A Lost Soul Without a Body - Katherine Stangby

About a year ago one of my close friends’ informed me of a spooky story that happened to her family decades ago. A young boy at the time, but her great relative now, mysteriously went into an unexplainable coma. His parents responded abruptly and got him to a hospital and into an at home hospice care shortly after. The doctors had no explanation for the sudden coma.

A couple of months passed and it seemed as if there was some sort of presence following the family members around the house. The presence was not threatening, but even sometimes comforting to those who came in contact. The family was desperate to expose the truth of what happened to their beloved baby boy, and why there was this sudden presence.

Heebie Jeebies - Paresa Bighash

Coming from a large family, heredity plays a big role in the person I am today. I have singular genes in my being that I have derived from distant family members that reside all the way overseas. Out of all these characteristics, one stands out the most: psychical ability.



It is strongest in the females from my mother’s side. My grandmother, my aunt, my mom, my sister, and myself all have had experiences relative to ‘spirits’.  To start from the origin, my grandmother and mother were sitting in the yard one night nearly a month after my grandfather had passed away. My grandfather always kept his car on the driveway, and it had not been touched since the day before he parted. As they spoke of him, suddenly the car alarm began to sound. Head lights flashing, doors locking and unlocking, and a repetitive honk that filled the entire yard with awe. The two were shaken, but rejuvenated because they “knew it was him” my mother claims. 
           

Sightings in Salida-Erin Lord

A man told me about an encounter he had with a UFO in Salida, CO.

The man had gone up to the mountains often, and on this particular night the wind had blown him to Salida, CO. He was camping out. When the man was sitting in his truck with his dog, he noticed something creep into the corner of his eye. When he looked at it, he saw a bright light in the sky. The light hovered over him. It was not the light itself that terrified the man, but it was the nature in which the light moved.

Can't Breathe - Ashley Tilford

“I woke up in shock. I couldn’t move my fingers and toes. It felt like something is pushing on my chest. I couldn’t do anything but look around because my eyes are the only thing I can move.” This statement was taken by my girlfriend, Brittany Simms and she relayed what happen to her. She calls it “getting attacked”. I believe that this is more of a Religious means. Demons trying to get inside her body and replace her soul with one of theirs but her guardian angels fight against them and Brittany is trapped in the middle of it. Brittany had confided in me about this unusual occurrence, which happens to her every other night. She always tells me that she can’t breathe and every time her eyes roam she sees weird things.

The Elegant Encounter - Robert Holmes

After hearing a story from a fellow coworker about her strange cousin, it made me think of another unusual event, one that happened to me. Many moons ago, walking along the warm costal waters of the gulf down in southern florida, I encountered quite a strange lady late one night. One unlike I have ever seen before and oh so elegant. And what was even more significant about her was her large tail shimmering in the moonlight. This woman was a mermaid, just as beautiful and exotic as they say in stories. But there was one thing about her that wasn’t right, she looked very ill and slightly frail. Now, I’m not an expert on mermaids and the health of strange creatures, but I knew I had to help.

An Indian Siren - Brittany Fernandes

Most children growing up are told a variety of stories with varying significance, from recollections of the parents’ childhood to reasons not to misbehave. Some children are even read bed time stories. My parents, however, favored the to the point bed time rituals which consisted mainly of tucking my siblings and me into our respective beds or crib (depending on our age), a kiss on our forehead, wish us sweet dreams, and after reassuring us no monsters would emerge from the depths of the shadows they would close the respective bedroom door.

On rare occasions, the tradition was broken. On one particular evening when my mother deemed my sister and me old enough to decipher fact from fiction, we were granted the opportunity to hear a couple stories which she was told when she had been around our age. Besides recounting memorable moments from the many sleepovers she would have with her cousins, my mother told us a story which I now consider a rough equivalent of the Sirens from The Odyssey but in India.

Healing Powers - Neima Demessie

In the deep wet tropical place of Gambella, Ethiopia a tale of a man who had the power to heal his people is told from generation to generation. The village people called this man “Nuka” because it was believed that he was sent down to them by their god “Awaka” to help the poor who suffered from the harsh environmental diseases. Nuka lived in the deep woods of Gambella, in a village called Souka. By day Nuka healed his people; fed the poor, and taught the uneducated, and by night it was told that he fed the animals, like the hyena’s and the bears. The village people would some times wondered where he gets the medications that had the power to cure people in instant, and he would tell his people he gets it from the leaves of the tropical tree that grew so tall behind his little place he called home.

