Haunted Muskoka, Grandpa Stood At The Bottom Of The Bed

In recent days, I’m be sorting through some boxes of old photographs that I’ve been given over the years. What kind of Gravenhurst did people live in during those days?     I would have like to known those times!   - Photo by Fred Schulz

HAUNTED MUSKOKA

GRANDPA STOOD AT THE BOTTOM OF THE BED

     Following the passing of my father, Ed Sr., we have had many family chats reconciling the unfortunate events and the circumstances of his final days of poor health,.... as well as reminiscing a wee bit about the death of my mother, back in May of 2008, something that he never really got over. They had been married for 60 plus years.

     As we certainly subscribe to the belief that the spirit "crosses over," after death, and that this parallel existence allows for communication between the living and the deceased, we of course have been paying particular attention to signs, of which there were numerous, following Ed’s death. (Some are included already in this blog collection). But the lengthy discussions part of the traditional mourning process, did remind me quite suddenly.....as if my mother had just then tapped me on the shoulder, that our family had experienced paranormal visitors in the past. We just didn’t make a big deal about it! Which is true because we’ve had a lifetime of interesting encounters that we’ve pretty much heaped, quite unceremoniously, into our family album of "believe it or not," manifestations.

     My mother was from a religious family that spent considerable time at church, and she maintained a strong sense of belief in the afterlife until the end of hers. I wasn’t brought up to be a regular church-goer. For whatever reason, she gave me the choice of attending or not. In fact, of my own interest, I attended several months of Sunday School at Burlington United Church, until I decided formal attendance, each Sunday morning, wasn’t for me. It didn’t mean I grew up without a strict belief in God because that was definitely not the case. I just wasn’t interested in attending Church as part of a regular congregation.

    Merle was the same, and I dare say my father Ed had his beliefs, and I do think they were the same as my mother’s. Merle didn’t believe in ghosts, as such, although she liked to watch movies with ghosts. If I told her I saw a ghost, she’d say "Isn’t that nice, now go out and play and let your mother have some peace and quiet." Yet she was religious to the point of respecting the difference between a soul’s fate in either heaven or hell. Ghosts just didn’t enter into the equation, in part because they couldn’t be slotted into the heaven or hell category. She didn’t want to acknowledge a ghost that might have the Devil’s commission. It was just better to defer all discussion about ghosts, and simply enjoy them on the silver screen.

    But Merle did have a ghostly encounter and she was quite perplexed. She would never admit to seeing a ghost, so she decided that depicting an unearthly visitor, as a vivid dream, covered all areas of her paranormal reservations. Merle explained to me one morning that she had awoken to find her father standing at the end of her bed......just standing. It was well after his demise....which happened on the steps of a church in Florida, when he suffered a fatal heart attack. This alleged visitation happened six months or more after his passing. As she explained it, he had a beautiful look on his face, and she wasn’t startled by the appearance or fearful in any way. She just continued to look at him until the vision eventually faded into the darkness of the bedroom. There were no lights on but my grandfather had been illuminated.

    As she was trying to convince me that it hadn’t been a ghost at all, she couldn’t help but confess that it was exactly the same visitation, she’d experienced after her mother Blanche’s death, back in the early 1960's. I suppose she thought it was odd that both had appeared in the same pose, standing at the end of her bed but she still attributed it all to a very life-like dream. And possibly this was the case. Still she footnoted that Blanche as well, had possessed such a peaceful expression, hovering at the end of the bed. On the first occasion, she had called out to her mother but there was no response....just that eventual fading into the darkness of the bedroom in the wee hours. Up until shortly before her death, if you had asked if, during her 88 years, she had ever seen a ghost, she would have vigorously shaken her head. If you asked if she had seen her mother and father’s spirit after death, she’d possibly wink, if that, and shrug her shoulders, not agreeing entirely but not disagreeing either. Merle believed in the spiritual qualities of afterlife but she was nervous of offending God by being overly presumptuous about what was his domain afterall.

    I have not witnessed either Merle or Ed, stationed at the foot of my own bed, just yet, but there have been plenty of small signs we believe were spirit-generated. You can read about them on this blogsite. One evening, just recently, while sitting watching the television, and thinking about Ed momentarily.....and having asked him for any signs he could spare to validate the existence of the other side.....by golly, I felt this blowing against my ear.......and there wasn’t any other reason or source of this sudden gusting of air. It was a funny way to represent the afterlife. But I’m pretty sure you’ll appreciate, having the sensation someone is strongly blowing in your ear, is a stretch to concoct even with a vivid imagination. As for my dad doing such a thing.....sure he would. He was a performance kind of guy.

    I’m pretty sure Ed, Merle and the rest of our passed family members, are chortling in that spirited way, teasing as they did in life.....the kid who always took things so seriously.....that would be me.