The Campground Ghost

All my life I have believed in ghosts. When I was a child, of course, they were a source of terror. As I grew into an adult they became something of vast interest. I secretly wanted to see a ghost, although I know I would run and scream in fear if I ever did. I know that some people have the ability to communicate with the spirit world, or at least be aware of their existence, but I have never had that ability.

In earlier years I had toyed around with a Ouija board with friends and siblings, despite warnings that it can be a portal into something from a darker dimension. We had some very interesting and some frightful experiences. Some people I've told of these refused to believe it was real. Either I was making it up, or someone in the room was playing a big joke on me. I do hold out the possibility that they could be right and that could be true but I know that some of the things I was told either were accurate about current details of my life or happened the way they were predicted. Coincidence? Very possibly but my gut feeling is we were indeed communicating with spirits from the other side. Was it smart to communicate in that way? I don't feel it was. Some of the "beings" we talked to said horrible things and used vulgar language so I was convinced they were spirits from a lower plane. Whether they were evil or not, I can't answer that. My thinking is they were just jerks when they were alive and remained jerks after death. Perhaps they didn't want to move on. Perhaps they couldn't. I'm not the one to know.

I put that board away many years ago and never went back to it. In fact, I never wanted to mess around with one of those again. But I still I believe that the spirit survives death and still secretly hoped I could see one. Why I don't know. Maybe just to satisfy a morbid curiosity. Maybe just to have proof that they are real.

I did have an experience, though, one day that I believe was in fact an encounter with someone who had passed on. I've told some people about this and again there are doubters among them. It was a very simple experience and could have a very logical explanation. But I had too many unanswered questions so my feeling still today is that what I saw was in fact a ghost.

My family went camping once a year at a somewhat rustic campground on a small lake. It was rustic in the sense that there were no bathrooms or showers - just a smelly outhouse to use. I had been spoiled that way but I learned to deal with it and find some enjoyment in tent camping without any amenities. My daughters and my step-daughter, however, never learned to appreciate any of this. On one of those camping trips we had been inundated with a couple days of rain. Our spirits were dampened along with our tents and our sleeping bags. My husband spent the days fishing on the lake while I stayed in the camp trying to cheer the girls up, all to no avail. We had two dogs that needed walking and would love to go swim in the lake. There were also a couple bikes just waiting to be ridden. But the girls would rather sit around the campfire feeling sorry for themselves. After all, the CD player's batteries had died and there was no cell service out there under all those trees.

I finally gave up on them and went out for a ride on the bike alone. I explored a dirt road I hadn't been down before. It was slightly muddy from the morning rain but at the end of the road I came upon a big white farm house. It was obviously vacant as most of the windows had been boarded up. The backyard was nothing but dense forest but the front yard had a split rail fence that still partially stood around it and in the middle was what was left of an old above-ground swimming pool. I was curious about that pool as it had what appeared to be trees growing up in the middle of it.

I continued my ride and eventually made my way back to 3 grumpy young girls and 2 extremely bored dogs. I told them about the house with the weird old pool and suggested one of them take a ride with me back over to it to check it out before it got dark. I had no takers so after feeding everyone and taking the dogs for a walk and a swim, I took a second ride over to the old house. I just wanted to peek over the side of that pool and see what all was growing in there. It clearly had been sitting there a long time.

I pulled off the road into the dirt driveway of the old house and got off my bike. I had planned to walk over to the pool when I saw a woman sweeping the front porch of the house. She had gray hair and looked to be in her early 60s perhaps. She was not aware of me so I quickly got back on my bike and hightailed it out of there. I was afraid I'd be accused of trespassing. I got almost all the way back to the campsite when suddenly it occurred to me how it odd it was that someone would sweep the porch of that house at all. The majority of the windows of the house were boarded up and those that weren't were broken out. There was a huge hole in the roof that had apparently been there quite some time and the very porch she was sweeping had collapsed on one end. It was obvious no one had inhabited that house in many years yet there she was sweeping away. I mentioned this to my husband who suggested maybe she was getting ready to sell the house. That made no sense to me since I would think that would be the least of your concerns with a house in that condition. I would think you would need to fully rebuild the majority of the house before worrying about sweeping anything.

It had also been suggested to me that maybe she lived there. Again I couldn't imagine someone living in a house in that condition. If someone did I doubt they would worry about sweeping the front porch then either.

Before it was fully dark I decided I had to make one more journey there. My curiousity was getting the best of me. I rode back down there and stopped short of pulling all the way into the driveway of the old homestead. I peeked around the corner and saw no one around. I wondered then where she had gone. There were no tracks of any kind leading away from the house: no footprints, no tire tracks, no hoof prints or paw prints of any kind, nothing but the tracks I had left when I pulled in there before. Since the ground was still soggy tracks would have been evident. There no lights on in the house either. It was dusk so surely someone inside would have needed some source of light by now but I could see nothing through the broken windows on the side. It appeared pitch black inside.

By now I was fully creeped out as it was getting to be quite dark. I headed back as quickly as I could to the campsite. I didn't make a return trip that camping trip but every year from there after I did. The house continued to deteriorate and the pool eventually completely collapsed, probably from a heavy snowfall that winter. I never saw that woman again.

I do realize it is entirely possible that the woman I saw could have been as alive as I am. She may have been someone who just enjoyed cleaning up, even when it was futile. But to this day, my gut feeling is she was an earthbound spirit. Perhaps that home was her whole world and she couldn't bear to leave it after she passed over. I don't know the answers and, except for being a little creeped out, it wasn't a scary experience at all. Maybe someday I'll see another ghost but for now that is my one and only true ghost story.