A Following Spirit - Somarrey Prum

My friend told me a story about her brother in law, Kevin. On his fourteenth birthday, he and his friends decided to go to a graveyard to play with a Ouija board just for the fun of it. A Ouija board is a game used to communicate with spirits by asking it questions. Rumor has it that messing with those objects allows good or bad spirits to go through a passage of some sort and connect with human life at any time. He did not expect anything to happen but after two months odd occurrences began to affect him.

The Unusual Gift - Kelsey Schuler

Every year during the month of December over a billion gift packages are sent to family and friends in honor of the holiday season. Many receive little packages such as Christmas cards with some exquisite candy, while others go all-out and send large basket arrangements with fruit, candy and some other knick knacks. However, in 2007 on the small culdesac in suburbia Colorado, the most bizarre “gift” was delivered to the youngest Benjamin on Otero place.

The unusual delivery began when the youngest Benjamin, Katarina was on winter break from school, waiting for the arrival of Christmas day. Days before the big holiday Katarina was being a usual bum, sitting on the couch watching a ten hour marathon of Gilmore Girls. As her “restless” days home alone continued, the day before Christmas Eve she heard someone ring the doorbell, so she went straight to the door to see who it was through the peep hole. Katarina recognized the awkward presence of the man and was not interested in opening the door to a man who was displaying a questionable demeanor.

The Dead in Dreams - Michael Paff

My mother has always had an open mind about spiritual forces interacting in our world. She follows the Zodiac and reads her trusted horoscope every night, "to see how her day was." She will immediately notice the horoscope's parallel's to the events that occurred to her that day. She is religious and feels that God plays an important role on the planet Earth. She feels good knowing there are forces in this world stronger than us that cannot be measured or manipulated by us in any way.

A Veggie Tale - Diep Do

My cousin, Kevin, and I were not raised with traditions. So whenever the older generations of our family or someone that we don't know that's apparently a part of the family does something out of the ordinary, my cousin and I turn into those seagulls in the movie, "Finding Nemo", and instead of constantly saying, "Mine, mine, mine," we ask, "Why, why, why"

Since the majority of the family are Buddhists, they do eat vegetarian. One time Kevin and I ordered onion rings and we offered some to our other cousin, Yen, but she told us that she was eating vegetarian that day and therefore could not eat any onions. Kevin turned to me and asked, "Why?" I shrugged my shoulders and told him "I don't know" and we both looked at yen and she just rolled her eyes and walked away.
The following week I was hanging with my other cousin, Tong, and I asked him why vegetarians cannot eat onions and/or garlic since he is more knowledgeable and more open to answer my questions. So instead he told me a story:

Time-Slip Sounds a Little Risqué - Zach Kimbell

This is not your typical time travel narrative. No H.G. Wells protagonists to be found, traversing the space time continuum. Leave your preconceived notions and your (perhaps well placed) skepticism at the door. It almost sounds like the introduction to an episode of the ‘Twilight Zone’.

The year 1935, Edinburgh, Scotland, the witness to a paranormal phenomenon none other than the father of the British Royal Air Force, Victor Goddard, this particular incident involved what is known as a time-slip. These “slips” are defined when the present and past interlace with one another. Though, the event is usually unnoticed by the individuals residing in the “times of yore”.

Cripple Creek Creepers - Logan Clarry

My Aunt Lisa came to visit from Michigan one summer about 15 years ago and my mom decided to surprise her and take a family trip to Cripple Creek, some 2 hours from Denver. We stopped off at Santa’s Workshop which my mom said was not much fun because being summer, it was not anywhere near Christmas and we were the only people there. We took the back roads to Cripple Creek through the canyons that dotted the mountainous landscape. My Aunt Lisa was afraid of the twists and turns and driving so close to the edge of the cliffs.

Life Beyond Death - Alex Tran

Life and death aren't any distant from each other as Thich Nguyen Tang, a Buddhist monk, claims: "death is not the end of life, it is merely the end of the body we inhabit in this life, but our spirit will still remain and seek out through the need of attachment..." This explains why many things fall into the realm of the "strange and unusual". During the time of my aunt's sickness I myself witnessed strange and unusual events.

I found out my aunt had cancer when she was 53. What happened was my cousins kept the fact that she had cancer from the rest of the family, and the only ones who knew the truth were the ones living under the same roof; her immediate family. I'd visit her weekly and every time I saw her she'd seem very healthy as always, but sometimes her family kept me from visiting her because they said she wasn't feeling well. I didn't think too much of it until the next week. She looked so much skinnier and her head was shaved. When the thought of cancer wandered to my mind, "Impossible, maybe shes becoming a full fledged Budhist or something," I thought to myself. Later that day I heard my little cousins mention something about cancer. That's when I had to believe the unbelievable.

