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Sunday, October 31, 2010

Greta Hayley Says - HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Hello friends! Greta Hayley here! Today is a very fun, campy little holiday, where people tell stories about ghosts and goblins. But I don't like any of those things. So for Halloween I thought I would share a treat with you, not a trick.

To celebrate Halloween, my mommy took me and my sister Helena to a party at my favorite store, PetSmart. I couldn't go unless I dressed up and mommy didn't know what to make me this year. Last year I was a Vegas high roller, and boy was I adorable in my "I almost lost my shirt in Las Vegas" shirt and card necklace. I didn't want to be the same thing again this year, though. Mommy searched and searched and finally realized that she still had her scrubs from when she was a vet tech. She took out one of her shirts and put it on me, and it fit! I was so excited!

Off we went to the wonderful party where I got lots of treats just for being cute! I like getting treats! But mommy said the best part was getting our picture taken together. Mommy said this is her favorite picture of me, and the first picture of the two of us together!

Because Mommy wanted the holiday to be fun, she threw a Halloween party for us puppies and kitties, and my grandma and Aunt Bev last night. She gave us all pretty gift bags and we got more treats. But that's not important to the blog. What's important is that, to add to the creepy atmosphere, she got candles that dripped blood and put them in skeleton candle holders. Look how neat they were as they burned!


SPOOKY!

That's all for today. I have to get ready to go trick-or-treating now! Everyone enjoy your Halloween and be safe out there. And if you dress up tonight and would like your picture featured on RubyRedHearts, then please email Mommy at CWillows@verizon.net.

TTFN,
Greta Hayley the Puppy Nurse

Monday, October 25, 2010

We're Single Because Kim Kardashian Is Awesome

Seriously, that's mine and my friend's new motto. Let me explain. Today while watching Dancing With the Stars, my mom and I got to talking about previous seasons, which led to us talking about Kim Kardashian. We missed that season but I looked up her dances online. I was telling my mom that that she was a good dancer, but the reason she didn't get further is that she was so stiff and had issues letting go and showing a "romantic" side with her partner, Mark.

From there we got to talking about how Kim is the text book good girl, and a little stiff socially, in general. If you're not familiar with her, she doesn't drink or party. There's even an episode where she got a new house and her mom threw a party for her in her new house. She couldn't relax because she was worried people were going to ruin this beautiful house that she had just bought and customized for her. She didn't enjoy her party, and in her defense, a pillow was ruined by a drunken wine spill.

My mom commented that I was exactly like Kim socially. I one hundred and fifty percent agree and am completely flattered by this comparison. I adore her and I am exactly like Kim socially, although I'm more like Khloe when it comes to sarcasm and what not. I have a big personality, whereas Kim is a little more backward with the funny. But I am a good girl, and I like things in a certain order. I'm not romantically comfortable or loose, and I like things a certain way. I don't have a stick up my ass, but I can see where some could feel that way. What I do and don't do is my choice. I like having nice things and knowing with a clear head what I am doing, and I don't see anything wrong with that. However, I realized that I'm probably single for the same reason that Kim is. I'm totally okay with that.

Anyway, being single because Kim is awesome is not why I'm writing this. I want to tell you about the inspiring week I had, followed by the weekend from somewhere that I can fairly positively identify as not heaven. Let's just start with the inspiring week, shall we?

Last Thursday I went to the vet's office with Aunt Bev. I'm going to go on record and say that I think it was Thursday, although it could have been Wednesday. However, I feel like dog doo-doo right now and don't feel like thinking this one out too awfully hard. Anywho, this particular vet was the one I used to work for, so I went to be her translator. Look, the vet is originally from Poland. He's hard to understand for a lot of people and one of my jobs as his vet tech was to basically be a translator. I've known him long enough that I understand him just fine. But this story has nothing to do with the animals. You're all shocked by one of my stories having nothing to do with everything it should have to do with, I'm sure.

While at the vets office, I met a little girl who touched my heart. As you all know, I love kids. In fact, I often say that a husband is optional but a little girl is not. I know I shouldn't be zeroing in on a little girl, but I know with my health that having kids is not going to be much of an option for me, so I plan to adopt. And I want a little girl. It's not that I wouldn't love a boy all the same, but I'm not around a lot of guys in my life. I never have been. I could connect with a little girl better. I've always had my dream little girl in mind; one that I thought I would connect with and would connect best with me. We all dream of our perfect husband and perfect kids. I just forgot the husband part.

When I met the little girl at the vets office, she was everything I wanted my little girl to be. She was smart, sweet, adorable, sassy, and furthermore, she was strong. She befriended me nearly immediately and asked me if I would be her new best friend. Who could say no to that? I agreed. While her mom was in with the dog and her grandma in the waiting room watching her, we played. We probably played in the small waiting room for a half an hour, and we talked. I told her she was cute, she said, "I know." I asked her her favorite color and she said, "I like them all evenly." I adored her. Then she turned around and inspired me.

It turns out this little girl of only four was diagnosed with diabetes recently. No matter what they do, they can't seem to get her blood sugar stabilized. They give her the dose for her size and it's too much. They give her less and it's not enough. Because of this she was passing out. They took her to the hospital and found out she was actually having seizures. When I met her she was actually getting ready to go to the hospital after the vet visit to have this further checked into.

A lot of you have heard me say on here that, although I know I am sick, I also know it could be worse. That's what keeps me strong. This little girl is what keeps me strong, and I am praying that she has the strength to handle everything coming her way, and they can find what it takes to help her feel better. The little girl and I bonded so well that her mom and I exchanged numbers. I hope I get to see her again. As Aunt Bev said, "I don't know who's having more fun, you or her." Me, definitely. Aunt Bev also pointed out that we are probably the same age when it comes to the things we like to do with our spare time. Considering Aunt Bev bought me coloring pages that make farm animal sounds when you color the pages, and I play with them, I'd have to agree. Last year my mom bought me crayons and coloring books for Christmas. See, I'm in with the cool kids.

