Subject: RE: My Shadows Are Different
Date: 5/13/2007 12:32:10 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time
From: Name Withheld by Request
To: The Official Shadow People Archives
Like many people who wrote their stories of encounters with Shadow People for your wonderful web site, I am so glad that I found it during my recent research into this phenomenon! I would be very pleased if you included MY story on your site, edited as you see fit, but please withhold my name and e-mail address if you do. Thanks.
I may have had some paranormal experiences while growing up and my boyfriend Mark, who is somewhat psychic, has always been able to "see dead people." I had my first definite sighting of a ghost -- a hovering skull in my bedroom -- while Mark and I were living in a motor home for a year, providing unofficial "security" for the area of an industrial park where the business he works for as a night street sweeper was located at the time. The business has since been relocated to another industrial park where living in our RV is not allowed, so we moved into this apartment on 31 March, 2007.
Believe it or not, I was thrilled (mostly) to have a ghost in the RV, though I slept with my light on when Mark was gone at night after the above sighting, and more than once we asked it to accompany us to our new residence. For the first week or so, things were quiet and we figured it had not taken us up on the invitation; perhaps it could not. Then Mark found our new front door unlocked when I was sure I had locked it. I explained to what I thought was our previous ghost that this was unacceptable behavior, as I was going to be alone more nights of the week than not and except for possibly once when Mark was going to be right back, the front door lock has not been tampered with since. It was not long after that, however, that we began to suspect whatever lives here was not necessarily what we'd lived with before.
Mark began seeing something black going around the floorboards out of the corner of his eye. I saw some things with my peripheral vision, too, but it wasn't long before I was seeing what I thought was a single entity clearly on the ceiling of my room. It was a shadow, but a blob not a person. (Another reason I was enchanted to find this site was Sue Fowler saying on the Home page that Shadow People COULD be blobs! Although I have told this story elsewhere on line, none of the helpful people who responded to my posting made that clear to me.)
Shadow, as I came to call him, did not seem at all evil. He was more like a curious, playful child. He didn't have red eyes but little white lights that seemed to resemble a line of tiny, twinkling light bulbs. Somehow he, or something, lights up the ceiling, too when he comes out to "play," which is usually after I go to bed -- I know it gets lighter and the only illumination we provide is two small night lights and the outside porch light, which automatically comes on at dusk and goes off at dawn, courtesy of the management. The best thing of all was that very early on he "gifted" us by manifesting either a rose or possibly a poppy on the ceiling above our beds; I took this as a sign that he liked us as much as we liked him. I was touched when he was in the living room with Mark one night and I opened the bedroom door, only to see him literally bound across that ceiling and dart through my door, hopefully anxious to be with me.
Unfortunately, things didn't stay quite that rosy. One night Mark told Shadow to go give me a wave. By that, Mark meant that he should reproduce the "mirage-like shimmering" that he frequently appears to Mark in or as. He doesn't do that so much with me -- but he took what Mark said literally. A few minutes later I was startled to see a large human hand travel across the far end of my bedroom! I let out an involuntary exclamation that made the hand quickly disappear, as I think Shadow felt bad and that I was mad at him. Though I later apologized to Shadow and told him repeatedly I wasn't mad and Mark and I laughed about this incident, things haven't seemed quite the same since.
Shadow has the ability to morph into things. One night I opened my eyes to see him masquerading as a saucer-sized black spider with business-looking long legs. He turned and glittered his lights at me, and I'm afraid I jumped to the conclusion that he might be showing the "demon" tendencies that so many people think Shadow People possess. I think now he was just playing and proud of himself -- he did look really good -- but he either understands us or knew from my tone I was less than pleased. Actually, I told him so in no uncertain terms and that if he wasn't going to be "nice," he couldn't stay here.
Mark was not pleased with him either for scaring me and interfering, as Mark thinks he does, with my sleep. The next day when Shadow came around the corner "wearing" a scary-face like an angry Kabuki-type mask, Mark told him "to get out of here" if he was going to be like that because Mark didn't have time for it. Once again, I think we hurt his feelings and eventually I, at least, felt bad about it. The last straw may have been when I opened my eyes the other night to find something white inches from my nose -- not sure if he was "dressed" as a mummy or a ghost or what he was up to -- but couldn't avoid going "ahh!" at first. I noticed last night he is going into the shadows he hides in when necessary, but now doing so when he just sees me looking at him, though I have once again apologized profusely.
I wish I had a picture of Shadow to show you. If possible, he seems bigger then when we met. Unfortunately, he is very camera shy; if I have a camera in my hand or a tape recorder, he won't come near me. I'll keep trying though to get a picture, quite possibly with the video cam-corder someone has left in our care, as I'd like to prove to my family and the world that he exists, though I have no intention of disclosing his location. Actually, I see multiple places on the ceiling where there are little flashing lights, so think it may be THEIR location..
BTW, we know now he is NOT the ghost in the RV, who gives every indication of still being there going through our stuff in our absence. Actually, Shadow seems to have been here before we were -- the pistol-packing senior citizen from Texas who lived here before us used to talk about things "growing" on her ceiling. Of course, when the maintenance men came to look, there would be nothing there. She was dismissed as a nutcase and at 82 is in a nursing home now. (There is a possibility that Shadow mistakes me for her, though she was older, I am nearly 60 and we share the same first name, Sharon.) We have learned from a colleague of Mark's at work, who used to live in this complex, that other people in our building talked about seeing ghosts, too. I've often wondered if Shadow doesn't visit the neighbors -- though I've heard no screams in the night -- and now it seems likely, especially since I have seen him melt into the walls and Mark has seen him go through the front door without opening it and thus presumably outside.
Seeing Shadow vanish doesn't prove he's a ghost at all, though. I like to think he is, but we're amateur ghost hunters and have some ghost hunting equipment as a result. Can you be a ghost if you don't register on an electromagnetic meter and there's no "cold spot" in your vicinity when it's tested by a laser thermometer?? Whatever Shadow is, I hope we will get our early relationship with him back someday. Not just because after reading the horror stories people have to tell about Shadow People with some trepidation, I wouldn't want our story to take that bad a turn. But mostly because I love him dearly and he can be a spider for Halloween if he wants . . . I told him so!
