Extreme skeptic? You bet. I don’t believe ANYTHING unless it’s completely backed up by my lucky astrology mood watch. . . . Okay, seriously? I’ll say upfront, sans equivocation, that I don’t claim to know, one way or the other, whether there are ghosts, whether ESP is a real thing, whether there really is such a thing as telekinesis. I’d like to give a sweeping “pshaw!” on the whole subject, but I can’t, and here are a few examples why.
When I was thirteen years old, my closet had turned out not to be empty one night. About four o’clock one summer morning, I started awake, thinking I had heard a noise. Not a normal house noise, like a creak or a groan; nor was it a people noise, like a footstep or a fart; it couldn’t even be attributed to the pets in the house. It had been a sort of sliding thump, followed by a jangle of clothes hangers, and it had definitely come from the closet. I was a very lucid boy by nature, and realized the sound had probably been part of a dream. But the impression that it had come from the closet persisted nonetheless. Shaking the sleep from my head, I arose, walked resolutely across the room, yanked the closet door open, and almost didn’t see the corpse at first.
It leaned forward slightly and caught with a sickening jerk when it reached the end of the short tether that held it by its neck to the hanger bar. The wrinkled, desiccated remains of its yellowed eyes were rolled up to heaven and its brown teeth shone faintly by the light of the moon. Its gnarled hands were tied in a pose of supplication at its chest. It appeared to be praying. It had no smell, made no other sound once it was through jerking around at the end of its rope, and scared me so shitless I couldn’t scream. In a panic, I called upon the only talisman I was sure would work in this situation: I flipped on the light.
Despite the bright light of the room shining directly on it, the corpse threatened for the first few seconds to remain a corpse anyway. But it slowly resolved itself into a golf bag full of clubs that had been hung from a wire coat hanger. The hanger had finally bent, resulting in the bag slumping forward against the closet door. There were a few articles of clothing draped over the top of it, and it looked nothing at all like a corpse. I heaved a shuddery sigh of relief and chided myself for being stupid. Of course, this isn’t a fair example because I immediately realized I had merely mistaken an everyday household item for something it wasn’t. However. . . .
That same night, I wandered down the hall to see a man about a horse, and went with the damn light off because I was man enough I didn’t need it. On the way back up the hall to my room, I almost tripped over a little girl in a black smock standing in the doorway to the living room. I stared at her in disbelief, wondering why in hell she was there when I was perfectly awake and thinking soundly. I flipped on the light and she promptly disappeared, like a good little apparition. “Hmph!” I hmphed, turning the light back off. There she was again, staring at her feet as if to say, “I’m sorry I came back, but it’s my job, you see.” I once again flipped the light on and she once again vanished. I tried the light switch yet again and she dutifully came back. I shook my head vigorously, looked again, and she was still obstinately insisting on being there, staring meekly at her shoes. Screw it, I thought, and went back to my room.
Closing the door behind me, I glared at the golf bag leaning out of the closet. I dared it to become a corpse. I flipped it off and reached for the light switch when I remembered the little girl in the hall, whom I could only assume was still out there. What if the corpse only comes back when the light is off? I thought. I bravely walked over to the closet door and valiantly slid it shut so I wouldn’t have to find out.
So, what was with the girl in the hall? I really don’t know. Misfiring neuron? Still asleep enough to have a bit of dream stuck in reality? Or did I see a really real, honest to goodness apparition? Can’t completely rule anything out on this score, because never before or since have I been so certain I was awake and yet seen something so clearly that couldn’t've been there. I’ve never had another experience like it. So maybe there’re ghosts, or maybe I had a very short-lived psychotic break at thirteen. Hey, who hasn’t?
There are examples without number where the missus has asked me, “Did you just say [insert whatever subject here]?” And I’ve had to reply that no, I hadn’t said anything of the kind, but I was thinking about it rather loudly. Another VERY specific example of this sort of thing, however, happened the summer between 11th and 12th grades. My friend Mason was at my house, eating cereal and watching TV. I was lying on the sofa, drifting but not yet asleep. Mason was going on and on and on about Space Camp and this girl he’d met there, but I was trying to get to sleep and he was keeping me awake. Finally, I sat up and rather rudely asked him to shut the hell up. He pointed out that he hadn’t said a word — he’d merely been sitting and eating his cereal and, quite frankly, minding his own business. I told him that was nonsense, he’d been going on and on about Amy this, and Space Camp that, and New York the other. He said he hadn’t either been talking about any of it, but he had been thinking a lot about it. I decided it was better not to pursue this further and went back to sleep. Could he have been pulling my leg? Yeah, of course he could’ve, but I really don’t think so. He was eating cereal, so if he had been talking, I’m sure my built-in correction circuits would’ve made me tell him not to talk with his mouth full.
We’ve all experienced that mundane, unimportant, barely noticed type of telepathy that I like to attribute to the mind’s juggling variables and probabilities and arriving and sometimes scarily accurate predictions. My friend Zod and I were famous for anticipating one another’s plans to put a pot of coffee on, but I think that arose more out of long acquaintance than any kind of psychic link. He has always claimed, and I have too, to be about as psychic as a particularly muddy mud puddle. The missus has often said I’m a much better sender than receiver, and this I’d almost certainly agree with — I have VERY few examples (other than the one above) where I’ve seemed to read someone else’s mind, but many’s the time someone else has seemed to hear my thoughts. I hate to think I’m broadcasting like that, but who knows?
I wish I had a cool example of telekinesis, but I don’t. =(