Another thing that struck me is that, as you all know, I've been struggling with my novel. The story feels so right and so wrong all the same. I struggle with if this is the story I want to go with and represent myself with for a first novel. I struggle with a lot of questions. As I get other story ideas, I file them so that I can move on when I'm done with my novel. I plan to keep writing and submitting my stories until I get a book deal. There's a lot of ideas in my head. And one is about a little girl. She is a character that I have developed down to the last detail of her look and personality. The little girl that I met at the vets office defines the little girl character in this story. She is her to a tee, and I wonder if maybe this is fate trying to tell me something. And the more compelling thing? The working title for that story is New Best Friend, because when the little girl meets the lead female character, she immediately asks her if she'll be her "new best friend." Coincidence?

This weekend was supposed to be blissful, especially after the crazy-busy week I had. I would further report on it, except it was mostly running around with my mom, a day out with Aunt Bev and planning, planning, planning and finalizing some things for this weekend's Halloween party that I am having for the grand total of three people, including myself. Go on and guess who the other two are. I'll give you a minute...

If you guessed Mom and Aunt Bev, you are right. Word.

I will try to never type word as one word with a period again. Or, you know, a sentence. I will try to never make the word, word a sentence again.

This weekend I had strict plans. I was going to go to the PetSmart Halloween celebration with two of my dogs, Greta Hayley and Helena, and watch the marathon of Ghost Adventures, along with a few Halloween movies. When I say I have strict plans, I am not kidding. On Friday night I sat on the computer and went through the guide, writing down the episodes of Ghost Adventures that I wanted to see, and the times they were playing. I also did that with the movies I wanted to see and then adjusted things to which I wanted to see the most. I then stuck those schedules on the television so that I wouldn't forget.

I know what you're all thinking. But Cassadee, didn't you say in an earlier post that you were afraid of Zak Bagans from Ghost Adventures? Yes, yes I did. I know what you're all thinking now. But Cassadee, why in the heck are you planning your weekend around watching that show? Well, my friends, these are all valid thoughts, but the thing is, I'm not longer afraid of him. Let me tell you...scratch that, let me show you why.

Go to 7:00 in this clip. Any person who admits they are afraid of snakes and then picks on up is good in my book. However, any person who drops the snake and runs away while screaming, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," repeatedly just makes me laugh, therefore making my fear of them null and void. I could also mention where he heard something and literally huddled in a corner, and another time when something overtook him and as the other two men on the show debated if something was wrong with him, he began to skip and sing down the hallway. Just a note, this guy probably hasn't skipped a day in his life. This absolutely wasn't normal, which is fine, because now I just find it impossible to be afraid of him every time I picture him running away from snakes and apologizing. The other few things don't hurt, either. So in case you were wondering, that explains that.

Saturday worked out well for me. I got in my Ghost Adventures and then headed to PetSmart with the girls. I always knew that Greta Hayley was a very special dog. She has always taken care of me and I always feel like I have to find a way to live up to that. She is sweet, loving, and wants nothing but to get hugs and love, and I hope her do her right. On Saturday she showed me a completely different reason as to why she is so amazing.

Greta is a bit of a nervous PetSmart visitor. (You guys, this is how good I'm not feeling. I just tried to figure out how it was that visitator wasn't a word. It took spell check to tell me the right word would be visitor. I knew this...but apparently whatever has come to make me sick did not. Thanks, whatever is making me sick, for making me not only act like a dumb ass, but share it with people who would have never known otherwise.) She will let people pet her, but she shakes a little, or will turn and hide her head in between my legs. She likes it, but it makes her nervous all the same. Then when she's had enough she just walks away from people. But really they shouldn't feel insulted. She does it to me, too.

While we were waiting for the parade to start so that we could take our dogs "trick-or-treating" for dog treats, two women walked by us with a mentally challenged individual in a wheelchair and another who was older and able to get around just fine. The older woman got very excited over Greta, but the younger woman she was with, who I later found out was her granddaughter, wouldn't let her come over and see Greta. I figured this was most likely because she wasn't sure if we'd be okay with it. The woman clapped for Greta and everything.

As they walked away, Greta got antsy to go for a walk. Her walk led us right over to the same group of people. And the sweet little darling did the most profound thing. She simply walked over to the older, mentally challenged woman and sat down. The older woman just looked at me and I told her she could pet her. She asked me if Greta was a boy or a girl and I told her she was a girl. She got down on the floor with Greta while Greta just sat there, and petted her. While this was going on the granddaughter thanked me profusely, explaining that no one would ever let the woman pet their animals.

People, this seriously stumps me. The woman was delightful. Just because she is mentally challenged does not, by any means, mean that she is a mean woman who doesn't deserve to be treated like the rest of us. Some of the most amazing people I've met in my life have been mentally challenged. They see the world painted beautifully, something that more people need to do. If you talk to them for any amount of time, you realize that they are the ones who understand the world, while we make it into what we want to see.

When the woman was done petting Greta, she got up and hugged me. The young woman tried to stop her, but I went back in and hugged the woman back. She was a wonderful woman and so thrilled to have gotten to pet Greta. I was thrilled that Greta went right over to her and let her do so. She has an amazing little heart, and I don't care what people say, she knew this woman just wanted a little puppy to pet. She made the woman's day, and in return, this amazing woman and Greta Hayley both made mine. I was so proud of her that I could have cried. Directly after this she went back to being shy about people petting her.

