls room. Right beside the girls room, was a set of stairs that led to the attic. There were about 5 steps then a landing, then turned to the left for another 4 or so steps, then finally the attic, it ran the width of the house. There was some stuff that was left in the attic from previous renters, we added to it and used the attic for storage space. For some reason, I did not like the stairs going up to the attic. I think because the middle step, the piece of wood that is in the front of the step, was broken and never stayed connected and always fell, leaving a dark hollow hole, big enough for a hand to reach out and grab your foot as you stepped up. I always skipped over this step lol.
If you're familiar with sweetgrass, I had a braid that I would hang on the wall by a nail that was already there when I moved in. One day while cleaning, this braid fell off the wall. I picked it up and hung it back on the nail, not thinking about it, because it basically was just resting there. lol. Few weeks go by and again, I find the braid on the floor, didn't think anything about it, thought maybe it fell off because the girls were always jumping around upstairs, their room after all was right above the living room. It wasn't until this braid of sweetgrass literally flew off the wall and landed almost on the other side of the living room, which was when I was like,, what the hell?? Then the thought went thru my mind, I have a spirit on my hands.
Eventually I added a phone downstairs in kitchen/dining area so I didn't have to run upstairs all the time. Some times I would get phone calls, some times days or weeks would go by without calls. No big deal right?, until you're talking on the phone and are constantly getting disconnected, only to have them call back and their end ring off the hook and my end, nothing. After a couple of weeks of my phone not working, the phone company came out to check the line. Some how the lines in the basement were completely tangled and rewired all wrong, no wonder I wasn't receiving any calls. I had no idea the line was messed up until my Gramma and Grampa stopped by and dropped off some food and mentioned that they kept calling and nothing was happening. The phone guy had come out a couple times, the last time there, he was scared and didn't understand why, all I could say was,, it's the basement. He showed me how to fix the wires myself so they didn't have to keep coming out lol.
Not to get into any details but my husband and I split up and he decided to go back to Oregon. Some months later, I started seeing someone, this person I had some what known for quite a few years, since we were teenagers. We kind of knew each other from The Erie County Fair, some of my family members had a craft booth down in the Indian Village, as did his parents. Do you remember me mentioning earlier in the Ridge Road chronicles about a lady who had been dreaming about my house and didn't know why or even who's it was, well, that lady was this guys mom. lol. Anyway, I do not know the history of the house, I think but don't quote me on it, but I was told that it was one of the underground railroad houses. Throughout my stay there, there were some strange occurrences. Every once in awhile I would smell a soft scent of roses in the living room, the smell never lasted long but was always pleasant. Sometimes I would get a whiff of pipe tobacco, for some reason, it always reminded me of a great Uncle on my dads side, it too was a nice nostalgic smell, comforting. Eventually this guy I was talking to, moved into the house with me and my two girls, he has two boys.
Another strange thing that would happen was that the doorbell would ring at odd times, which wouldn't be so bad, if I only had a working doorbell lol. Yep. There once was a doorbell, but not one since I had moved in. In the living room, high up close to the ceiling was a small hole that two wires came out of. They were not capped and not connected to anything, one was bent to the right, the other was bent to the left, these would be the wires to the doorbell. Can you explain to me how the doorbell would ring when there was not one hooked up? No? me either, except it was a spirit.
The basement was completed, it had a cement floor, washer and dryer hookups, an old sink basin, a work table and a shower. I did not like taking a shower in the basement so I took baths instead, even though I don't like baths. lol The guy that moved in, his name is Shane, he liked taking showers in the basement AND in the complete dark. Every time he took a shower down there, he could feel a very strong presence. This presence could be felt, it was strong, you could feel it, as if it was standing nose to nose with you and he definitely let you know he was there. That was the reason why I did not like showers in the basement and I'm guessing that's why the phone guy didn't like the basement, maybe he met my unfriendly spirit.
I only had one tv, it was in the living room, it sat on a metal cart in the corner (think Poltergeist... stay away from the light Carol Ann lol). More often then not, the channel would change while watching a show. I always dismissed it and changed it back because I may have accidently bumped the remote and it could have changed channels. Some times the volume would go really low, to the point where you could barely hear it. Other times it would go full volume, again, I would just turn it down, maybe the batteries needed changed, who knows? One day, while Shane was watching tv, it did the volume up thing and changed channels. It kept happening even though he would put the previous channel back on, minutes later it would change and the volume would either go really low or all the way up. He got annoyed by that happening so he unplugged the tv and guess what? It still came back on even though it was not powered by electricity. Faulty tv or Casper playing pranks?
