The events I am about to share took place at my randmother's house in Orillia, ON. Some of the experiences I will relate are my own, and some are things that my Nan told me.
Both my grandparents were very kind, loving people. Solid Baptist background, active within their church and community, and just all around good people. My Grandfather passed away in 1981 and my Grandmother remained in the house until 1994 when she fell and had to move into a nursing home. She was 94 years old and until her fall had lived on her own and maintained her home herself.
In 1986, my Mother and I moved in with Nan from our home in BC. My Mom was considering a permanent move back to Ontario but opted to reside for the time being with Nan until she had made up her mind whether or not she would sell her home and make the move across the country for good. It was during this time that I personally had experiences that I could not explain.
One night I woke up to hear the television in the front room on. I thought perhaps my Nan had fallen asleep while watching it and so got up to go and turn it off and wake her to send her to bed. I was surprised to find the living room in complete darkness and the TV off. I assumed I had been "hearing things" or maybe not quite as awake as I had thought and went back to bed. I didn't give it another thought.
Some time passes and once again I wake up in the middle of the night and I can hear the television on and I can also smell bacon cooking. It's a pretty distinct smell, especially at 0300. I wondered who was up cooking at this time - and also thought maybe I could get a piece of that bacon action - and started to the kitchen to join them. In order to get to the kitchen form the back of the house you must pass through the living room. Once again - total darkness. No TV, no lights in the kitchen and nobody is up cooking. I can, however, still smell the bacon. No bacon to be found. Needless to say I am a little freaked out.
The next morning, I asked both my Mom and Nan if they had been up in the night and told them the story. Neither had but my Nan said, "Oh, don't worry. It's only your Grandfather. He often cooked bacon in the night as a wee snack." Apparently, it mattered not that he had been passed away for the last five years. She followed that up by telling me that not only that but he quite often woke her from her chair at night if she fell asleep while watching the news. And then reminded me that he had not hurt any of us in life and he certainly wouldn't in death. As much as I adored my Grandpa, after that whenever I would wake to the smell of bacon in the night I stayed right where I was in bed and left him to his late night snacking.
Fast forward to the summer of 1988. I am living with my brother and his family in the same town. I catch the chicken pox and because my brother's children have not had them, he boots me out to stay at my Nan's. My Nan has gone off to my cousin's wedding in another town and I am not keen on being by myself in the house having now heard all kinds of stories from her and other family members about what they have experienced in her home. I manage to get my best friend to agree to stay with me.
At this point I am literally covered in chicken pox and do not want to go out anywhere. I am dying for popsicles and she agrees to go down to the corner variety store and pick some up. It is daytime so I feel okay about being in the house alone since my experiences all happened at night. While she is gone, I fall asleep on the sofa and wake what feels like a short time later. I notice that the TV is off, and it had been on before as I was watching a program. I can hear pots and pans and "cooking" sounds in the kitchen. I call out to my friend and tell her glad she is back but she didn't have to shut the TV. I get up, turn the TV on and reclaim my spot on the sofa. Just then, she comes through the front door with grocery bags. I jump up and run to the kitchen to find all the cupboards open. She had gone to the grocery store and not the variety store as they had not had the popsicles I wanted.
The other odd thing was when we put our bags in the front bedroom, we had walked passed my Nan's open bedroom door. Her bed, as always, was perfectly made. When I got up to use the washroom and passed by her bedroom, you could see where someone had been laying on the bed. Yet neither one of us had been in the room.
To this day, I dream about that house... But that is for another story.
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