A little later in the evening we ran into the same woman and she got to pet Aunt Bev's kitten, Nugget. I really hope we made her day a little brighter, because she was wonderful. Also, for Halloween I will be posting the pictures of Greta Hayley and Helena that they got taken at the celebration.

I came home Saturday and resumed my evening of Ghost Adventures and a Hallmark movie, Growing the Big One. And no, I didn't just watch it for the name. But then Sunday came and it all went to somewhere that isn't heaven. I woke up sick. I stayed sick all day. To put it nicely, nothing I ate wanted to be friends with me. I shrugged it off and figured it was just me being sick although I felt like my body was going through hell. When it didn't let up today I realized that something had caught me. I hadn't caught it. I'm not that dumb.

So here I am today still feeling like crap, succumbing to the fact that I am exhausted and hungry, and probably won't sleep because I'm too hungry to sleep, and if I eat I won't be able to stay friendly with it, so I'm trying to amuse myself online. But it could be worse, I could be the local man who stole an empty cash register and is being charged with attempted burglary. How sad for him.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Dolls of the Night

You all, I have two things to share with you. One is very exciting news, and the other is clarification on the last post. Let's start with the latter since it's probably less exciting. Then we'll get to things that veer away from the supernatural.

Apparently I am a dumbass and need to clear something up. I had put in the last post about my spirit girl saying that her son had to go live with sister. That is what she said, but I took it to mean she had a son and was saying he after that. That's not the case. She referred to her daughter as her sun, as in "her sunshine, her world." It was her nickname for her. Her words, not mine. She also referred to her as she when she said "she has to go live with my sister." I, however, misheard her. She didn't hesitate to correct me, I just hesitated to correct the post because I didn't really have a chance to until now. So basically I got told. By a dead person. Not so sure how I feel about that.

The second bit of news I have to share is accompanied by a short story. But let's be honest, when is news I have ever not? Miss Zoe and I were talking a little while back and she had mentioned about writing on FanFiction.net. This is something I had never done or attempted. With the idea in my head and a little persuasion from some friends, I decided to go right on ahead and write a story to post on there. I realize I'm supposed to be working on my novel, however, I don't think taking time to write a fan fiction is a bad thing for two reasons.

One, it gets me out of my head and frustration and reminds me that writing is fun, and to write for myself, too. Sometimes with working on the novel I forget that and tell myself I have to get it done and it's all work and no play. I started out writing for fun and I need to go back to that. I think it will cure a lot of my issues of stumbling all over this novel. Two, it seriously challenges me. You guys, I didn't realize how hard it would be to write a story based on characters that are already developed. I'm used to making up my own. Which also poses the problem of having to write in third person as opposed to first. Ah, adjustments. If anything, I can only learn from this and I'm excited to do it! I think it will help me grow as a writer and make my novel even better. The story, however, does not reflect what my novel will be like, or the narrative in which it will be written.

It really only took me about two seconds to be persuaded to write a fan fiction once I saw there was a Criminal Minds category. It's like I was attracted to it and just couldn't help myself. Really, that just sounds dirtier than I intended it to. I have this whole thing intricately mapped out and plotted, so if I can nail all the characters I think it will hopefully be a delightful story. That sounded inexplicably dirty, too, and I'm not sure how delightful a crime story can be. Work with me on this.

So, without further ado, I present to you the first chapter of Dolls of the Night.

Monday, October 18, 2010

Pink Flamingos and That Line From The Sixth Sense

This month was supposed to be the month of awesome blogging. I have about nine posts in cue and all these spooky, true life stories that I wanted to tell. Then, I sucked at following through with it. Quite frankly, I'm really tired of the constant excuses for not updating. And even though they're valid, they're still getting old. So today I am going to get a little more personal with all of you. Not so personal that you'll need a restraining order, but more personal than I thought I would ever get on here.

In my last post, I wrote about a girl who was coming to me at night and talking. I had mentioned that I was pretty sure I figured out who she was and gave you all the information she had given me. I would like to share the update on that. A few nights after I posted that, new information was released. I will tell you what it all is and I welcome comments on if this was a coincidence or not. I will not, however, link you all to the article but will explain the reason for it towards the end of this blog.

It was reported that someone was arrested for a parole violation and blood was found at his house. It has not been tested, but is assumed to belong to her since he was the last person who had seen her alive. He claimed to have dropped her off at a certain place around one in the morning, but when his cell records were checked, other information was found. Not only was he never in that area, but his cell phone pinged the whole way up to a lake in another state, and then pinged its way back to where he lives. They are now searching the lake for evidence of her being there. This lake was a place the family was known to vacation when the missing girl was a child. Please remember the arrest didnt even happen until after I posted the last blog, and none of the information came out about it until a day later. I had no way of knowing any of this, but I can't help but think it's not a coincidence and that I have the right girl.

Then last night she came to me again, but there was something extremely different about her. When I had seen her before she was not wet. This time the bottom of her hair was wet and she looked so very sad. I reached out my hand to her and she came over to me, took it, and I told her to sit next to me. She seemed like she needed consoled. She proceeded to say this to me. "My heart gave out. Make sure my son goes to live with my sister. He has to go live with my sister." And then she cried. Folks, this is new to me. I can't say I'm familiar with dead people that need consoled. At this point, I'm pretty sure she's passed. Judging by just the bottom of her hair being wet, I have reason to believe she fell when her heart gave out and only the bottom of her hair touched the water. I keep Googling her to see if any new information comes up. Right now, I just have to sit and wait and see what develops.

