My Proof of Survival
June 2003
by Richard D. Sparkman
Some people see ghosts. I am one of those people. Of course, I do not see ghosts all the time. In my experience, real ghost sightings are infrequent and unpredictable.
The most recent sighting occurred in my present home. Several years ago, when my children were still living with me, I met my resident ghost.
As I entered the front door carrying a bag of groceries through the living room into the kitchen, I noticed a woman standing by my son’s bedroom doorway. My house is arranged so that from the front door I can see through the house to the backyard; the bedrooms and baths are off a hallway to the right.
At first I thought the woman was my girlfriend–the hair color was right, but the style was wrong. She was also thinner than my girlfriend, and her build raised the first question in my mind as I placed the groceries onto the kitchen counter. At this point the woman was about 14 feet from me. She was standing with her right shoulder to me, facing slightly to the right of the doorway. Her face was about six inches from a blank wall that divides the bedroom from the bath. She was dressed in a plain, dark-navy-blue dress. She did not move as I walked through the living room into the kitchen.
“Sharon?” I questioned. She did not respond.
After a second ot two she turned and stepped briskly into my son’s bedroom. I was puzzled and walked directly to the room. On the way, seven steps, my mind was racing. What is Sharon doing here this time of day? That really didn’t look like Sharon…. Strange that she is standing like that, staring at a blank wall. Why doesn’t she answer me? Maybe it is one of my children’s friends–but she is a mature woman, not a teenager.
When I got to the doorway, nobody was in the bedroom. That prickly feeling started up my spine and gooseflesh crept down my arms. She could not be behind the door; it opened almost flat against the wall. I hesitated, then I looked under the bed and in the closet. There was nobody in the room. It was impossible for someone to have gone out the window quickly as the blinds and drapes prohibited a quick exit.
I rechecked every nook and cranny in the bedroom. Then I checked the entire house. I was alone, expect for my now-invisible ghost. The only window in the bedroom had not been opened in years.
This lady was a full-figured, three-dimensional person. She was opaque and staring at a blank wall. I could see her back and the side of her face. She made no sound and did not react to me except to step into the bedroom and disappear.
I had no further contact with this particular ghost until a year or so ago. I started to glimpse something peripherally that would disappear the moment I turned my head. At first I shook the shadows off as nothing. But the shadows became more persistent and started getting spooky. At this point I decided to speak and ask this ghost to reveal itself or give me a sign. When I started speaking, the phenomenon stopped, and my house is now undisturbed.
I believe I was dealing with a ghost because of an earlier, more insightful experience that took place around 1990.
I was visiting a farmhouse in northern Illinois that had been built in the 1840s. One afternoon I went upstairs to my bedroom. As I was returning, I experienced one of the more memorable moments of my life.
I was approaching the doorways of two opposite bedrooms, just up the hallway from the room I was occupying, when a ghost drifted from the bedroom on my right and stopped before me. I stopped. The ghost was a little over an arm’s length from me. If I had leaned forward, I could have touched him. I uttered one word: “Wow.” My first thought was: Casper the Ghost!
The ghost was four feet tall and hovered inches above the floor. He looked like the cartoon Casper. He was semitransparent, but a definite form, and a real presence. He was looking directly at me.
The ghost hovered before me for a long two seconds, then continued his drift into the bedroom on my left and out of sight. I stepped forward and looked into the bedroom. He was not there. I stepped into the bedroom and looked around. There was no ghost, nothing. I walked across the hallway to the other bedroom: again, there was nothing. I walked backward down the hallway and retraced my steps, unsuccessfully trying to recreate the phenomenon.
After three or four minutes, unable to find or recreate my ghost, I hurried down the stairs and announced to the farm family that I had seen a ghost upstairs. The family was not amused. Their youngest daughter had seen the same ghost in the same location on two occasions. None of the family wanted to believe there was a ghost floating about.
Over the years I have had my share of paranormal experiences, but these two sightings are my clearest and strongest experiences.
We have radio, television, and other electromagnetic waves surging through our brains every second. We do not have the receivers in our brains to interpret these signals, or we would not need television sets. Some people receive and hear music others cannot hear. Some see in art what others cannot see. There may be much of our brain potential not yet developed. Some people see things in what we call the paranormal. When competent people describe ghosts as I have experienced them, I believe them. -Naples, Fla.