Months go by, eventually we all move out and move to a different town, in a different county.
As I'm typing my experiences and recalling incidences, my memory was triggered by a short visit to Buffalo for a celebration of life for a family member that had recently passed. The place where the celebration took place was just down the street from a building that I lived in as a child. The road behind that building is where my Aunt Lorraine lived, I had mentioned her in the Ridge Road parts. I remember her house, I had spent quite a bit of time over there, at the time, she did not have any kids, so I would spend weekends and days there. I was in kindergarten maybe??? Anyways, I can clearly remember the layout of the house.. we hardly ever used the front door, it was the side door. This door when opened, entered into a closed in narrow porch, no windows, just darkness. The kitchen was the main room when you entered into the house, to the left was the bathroom. On the other side of the kitchen, same side as bathroom, was a smaller room that Uncle used to make small projects or make jewelry. Dining room was to the left of the kitchen, not your typical dining room as the table was a pool table that doubled as a table when used during family functions lol. Next is the living room, not very big, then the door to front porch.
There was an upstairs, those stairs were off from the kitchen. The stairs themself were very narrow and steep. As you're walking up the stairs, you walk past a small door that was just shy of reaching the top of the stairs, it was used as storage, that area always scared me. There was 2 bedrooms upstairs, the front bedroom was my Aunt and Uncles room then across the hall, the 2nd bedroom, much smaller then theirs. This is where I would sleep when I spent the night, most times tho, I slept downstairs on the couch. I was always afraid to go upstairs because I would always see a tall dark shadow figure standing at the top of the stairs. I could never see the face, I swear I can remember it talking to me which made it even more scarier to go up there.
That's all the rooms, at least that we saw. I say this because there was this large area that should have a room, but was not visible. The dining room was not as wide as the house or even the living room. There was a wall there, no door, just a wall. Never really thought about it as a kid and growing up, but decades later I would dream about this house. In my dream, there was a room that originally was part of the house, like a study or an office but it was enclosed. My dream told me that something gruesome took place there. I was showed book cases, a desk, and a couple of chairs. The room and items in the room were covered in blood, lots of blood. When I think about it now, as an adult, it makes sense. Someone was either butchered to death in that room or, not to be graphic, but they could of blown their brains out. Idk. Like... why not use that space? I can't imagine just blocking that area up with just air and not utilize that space. I only dreamt about that house and uncovering that room, 2 times in this life time. I have driven by that house a few times over the last few decades when I've been up in that area. I almost want to go knock on the door and ask to step inside or at least ask if they uncovered a room. Maybe one of these days I will, but this shadow figure was my first true experience with the paranormal, then nothing until age 12.
I moved around a lot in my younger years, but not much activity happened but the few things that did happen while temporarily staying places I will share with you.
This one particular house I was staying with for a bit, is the sister of the guy I started seeing, remember him and his 2 sons moved in with me while in Niagara Falls? ok, well he has a sister, that's who's house this is. So like I mentioned earlier, we are Native American. There are certain groups that certain Natives belong to. His niece belonged to what is known as The False Face Society, too much to go into details, but she had this one particular false face that scared the crap outta me. It was put up on the wall at the end of the hall. It hung between the room I was in and the room that her kids were in. I swear that this false face did not like me, it sure gave off the vibe that it didn't. I could "feel" it follow me as I came out of my room. I could "feel" its eyes stare at me and follow me down the hall. Very uncomfortable feeling to have this inanimate object "watch" you. But other than this creepy feeling in the house, that is all that I ever felt there.
There may have been an incident or two before settling into a house that we spent a lot of years in that may have happened, well, it did happen, it all just leads up to this house that I'm going to talk about next, we will call it Maple St.
