Hauntings and Spooky Things

Can't believe I'm actually writing about hauntings and it's nowhere NEAR Halloween but we're going through a little thing here at house and I figured I'd get it off my mind. During the last school year, my daughter (who is a college student) told me that she believed her apartment was haunted. Her little dog acted weird at odd times...staring at her closet door. Seemed harmless enough but when she told me she'd gotten into the habit of stacking things up in front of her closet door only to find the door open the next morning and all the pillows moved away, I started to worry a little bit.

Now we've never had anything weird happen here at our house until recently. No spooky feelings of being 'watched' etc. but I'd begun to notice small things when my daughter came to visit. We have an alarm system and little boxes are on the ceilings in various rooms (motion detectors) that feature a red light when the alarm is engaged. I'd noticed that when she is home, that the box with the light in her bedroom blinks like crazy. Didn't get TOO alarmed except those little lights don't blink anywhere else in the house. She is now home for summer break and things are getting too crazy for comfort around here.

For the past couple of months my husbands computer turns on (all by itself) every Thursday at 2 pm. Very odd. I talked to my computer guys and they just kinda gave me a funny  'look' about all that. Computers don't turn on by themselves, do they? Someone actually has to push the 'on' button. Right? Around the first of June, my husband was attending a conference out of town so it was just my daughter and I hanging out at home. We had a habit of having 'movie night' in our family room so one evening we are huddled in there chilling out. We weren't watching anything especially scary or suspenseful, nothing that would cause our imaginations to overreact. My daughter heads across the house where we have a master bedroom, my husband's office and an extra bathroom in the hall. She suddenly calls out...Mom, Dad's computer is on.

Hey, it wasn't Thursday afternoon but Thursday night so that was new. I got up to head that way when she came around the corner with her eyes BIG. Mom, she said, the bathroom light turned on all by itself as I walked past. Okaaaaay. I say, did you turn it off. She said, yes, she did but she was freaked out and could I go turn off the computer. A chill raced over me because my daughter isn't prone to dramatics. I believed her. Totally.

I headed across the house and notice a light on in the master bedroom. Weird. She'd said a light was on in the hall bathroom but she'd turned it off. So I got about halfway across the living room and hollered at her. Hey! Did you say the hall bathroom or the master bedroom? She  replied it was the hall bathroom. Hmmmm. I turned off that light and felt a very creepy vibe. I'm not prone to hysterics either. A very sensible woman mostly. So I go back into the family room and my daughter and I discuss the weirdness with the lights. I said, aw, it's probably some strange glitch with the electricity. I think at this point I was lying through my teeth because the air felt 'off'. I didn't want my daughter scared though so I tried to be chill about everything. Finally, I get up and head into the kitchen and what do I see? The HALL light is on now. We hadn't left the family room, hadn't touched a thing. The office light is on too and my husband's computer is ON. Again!

I told my daughter I'd 'had enough of this shit' and go into my husband's office to deal with the computer. The lights were all on as I sat in the chair and looked around. Finally I said. "You are NOT welcome here. You are scaring us and you have to LEAVE." Can't describe the sensation that poured over me. My skin tingled, hair stood on end and my heart-rate accelerated. I KNEW something was there. Later when my husband called to check in and see how we were, I told him what was going on. He got really quiet and I knew, since he's not a dramatic guy, nor one who believes in ghosts and such, that he was mullling this over. In the end, my daughter and I, armed with a baseball bat and tennis racket headed through the house and into each closet, flipping on lights and checking things. Nothing. The house was empty except for two scared women, a cat and a dog. That was some time ago and nothing quite that dramatic has happened except with bizarre 'pops' in the air and the sensation that we are not alone.

A few days ago I talked with a friend who is 'connected' with this sort of thing. She offered advice on how to deal with this 'thing' that is hovering around. Looking for sage to burn and thinking seriously of ringing the perimeters of the house with salt. Anyone else have experiences like this?

In other news:
Return of the Daredevil (a sequel to Return to Delight) has been contracted by Ellora's Cave. I'm awaiting edits and a release date and a few days ago, I got the cover. I'm sharing it here.