Author Archives: Megan Angulo

Ghosts in the Attic

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Mission Hills, Kansas
Performance Date: April 2nd, 2015
Primary Language: English

The informant is a 20 year old girl and also my current roommate. I have always been aware of her belief in ghosts, and in this interview, I asked her to tell me about her experience with ghosts in her home. She currently resides in Mission Hills, Kansas in a home built back in the 1800s. Her home is right on the border of Kansas and Missouri.

Me: Can you tell me about the ghosts in your house.

Informant: *Thinking* I don’t know where to begin…okay…So… I moved upstairs into my sister’s room. It’s third story of my house, and it is right next to the attic. When we first moved in, there was this really creepy closet that had all of these… like… graffiti markings around it. There were these rules in it, that said ‘no breathing’ ‘no eating’ ‘no sleeping’. Really creepy stuff. But a teenager lived there before we got there so we were like ‘okay whatever this is really creepy. This teenage is on crack or something’ and didn’t think anything of it. But I moved upstairs. I have always been really kind of scared of it. And my sisters all left so it was just me living upstairs on the third floor and I would always hear things at night, but I never really thought anything of it. I would hear footsteps up and down my hall… Didn’t think anything of it. And then it got to a point where my mom was finding underwear with the crotch eaten out of it… really freaky stuff. We found out we had a rat problem. But besides the point, we got rid of those and I was still hearing footsteps down the hallway and stuff. Then finally, one day, I was sleeping and I heard purring. Like a cat in my ear. And I was like ‘okay I am not making this up.’ Shot up in my bed and there was a bat flying in circles around my bed. So I screamed and ran out! We caught the bat and it was fine, whatever. Then, after 2 weeks of me being afraid of my upstairs, I went back to sleep in my room and I was sleeping and I felt something slapping both of my cheecks. I opened my eyes and it was another bat. And it had landed on my face. So, swatted that away, but we could not find it. I had to get a series of rabies shots. Wasn’t fun. Then, after that, I continued on, kind of got used to the shadows and footsteps in my hall. Then one night, I was not feeling well and I was home alone so I slept in my parent’s bed and I had my best friend sleep in my bed. But she left at 6am that morning, and I had no idea why. She didn’t talk to me for like 2 days and then finally called me and was like ‘did I ever tell you what happened to me at your house?’ and I was like ‘no what happened?’ and she said she was laying in my bed, she heard a big thud on the wall behind her from the attic, and she shot up to see what it was. Didn’t see anything, laid back down and then heard someone sprint down the hallway. She shot up and there was a man at the end of my bed, staring down at her. She screamed and he disappeared into thin air. She went underneath the covers and did not sleep for the rest of the night and left as soon as the sun came up.

We always tell these stories as jokes, just being like ‘oh yeah there is a ghost on my floor’ but now we are serious because Audrey first hand saw it. We told my friends, and they all told us we were full of shit. Even one of my friends who dose not take to this stuff was like ‘no way you are so full of shit.’ Really did not believe me. I had a huge group sleep over on prom night and she, my friend Madison who doesn’t believe in any of this stuff, was like, ‘I never wanted to tell you this, because I don’t believe in this stuff, but I saw him standing by the pool table on prom night. I didn’t believe it until the next morning when I walked over to the pool table to see what was making that weird shadow, and there was nothing there.  So it had to have been him.’  Ever since, I always say I swear there is a ghost there. I think he is friendly. I think he just lost his way, but he is nice. I think he is just protective. I just think he isn’t happy with strangers sleeping in my house.

My analysis:  Similarly to the other informant I interviewed about ghosts, this informant also believes that they mean no harm.  Both women have views of ghosts being very docile and simply lost.  I would say that this story is an example of a memorate. The informant had it in her head that there were ghosts in her house, so when her friend came to sleep over and heard weird noises/saw a shadow, she immediately jumped to use this as evidence of their being a ghost. In reality, it could have been a dream, or a shadow from a tree, but instead the informant deemed it as the ghost. From there, what was initially just a joke became real.

Pre-Game Prayer

Nationality: American
Age: 14
Occupation: Student
Residence: Morris Plains, NJ
Performance Date: April 22, 2015
Primary Language: English

The informant is a 14 year old male living in New Jersey.  He goes to a Catholic Middle School. I asked the informant if there were any special rituals that his hockey team did, be it around game time, practice, traveling, etc. He told me about the ritual that happens before every game. It involves the Monsignor conducting a prayer.  It is exactly the same every time, and it unfolds as follows.

Monsignor:

Our Father,
Who art in heaven,
hallowed be Thy name;
Thy kingdom come;
Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread;
and forgive us our trespasses
as we forgive those who trespass against us;
and lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

Team:

Amen.

Monsignor:

Elizabeth Ann Seton [saint after which the school is named]

Team:

Pray for us

Monsignor:

Our lady, queen of victory

Team:

Pray for us

The informant described this as a “school thing.” After the Monsignor leaves, the team chants “All right Hall!” The Monsignor tries to go to every single sports team before their game to do this prayer. It is a practice across all sports teams at the school.

