Ghosts In The Spare Room

Boogeyman and I are having a terrific and spirited debate today over at my book review blog. Who'd think a review of the Costello Memoirs would end in a show of metaphysic aggression? But he did make me think of things other-worldly, and so I present this little tale.

I live in a 3 bedroom house. One of the spare rooms makes me feel odd. From the very first time I went in there, I felt, well, a little uneasy... as if there was something or someone else in there. I didn't feel threatened, just, I dunno, aware of something unseen being in the room with me. The feeling has never dissipated. Likely theory - the first time I went in there, something happened physiologically with me and now my mind and/or body relates that room to how I felt that first time, and thus, like muscle memory, every time I go in there I have the same reaction. But, for the sake of this tale, let me thrown that theory out the window.

Hot German Chick, mentioned in my previous blog, is a new-age freak. We fought and fought over new-age spiritualism. She was all astrology and Tarot and Wiccan and 'it was meant to be' and the 'cosmos' design' and it shat me up the wall.

She lived in that spare room for 4 months last summer. When she first walked in the room, she was in there for no more than five seconds before she stopped in her tracks and said, "Whoa! There's three ghosts that live in here."

"What?" I said.

She stood silent for a bit, then said to me, "It's okay. They are not harmful. They think you are okay, and they are fine with me stayting here. They are angry, but not with you."

If I hadn't have already felt a 'presence' in that room, I would have kicked her out immediately for being a freak. But, as it was, I said to her, "You know, I've always felt like I was being watched in here."

She said, "Yes, whoever comes in here is watched."

*

Now. Stick with me. The question I ask is not, "Are there ghosts in my spare room?", because I have other questions.

First, what is a ghost? It is a mainstream belief that ghosts, should they exist, are the souls of dead people. Allow me to tweak that theory slightly and call them 'remnants' so as to keep us all happy.

Secondly, and here's my big question, the one that even Hot German Chick coluld not answer properly... "Is a ghost sentient?" That is, does a ghost know that it exists?

I am atheism's number one ticket holder, but yet, conversely, I think there is the remnants of something in my spare room. The fact there is something in there was independantly verified by a Hot German Chick. So what the fuck is it?

Here's my two bob. There is the remnants of something, or someone, in my spare room. My sub-conscious detects it, as does hers. Because we cannot grasp what it is, because it exists on a plane we cannot grasp, my brain translates it into something I can recognise - the feeling of being watched - and something the German recognises... human form.

Voila, ghosts.

I am prepared to say unequivocally that my spare room is haunted by a ghost or ghosts. I am also prepred to say unequivocally that the ghosts do not know they exist, but rather, my own brain conjures them up to let me know that in that room lays the remnants of something or someone or some event that is somehow relevant to or essential to the design and layout and history of the spare room.

I have no proof of this obviously. Boogeyman will potentially use this as a way of saying that I should go easier on the religious, but I don't care about how much I have exposed my arguments against the existence of anything eternal and sentient as being weak.

But I offer this:

* I am moved by some presence in my spare room.

* I am also moved by the full moon casting a ray across the ocean.

* I don't think the moon-ray knows it exists.

* Then why should I be convinced that the ghost in my spare room knows it exists?

**

Any ghost stories or opinions here?