Maple Street
This house, was something. Before we actually moved in, we did some inside work, hard core cleaning and a lot of paint. 4 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, an attic and basement. 2 stories, built early 1900's, not sure of the history. We lived there several years.. I think.. lol
Any and all extra free time was spent at this house, preparing to move in. We would pack sandwiches and head over. It looked quite normal on the outside, on the inside when you first walk in, you step into an enclosed porch with swing out windows. Once inside the house, you are in a small room that has a set of stairs leading up and to the left. Looking straight ahead is a small hallway that leads to the kitchen and beyond that, a decent size walk in pantry. Off the kitchen to the left was the dining room, a little small. The living room was to the left of the front entrance and connected to the dining room. Both the living room and dining room had a set of pocket doors, which I thought was pretty cool. You could literally run in a circle through the rooms if you kept the pocket doors tucked in, which we did the majority of the time.
I mentioned a small hallway that led to the kitchen, off this hallway were side stairs that led up to the main stairs that continued up. Also off the hallway was a small set of stairs that went down and to the outside, these stairs also led to the basement.
If anyone knows me, then you know that I am constantly putting things down and forgetting where I put them, or I don't put them back where they are sapose to go LOL. Well I was about to go to the store for dinner but I could not find my bank card..surprised? No. After looking everywhere, and I mean EVERY where, I remembered where I used it last. I had to run to the new house because I dropped my card into the plastic grocery bag instead of sticking it back in my wallet or coat pocket. On the way over I had to hope that that one particular bag which had the bread/buns inside of it, did not get thrown away.
Anyway, it is now dark out, and pretty late. As I get closer to the house, I start to get a little unsettling feeling. I pull into the driveway and it was right then and there that I realized that I do not want to go inside. I was starting to have a panic attack. Silly right? lol The house looked totally different from the outside, at night, with zero lights on, too eerie. It was like I was being watched and I felt that what was watching me, did not want me to go back inside, but I had to. So there I stood, in front of the house trying to convince myself that I HAD to go inside and look for my card, even thought that I could get away with throwing what we had at the house together for dinner.
Eventually I went in. I had to reach inside the door to turn on the light before walking in lol but I did it!! Panicking the whole time, well, I guess not really panicking, I was straight up scared lmao. I reach into the living room and turn the light on, walk over to the dining room, turn the light on, do the same for the kitchen. I look through all the plastic bags, I found it!! I hurriedly went back through the house shutting off the lights, saying out loud, "sorry, I had to find my bank card". Never did I want to go back there again, by myself, in the dark. Lesson learned? No, to this day, you would think I would put my card back where it belongs right after I use it... Nope!! lol
Maple Street : Part II
My first experience that I remember in this house was when I was in the living room. On the main stairs leading into the front entrance is a small window. I saw a person coming down the stairs from the corner of my eye, I glance over expecting to see one of the kids. I did not. Instead I see a woman walking down, she stopped half way, her hand on the rail. She was wearing a bluish dress with a wide collar that buttoned all the way up and stood up. It looked like it wrapped slightly around her neck. Around the collar was a white yoke, kind of frilly like. The bottom of her dress widens out, like there is a hoop under it, you know what I mean? Wrapped around the bottom from the waist looks like a white apron, but who knows lol. This lady was Caucasian, she had wavy blonde hair that was pulled up on top into a loose bun. She had some shorter hair pulled out that curled down each side of her face. I stopped and just stared at her, she looked right at me, tilted her head slightly and smiled. Then she slowly faded away. That was the first and only time that I had an encounter with her.
There was an older man who had once lived there, he passed, but I am not sure if he died in the house or not, but he still lives there. I had only a few things that dealt with the old man. I would be lying in bed and in the middle of the night I would wake up because I would hear big heavy footsteps coming up the stairs, continuing up the attic stairs. For a while I thought it was Lance, he worked security at the factory here and would get home like 2 a.m so I always thought it was him, it was not. I would hear the footsteps a couple times a week, eventually other household members would hear the old man.
Lance is my brother in law, he stayed with us for a while and occupied the attic. He had some of his own experiences of the old man in the attic. One night Lance had his girlfriend over, the old man apparently disapproved of the situation and made an appearance to her. He stood at the foot of the bed and put off an unsettling energy, enough to wake her up. When she woke up, there's this old bitter angry looking man staring at her, full apparition. She wakes up Lance who then sees the old man for himself, Idk about you but I would find that a little awkward. lol The old man made a few appearances to Lance and company, eventually the old man backed off, after all, we were not moving, at least for a while. He continued to walk up and down the stairs all the way up to the attic.
