Who You Gonna Call?

Do you believe in ghosts? I have mixed feelings about it. On the one hand, if so many people throughout time have experienced supernatural or unexplainable phenomena, they can’t all be making it up, can they? We have whole television shows and film genres devoted to ghosts, not to mention a field of pseudo science. And don’t forget the Ghostbusters. Most of us have had one of those unusual sort of feelings that can’t be explained rationally, or at the very least known someone who was related to someone who felt a presence or saw something or lived in a house where something may or may not have occurred. It all sounds so vague because of its very nature; none of it can be explained rationally.

On the other hand, though, seriously? Just because we had Casper comic books and watched Scooby Doo doesn’t mean we should believe that ghosts are real. Or does it?

Cue the eerie music.

My older daughter, E, has had a sixth sense sort of thing ever since she was a baby. It’s not so much she could see things as sense something that would make her uncomfortable in some way. On her second Thanksgiving, for example, we went to an old inn in North Carolina for our holiday meal. Every time we took her in one room in the inn, the one with the buffet tables, she would freak out baby style, which involved lots of screaming  and crying and pushing in an attempt to get us to haul her out of that space. Once outside, she would  immediately calm down like nothing ever happened. Which would make us think she was ready to go back in and eat, until we would walk back in the buffet room, when the process would start all over. It wasn’t a fun Thanksgiving, but at least we didn’t overeat.

Another time when she was a toddler, I had taken her to see some goats at an old farm. We walked the property, went into the farmhouse, and avoided the goat pellets while petting the goats, but the minute we stepped foot inside the dairy barn, E freaked out and had to be carried outside, where almost instantly, she behaved completely normal.

E is now twelve. A few months ago, she asked me, “Mom, do you ever get the feeling that something happened in a building? You know, like the old homes in Charleston? Do you ever go inside and feel like something bad happened there, somebody died or something?”

I smiled knowingly. “Oh, that?” I said. “You’ve been doing that since you were a baby.”

Now, before you think my child sees dead people, you need to know something about my family. We value rational, scientific thought very highly in our home. We believe in the power of logic and the ability to explain things. We employ critical thinking skills and do not believe in much that cannot be proven or demonstrated. That being said, I still allow for the possibility of the supernatural and the inexplicable. I don’t think that Big Foot is real, but at the same token, it seems sort of self-important of us Earthlings to think that in all the vast universe, we are the only living creatures.  You get where I am going with this, right?

Last week, we vacationed in the low country of South Carolina. We spent our last day before driving home exploring Beaufort and the barrier islands nearby, finishing the day with a stop at Hunting Island State Park. We had never been there before, but they have the only lighthouse in the state that allows visitors to explore inside and climb to the top. The whole family thought that sounded cool.

But it wasn’t cool. With the heat index, it was over a hundred degrees that day. The lighthouse, built in 1873, is constructed of cast iron, with a brick interior. It has 168 steps to the top, and maybe four windows that open. There was nothing cool about it. We paid our admission fee and started the climb to the top. It was a fascinating structure, full of romance and history. As I walked those spiraling stairs, I couldn’t help but think about what it would be like to live on the island alone, to wear a hot as hell lighthouse keeper’s uniform, making sure that I protected the ships along the shore in my lonely existence.

We reached the top and enjoyed as much of the view as we could without getting queasy looking down. E has a decent fear of heights, and after creeping along with her back to the wall of the top of the lighthouse, she was ready to begin the descent. I decided to join her since I looked too far down and had that weak in the knees feeling, although it might have been worse due to the heat.

We walked down the stairs, and with each landing, I was covered in more sweat. Not a dewy, lady like glistening sweat, but more like a Gatorade commercial, or a maybe a hose under my hair had sprung a leak. Sweat was pouring down my face, my back, between my boobs, my butt cheeks. If there was a crevice anywhere on my body, it had become a flash flood zone. I decided to stop and take a rest on the next landing, only a few levels from the bottom.

“Mom, are you alright?” E asked me.

I looked at her, and said, “Watch out. You are going to walk into that woman.” I meant the woman behind her. She had blond hair tucked in a bun, and she was wearing a long cream colored skirt, almost down to the floor. She looked like she was about to walk right into my daughter, as if each didn't know the other was there.

“What woman?” E said.

 She was right. It was just the two of us on that landing. It was just the two of us walking down the stairs as well. My husband and younger daughter were still at the top of the lighthouse, and we had not passed any other tourists on the way down. What I saw was a woman who almost walked into my daughter, a woman that was clearly not there.

My rational mind tells me what I choose to believe. I was overheated. The lighthouse was an oven. I hallucinated.  I imagined I saw a woman standing beside my daughter. My not right mind tells me otherwise. E did not see a woman, but she does confirm that I asked about one and that I was convinced there was a person next to her. I am a little scared to ask if she felt  a rush of cold air or any movement near her at the same time. I don’t want to put ideas in her head, and I also don’t want to know the answer because it would screw with my hallucination theory.

You can believe what you want to believe. I am not claiming I saw a ghost. I’m also not denying it. But I will say this: don’t climb a cast iron lighthouse on a hundred degree day. It’s fucking hot.