This entire situation is breaking my heart. I've cried several times over this. Not just because it, in general, is heartbreaking. I'm used to seeing dead people. I'm used to heartbreaking stories. What bothers me the most is that most dead people I get have been dead for awhile. They simply need help crossing over. They have sad stories, but they're not looking for absolution. They're not waiting to be found. They just need to find the light. Some of them are just an imprint on the property of which they dwell and their story plays like an old movie. I never had spirits who were still missing, or worse yet, not yet dead. I never had spirits that were looking for help for their families in the way these spirits are. Then last year, all of that changed.

I had a woman come to me one night in late October. She told me who she was, although she preferred to go by her middle name as opposed to her first name. She told me she had been taken and tortured and was being kept in an unattached basement of an old farmhouse. I saw her as clear as day. I had nothing to back this. Then, a few days later, a story started popping up all over the internet that this particular girl; same name, same face, same everything, had gone missing the night that I had first seen her. It took a few days for the news to get here since it didn't happen in this state, and because they always wait forty eight hours to do anything with missing persons cases.

I thought about calling the police about what I had known, but never dealing with anything like this before, I didn't know if I could. I didn't know if they'd believe me, think I was crazy, or suspect me from hundreds of miles away. I was scared. To top it off, I had never been in a situation like this and actually wondered if I was going crazy. Plus, when this story blew up, it blew up and it led to the biggest search ever conducted in the history of that state.

While I wrestled with what to do, she stayed here and things changed. Her body was moved; it was dumped. A month and a half later the body was found right where she told me it would be, right in the position she told me it would be in. A few weeks later another dead girl popped up. The same guy had killed her and, just as the first girl told me it would happen, this person had increased and was beginning to get a taste of killing and liked it. She said if he wasn't caught he would turn into a serial killer. She also knew the guy. She had one class with him, so when he offered her a ride home because she couldn't get back into the place she was at, and she had left her keys in there, she thought nothing of it.

Now I was stuck in a moral versus insanity quandary. Was I losing it? How could I be losing it? How did I know this stuff? How did I know such exact, specific things before they were reported? There was no way I could have! Right? But I knew them down to the last detail. Three more girls popped up, all killed by the same guy, and then the first girl told me she was going back home. She was angry because the police had questioned the guy who killed her and the other girls a number of times, yet they had nothing to hold him on so they couldn't arrest him, even though they had an idea he could have done it. Still, they weren't positive. I haven't seen her since, but one of the other girls moved right in here. She's a prankster and not exactly a joy to live with, but I like her anyway.

It took them until last month to announce that the guy who killed her was a serial killer. I knew this since late October of last year when I was told he was going to become one. I knew for sure a few months later when he took another life. There were a lot of things they announced last month, specific things about the way her body was found and what had been done to her, such as she had been tortured, held and killed somewhere else and then moved, that I had known.

Then the guilt came. I knew this stuff for months before anyone else did. I knew what happened to her and where her body was far before her family had any peace. Was it my fault these families suffered as long as they did? Could I have helped them and didn't because I was afraid? Yet I did nothing. But I didn't know if I was right, because I had never had this happen. I had no way of knowing this stuff and I didn't know what would happen if I called the police and found out I was wrong or right. In my heart I knew I wasn't wrong, but I didn't know how to handle it.

Now this is happening. I also have another young lady who has repeatedly told me to call her dad and let her know where the paperwork she got murdered over is. She's given me a phone number and extremely specific details regarding her murder; details that haven't been reported, as well as very specific details as to where this paperwork is. Part of me now wants to play Devil's Advocate and call that number just to see who's at the other end. If it's her dad, I'll know it's for real. But a larger part of me doesn't now how to handle this. If it is her dad, what do I say? How to I handle this? Her body has never been found, although it's assumed she is dead. So do I just tell him that his dead daughter is talking to me and then come out with all these specifics things I shouldn't know and that were never announced? How does one go about doing something like this?

As much as I want to use the logical explanation, which is that I'm nuts, I have far too much proof to back what I'm being told and what is happening. I have several people who can vouch for me telling them specific things about these dead women and then having it turn up in reports days, sometimes months later. I can't explain it and I don't like that. Despite what I do, I'm a logical person and I want proof. Then, when I get it, I still want more.

I can't control the people who come to me and the people who don't. I can't all of a sudden see someone who is missing and tell you what exactly it is that has happened to them. Often times I can see a picture and tell you if they are dead and alive. Sometimes I know how, but I don't have the details that I do when I see who I see. I just get feelings and impressions. And there's no guarantee that I'll see anyone. I can't pick who I do and do not see. It's up to them if they want to come to me or not. I don't control that. They do.

This has really messed with me emotionally. I don't know what to do, but I feel so guilty no matter what I do. There's not much more that I can do for this current girl as of now. They are looking in the right place for her. It's just a matter of time before they find her. But if this happens again, if I find I know something like the back of my hand, do I suck it up and call the police? Or do I sit by again and see if things unravel the way they have been, where I end up being right and did nothing because I didn't trust what I saw or was told?

The reason for me not giving specifics on what girls I've seen and am dealing with is the media attention surrounding them. I don't feel right, even though I've done nothing wrong. I guess there's the fear that if I put the information I know paired with the name of these easily Googled women, that somehow I'll get in trouble. It sounds so selfish, I know, but with my health problems and my inability to travel due to doctor's orders, I'm in no position to be in any kind of trouble. Maybe one day I will reveal the girls I've seen, and maybe once they find the current girl I've been seeing, I will tell you who she is. That way, you can do your own research having the dates my blogs were posted versus the dates the information was announced and judge me for yourself. But I don't know how comfortable I'll be, and I wonder if the families found out, if they'd blame and hate me for not coming forward, or feel like I'm exploiting their daughters. That's not something I want to do. Before I even post things like this, I always get permission from the girls so that they know I am not looking to violate them.

