Tag Archives: ghost story

The Lady with the Pearl Necklace

Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Performance Date: 3/31/2024

Text:

“My mom told me a story about when she saw a ghost/dead person before, she said that she was walking down the street with her cousin, and then she saw this woman and she had a pearl necklace. The lady was like ‘oh would you like to buy this from me?’ and she said ‘oh I can’t buy the necklace let me go just tell my mom and see if she has any money’. Then the lady was like ‘no just like, like you can have it, you can have it you don’t have to pay for it I just want you to have the necklace’ and my mom said ‘ no no I can’t take it for free let me go see’. So then my mom remembers that this like elder lady had a green sweater on. Then she goes back into her house and there were a bunch of people surrounding her dining room table and she was very confused so she goes in and she’s like ‘oh mom this one lady like she was asking me to buy her pearl necklace, can I have some money to give to her?’ and then her mom was like ‘oh what did she look like, who was this woman, have you ever seen her before?’ and my mom was like ‘no I haven’t seen her’ so then my grandma was like ‘okay what did she look like’. My mom starts describing this woman and telling her like that she had a green sweater on and then the entire room goes silent, and just goes quiet, and they’re like ‘okay go to the other room’ and then my mom was like ‘okay that was weird’ so then she goes to the other room but stays near the door. Then my grandma was telling her sister that the woman that my mom had described had just been like, they had just had her funeral mass. Like the woman was dead and they were going to put her body in the ground and my mom was freaked out and she got chills and everything and then they never saw the woman again, obviously, because she had died.”

Context:

M is a 19 year old student from a town right outside of Chicago, IL, and she explained to me a ghost story that her mother told her about when she was younger. M explained that her mother grew up ‘not wealthy’ which is contextual to the story where she declines to buy the necklace, as this was when she was younger. M’s mother grew up in a small town in Mexico, El Sauz, Guanajuato. She thinks that this was around October when she was very young, probably about 9 or so. Although her mom experienced this and fully remembers it, M doesn’t think her mom fully believes in ghosts. M also doesn’t fully believe in ghosts herself, she thinks she would first try to explain a situation with logic and reasoning, before fully believing that it was a spirit.

Analysis:

M’s ghost story reflects a complex interplay of personal beliefs, cultural narratives, and family dynamics. It highlights the enduring significance of folklore and tradition in shaping individuals’ perceptions of the supernatural, while also underscoring the human capacity for skepticism and rational inquiry in the face of mysterious encounters. It encapsulates the tension between belief in the supernatural and skepticism. While M’s mother experienced a seemingly paranormal encounter, both she and M approach the story with a degree of skepticism. M’s mother’s hesitation to accept the pearl necklace for free and her subsequent confusion when she learns about the woman’s death reflect a blend of belief and rationality. The story takes place in a small town in Mexico, where beliefs in ghosts, spirits, and the afterlife may be deeply rooted in cultural folklore and traditions. The encounter with the ghostly woman wearing a green sweater and offering a pearl necklace resonates with traditional ghost stories that often feature encounters with benevolent or unsettled spirits. The story unfolds within the context of family interactions, with M’s mother consulting her own mother about the encounter. The family’s reaction to the description of the woman and the revelation of her death underscores the importance of familial connections and shared experiences in processing supernatural events. The story’s setting in a small town in Mexico adds layers of historical and cultural significance, contextualizing the encounter within a specific geographic and temporal framework. The time of year, possibly around October, may also carry symbolic meaning, aligning with cultural traditions such as Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) when the boundary between the living and the dead is believed to be particularly porous.

The Haunted Radisson Hotel – Tucson

Text –

R – “Okay, so it was May, and I was in Arizona. We (himself and his co-workers) were staying in a hotel because we lived in Glendale Arizona but were in Tuscon for work. I just got off of work and went to go take a shower. I shower, hop out grab a towel, look in the mirror and all I see is a little girl staring back at me. She had blonde hair and was wearing a blue shirt. I could see it vividly. Then I wiped my face and eyes and she was gone. I went downstairs to the desk and asked if this hotel was haunted. The worker said he didn’t think so, so I followed up asking if someone had died in the hotel. The worker then said plenty of people had died in this hotel, so I asked if a little girl died in the hotel. The worker said no just older people. So, I asked if there were any murders and the worker quickly said that he could not answer the question. I looked it up and found out that a lot of workers have reported hearing child-like giggling when alone.”

