My outlook on ghosts has changed over the years. As a child, no surprise, the notion of ghosts made shivers jolt in my body. Then as a teenager and into my early 20s, regrettably, I honed a smartass callousness about ghosts. I was dumbly overconfident to balance my deep insecurities. Results were mixed, at best.
In one ghost story, when I was 21, my friend lived in a house he claimed was haunted. My other friends sided with him, but I was a skeptic. A contrarian weirdo.
Among other places in the house, my friend had been frightened by intangible bad stuff in the hallway between his bedroom and the bathroom. I went to that hallway. I paced it up and down, talking shit to the specters. I talked shit to thin air, trying to get a reaction.
Sure enough! As I spun back to my frowning friend sitting on a dryer, shaking his head no dude, just no, I felt a sudden tug beneath my ankle. I looked down. On that shoe, my laces had been untied. My friend told me the laces burst open like a shot of silly string. He wasn't surprised.
To reiterate, I was 21 and passing through a callous smartass phase, especially when it came to ghosts, and so nonetheless, I laughed dismissively. Undoing my shoelaces seemed petty. Underwhelming. What, was I dealing with the spirit of a ninth grade bully? All spite, no smite. Tisk, tisk, pathetic. I knelt down and re-tied my shoes, laughing but untroubled. My pride was absurd.
“What's next?” I scoffed. “A 'Kick Me' sign? Does the ghost give noogies?”
I acted like a snotty naysayer. That Nick could have been the first murder victim in a horror movie. I’d be the one who would make people shrug and go, “He had it coming.”
My haunted-house friend told tales of antique dolls somehow relocating on their own. He had tales of murmurs from the closet that revealed no one at the tense moment of truth. Most chillingly, in the pitch black of night, he woke up to a disembodied scream right next to him in bed. Now, I can't confirm that all of these accounts are true. But I will go on record and say that some invisible motherfuckers in his house un-tied my shoe. I believe that. So, maybe my “ghost who gives noogies” routine was kind of insensitive.
Thankfully, I'm the type who likes to endure long enough to look back and realize how much of an asshole or coward I used to be. Aging being what it is, I like to have that cathartic moment when I smack myself in the forehead. My head swings like a fast pendulum, I sigh with dread, I have a good laugh. I say to myself: “Now I get it... Maybe I won't regress this time!”
With that in mind, I want to atone for naysaying the paranormal. I feel sympathy for those who have been freaked out by that ghost shit. Part of my mindset about ghosts was valid, but it was too extreme. It's sane to fear the paranormal, but one has to do so with relativity. And a more certain reality.
Ghosts are super-freaky. But the truth is they're not as scary as mortal, breathing, flesh-and-blood lowlifes. Because over 99% of the time, the worst and freakiest atrocities on this planet are done by someone with a pulse. The paranormal is frightening because it's inexplicable, more so than because it's a real danger. When the intent is to cause harm, being dead is a drawback.
Consider some examples: A serial killer who has the advantage of being alive is a greater threat than one who died decades ago. If I was forced to spend the night at an ominous, bloody-red-flag place like the Villisca Axe Murder House, I'd be most worried about packing enough underwear to withstand eight or nine full crappings. I’d be less panicked about getting brained by an axe that floated and struck on its own. To make a tired point, a psycho on the prowl with an axe anywhere sounds more dangerous than the rumor of Ghosty McMurderaxe roaming his old stomping grounds. It’s all scary on some level, but all things considered, sign me up for the trauma of seeing a chandelier sway a few times for no reason.
Furthermore... There's no reason to fear the tortured spirit of a woman from the 1920s hanging in your attic more than a random psycho knifing you at the intersection of Wrong Place and Wrong Time. Nights of fitful sleep caused by the moans of some phantom flapper who 86'd herself make for intriguing, nonviolent stories to tell coworkers, friends, and family. I’d prefer that to calling home, in the second scenario, and saying those four words we all dread: “Uncle Nick got stabbed.”
Now, maybe I'm regressing to “too cocky” again, but have you seen the YouTube classic “Real Scary Ghost Pictures”? It suggests that someday a ghost might startle any one of us with a photobomb. That would be a bomb… but of the photo variety. By contrast, the nightly news is a safe bet to report trouble with regular bombs, the kind that blow up and make loud noises and kill many living things at one time. No disrespect to paranormal bad stuff, but overall, when it comes to getting me to crap my pants, real bombs > ghost photobombs.
It is creepy to wonder how that antique doll turned its head to face you while your back was turned, or how my shoes got un-tied in a flash in that hallway. But these moments of fright are not as bad as mass shooters, suicide bombers, serial killers, hired assassins, sex offenders, Proud Boys, human traffickers, extremists who no longer care about critical thinking, home invaders, thieves, pirates, wife beaters, Grand Theft Auto copycats, rude customers at Olive Garden, world leaders who deny climate change, or Jeffrey Bezos--among other lowlifes.
If you're scared of ghosts, I hope that helps.
Really, the most harmful thing a ghost might do to us is give us a heart attack. This happens once in a while. Imagine what it’s like to be that apparition: You’re so filled with spite and unrest, being a fraction of your mortal self, that you go and terrify a fragile human. All the way to death. It's sad... I want to believe, like I said before--and so I feel sorry for all involved.
In the end, ghosts are but a grim reminder to not live a disgruntled life in vain, if you can help it. Heaven might be bullshit, but I’ve never heard of a happy ghost.
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