Some teenagers think it's fun or cool to go traipsing around disrespectfully in cemeteries on Halloween. If you've considered such an outing, consider too that you might be disturbing those who rest there... and something might even follow you home.
A 17-year-old British girl made that mistake. It wasn't Halloween, but the Spring of 1978 when a girl, identified only as Miss A by the Society of Psychical Research, and several of her friends decided to make their way through a local graveyard, trampling graves as they laughed and joked. Only Miss A and her family was to pay the price for that prank, however. Several nights later, Miss A awoke to see the apparition of an old woman sitting in a chair near her bed. The spirit was not transparent, and Miss A did not sense any harm from it.
In the morning, she wrote off the experience as a weird dream.
But it wasn't. For several weeks following, Miss A repeatedly saw the ghost of the old woman - sometimes in broad daylight. It would follow Miss A from room to room, hovering less than a foot above the floor. At times it watched Miss A's every move, following her, and would freeze in place whenever she turned to confront it. And soon the encounters became more threatening.
While making tea one day, she felt an unseen force grab the tea kettle - filled with boiling water - and twist it in her hands. Miss A felt that the entity was trying to scald her. Finally, Miss A told her mother of these bizarre experiences. Mrs. A was skeptical at first - until she too saw the old woman drift across the downstairs hall and disappear into a room. The entity continued to make its presence felt. On one occasion it wrenched the vacuum cleaner from Mrs. A's hands. It would sometimes push or pull against doors that family members were trying to open or close. Miss A's father - the most diehard skeptic of the group - was even forced to believe when loud rapping noises awakened the entire household, and later when he could not explain water incessantly dripping from the kitchen ceiling. A plumber could find no leak.
The poltergeist activity escalated. Loud banging, unexplained snoring sounds, objects moved about. Then, it seemed, the entity attempted to make its identity known. Miss A was sitting with her father one day when she suddenly fell into a trance. She began to speak of another life - as the daughter of a French doctor in the 1800s. After this incident, Miss A's behavior changed noticeably and she appeared to be endowed with unexplained psychic powers: she could bend the tines of a fork just by brushing them with her fingers. Doctors and other investigators could find no rational explanation for what was happening to the A family. But they could endure no more. Miss A and her family moved out of their home of 11 years.
But the ghost was to give Miss A one last life-threatening scare. Out of a nagging curiosity, Miss A returned to the empty house one day. She found the back door broken and open. She went in. She picked up the telephone to see if it was working. Suddenly, something grabbed her by the throat. Icy, unseen fingers had grabbed Miss A by the neck and were choking her. Terrified, she managed to pull herself away and ran out the front door. Needless to say, she never returned.
Subject: THE OLD WOMAN HAUNTING 
Mon Dec 31, 2007 6:55 am