I asked the informant why he thinks they do this before every game and he responded, “to ask god to be with us during the game. So that we will win. It didn’t really work out for us, but is is a catholic school soooo…”

My analysis:  Nowhere in the bible is it mandated that before every sports game, teams must pray for guidance or else they will lose.  My interpretation is that, at this point, the team says the words and follows the Monsignor without actually believing that the prayer is going to have any effect on their performance.  They do not leave every game they lose blaming God for not listening to their prayer. My guess is, though, that if they won, they would attribute part of it to the prayer. This being because God is viewed as bearing good, not bad.  Furthermore,  when things go our way, and we want to continue for them to do so, we try to perform every action exactly the way we did when it went well. While winning a game would mean trusting in the power of the prayer, losing a game, does not constitute changing or getting rid of the prayer…

Middle School Nicknames

Nationality: American
Age: 14
Occupation: Student
Residence: Morris Plains, New Jersey
Performance Date: April 22, 2015
Primary Language: English

The informant is a 14 year old male living in New Jersey. I asked by the informant about any jokes that are told between him and his friends, anything that makes sense amongst them but not necessarily to other people.  Following is the transcribed conversation talking about some of the nicknames the boys have for each other.

Informant: We call my friend Zach “roast beef Reda”

Me: What is reda?

Informant: Reda is his last name.

Me: Why do you call him “roast beef Reda?”

Informant: Because we have a theory that he doesn’t brush his teeth and there are little bits of roast beef in his teeth from the week before.

Me: Great. When did you start calling him this?

Informant: We started calling him it a year ago and pretty much always call him that.

Me: Does everyone call him by this nickname or only his close friends

Informant: Only close friends call him that.

Me: Why do you guys still use this nickname?

Informant: It gives us a reason to laugh in school.

Me: Okay. Are there any other people you have weird nicknames for?

Informant: This kid named Zach Crowe. We call him snack Crowe.

Me: Why?

Informant: Because he is really small and used to have to go to the nurse to eat a snack in the middle of the day. We don’t know why he has to do that, but he stopped having to go half way through the year. We still call him snack Crowe, though.

Me: Do your friends like these nicknames? Like are they offended by them or do they not care?

Informant: They don’t care that we call them those names because its been a while, but initially they were kinda annoyed.

My analysis: Common practice among middle school aged kids to make fun of each other and use “inside jokes” as a social interaction.  Middle school is an awkward, transitional period, and making jokes about seemingly insignificant things is a way of showing what group you are a part of and which people are your friends.  In this case, the boys took two seemingly meaningless things and blew them out of proportion to the point where they were humorous.   To other people, these nicknames are not really that funny or relevant, but that is precisely what makes them significant to the boys.

Pasta on Sundays

Nationality: Italian/German/American
Age: 50
Occupation: Physical Therapist
Residence: Morris Plains, NJ
Performance Date: April 22, 2015
Primary Language: English

The informant is a 50 year old woman. She is married, the mother of 3, and currently living in New Jersey. Her mother is Sicilian, and she told me about a weekly, Italian tradition that she partook in growing up.

This informant first remembers this tradition starting when she was in kindergarden. It consists of the informant, her 2 sisters, mother and father all eating a large pasta dish together every Sunday.  They would always eat at noon, right after coming home from church.  It was a special sauce made by the informant’s mom.  Her mom would always make the sauce the day before in preparation. The 3 daughters would help with setting the table. They would always say a prayer before eating.  This lunch was the main meal of the day.  Dinner later would consist of meatball sandwiches made with the leftover food from lunch. The informant described it as an “Italian thing.” She said that usually Italians would do a full, 5 course meal with antipasto, spaghetti and other foods and have a full day of eating. She said that her and her family adapted it, though, to only do the pasta part. She started remembering this tradition when she was in kindergarden, and it continued until she moved out of the house for college, so she participated for around 17 years.

My analysis: There is obviously no mandated law in Italy that everyone must eat pasta on Sundays, yet I have a number of Italian friends who do so.  Sunday is highly regarded as a holy day because in the bible, it was on the 7th day that God rested after creating the world.  This tradition most likely stems from people resting and eating on Sundays. Italy has always been a heavily Christian country, so the practice of relaxing and eating on sundays most likely started as a biblical practice that has now lost its religious aspect and is simply a remnant of the original practice. Italy is also known for its pasta, so it makes sense that the food being consumed is centered around a pasta dish.

The Manners Dance

Nationality: Italian/German/American
Age: 50
Occupation: Physical Therapist
Residence: Morris Plains, NJ
Performance Date: April 29, 2015
Primary Language: English

The informant is a 50 year old, mother of 3 living in New Jersey. I witnessed this piece of folklore at her house, in the kitchen. The piece is a dance performed by the informant whenever her children use good manners.

The lyrics are simply “the manners dance, the manners dance, mommy loves good manners” and accompanied by a jig, of sorts. There is a lot of arm shanking and hip swinging. As the kids got older though, a jumping air guitar move was added. The dance would be performed whenever one of the informant’s kids, or the friends they had over, would spontaneously use good manners. It caught on to the point that whenever the kid’s friends would be over, they would get mad at the informant if she did not do the manners dance. The informant started performing this dance when her kids were age 2 or 3 and consistently did it until they were 11 or 12. Although the kids are now 14 and 15, the dance will still spontaneously occur, though not with the same frequency. The informant stated “I would get excited when they used good manners, and it evolved to dancing. Now I have to beg for good manners.”

My analysis: I know of parents who do different versions of a “manners dance” in order to entice their children to listen.  Respect and manners are two things important in Western culture, but so is getting rewarded for doing good.  The fact that the children expect a reward when using good manners, rather than do it because it is what is expected, is the aspect of the manners dance that I find most interesting. The necessity of a manners dance in the first place is a thought provoking concept.