Bide One’s Time: Ghostly Encounter

One of the most intriguing aspects of touching the unknown is coming into contact with a ghost in an old deserted building. I refer to those old buildings that once held a thriving business, and are now long vacant. Deserted? No, not always!

I recall as a nine-year-old child encountering a ghost in an old Missouri red brick building during the 1950s. It was the ghost of a woman, and she was there but she was not there. She faded in and faded out.

But her clothes were definitely Edwardian and she was in her youth. I could not decide whether she was a blonde or a redhead. That was the outstanding feature about her, for her facial appearance remained a mystery, something that shifted in content and depth. I did not know if the face was pretty, plain, or otherwise because it always shifted during those brief moments I tried to see it. I remember she carried a pearl hand purse.

I recall being with my Uncle Willard who also saw the ghost. He smiled and told me the building had a long history of being haunted. Ten years later the building would be destroyed and I wonder if that ghost still walks its route on a parking lot complex!

To touch something like this by way of seeing it, and registering its exhistance by simply acknowledging the presence, is a direct way of touching the unknown and making it uniquely your own. It is an experience to savor and remember.

Too often people allow such instances to pass them by, too quickly dismissed as a quirk of the imagination. Pause, think, relax, take time to enjoy such moments as they come to you wherever and whenever you happen to be in such a location. 

The world is full of ghosts. Each one is different. Each one has a different reason for being where it is at a given moment in time. Enjoy that moment in time with them, if you wish!