Haunted Housesitting - Evan Fitzgerald

A close friend of mine recently told me about some experiences he had while housesitting for his girlfriend’s family. The events, which had occurred, had left him very uneasy and made him afraid to even stay in the house alone for another night. This was very surprising to me since he had always been the fearless one.

It all started at the beginning of the night when he walked outside to take care of their lamas for the night. When he walked back in, he noticed that three of the photos had fallen over from one of the shelves. At the time he just assumed one of the cats had climbed up and knocked them over when walking by. So he placed the pictures back on the shelf and didn’t think twice of it.

Unwelcome Neighbor - Carsyn Gallegos

When I was growing up I heard a variety of ghost stories from many different sources. I read them in books, I heard them from friends, and I even heard them from family. More often than not I could tell the stories were not real. I could tell by the exaggerated way they were told and how they often had a moral. The stories with morals were meant to scare kids into thinking before they do and taking the advice of their parents. The stories that always seemed to have lasting impact were the stories I heard from family. The first time I heard a ghost story told by my father that truly seemed to frighten him was the first time I was ever truly frightened by a ghost story.

Anti-Gravity in the Black Hills - Chelsea Starr

When was the last time you saw a ball roll uphill? You’re probably thinking, “As if that would ever happen on Earth because we have gravity.” Or better yet, you might assume that the ball was pushed up the ramp so it appeared to roll uphill. Let me tell you that I have witnessed this intriguing phenomenon of a ball rolling uphill while in the Black Hills of South Dakota, on vacation. We all know that it is a proven fact that water runs downhill, and objects eventually fall to the ground, due to gravity. It is also known that trees grow straight up out of the ground (as long as there are no obstructions that would cause the tree to grow around the object). This is not the case at the Cosmos House of Mystery deep in South Dakota’s Black Hills. At this tourist attraction, if you place a ball at the bottom of a sloped board, the ball rolls uphill instead of downhill. If you pour water on the bottom of an angled piece of sheet metal, it flows upward. The trees grow at an angle from the ground, all pointing away from this one spot in the middle of the Black Hills. They do not grow up straight out of the ground, but instead are all curved, even the tallest trees. This location with these strange happenings is not a hoax, though. The ball is not a “trick” tennis ball, and the water is plain tap water. At this location, an ordinary wooden chair is able to balance on just one chair leg without the support of any other objects. A person can even sit in the chair and it is still able to balance on just one leg, and does not waver at all. One can feel the effects of flying by stepping on two blocks of wood, leaning forward, and not falling flat on his/her face.

Dreams/Nightmares Do Come True - Khoa Nguyen

What are dreams? Scientific definition: dreams are a series of thoughts, images, and sensations occurring in a person’s mind during sleep. Common definition: dreams are just the happy place where you can escape to and have things the ways you wanted them to be. But sometimes, they WILL go wrong and become nightmares, and sometimes, those nightmares will come true and haunt you!

I believe that everyone, at least once in their lives, has had a dream about something. But to everyone out there, do you think that dreams/nightmares can come true? For me, I would say, “Yes, yes they can! But not all of them, just the WORST ones, nightmares!!”

Talking to the Deceased - Lisa Lor

It’s been a tradition for many many years that Shaman people have a sixth sense. For those who are sixth sensed can talk to dead spirits; good or evil. The shaman can see what is wrong and how the sick person got ill. But not everyone gets to become a shaman; they must be chosen by the spirits to become an intermediary between the spiritual realm and physical world. In Hmong shamanism, a shaman can be a man or a woman. Typically, there is a strong chance for an individual to become a shaman if their family history contains shamans. This is due to the belief that ancestral spirits, including the spirits of shamans, are reincarnated into the same family tree.

Coming Alive Through Music - Holland Foley

During an eternal family car ride, my father related to the carload of sleep-deprived corpses a story of a ghostly encounter. Although we were all a bit skeptical about the reality of this tale, we had no option but to be a captive audience.

Inspiration of Light - Anna Klein

As a child my Grandmother and I would spend time on the weekends taking walks on warm sunny days. She was a very optimistic woman, who always looked on the bright side. I looked up to her; not only as a child does to their grandparents, but as an inspiration. It amazed me that, even in the worst of times she would find happiness. She was like a beam of light, her presence alone seemed to light up a room.

