Grandma's Little Haunted House

I have been reading the stories on this site for some time now and I find them all very interesting. I find myself not only on the site everyday but also that I can't wait to read the stories that have been published. I really like this site!

Let me start off by saying that I have never seen a ghost but have had a number of odd things happen to me all my life. You could say it runs in the family. My father and his sister have had things happen to them but that is for another story. This story has to do with my grandmother (my mother's mother) whom I was very close to, until we lost her to cancer last year (December, 2008) one week before Christmas. I miss her sorely and this time of year has lost some of that sparkle it once held for me... But I am getting off track.

These experiences have to do with my grandmother's house, since my grandmother past away my brother now owns it. It may sound strange writing about a house like this but I believe that there was another house/building that once stood on the land that my grandmother's house now stands.

The first experience:

My grandmother was watching TV one evening and she looked up in the hallway (which you can see from the living room) and she saw a man walking down the hallway and into one of the back rooms. She was alone in the house at the time. When I asked her what he looked like she said that he was wearing an old fashion black formal outfit (like the ones men used to wear when they would go to fancy parties back in the late part of the 19th century/early part of the 20th century). She also noted that he was also wearing a top hat. She told me that the coat the man was wearing was black and had 'tails' that hung down to the knees. She then told me that she could only see him from his knees up; she could not see his feet.

The second experience:

My grandmother was once again home alone in the house. At this point she had retired from her job (it was the early part of the 1980's). She was in the dining room when she looked up she saw a man walking from the hallway into the living room toward her. The living room and the dining room in my grandmother's house are connected. There are no walls that separate the two rooms. My grandmother was not scared she said she was just interested in what was happening (I am the same way). The man stopped a few feet from her and just looked at her and smiled. After about a minute or so he simply vanished but not before she saw what he was wearing.

When I asked her to describe him she said that he was wearing a white shirt and white pants and said he was also wearing what looked like a doctor's coat because it went to his knees. I found this interesting but what really interested me was when she said that once again, she could only see him from the knees up, no feet.

I read books on the paranormal every chance I get and found one that explained this phenomenon. It said that when a house/building is built in the area that another house/building once stood or if you raise/lower the flooring of an existing house/building and see ghosts in this way, it is because the level the flooring has been changed from what it was like in their own time. Hence, this is why you would only see a ghost from either the knees up or from the waist up, depending on how dramatic the level of the flooring has been changed. I was thinking something along the same lines, but the book confirmed it for me.

Let me also say that I believe my grandmother one hundred percent when she told me about these encounters, she was not one to make up stories. Also because my brother and I have had things happen to us in this house, but that is for another story.

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed it! Sorry about the length.