Through the years growing up in Heidal, Norway, a small town loaded with its history of powerplays of old days and encounters after death, I have heard a small share of the stories told from generations to generations.
In my first submittion " Some Kind Of A Door Was Opened That Night" I mentioned my grandmother, and the rules she made for herself regarding spirits, from the days of her youth when she lived in a house far more haunted than that of my own.
Whenever I have an encounter where there is no logical or natural explanation, where it is evident that what I experienced could not be anything but our dear ghost or some other spirit, she's the one I'll tell first.
In those moments, we are both in depth of our conversation, and I love it when she starts telling me of the things she experienced as a young girl. Even though I've heard them all many times before, they're still the best I've ever heard. The fact that not one single detail ever changes, even as the years of life takes it's toll on her memory, tells me that those are not stories she's made up. Those are memories which have made a special place for themselves. Some of these memories are downright frightening. Her ability to tell good stories is above the charts, at least in my opinion.
I would like to tell you one of these stories, where I learned of just how badass my darling grandmother was as a young girl, and I don't know which of the two impressive parts of it is the most shocking. Her reaction, or what she reacted to. I can however tell you, that even tho I'll be telling her story, I am in no way able to write it as she tells it, in terms of voice, expressions and the ' I'-perspective. " I heard, I saw "...etc. I will however try my best.
--
She lived with her siblings and her parents on an old farm a few miles further up the dirt road from where she lives today (this place has since been torn down). They were so many siblings, that whilst the others slept in the bedroom, my grandmother had her bed in the living room, where she slept alone. At least to some extent.
As the darkness of night had come and silence had fallen when the others were sound asleep, my grandmother told me she would often read a book before going to sleep herself. That is what she did this night, using a candle as nightlight.
It was quite normal for this event to happen now and then, and with her being in the living room she was quite used to it, by now. This particular time the event took place in the winter. Every now and then, she could hear footsteps in the snow outside. Calm footsteps in the dark, closing in towards the front door. Then the sound of boots kicking off snow, then the handle of the door as if someone was opening it although it remained shut.
These heavy boots walked into the hallway, and my grandmother would lay there with her book in her hands, the candlelight flickering, casting a dimmed ray of light towards the hallway, and she'd always look towards the hallway without seeing anyone. So she just sighed alittle and kept on reading as the sound of the boots had vanished, and this was usually all there was to it. Not this time.
The only sound in the room now, was the old clock in the corner, ticking away second by second, and her book as she turned the pages.
A few minutes later she decided it was time to go to sleep, so she put the book down on the nightstand. It was opened on the page she was reading, and the text laid downwards. This way she'd easily find her page again when she picked it up.
She blew out the candleflame, laid back down and pulled her covers better over herself. She was about to close her eyes, when in the corner of them, she saw her beloved book fly off the nightstand with such force that it flew several meters before landing heavily on the floor with a loud noise.
She sat up, staring at it. She couldn't see or hear anything else out of the ordinary. And this is the moment where I always crack a smile in pure admiration of her total badass reaction. See... There she was, had just witnessed her book fly several feet into the dark living room, and yet she wasn't frightened, she didn't freeze. Nope.
She simply got out of bed, walked across the old wooden floor barefooted in the dark, picked up her book, went back to bed and sat down on it. The only reaction she had to it, was being annoyed about the fact that she now had to look up her page again, which she did. Then without any further she simply laid back down and went to sleep, with who knows what kind of spirit perhaps still lingering in the living room with her.
--
If that's not badass... Then I don't know what is, and this is the woman I'm taking my advises from.
She has admitted that she's now more frightened than she used to be. Where she lives now, (also my childhood home) although haunted, it is far from as active as it was in her own childhood home, so she gotten less used to it now. Her mother was of the same sort, never flinched in the face of something supernatural like that. But she did see her mother pale-faced and refusing to utter a single word, once. It was only several years later that her mother finally told her what she had experienced that night. When grandma told me that story, I had the chills straight into my inner core.
Thank you for reading!
Loading comments....