How crazy do I sound right now? I know.

Also, I've often wondered why it is that I mostly see girls, and in cases having to do with murder, always. They are all around my age and have been brutally murdered and sometimes tortured beforehand. I feel like maybe, because of me being close to their age and the pain and trouble I feel from being sick, I draw them in. Maybe it's something I'll never have an answer to. But there's one thing I know for sure, no matter how crazy I feel, I know I am not. I've been evaluated; it was required by my health insurance so that they knew I wasn't being a wackadoodle and making up my symptoms. I've not so much as an anxiety disorder and I feel mentally stable. It's just that I like things I can explain. I like reason. I like logic. I like science.

Anyway, all of this has thrown me into an emotional loop of confusion, and blogging, unfortunately, has been at the bottom of the barrel when it comes to things I'm thinking about. Mix that with the fact that this is the first holiday season without my grandmother, who I was extremely close to, and that keeps being thrown in my face every time I turn around with the upcoming season, and my mind is a little preoccupied. I'm okay, but I just have a lot to deal with.

I'd also like to give novel update. I've been struggling with my novel. That's never been a secret. The problem was, I just didn't know why. I used to be able to write decent stories in a month, so I thought this would take me, at most, a year to knock out a really awesome story, check it, recheck it, and then check it again, but that hasn't been the case. I had to find out why, and to do that, I had to find a piece of myself that I didn't know I was missing. I tried to blame being sick, but I knew that wasn't the real reason for my lapse of writing. I also wanted to blame a brain fart, and although I'm sure it lended itself to the issue, it wasn't all its fault either. There was a reason my brain was letting out ghastly sounds.

The truth is, the novel I started contained a character that was everything about myself that I was afraid to deal with, mixed with everything about myself I wanted to be. Let me explain. She was the girl who was battle scarred, and she tried hard to hide it by doing what I never do, and saying whatever is on her mind. I mean, I do it for the most part, but I also hold back a lot depending on the situation. She does not. And she's a blast to write, don't get me wrong. All of sudden, though, I just couldn't write her anymore and I was so stumped as to why this was. I tried everything, but no dice. I moved on to another idea I had partially done, only to find that I couldn't write her anymore either after awhile.

That's when I realized I had completely changed. I didn't identify with these characters anymore. It's not that the ideas will go to waste. One day I will be able to use them and write them freely, but my grandmother's death changed so much about me, and there's still so many scars from the pre-change that I've not been able to go back to those characters yet and connect. One day when I am able to peel away the salt from the wounds I will be able to go back and write those characters again, but right now there's so much emotionally sorrow surrounding them. Besides that, I've been through a journey of growth and truth with being sick, and find myself at a much less hectic and much more finite place than previously before. It affects my writing immensely.

The stories I'm writing are deep, which I want and love, but they don't reflect me as well as they could. I need something new, hip, fun and something that someone reads and can see my personality from and not wonder where it all came from. There's no shame in starting over and see if that cures my problem. I will always have those ideas. I can always go back and finish them. But writing a novel is about more than just writing, which I found out. It's about finding your heart, and I guess I'm still finding mine. It's okay, because my focus is working hard to get it right. I'm working hard, but I'm just not getting it right. As long as I keep working hard, it will happen. I just have to keep going until it feels right, and keep going I will.

And because you all had to read about a whole lot of no-fun, I shall share two funny things with you that happened today.

Have you ever bought those packs of Nestle Tollhouse cookies that you just break apart, put in the oven and call it a day? You know, the ones that have forty per pack. During Dancing With the Stars tonight, I got a hankering for one, so natrually I broke up all forty of them and made them. But because there were forty as opposed to the twenty four that I thought there were, therefore needing two pans, it took me a little longer than I thought to do and I missed about a minute of DWTS. I commented this to my mom and she said the most bizarrely common sense thing ever. She asked me why I didn't just make one pans worth and put the rest back in the freezer. And let me be honest, it never occurred to me. There's forty in the pack, so I made forty. I can not be the only one thinking this way, right? Right?

And to further prove I don't come from the most educated area of the world, I will tell you the second story. The area I am from is filled with a lot of hicks. The schools are by far way too overcrowded and because of this the curve has become so low that we're not exactly producing rocket scientists here. Then, there's the other few who just think it's ridiculous that they're dumbing everything down and get completely space-eye bored. I'm one of those people and have several friends that are, too, but generally you can sum us up as the trailer park of the East. I live here, so I think it's fair for me to judge. Maybe I'm wrong. Also, I realize there are some really nice trailer parks out there. I'm not talking about those. I'm talking about the pink flamingo, lawn ball kind. And yes, you'll find quite an array of both of those things here, minus the trailer park.

I've worked hard to class myself up while still staying with my roots. I'm a country girl at heart, but I also enjoy some of the finer things. I like the balance, and where I came from keeps me from getting my head up in the clouds. If I ever become one of those people, I'm confident I know at least twenty people who would not hesitate to literally smack me. Hard. Which is the way I like it. And, as my uncle says, "if I ever act like that, just shoot me. Don't even put up with me." I fully agree. Then again, sometimes my roots come out. Like when I say things like this.

"She's just about gonna have an excitin' day."

I'll just leave you all with that.

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Ghost Gal - You Can Tell It's Halloween

This is one of the couple posts I had planned and was without the time to write them. I promise the other post is coming and it's chock-full of random. It's a doozy of a post. Do people even say doozy anymore?