Interviewer – “What did you do after that incident?”

R – “Of course, I slept in my coworker’s room because I am not dealing with that.”

Context –

This story occurs in The Radisson in Tucson Arizona a few years back. R, 29, is originally from Washington State but has since moved to numerous states and countries due to being in the Air Force. This story takes place during one of his work trips for the Air Force.

Analysis –

After hearing about this encounter, I researched The Radisson Hotel in Tucson and found plenty of recounts of paranormal occurrences and murders. Others have encountered similar experiences including TVs and lights chaotically flickering like someone is playing with them, or crying sounds heard in the ballroom. However, I was not able to find a claim that fully supports R’s event of a little girl. Despite not finding exact matching claims I think that R was speaking his truth about the situation due to him normally being a paranormal skeptic and similar stories.

Familial Haunting

Text –

T – “When I was growing up, my grandfather was a pain. We lived in a house with a basement, living area, then an attic. Every time we would leave the house we would turn our lights off. Well, every time we came home the lights would be on. It was eery. Then in the middle of the night, he would pace the attic floor and turn on the TVs when we were sleeping. He didn’t do much else but he always did that. That was my experience with my grandfather… or maybe another spirit, in my childhood home.”

Context –

This story was told by T, age 32, born and raised in western Washington. She tells me about who she believes to be her grandfather who haunted her childhood home. However, she has some doubts about if it was truly her grandfather. Since growing up, T has not been to her childhood home again and is unsure if there have been any recent updates on the spirit she believes roams the attic.

Analysis –

The part of Washington we are from has notoriously old homes with a lot of history from being on native lands and tales from the old lumber age when the town was in its glory. I personally think there was some form of spirit messing with T’s family. My most likely guess is it is her Grandfather as he would have a familial connection as well as that the haunts did not start until his death.

The Lady in Flats

Nationality: American

Primary Language: English

Age: 51

Occupation: Chief Marketing Officer

Residence: Driggs, Idaho

Performance Date: November 24, 2023

Text:

“I was staying at this friend of a friend’s house near Georgetown, one of those little townhouses or whatever that have the entrances kind of underground, ya know? I thought it was a little weird, didn’t really know the people that well, but I had been driving for so long and it was so late, just had to get to bed. Whatever. The people weren’t staying there at the time, so it was just me in this townhouse. The whole thing was about three stories, and the layout was kind of funky. You have to kind of walk down from the street into the basement, and then walk up another set of stairs from there to get to the main floor and then again to the second. I ended up crashing in one of the guest rooms on that first floor, kind of tucked away into the corner of the building, and it was all hardwood. Like the whole place was all hardwood. Super loud to walk on, love it. Anyways. Went to bed that night, and sometime in the early morning, like 2 or 3, woke up to that same super loud footsteps on the hardwood. Well I was kind of awake, but not really awake. Like I couldn’t move at all, and I was looking through my eyelids and still seeing everything somehow. So I heard these shoes on the floor, and I look up and there’s this woman, just walking all around the bed in a circuit. And she had on these flats, and this kind of green looking pants suit, just clacking along the floor, around the bed, through the wall back behind the headboard, then back again on the other side. Fully formed too, she looked, like, full. Not wispy or ghostly at all. And she was walking this super fat golden retriever on a leash, just lapping around the bed. And the flats just kept slapping against the hardwood floor, super loud, and I couldn’t really get up at all, and I’m kind of starting to freak out. Cause I’m thinking, how did this person get in, middle of DC, only one lock on the door, random stranger in the house, nothing I can do, and for some reason they can magically walk through walls. After a while of her just kind of walking around in this little green pantsuit and these flats with her dog, she just sort of disappeared. Then I kind of drifted back to sleep eventually, got up as early as I could the next day and hightailed it out of there.”

Context:

AM is a 51 year old mother from a small town in central Connecticut. She was visiting her brother in the Georgetown Hospital in Washington DC when she experienced the events that she described above. At first skeptical of whether or not she had been visited by a paranormal entity, she became convinced entirely that the Lady in Flats was a ghost, upon finding no trace that anyone had been in the house, not even a single strand of dog hair or a scrape on the hardwood floors.