Another incident that did not involve me but happened at the house, was when Shane stayed up late after everyone went to bed, to read a book. The old man did not like that at all. Remember the pocket doors? The old man would make them shake inside the pockets because Shane was up late reading, I guess the old man didn't like it. Shane would ignore the shaking, but it only aggravated the old man who then would shake them more. Eventually Shane would acknowledge and tell the old man to knock it off and that it is his house now and would like to read in peace. Over time the doors would stop shaking.
Like I said earlier, I personally did not have much experiences here but others have, so I will tell you about some of them.
My sisters use to spend the weekends, I say use to because they no longer do lol. Every house that we had ever lived in always had some sort of paranormal activity. One weekend two of my sisters and niece came down, they all slept downstairs in the living room, with the pocket doors pulled out and closed off lol. I'm guessing the old man decided to mess with them because he kept rattling those doors and made the lights flicker. It was that night that they decided that they would never spend another night at my house.
The old man liked rattling doors and flicking lights on and off because he did that to one of Lance's friends who was over. Again the doors were pulled closed, can you guess what happened next? lol yep, they started rattling and not quite so nicely. They rattled so hard and violently that the ones that were inside were so scared that they had a hard time getting the doors to open. They were in a sense trapped in my house, yelling to get out. The old man was a dick, but he eventually caved and he learned to co-live with us. We did not bother him and he did not bother us.
Shane's mom one time needed something out of the pantry, which was off the kitchen. It did not have a door so we put up a rod with a curtain on it. She went to walk through but was stopped because as she went to walk through she ran into something solid and hard, she thought there was a person on the other side, so she said "oh, sorry, excuse me" as she was pulling the curtain aside, but no one was standing there, no one came out, there was only one way in and out and she was standing in the doorway.
Maple Street: Part III
One time we decided to go ghost hunting inside our house, it was me and my oldest daughter. We went upstairs with flashlights and phones. We just got to the top of the stairs and thought we heard something so went to investigate, as we were walking towards the noise, we saw a "mist" in front of one of the bedroom doors, it got sucked under the door and into the room. This room was the room that my brother ended up occupying for a little while. To this day, it is unexplained and was never seen by anyone else, ever.
There is a picture that was taken at the house during a birthday party. Some say it is of a little boy that apparently lived in the house and had also died. In this picture he is sitting on the main stairs, he is holding the spindles with his face pressed up against them, watching the party in the next room. I on the other hand say it is my 2nd oldest daughter sitting on the stairs watching. That part of the picture is too blurry to make out if it is her or the little boy. The little boy has been seen by some family members. They say they see him playing shy on the stairs. He will peek around the corner and once he is spotted, pulls back so he can't be seen, then peeks back around, as if he is playing peek a boo. I had never seen the boy or heard him, but I felt him.
It was early one morning on a weekend, I was just waking up, my arm was hanging off the bed. I could feel a little human hand holding my hand. I thought it was my youngest at the time, holding my hand, she would make her bed on the floor even though she had her own bedroom and bed lol. I roll over to look at her, she's not there, not even a bed made, nothing. I could feel a little hand, it was warm and definitely had a grip, but like I said, there..was..no..one..there.
One time I woke up in the middle of the night because my youngest at the time had woken up, she was 3. She was crying. When I went into her room to see why she was crying, she was not in her bed, she was standing facing the corner. She was crying hysterically, saying something, it was the same thing over and over. Unfortunately, I do not remember what she was saying, I was eventually able to "wake her up". I picked her up and carried her to my bed, that was the last time she slept in that room while we lived there. This was also the room that had the mist go under the door and the room that my brother stayed in.
Maple Street: Part IV
This next part, is something that had been ongoing for quite sometime, I was not made aware of it until we moved to Maple St. Why? because it's not your typical haunting and does not involve a ghost, it is beyond ghost.
Some years before moving to Maple St, we had lived in an apartment building. It was late at night, everyone was in bed except for Shane, who liked to stay up late reading because it was quiet. It was a summer night, the only door open was the screen door. Very little light was shining except the light from the moon. Shane said he had this weird feeling, like his stomach was in knots, something just didn't feel right. He looks up from his book and sees this little girl looking in thru the screen door, her hands were cupped around her face as she looked in. Shane tells the little girl that it is late and she needed to go home.
