Shadows of My Mind.

Tara

Writer

My name's Tara, and I live in the fabulous city of Atlanta (go Braves!) I enjoy reading, music, and long walks in the park. When I'm not busy lusting over Derrick from the Real World/Road Rules Challenge on MTV, I enjoy trying my hand in the kitchen. My family are genuine, "straight off the boat" It...

Tuesday, August, 19, 2008

I was seven years old when it happened, and to this day, I’m still not sure exactly what it was.

I woke up in the middle of the night surrounded by darkness and silence. On the face of things, this occurrence would seem no different than any other night my sleep was disturbed, but instinctually, I knew that it was. I could feel the air closing in on me, and the room’s calmness was so scary it was deafening. It was then that I noticed something out of the corner of my eye – something that would haunt my memory for years to come.

Kneeling at the foot of my bed was a dark, shadowy figure that could best be described as the widely-known Death character. Its frame was engulfed in an eerie black-hooded robe, so much that it seemed as though that’s all it really was – cloth, with no possibility of an arm, elbow or shoulder. Unlike the Death character, however, its face was not a mask of skull bones, but rather just a black void of nothingness. Even now as an adult, I still wonder what would have felt more threatening – seeing its eyes or not seeing them.

Contrary to its appearance, inside, I did not feel scared in the slightest. Perhaps it was the child in me at the time that felt the world was sincerely my friend, and never posed any possibility of a threat. Being the product of a single-mother household, I logically assumed the figure was my mom watching me sleep, and so, I called out to her.

“Mom?”

Its response was silent and motionless, creating an air of confusion within me. “Why is mom just staring at me?” and “Why won’t she talk to me?” were just some of the thoughts racing through my elementary mind.

Time stood still in my bedroom that night, so much, that I couldn’t begin to tell you how long my face-off with the mysterious creature lasted. Somehow, I managed to fall back into my slumber, but the effects of that night left a lasting impression in my mind. Although I was young, I was not stupid enough to think that the figure was actually my mother, so I never mentioned the incident to her. Besides, it could’ve very well been just a dream, although in my heart of hearts, I know that it was not.

I’ve always had a passion for the paranormal. Whether or not this fascination was a result of my personal experience, I do not know, but I can tell you that seeing what I saw has only furthered my curiosity. Since losing my job, I’ve had plenty of time to brush-up on my paranormal television programming, which includes such shows as ParanormalState, A Haunting, and the ever-famous Ghost Hunters. Now slightly more refined than I was at age seven, my musical tastes have delved into the classics, and I can’t help but envision that dark figure every time I hear Camille Saint Saens’ “Danse Macabre.”

While I’m certainly no ghost-hunter, something inside me says that whatever that creature was, it did not intend to harm me. When I said I wasn’t scared upon seeing it, I meant it. The spirit is the core of every human being, so I can’t believe that malevolence in one could be greeted by tranquility in another. Perhaps it was my childlike innocence that kept feelings of distress at bay. Perhaps that’s why so many children claim to see things so many others cannot. Children are free and without blemish; they see the world through a window that closes only too quickly upon entering adulthood.

That was my one and only paranormal experience, and I can’t say with full honesty that I’d want a re-run of that night. I can say will full honesty that I know there is an unseen world out there – a fourth dimension, if you will. Of course, there will be skeptics, and they’re all entitled to their opinions. But no matter what they think or say, I know what I saw, and I will carry it with me until the day I die.

Maybe then, I can find out what that thing really was.