This happened many years ago when I was a dumb kid, & messed with something I shouldn't have only to regret it later. My cousins, C., & K. (Just using the initials for privacy reasons.) lived in Cleveland. My folks would take us to visit with them quite frequently through the years when we were growing up since C. Was my age, & K. Was my sister, J's age, which was 5 years younger. So, C., & I were the 'big sisters'. We were the big girls. About 13-14 years old around this time. It was during the Fall time of the year.
We did all the stupid things that kids do before they develop something in the later years called 'common sense', lol! We told ghost stories a lot & recorded our antics on a little 3-inch reel-to-reel tape recorder that I had. We'd play ourselves back for fun. We'd go exploring, or walking to places that we thought were interesting. In other words, we had fun together.
One time, whilst visiting at their house in Cleveland, one of us-I don't remember who-had the idea to conduct a 'seance'. Since I had had some paranormal experiences when I was much younger, I was selected to conduct it. Lucky me. I didn't really give too much credence to what we were about to do at the time. I wished later that I would have.
They lived in a relatively smallish-sized house. There was the master bedroom downstairs that my aunt, & Uncle slept in, & a spare room that they used kind of like a playroom. It was small, but big enough to accommodate a sofa, T.V. Stand, easy chair, & 2 little end-tables. My cousin's bedroom was upstairs. It was originally the attic when they bought the house, but my aunt, & Uncle labored to turn it into a lovely girl's bedroom of a very large size with a walk-in closet/cubby-hole room on one side of the hallway.
We held the seance in the back spare room. We closed the door, & just lit a small lamp to give off a soft light. Before starting we had to decide who we wanted to contact. The vote was to contact-get this-King Tut. I began it with a tongue-in-cheek attitude quite frankly. However, as it progressed, I began to take it seriously. We were all concentrating & calling on him while holding hands & staring at the lamplight. It wasn't but about 10 minutes into the session that we started to observe 'something' forming in the corner behind the easy chair that sat next to the window. It was rather short of stature, standing rather off-center, & a vaporous gas-fire blue. It looked like a short person.
We sat speechless & transfixed just staring at it. We were squeezing each other's hands so hard I'm surprised that we didn't break each other's fingers. That's how stunned we were.
Suddenly the spell was broken when "I" had what felt like 2 fingers forcefully rammed into my right ribcage causing me to jump, & scream at that point. We all unclasped hands & watched as the form just evaporated from the corner of the room. One of my cousins jumped up to the light switch & turned the lights on. Our parents came to the back room, & demanded to know what us kids were up to. The usual answer from a kid was 'nothing'. We were told to keep it down.
We didn't dare tell our parents 'what' we were doing. Our parents were religious, & what we were doing was a major, big time no-no. We just all sat there looking at each other, & glancing around the room trying to evaluate just 'what' really happened to us. I was sitting on the far end sofa that had a stuffed toy kitty sitting on the armrest. So, who poked me so hard that it hurt. No one was even near me. I know what I felt. It actually hurt. Matter of fact, I had a little bruise between my ribs to prove it. I decided, then, & there, no more conducting seances. It was far too scary for my taste.
However, 'that' was not the end of it. Months later. In the good ol' Summertime, our cousins came to visit us. We went upstairs to my sister's, & my bedroom. C., & K. Wanted to have another seance'. I protested, but they 'talked' me into it. Ugh! Our bedroom was, once, the attic also, but our parents worked hard to turn it into a beautiful bedroom for us. We all sat on the floor & lit a candle. We were discussing who we wanted to contact. One of my cousins mentioned Adolph Hitler. I gave a resounding "no way!". I told them to contact someone nice. Not a monster like that. We decided on Abe Lincoln. He was always my favorite President, next to JFK. We held hands, once again, & concentrated. This time I asked for an audible signal like 2 knocks. Inside of a couple minutes we heard 2 loud knocks resounding from our cubby-hole crawl space that we used for storage. We 'all' heard it.
I lost my nerve at that point. I told it to go away, & I broke the circle. I told my cousins that what we were doing was not a good idea. That we shouldn't be messing with stuff like this. My cousins were intrigued, but my little sister, J., 'listened' to me. Unusual for a little sister to 'listen' to the big sister, but J. Looked up to me, & if "I" said it's a bad idea then it's a bad idea. However, that was not quite the end of it that night. Unbeknownst to me, the worst was yet to come.
After they went home, we went to bed for the night. Nothing strange there. J., & I had twin beds. One on each side of the room across from each other. Next to our beds & built into the walls were shadow boxes that we kept little knickknacks, some ceramic animals, books, & we each had a little doll sitting in the cases. About 2 in the morning, I heard what I, first, thought was my Dad tromping up the steps to our room. He would, sometimes, come up to check on us. As parents often do. Only 'this' time he didn't turn on the hallway light coming up the steps. He would bring his flashlight with him to shine just far enough to make sure we were in bed, & alright. This time there was no hall light, or a flashlight. I thought that to be very strange for him. I was laying on my stomach, pretending to be asleep when I got the feeling that it wasn't my Dad coming to look in on us after all. I, then, heard very heavy footsteps on the tile floor coming towards us. My Dad was always barefooted when he did his checks. This whatever it was had heavy-soled shoes on.
I, suddenly, felt enveloped in an intense cold. To the point of shivering. Weird! It was Summer. That upstairs bedroom was ridiculously hot that time of year, & in 1968 my Dad couldn't afford A/C at the time. So, we just slept with the windows open for air. I laid there motionless, & barely breathing with my eyes closed tight. I felt a definite weight leaning over me & heard the items in my shadowbox being moved around. After that I heard 'it' go over to my sister's bed & do the same thing. I was freaking. I, then, heard it turn, & walk away back down the steps. I must've passed out after all this was over.
In the morning, my sister began accusing me of knocking all the stuff over in her shadowbox. However, everything was knocked over in my shadowbox as well. I told her exactly what happened during the night. Her face went blank. We were very frightened. We vowed to never conduct a seance' again.
A couple of weeks later I confessed to my Mom what we had done. As expected, she read me the riot act. My Mom is deeply religious & told me that only God has the power to do those things! I felt quite upset, & ashamed. I would never do something disrespectful like that. At that time in my life, I didn't even give a thought to what we did. To us dumb kids, we thought it was cool, but cool soon turned on us, & brought us to our senses the hard way.
I guess that some of the best lessons learned are those that we learn the hard way. I've, since that time, have never again experimented with conducting, or participating in seances. I realized that you cannot command the spirits to perform for our amusement. If anything, you respect them. I've had visitations from my late husband, but I never tried to contact him. He came to 'me' as an assurance that 'he' is alright & loves me. He has visited me in special circumstances when I was extremely stressed, & trepidatious to give me comfort. I believe that our loved ones do that to comfort & encourage us. That's fine with me, but I, no longer try to contact the other side. I know better. I learned my lesson. If you don't know what you're doing, just don't do it. You'll be better off in the long run. I hope these are words of wisdom!
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