Moving can be stressful – especially with three kids under the age of five. But when you’re a lover of old homes, and you’re lucky enough to be the second family to own an enormous turn-of-the-century Georgian, you just pinch yourself and deal with whatever comes your way.
This amazing home included a small four room apartment. It was accessible through a separate outside entrance and a strange door in the hall of the main home. The apartment was originally used as a medical office by the doctor who built the place. He would go to work by simply slipping through the hallway door. And sadly, although the main home was in pristine condition, the apartment was now almost destroyed. The current owner, the doctor’s daughter, had rented the space to a tenant. Thanks to his cats and his cleaning habits, the apartment’s condition had deterred every buyer but me.
The day before the real estate closing, I requested permission from the owners to try and clean the apartment. They agreed, so in broad daylight, I marched into the apartment armed with Professional Grade Mr. Clean. I opened the bottle, set it in the corner, and started scrubbing every surface. As I scoured, I had the strange feeling I wasn’t alone. Hello? I called out. About 5 minutes later, just as I turned my back to the opened bottle, I heard a thump. I turned around to see the bottle on its side and Mr. Clean flowing freely on the floor.
Someone was here. I could feel it. I uprighted the bottle and asked out loud, “Are you upset I’m here?” or “Would you like me to use more Mr. Clean?” No one answered. All I could hear were the voices of people chatting on the nearby sidewalk. And although the occurrence was odd, there was nothing threatening or off-putting about the room, except of course, for the mess I had come to clean.
The next day at the closing, the entire family of the previous owner was present. The owner, now in her 90’s, had asked her children and her siblings’ children to attend. Most of the people were much older than me, but there was one fresh face.
He introduced himself as the owner’s youngest nephew, and he told me how happy he was that little kids would be living in the house again. “We’re excited to move in,” I said. “But I have a question. Is it possible there’s a ghost who is going to be living here too?”
“So no one’s told you?”he asked.
“About what?” I stammered.
“This is fabulous!” he shrieked. “Now we can document the ghost!”
The nephew explained that there was indeed a ghost in the house but he would give me no details. He wanted me to take notes for the coming year and then upon his return (the nephew visited annually for a reunion), I could tell him the stories of my encounters and possibly cast a vote regarding the specter’s true identity.
Today, it sounds like a reality TV show. “A Year with a Ghost” or “365 Days of Peril.” But then, and maybe it had to do with the nephew’s calm demeanor, it sounded completely normal. “Okay, I said. As long as you can guarantee we’re in no danger.”
“You’re in no danger,” he assured me. Then he handed me his business card and said, “Talk to you in a year!”
____
Move-in day went smoothly. The house was big compared to my previous digs so it had ample room for everything. I was even able to pack my extensive book collection into the built-ins that lined the halls upstairs.
The first night, the only thing that stood out was how far I was from my kids’ bedrooms. I wasn’t sure I’d wake up if they were calling me.
I needn’t have worried.
A few nights later, I woke to the sound of books falling in the upstairs hall. Knowing how tightly packed the books were, this was no easy feat. I got up and walked to where the books lay. That’s when I heard my daughter whimpering. I darted into her room to see she had just puked in her bed. I peeked in on the others. No one else in the house was moving. As I tended to my daughter, I kept thinking, “Who could have pulled those books?”
A month later, books fell again. This time closer to my oldest son’s room. He was on the floor frustrated, trying to reach a favorite stuffie that had gotten wedged behind the headboard. I freed it, handed it to him, and he climbed back into bed.
On my way back to my room, I stopped to put away the books. I had to reach on my tiptoes and push hard to get them into place.
In the coming months, there were more book instances, always tied to the kids needing something. What was even stranger was after falling and suffering a painful bone break, I would hear pacing outside my doorway when I was resting and the only one home. The pacing was never threatening. To be honest it was comforting, like someone was on watch, and that I was not alone.
A year passed, and I invited the former owner’s nephew back. “So tell me,” he said eagerly. “Who is the ghost?”
“It’s your grandfather, the doctor,” I said. When he asked for my reasoning I retold him my encounters, saying “this ghost is a committed caretaker.”
The nephew was delighted. “Right you are!” he gasped. “I used to see him all the time!”
“See him!” I shrieked. I was so grateful I hadn’t laid eyes on him. Hearing the books and the footsteps were enough.
The nephew then told me how his grandfather passed in his early 50s. He had gone to the hospital for surgery, got an infection while in hospital, and then died unexpectedly. The family was devastated. The doctor was so kind that much of his work was done for barter. That meant without him, there was nothing coming in and little savings to pull from.
Even sadder, the nephew told me that his own father, a young boy living in the house at the time, had made a present for his dad (the doctor) when he went in for his surgery. Downstairs in a room that had served as the doctor’s pharmacy, there was a neat work bench with a medical badge on it. “My dad took this medallion off an old medical bag and put it here to make a special workspace for my grandfather,” he said. “Of course, he never got to see it.”
The sadness was so heavy at this point, I was afraid to speak. They say when people die with unfinished business, they’re compelled to hang around. Clearly the doctor wasn’t ready to leave. His family relied on him, loved him and needed him.
___
Our ghost, the doctor, stood watch at the house for the next few years. When relocation prompted my selling of the property, I excitedly told the new owners about my supernatural friend. They were not amused. They sternly requested that I never speak of it publicly, stating the negative vibes would certainly devalue their new investment.
How strange I thought. Negative vibes? The entire time living in that home I never had a bad thought about my ghost protector. And that was even after he spilled the Mr. Clean.
