Sometimes I wonder, when people will say without batting an eye, that a place is not haunted. I'm curious, is there actually a way to prove that a place is not haunted? Going somewhere, walking around, and not seeing anything, doesn't really seem like proof of non-existence.
I'm not trying to be flip about this either. How do they actually know, there is nothing there? I would think that you would first have to quantify what exactly hauntings are. Not speculation, or option, but facts, specifications, hard data, and details on the mechanics of how such things work.
Then you would need a way of being able to measure an area, at a given moment. If it matched, then you could then say the place was haunted. Plus if you are looking for something a little more scientific you would keep measuring the location until you had multiple events. Then you would also want to make sure that nothing you were doing, nor environmental factors, and such were tampering your results.
If it did not match you could say that the location was not haunted at that given moment. Yet, that given moment is not enough proof itself to say location is not haunted, nor to say that it has never been haunted, and certainly not enough to say that it never will be haunted.
Now if you can prove that the reports for a location are a hoax or a lie, and can prove it. Well, then you have something that will make you look good, depending on what type of person you are. Even proving that legends are not true, still would not be enough to prove the place is not haunted. They may go far to kill the legends though.
To me it just seems like no matter how hard it is to prove a place is truly haunted. It is going to be even harder if not impossible to prove that it is not haunted.
For me, I personally believe in ghosts. I've had some good experiences, and I've had some bad ones, regarding those who where dead at the time. Some have been as simple as dreams. Some have been things throwing themselves to the ground and shattering, even though no one alive or visible touched them. No, there was not an earthquake, the floor was not shaking. It's happened a few times now, and said items were securely sitting on the surfaces right before they "flew".
There was one time on my birthday a few years ago, where I was at Hastings. I had found a couple of books, I was at the checkout line, my mother was there too. Some guy comes out of nowhere, starts talking to me, and is only a few inches from me. He's really creeping me out, asking me questions about the books. I give a few quick answers, then it's my turn to pay, so I quickly pay, and quickly start to exit the store. I don't look back, and then my mom is asking me who was that weirdo, I tell her who it was, because by then I had enough time to calm down enough to realize who it was.
It was my ex-fiancé's, dead fiancée, who had died five months before then. Right there "in the flesh", talking to me, and creeping me out, for others to see as well. One interesting side point is that I had a dream on the day he was dying. I was sitting in the backseat of his car, behind him, and he was saying something to his fiancé, then he stops, turns towards me, and screams at the top of his lungs at me, very angry, that he never wants to see me again. No one at that time knew he was dying/dead, not his family, not his friends, no one. I found out several days after the dream.
Also keep in mind, the Hastings part of my story here, was not a dream, and other people saw him. I guess he wanted to see me again after all. I sure as hell, never want to see him again though.
When stressful, strange or non-normal events happen, it seems that we either bury them away in the back of our mind, or we create explanations that make us feel less scared, but don't actually match the facts. I don't think I could tell you how many times I reviewed my memories of those events, and even asked my mother how she remembered it. Just to make sure that it really happened, and that I remembered it correctly.
I think for a lot of people, it's just easier to pretend that nothing happened, and those type of things just don't exist. Rather than dealing with it. It's easy to make fun of people, it's easy to call people liars, it's easy to make blanket statements about something, when you have no facts, and it's easy to go along with the status quo.
Yes people make stuff up to scare each other at camp fires, or to get little kids to behave, yes history can get warped as it's told, and retold, from person to person, and from generation to generation. Real events can be exaggerated. Some people have beliefs that prevent them from being able to believe something, even if they see it. While other people's beliefs might tell them that all things unknown and scary are evil. And then finally some people are liars and hoaxers. Yet with all of that making the facts sometimes muddy and other times incorrect. That does not make it all invalid, nor does it prevent some of the incorrect events from being partially true. The true answer will rarely be a plain and simple NO.
I actually don't expect that many people will believe the events that I wrote about myself here, even though they are true. That's just how these type of accounts are treated. I partially put them here, so that the frequent readers of the site would know a little more about me, that is also on topic to the subject matter of the blog. That I'm a real person, that this stuff happens to me too. Not every moment, mind you. I don't think every noise in my house is a ghost, nor do I think every light I see in the sky is a UFO. I know that people are experiencing extraordinary events from time to time. I've always been highly interested in this type of stuff. I wanted to give people a place, where they could discuss the strangeness of life.
The other reason, that I posted what I did about myself, is an experiment. I won't say anymore about that, and will just see what happens.
One other tidbit before I post this. I think that in general science is good, but I also tend to think that scientists have not discovered all principals and laws, nor have all of their theories been proved.
My point here is that if you believe that all things are explainable, I'm not going to disagree with that idea, but I would also add to that, that it's my belief that we do not currently have the tools or collective knowledge, at least yet. To be able to come together and explain everything out there, and also have it be completely correct.
With that said, I think that it is safe and fair to use to terms unexplained, unknown, unidentified, and unexplainable. I'm not saying it's a good idea to stamp everything with these terms, it would be nice to see the "paranormal" become "legit" before I get to old to care anymore. And have it stop being the butt of the joke, with idiotic music at the end of the news casts.
I don't think we need everything to be explained at this point. You have to be able to talk about it before you can begin to understand it. Do you honestly think that everyone, understands all of the things they about around the dinner table, nightly? I really doubt it.
That's why I don't feel like it's my duty at all to have people somehow prove their stories. I assume that a lot of the people who share their experiences are telling it the way they saw it, and the way they remember it. I'm very honored that people do come here, and share their stories with you, and I. It takes a lot of guts for them to do that, there is still a lot of stigma, and ridicule towards people who come forward, to their friends, family, and coworkers. I deeply respect them for that.
At one time I thought I would use this site, to go out and look for evidence of ghosts, and other such things. Then share what I found. There is already plenty of that out there. I think it's much more important that this site, is a place for the people, to come together, share, learn, and become aware of these encounters. I think thousands of other peoples accounts is far more believable, and far more powerful as a whole, than anything I could go out there, find on my own, and bring back for everyone else.
I'm happy to entertain the idea of going out there and checking things out from time to time. I'm sure there are already billions of people on this planet that already have stories to share. To me that's the most interesting, and the most valuable aspect of it all.
Good night folks,
Have a great holiday.
Loui Zoot