A House Haunted by the Past - Christina Lundell

I have a friend who’s mother could be considered quite the skeptic. She did not believe in folklore, relish in the supernatural world, nor consider an extraterrestrial possibility. She could be measured as a bible thumper and a realist. Although she would be seen as the last person to report a story of a “haunted” house, she apparently lived right in the middle of one. A house that was lively with supernatural activity, she recalls never feeling alone. According to her, there was always someone watching her when she would be at the house while the kids were in school and the husband working. She described him as male, older, and not very content. She also described feeling like there were two younger children in the house. She could never tell if they were both female or if one was a boy and the other a girl. Her reports are chilling, because like I said before, she never believed in any of this until it happened to her.

The Ghost at 1162 Kearney St. - James Duensing

My buddies and I had just moved into our own place for our sophomore year of college. We had been looking at potential places for almost two months when we found the one that would later be our permanent place of residence. Our landlord told us that the unit opposite us had been bought by the bank and no one has lived there for a year and a half. He also told us that his daughter had lived there the year before us and we were still getting some of her mail in the mailbox. So my friend Phil, being the social networking guru that he is, looked her up and added on facebook. It was a little creepy how fast she accepted his request because within twenty minutes she was asking if we had seen the ghost yet. We said “no” and thought that she was just being a terrified girl who got scared of any noise at night. Now it wasn’t until we got mail from her roommates and added them also, and they were questioning our sightings of the ghost that we became more interested. As the summer went on we were all working and doing our own thing that we basically forgot about the possible ghost. Then one day when I was having a long board session in late July, out in front of our place I saw the door close and when I went to go see what made it move I found that the door was locked and I had left my keys inside so I was locked out, luckily my buds were inside and were able to hear my knocks. As the summer came to a close one of the last nights we had left, Phil came home after work around nine-thirty and when he opened the first door to the complex he heard footsteps where no one ever really goes and when he looked up the stairs to see if anyone was there he could have sworn that he saw the top of someone’s head crouching behind the railing. The third encounter was in my bathroom, now my bathroom has a door in it that leads to our balcony that is adjoined to the vacant unit next to us, that I make sure to lock every night almost religiously and the door to our rooms are able to lock as well. So I got ready for bed one night and did my evening rituals brushing my teeth, washing my face and locking the balcony door then I locked my bedroom door so I could have an undisturbed night of sleep. When I woke up the next morning and went in the bathroom to get ready for school I noticed that the balcony door was ajar and so was the screen door but my bedroom door was still locked. I couldn’t explain how the second door was open and the first door wasn’t. None of us have been possessed yet but at this point it is not completely out of the question.

Bee Sting - Christian Teske

One day while I was in line for lunch and asked my friend to hand me the honey. As he did so, he told me a story of his cousin and how he was attacked by a swarm of bees one afternoon. His cousin, Lance, was at home mowing the lawn and saw a dark cloud approaching his house. He stopped and observed the cloud but thought it was a rain crowd so he continued to do his work. A couple of minutes later he noticed a loud sound like a bunch of motorcycles racing down his street. All of a sudden, Lance was covered by millions of bees stinging him repeatedly, fighting for his life in the middle of dark obscure mob of bees. Lance could not help but to drop to the ground and protect himself. The sight was awful as if someone was digging in him with needles all over his body. Seconds later the gang of bees were gone and Lance was free, but he was minutes away from death. He laid there struggling for his life, until his mom came out and rescued him. They hurried to the nearest hospital, and on the way they saw in the rear view mirror the dark cloud was making its way somewhere else. They finally arrived, where the doctors were able to take him and save his life. Lance stayed over night to recover, but when he was released he never continued to be the same person. He became quiet and afraid going into dark places, and was known of his strange scent of honey.

The Lakeside View - Tim Hebert

In the small town of Nahma Michigan, where my grandparents grew up, there is a lake house where no one has lived since the 1940’s. This past summer, my brother and I decided to take a trip and visit our family and finally visit the empty the haunted house. When we got up there we could barely make out the mailbox wildering away from Mother Nature. Needless to say, the house did not look much better. After walking around the property we decided to see if the house was open and to our surprise it was. We ventured in looking around keeping an eye out for any animals that have made this place home.

The Unexplained Handprints - Jennifer Huynh

I’m sure everyone who lives in Colorado has heard about the haunted third bride in Aurora. There has been so many stories to why that place is haunted; such as local high school students dying there in a car accident, a school bus of small children that crashed and killed everyone, and one of the most common story is said that an Indian massacre took place there in which settlers killed the men in battle and then returned and killed the woman and children of the tribe. People claim that once you enter into the third bridge area there will be a mist of fog even in the middle of the summer. Others claim that they would see a man floating on a horse. I’ve been told that when you check your car’s window the next morning you’ll see hand prints on your windshield. Lots of stories and rumors have been told about third bridge, but how do I know if they’re true and it’s really haunted?