The little girl doesn't move, doesn't say anything. Shane gets up and starts walking towards the door, again he says, "hey,, it's late, you need to go home". This time the little girl responds and says "she's mine". Confused, he walks closer, this little girl was very pale looking, long scraggly hair and her eyes were completely black. It was then that he realized that this little girl was not a little girl, but a demon. She was apparently after me, why? I do not know. Once he realized that it wanted me, he told "her" that she couldn't have me and to leave. She told Shane that he could not protect me forever and that she would be back to get me. She then disappeared.
Fast forward some years ahead, back to Maple St. All the older kids played some type of sport in school, so we had been out to one of their away games. Lance and his dog Skippy were home by themselves.
Lance was out front on the enclosed porch. There were windows all around the porch that swung open, they were all open that night (he was out smoking a cigarette). While he was out there his stomach started feeling all twisted and gnarly, he had no explanation why. He finished up his cigarette, while sitting out there, he was looking around the neighbourhood. There were houses on either side of our house. Across the street was a church and to their right was an old school that was no longer in use other than for after school rec programs or weekend basketball games in the gymnasium. Our street was a little windy, on our end there was a curve, there was also a street lamp that highlighted that little bend in the road. As Lance was scanning the area, he sees a person walking down the centre of the street. The closer this person was getting, the worse his stomach felt. He got up and started closing all the windows making sure to lock them. He looks outside and sees that this person is a little girl. This little girl has long scraggly hair and is pale. With each step she took, his pain grew.
He quickly goes in the house, locks the door, makes sure all the curtains are closed and that the other door is locked. I mean, if I could feel what he was feeling and seeing this little girl walking towards the house, I'd be scared too lol. He looks out the front door, sees this little girl with her forehead against the plexi glass, hands cupped around her face. Yep, same little girl. She came back for me, except I was not home.
This little girl went on to play with Lance. She tapped and scraped on the windows and the side of the house. Lance had a dog who for the majority stayed by his side. When one feels threatened, scared or not comfortable, they retreat back to "their safe space", which is what Lance did, in the attic. While he was up there, this little girl could be heard scaling the outside walls, tapping on a window, running across the roof to the other side of the house, to only tap on the other window. Skippy the dog could be heard barking and whining from outside. Little did Lance know that it was the little girl messing with him to get him to open the door to let the dog in, also inviting the little girl in. Of courses Lance knew better and did not open the door, Skippy was found in the furthest corner, under a table, in the dark basement, shaking and whimpering, even he was afraid. Realizing that she wasn't getting in the house, or that I wasn't home, she left.
You ever have one of those dreams that you're not sure if it was real or not? Well I had one of those dreams. I remember waking up in the a.m, I had the heebie jeebies and the hair on the back of my neck and arms were standing up. I laid there replaying the dream in my head, it went like this.
In my dream I had woke up in the middle of the night thirsty. I had to go downstairs and grab a bottle of water, we kept the cases on the front porch (remember, it's an enclosed), they stayed cooler out there. I walk down the main set of stairs, unlock the front door and walk out on to the porch. I squat down and rip a whole in the plastic. You know how you can sometimes see things out of the corner of your eye even though you're not looking in that direction? Well, I could see something out the corner of my eye, and I knew what it was. It was the little girl. As she has done in previous visits, she pushes her face against the door, hands cupped around her face as she peers in. She has long dark scraggly hair, complete black eyes, skin a light grayish colour, she is wearing a tattered gown, not very tall at all.
I pause a second more, take a deep breath, while still squatting, I turn on my heels. Me and this little girl are basically eye to eye, nothing between us except for the plexi glass, which she could easily break. I stay as calm as I could, not showing any fear and I say out loud to her, through the door, "I don't need you, I don't want you here, leave me alone."
I stand up, turn around with water bottle in my hand, walk into the house, close and lock the door then head upstairs. Next thing I know I'm laying in bed, I wake up for real remembering my dream. All my arm hair and little tiny hairs on the back of my neck are tingly and standing.. like I have the goose bumps. I tell Shane my dream, he thinks it really did happen, subconciously. I don't know, the only thing I do know.... is that the little girl has not been back since.