There is something about this time of year … The air. The light. The memories.
I think about the smell of the burning leaf piles, the feel of flannel and fuzzy sweaters, pumpkin pulp squishing in my hands, the way the cold crisp air made the stars seem extra bright in the night sky. The green and ripe transformed to golds, browns and finally naked branches.
And then there’s the growing darkness and gloom. I used to like the vicarious thrills of horror movies and scary stories. How they made me feel more alive. Now I know the only real monsters are people, and ghosts are … something else entirely.
The other night, I was in Chipotle. The folks behind the register put the leaking burrito I ordered into a brown paper bag printed with a story – a ghost story. Not one which my daughters would respond to. Instead of scares or chills it’s tone was maturity and … acceptance. How apropos.
“Ghosts are among us. I am one of the 42% of Americans who thinks so. Then again, even if 100% believe something, that doesn’t make it true, does it? Like people who think they’re superior to others. Or voters who believe their candidate is best. Or those who say an invisible prankster is pounding up the stairs and making the sound of chandeliers crashing onto their bedroom floor. One of my ghosts used to do that. I thought it was my husband, a member of the 58% who did not believe in ghosts. But then he heard the tune to Jeopardy whistled behind his back—off-key, twice, and once when he was naked in the shower. Naked with a ghost! My husband now believes, sort of.
I bet many of the 58% have never heard a whistling ghost. They think ghosts are merely grief inflated by wishful thinking. Would they change their minds if the ghost named his murderer? One of mine did that, and the murderer was sentenced to life in prison. He also told me I would one day be a writer.
Defying science and reason, my mother sailed into my bedroom the night after she died, looking like a statically charged hologram of light. I was punched breathless with the strongest emotions I have ever felt and they are now stored in my intuition as a writer. From time to time, she brings me gifts—uncanny coincidences in the form of particular books, photographs, music, paintings, and people—at precisely that moment when I’m flailing in my writing. She helps me observe that happenstance can have meaning, that grief is beautiful, and that percentages are nonsense. There are things you feel because they are true. Like love, like loss, like ghosts.”
- Amy Tan
I think I’ve experienced one or two ghosts like this too.