Halloween is nearing, as you all know. What some of you may not know is the significance that Halloween has on the spirit world, and why Halloween is rendered as the season of the spirits. Here's some information on it. Go ahead and take a moment to read it. The post will make more sense then. I'll wait.

For those of us who have one foot in our world and another in the spirit world, it may seem as if the thinning veil would not affect us all the same. You would be right. It affects us more. The things that otherwise can't see us, which is rare, or are not strong enough to make contact us on their own, are now more open and more able to do these things with the veil thin. It's almost is if they get a whole new lease on life. No pun intended, seriously. I'm just trying to put this in the best way that can be understood for those who don't see what I do. You know, normal people.

Each year I thoroughly am prepared for more spirits than I'm used to, which, as you can imagine, is much like being stuffed in an area with a hundred screaming children and unable to get out. When I was younger, it scared me. Then, it just made me mad. After that, it was more of a frustration than anything. But now I've become accustomed to it and it's more of an occupational hazard than anything. In fact, it's become a sarcastic punchline and I actually enjoy it a little bit. Some crazy, funny things happen at this time of the year. I'm just taking them all in.

That being said, I would like to share some of the highlights of this season with you all. These are probably low lights for everyone else. I understand to most that this stuff is abnormal, but after you've done this long enough, it becomes a frequent event, and as I said before, it's more of an annoyance than anything else.

* A few weeks ago I was sitting in the living room with Greta Hayley a little after midnight and minding my own. I had the television on and all of a sudden booming music filled the room. I muted the television to get a better listen, even though I hadn't needed to. It was just that loud. So loud, in fact, that Greta got up and took off out of the room shaking. I knew there was only one place the music could be coming from and that was from the CD player / radio in the kitchen. I went in to find that the volume was the whole way up and switch on the player was turned on "radio." The switch had been on off and the volume is never, ever turned up that loud, nor is it in a place where you could accidentally bump it. If the switch had been on radio position, sound would have been coming out of the device all day, but it was not. Nothing was coming out of it at all. How the device switched from off to radio is beyond me. I turned it off and went about my business. The next day I told my mom what happened and she never heard it. The radio was on loud enough that I'm sure it could be heard outside the house. I don't know how Greta and myself could have heard it and she could not have.

* A few weeks went by without any incidents worth writing about, at least from my point of view, and I was again going about my business. Actually, in all these stories I'm pretty much going about my business. It was a little after seven and I was walking back the hallway to light the candle in the bathroom. Wow, I just made it sound like we live in the Colonial era. I promise we don't; the bathroom just smelled. Anyway, I happened to see a large, around an inch round, light around the top of my doorway as I headed back the hall. At first I shrugged it off, thinking the light on the smoke detector was blinking, even though the light seemed too big and was steady. When I reached that part of the hallway I looked up to see the light was still there, but the light on the smoke detector was not blinking. The light also wasn't coming from the realm of the smoke detector and just hovered there for several minutes. It didn't frighten me, but I have no idea what it was. There was absolutely nothing else in the hallway that could have caused that. Trust me, I tried to debunk it.

* I woke up one morning, and as soon as I moved my legs I knew something wasn't right. I've mentioned before how I get pain in my legs due to my blood disorder. I've been dealing with this for over a year and the pain is always in my ankles, and then will spread from there. It's rarely in my knees, but at the times when it is it comes after the pain in my ankles and there's a ton of swelling in my knees and ankles. On this day my knees hurt and only my knees. It also wasn't the kind of pain conducive to the pain I'm used to with my blood disorder. I literally felt like my kneecaps were broken, though I could move them just fine, and when I lifted up my pants they were neither swollen, which they would have absolutely been if it was from my blood disorder, nor bruised. They looked totally fine.

I got up and started to go about my day, and it became obvious to me that the pain I was feeling wasn't my own. Sometimes this happens. Sometimes I get pain that I know is coming from a spirit. I can't explain how I know that it's not my pain, but I do. Plus, as I've mentioned before, there was nothing visibly or physically going on that could explain the pain in my knees. Also, I was walking just fine despite the pain. I walk like a duck when my blood disorder affects me. My body wasn't acting odd, or reacting in a way to indicate that it knew I was actually having this pain. It was just there.

Because I was obviously fine to walk, I went about my cleaning for the day. It was going just fine, although my knees hurt like mother truckers and the pain wasn't going away. Come mid afternoon I was in the kitchen when I heard something, so I lifted my head to the right and saw a girl in a white dress, around seventeen, walking with her knees bowed in and all crouched over. She honestly looked like something out of a horror movie, but as soon as I saw her the pain in my knees started going away rapidly. I wasn't afraid of her because I knew then that the pain in my knees was merely her warning that she would be coming to me for help, but because of the way she walked, she didn't want to scare me. It was the best way she could warn me. And the first thing she said to me? "He broke my knee caps."

* It wasn't long after my new found spirit had come to visit that I was up on a step ladder taking down a set of curtains to wash. I don't dwell on ladders of any kind for too long because I have vertigo that comes on me very suddenly, and besides that I'm voted most likely to trip over nothing and fall tit over ass for no reason. When I'm home alone, it's just not a good idea to hang out on ladders for too long. Therefore, I took the rod down, got off the ladder, removed the curtains and laid the rod on the floor. I then took the ladder, did the same thing with another set of curtains, threw them in the wash, and then put both curtain rods on top of the counter so they weren't in my way when I scrubbed the floor.