Analysis:

While AM may have been slightly inclined to believe in the supernatural before her experience in the D.C. Townhouse, I find that her encounter solidified her belief entirely. What I found to be particularly interesting is the description of the apparition as entirely solid, dissimilar from the usual physical characteristics that are ascribed to ghosts in the 21st century, such as translucence or appearing as a pale shade. While perhaps not exactly reminiscent of the modern day ghost, AM’s ghost did exhibit at least some of the physical qualities that were seen in a number of Japanese stories on the supernatural from the previous millennia, that same solidness described in the story. Another curious aspect of the story that appealed to me was the apparent lack of purpose of the ghost, neither malicious or helpful, rather, it was simply present. Furthermore, the liminal state of sleep paralysis lends itself as a perfect opportunity to experience the supernatural, a classic motif found throughout the majority of ghost stories.

The Most Haunted House In Oregon

Nationality: American

Primary Language: English

Age: 25

Occupation: Self-Employed

Residence: Jupiter, FL

Performance Date: November 11, 2023

Text:

“After I left Florida, I started just driving all over the country, reconnecting with all my old friends that I hadn’t seen in so long. I was actually all the way up in Canada at one point, before heading back down into the States through to Seattle for a bit. Anyways, I ended up with one of my friends from high school in Oregon. I let her book the AirBnB that we were going to stay at that night, and for whatever reason, she only looked at the availability without checking any of the reviews before she booked it. Definitely a mistake, will not be doing that again. So she books it, we’re driving, it’s super late at night, we’re both exhausted, get to the house, and immediately vibes are just off. The whole time we were driving up there the area was just weird, something just did not feel right at all. The house itself was this really big old timey inn, straight out of the colonial era. We walk in and this place is just deserted, like nobody there at all, no one working the front desk for check in. After ringing the bell a couple of times the guy comes and checks us in or whatever, and starts leading us up towards our room down this super long hallway. Super weird thing, there were all of these tables in the hallways that were just lined with these big containers of candy, and all kinds too. Naturally we just start munching on some sour strings, and the guy turns back at us, telling us not to eat any of the candy, that it’s there to appease the spirits. Jokingly, my friend asks him if the house was haunted or something, cause she thought he was trying to mess with us or something. He gave her the biggest ‘are you stupid’ look I’ve ever seen, and said ‘Only the most haunted house in Oregon’, then kept walking down the hallway. We both kind of looked at each other, looked back at him, and immediately started looking this place up on our phones. Sure enough, it was literally the most haunted AirBnB in all of Oregon according to all these reviews we read. It’s too late to try and find somewhere else to stay for the night, so we just decide to stick it out and hope that whatever ghosts might be there just leave us alone. I think I slept maybe like two hours that whole night. The whole time there were all of these banging and groaning sounds coming from all over the place like people were fighting, but we were literally the only guests there that night. And I could feel the floorboards all around the bend like bending, there were all these footstep noises throughout the whole thing, I even felt a hand running up and down my leg at one point. Same thing happened to my friend except it was on her face. It never really felt dangerous or malicious, but definitely weird. Super creepy, we ended up checking out as early as possible that next morning, haven’t been back to Oregon since.”

Context:

CM is a 25 year old woman who has recently embarked upon a continental road trip to explore and reconnect with old friends. While believing in the supernatural and the powers that they may (or may not) hold, CM has held a decidedly wary stance against haunting ghosts, preferring to hear or read about them rather than experience them firsthand. This story was told only a handful of weeks after the initial events transpired, allowing for a fresh telling undisturbed by the passing of time.

Analysis:

Part of me is curious as to whether or not there was really a ghost there at all, if it was a trick the CM’s mind played on her. There were no ghosts or paranormal activities before she learned that the house was haunted, yet suddenly after learning about all of the spirits said to linger around the house, she began experiencing some of the classic tropes of a haunted house. There were certainly a significant amount of classic motifs of traditional ghost stories in CM’s retelling, namely the sharp noises in the middle of the night and the creaking of the floorboards around the bed, which may help alleviate some of my suspicions. What I found to be particularly interesting was the feeling of being in actual contact with a paranormal entity, that whatever it may have been broke the physical barrier. While in some cultures the spirits of the restless dead (or undead) are ethereal, in a significant amount of others the ghosts of those who have passed can most certainly maintain a sense of corporealness that is absence in most modern day ideologies of ghosts. While a significant amount of ghost stories may involve spirits interacting with the physical plain by moving objects or perhaps a piece of furniture, there are perhaps only a select few where the spirit will make physical contact with a person.