My First Encounter (Intro)

Hello, fellow Steemers. I'm not sure how many of you are skeptical of "The Great Unseen" or how many of you believe in the paranormal. What one believes in however, at least when referring to this particular subject, is somewhat irrelevant as belief systems do not trump the existence of something universally bound by Natural and Universal Law. For example, a person may attest that the existence of oxygen is a hoax simply because it cannot be seen. One can argue that we feel the wind, trees sway, waves move, we partake in breathing, and so on. Whatever it is, there is something all around us that causes and facilitates these things...whether we need it or not. Something to ponder but I digress.

In this series of blogs, I will be sharing my own personal stories based on real-life experiences and hopefully, will be bringing you into a world that you've always felt was there but just never saw. Maybe some of you reading this have had experiences such as I, or others may possibly have had more benign or more extreme occurrences. Whatever the case, consider yourselves part of a very unique club. We are members for life, possessing a membership that can't be taken away no matter what because what is seen, heard, and known cannot be erased from memory but only written in the timeless pages of our own history. For those on the other side of the spectrum or those on the fence, sit back and enjoy. You may just have an "aha!" moment or maybe an occasional chuckle or two. Whatever your position, the proceeding account and all of those that will come after are true and written how I remember them. Luckily (and unluckily), I recall them as if they had just happened yesterday.

My first story begins with my first experience at the age of three. I wish I could state that it was a wonderful first hand introduction to the spirit world, that a loving and caring family member who had passed showed themselves to me and smiled to the point of me feeling their warm connection, but it was just not so. And so it begins...

My parents and I were visiting family in South America for two weeks during their yearly vacation period and on this one particular day, had decided to gather for lunch at the home of one of my aunts. I recall my nonna (grandmother...mother's mother) being there as well as a couple of other relatives. Being three years old, I wasn't about to hang around the adults that were sitting down enjoying coffee and pastries (I would now, however) while conversing about boring adult trivialities. I did what any normal three-year-old would do during a situation like that, I reached into my pocket, took out some matchbox cars that were secretly hidden in there, and headed towards the living room to play.

Sitting on the rug, surrounded by furniture at all my perimeters, I lost myself in play and imagination for an unspecified amount of time until something snapped me out of it: an eery laugh, bordering on a cackle, coming from directly in front and above me! I remember it as if it were yesterday. I froze as every little hair on the back of my neck stood up as a sharp burst of adrenaline surged through my body. I was forced to slowly begin to face whoever or whatever was laughing knowing that everyone in that house was in the dining room.

As my eyes slowly scanned the space directly in front of me, I saw sitting on the wing chair, a man that seemed to be in his 90s, wearing a black (or dark gray) suit with matching hat and shoes, hunched forward, forearms resting on his knees, laughing and crazily cackling at me. Upon seeing him, I kind of jumped in place and this automatically sent him into a frenzy of thrusting his tongue out and wagging it all over the place while cackling like a demonic Kris Kringle on laughing gas!

Needless to say, enough was enough so I stood up and ran towards the dining area. I ran straight to my grandmother and while trying to explain to everyone what had happened, I could still hear the insane laughing behind me. In a split second, my grandmother picked me up and walked briskly towards the living room with the other adults in tow. She asked where this person was as my parents asked a barrage of questions of their own, so I looked back over my shoulder and pointed to the wing chair, all the while he was still staring at me and laughing uncontrollably. I felt the fear growing at the realization that I was the only one that could see or hear this entity. Not a stranger to these occurrences, my grandmother began to pray out loud and within what seemed like 10 to 20 seconds, the man vanished as suddenly as he had appeared. Even though I would not see or hear him again, there would be a few more experiences for me in that house. That is for a future story.

This was to be my first of many encounters spanning over the next 40 years. I will post a new story about every other week and please, I encourage any comments or questions that you may have since I love dialogue. Currently, I am visiting family in Europe but wanted to post this introductory story as soon as I had some free time here. Another window of opportunity will open up next week so I will get to all of your replies then. Till then.