All of this was well and good until I went to hang the curtains back up. I could find the one curtain rod but not the other. I looked for that jerk for a good fifteen minutes and finally gave up. I knew where I had put it and I couldn't find it anywhere, but the other curtain rod was still where I had left the both of them. I put the other curtains up, looked for the first one again, and then promptly gave up and figured I'd keep cleaning and deal with it later.

About a half an hour later I was done with the kitchen and now just really wanting to hang these dang curtains up. For some reason I happened to look up and there was the curtain rod hanging where it were to go after I put the curtains back on it. I know I did not take the curtains down and then get back up on the ladder and put it back up there. As I said, I don't hang out on ladders more than I have to. Plus, to do that would just be making more work for myself. But there it was hanging there, making me get back up there, take it down again, and adorn it with curtains only to hang it back up there.

* The Monday before last, Aunt Bev was here. We were sitting around the coffee table in the living room, my mom next to Aunt Bev and me across from them facing the both of them. Aunt Bev had a very large tray, about one and a half feet in the oval, sitting on the coffee table. This large tray also had a one inch lip around the edge. She was eating peppers off of the middle of the tray. I turned my head to watch Dancing With the Stars when, almost as soon as I had done this, I heard my mom and Aunt Bev both react to something that was definitely not the show. I turned my head back to them in time to see my mom pick a pepper off of the floor next to Aunt Bev's shoe. They proceeded to tell me that this pepper lifted up off of the tray, and flew the three feet or so to her feet. They both saw it.

Now keep in mind this is a big tray, the pepper was in the middle, and there was a one inch lip around the tray. It could not have just slid off and they both saw it lift up and take off at her. I had turned my head just before and just after, and had not seen anyone hanging around that could have thrown it. So if someone was there, they did it quickly and disappeared just as quickly.

* Our house is very small and mostly carpeted, with the exception of the kitchen and dining room combo, the hallway and both bathrooms. The only room that has furniture that can be moved in it is the dining room. There are two pieces of furniture both over one hundred pounds, then two others, including the table, over fifty. The only thing our animals are able to move are the four chairs to the table, which they do often.

So on Monday, about a half an hour after the incident with the pepper, when I heard the chair slide across the floor in the dining room, I thought nothing of it. The only thing that made me notice it at all was that it sounded like it slid a good ways. Usually they only manage to slide it a foot or so, but the sound of the slide lasted a good five seconds. I got up to go into the dining room to move the chair back, only none of the chairs were moved. They were placed nicely under the table where they had been left. The sound I heard was unmistakably something sliding across the floor and there was nothing moved, nor was there anything else the animals could have moved. We all heard it. None of us can explain it.

* Last week I turned off the light to go to bed. This should sound like it's going to be possibly the worst story in the history of stories, I know. I hopped into bed, closed my eyes, had just started drifting off when I heard a voice very, very clearly say "When is she going to leave?" It was the voice of a young woman, and was not threatening. I didn't feel like she was talking to, or about me. I looked over to the television stand where it had come from, but there was no one there. I turned back over and it happened again...but then it kept happening. For three nights it happened. I still have yet to see the girl, but she says it over and over very clearly. Plus, I don't know if she's talking to someone else who is dead and I'm not seeing, or if she is reliving an event before her death over and over.

There's also a third option which I would normally never touch, but in the last year it's something that has come on me more and more. I've often seen or heard someone, knew who they were without an inch of a doubt, only to find out they weren't dead. How did I find out? A few days later I heard of their death on the news or online. They died after I was already seeing / hearing them. This has only happened with women who were tortured for several days pre their death. There's a lot of different stories in the psychic medium world about how people will clock out and leave their body when being tortured, and are sometimes able to ask for help or seek someone out.

Considering I never had this issue, nor did I have any psychic abilities until the last year when the death of a certain young women had occurred. Coincidence or not, I don't know. But I never thought these girls were asking for help in the real world, because I figured they were already dead. Because I can't see this girl and she seems to be talking to someone else, I have to wonder if this isn't the case with her. And if she is talking to someone else, I have to wonder if she's being kept hostage with another young lady and tortured by some kind of serial killer, seemingly female. Since that's all she's said, I guess only time will tell.

Update: Since I originally wrote this post I was able to identify who this women is / was. I had a picture of my mind of what she looked like, even though I couldn't see her. I can't explain how I knew, but I did. I happened to come across a story, and as soon as I saw the girl I knew it was her. She's an endangered missing person and just went missing less than a month ago. The day she was reported missing was the same date she started coming and repeating "when is she going to leave?" After I found out who she is / was, the next time she came around I said her full name. She has since stopped asking over and over again "when is she going to leave?" In fact, she didn't bother me for a whole night after that, but then the other night she came back and kept saying "duck" over and over again. Then there was the unmistakable sound of trickling water and I got images of her as a child playing by water. My mom speculated that she could have been taken by someone she knew and is being held on a farm nearby and tortured; a farm she hung out as a kid. When I brought this up to her she said, "you've got it all wrong." And now she just keeps repeating that. I feel like I'm doing most of the work here.

I don't know what it all means, but I believe I have the right girl since she suddenly changed her MO after I said her name. I still don't know if she's dead or not, because she's not very interactive, which leads me to believe she may not be. If I get more solid information out of her I plan on contacting the police station in charge of the investigation into her disappearance, but I have to make sure that one hundred percent without a doubt I know where she is. Contacting the police would be a new one for me, but I'm starting to feel bad that I often know things and am too afraid to do it. If there's a chance this girl could still be alive I feel like I have to.

* This incident just happened the other night, and my mom and I are both so befuddled by it that we find we're second guessing ourselves over it, even though we know there's no reason to. It's just that we can't figure out how something to this magnitude happened.

Aunt Bev called to see if we wanted to come over, and of course we did, so my mom let the dogs in. We tripped over the dogs, said goodbye to all three of them individually, went to Aunt Bev's came home, and promptly couldn't find one of the dogs, Leo. We looked for him everyone, but no Leo. My mom physically unlocked and opened up the back door to find Leo outside.

We talked about it and there's three reasons we don't think we left him outside when we left. One: We both remember saying goodbye to him.
Two: We've never, ever, in thirteen years, locked a dog outside and left.
Three: We would have seen him locked out in our yard when we went to get in the car and did not.

If we ever figure out what happened, we'll let you know.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Wonky Chipmunks That Speak English

It's after three in the morning. I am so exhausted that I'm not even tired anymore. It's very annoying. I have two awesome, long posts coming up for you all to explain my absence. But right now I'm going to make a short post, because I'm pretty sure I just entered the Twilight Zone and need to document it.

I had a busy day today. I came home exhausted. I was ready to turn in around midnight, which is extremely rare for me. All was going well until the cats started to throw a conundrum that I could not sleep through. We have a crap load of stink bugs in our area and they often get in the house. This results in the cats chasing them around like nobody's business. Therefore, I figured this was all they were doing. Normally they catch it fairly quickly and life goes on. Only this time they weren't seeming to get it and the gosh darn things were keeping me awake.

I got up to get a drink and the vacuum to see if I could just end their fun and sweep up the little sucker. No pun intended. I really, really needed to sleep. As soon as I entered the kitchen, one of the cats threw a serious fit and the next thing I know it a little chipmunk goes flying past me. Yep, a chipmunk. In my house. After midnight. When I was trying to sleep. As you can imagine, this just made me all kinds of gleeful.

Now, I'm not particularly fond of things that run really quickly across the floor. I'm always afraid they'll run over my feet and cause me to scream. I know. I'm such a girl. I mean, I can deal with the dead, but little, furry things that run...forget it. Lots of people have irrational fears, I know, but seriously self? Woman up. Put your big girl panties on and catch that sucker. Which is exactly what I intended on doing.

For the first hour, yes, I said hour, I tried trapping the thing under a bucket in hopes of sliding something under it and taking it outside like that. I did everything you could think of. A few times I even had it cornered, but it managed to get away. Please keep in mind that this is on top of trying to keep the cats from getting it. I would catch the cats as I could and throw them out on the screened in porch, but some of them were running just as fast as the chipmunk, making them extremely hard to catch. And man, those freaking things are fast. After an hour of trying everything possible, I still hadn't caught it.

The second step was to take up texting my mom, who was staying with a little old lady for the night, and ask her what to do, because I was tired and had it with this bugger. She suggested chasing it outside. I realized in about two point four seconds that this wasn't going to work. The thing didn't want to come out in the open long enough, and when it did, I was too busy chasing the cats so they didn't eat it, and trying to collect them, to chase it outside.

The third third step was just to basically cry, swear, and get really upset because I was so tired. Then I wished I could just go to sleep and let it run around. But alas, I could not.

The fourth step was to go and get a cat cage out of the garage and try to trap it in there. The reason I didn't do this in the first place is because our garage is down a little hill and not attached to our house. We live in the country, and where the garage is situated, if anyone would want to kidnap me, they could without anyone seeing. Plus, it was super pitched dark out and I just wasn't comfortable doing this at the wee hours in the morning. Mostly, my fears were just irrational and nothing bad was going to happen, but every time I see the news and hear of someone going out and getting hurt at two am wandering around their yard and neighborhood alone, I wonder what the hell they were doing outside at two am if they weren't out with friends, at a club, etc. I just didn't want the headline to read "Girl Dies Tripping Over Feet In Own Yard At 2am." My fear wasn't that anything was going to happen, it was of the headline if a one in a million freak accident did.

I brought the cage up without incident. I think in my case there was actually a one in a million chance of me not having an incident. I seem to do the opposite of everyone else. By this time the little bugger had ran into the back bedroom and I had stuck towels under the bedroom to trap it in there so I at least didn't have it running everywhere and had a chance to catch it. I brought the cage into the room, put the towels back under the door, and prepared to catch this thing. But no matter what I did I couldn't get it. It even hid behind a few things and I would corner it with the thing it was hiding behind, leaving it only the cage to run into, and it would still find a way to crawl up something and jump over it. I tried just setting the cage there and hoping for the best. I tried chasing it into the cage with a broom. I failed at all of these things.

Finally, seeing as I was defeated and completely beyond exhausted, I set the cage down and decided to do the only reasonable thing; cry while having a conversation with the chipmunk who was hiding and that I couldn't see. It went something like this:

"Little chipmunk, I am just trying to help you out. I promise that I not going to hurt you, but you have to trust me. I just want to get you into the cage so I can take you outside and get you far, far away from any kitties. You don't want to be in here, darling. Please just let me take you outside where there's no kitties and set you free. All I need is for you to get into the cage. I promise I'm just trying to help, but you've got to trust me."

I must have gone on like this for a good five minutes. I eventually stopped, realizing I was just going to have to go to sleep with the chipmunk in the house, if I could get to sleep. Most likely I'd lay here and keep being woken up by the cats, hoping no one killed it. It was too cold to leave the cats on the porch all night. Then, not thirty seconds after I had stopped talking the dang thing walked right over to the cage and went right in. I shit you not. Let me repeat that for emphasis.

THE DANG THING WALKED RIGHT OVER TO THE CAGE AND WENT RIGHT IN.

As promised, I swooped up the cage, took it outside, and let it go where nothing would hurt it. If I had known all I had to do was give it a pep talk while crying, I would have done it two hours ago and had this whole thing over with.