Wandering a Forgotten Cemetery on a Spring Day

Cemeteries hide behind every corner here.  I'm not sure if all places are like this,  but in Madison County, Alabama cemeteries are part of the landscape.  They go almost unnoticed, they have become so common place.  There is one in the woods behind our neighborhood and another by Target in between the Mexican restraunt and the interstate.  There's one across from karate and several on the small road that leads to downtown.  I found an entire neighborhood that was built around a potter's field.  A potter's field is an old word to describe a poor person's cemetery.  Apparently,  the developer couldn't identify any of the names on the markers, so legally he couldn't relocate the bodies.   So the developer just made a square of houses around the cemetery with the houses backyards opening up directly onto the graves.

I decided to visit one of the old cemeteries I pass everyday.   There is no easy way to get to the cemetery.  There is no official parking.  All the graves are so old no one goes to visit anymore.  The youngest tombstone there is dated 1944.   The cemetery was beautiful,  hidden beneath old trees that rustled in the gentle spring breeze.   I chose this cemetery because a website I visited said that it was haunted.   According to the site,  there is a rocking chair on the porch of the nearby church that rocks on its own and footsteps can be heard following you through the cemetery as you walk through it.  

As I walked through the old graveyard,  I heard leaves crunching behind me.   Of course,  it may have been squirrels or birds scurrying in the undergrowth behind me, but I imagined that there were ghosts walking with me as I wandered the necropolis.  Shadows danced at my feet and the light made a lace on the tombstones.  It was a beautiful day and the cemetery offered a solitude that is rare in modern life.   It is amazing to me that such beauty can surrround us every day and go entirely unnoticed.   I have to wonder,  are all places like this?  Do tiny graveyards and necropolis's dot the landscape of every city hiding behind buildings and highways or is Madison County unique?

Akemi Kobayashi's Lawyer

From: Ms. Akemi Kobayashi
Subject: Dear Counsel,
Date: April 8, 2010 10:20:40 AM PDT
Reply-To: akemikobayashi1962@mail2japan.com

Dear Counsel,



My name is Ms AKEMI KOBAYASHI. I was married to my ex husband Newberg KOBAYASHI (who lives in your jurisdiction)for 7 yrs and in July 2009, We mutually agreed under a Collaborative Participation Law Agreement to go our separate ways. Newberg had agreed to pay me $914,000.00 under terms of the agreement so that I can settle down and to his credit; he has paid me $104,000.00 but with an outstanding balance of $810,000.00.I am hereby seeking your legal assistance in collecting the balance or helping me enforce the agreement, and have him honor the agreement entirety.

I will be providing further information upon your request. I believe that one of the reasons he has refused to pay is because I have re-married. I understand that been remarried does not automatically void the agreement. Prior to our separation due to irreconcilable differences, we were married for 23yrs of which by his instruction, I was a full time house wife to carter for our four children. Please get back to me if this is a case you can undertake. Let me know if you require consultation fee before you advice or look at the evidence, I am hereby seeking your firm to assist in collecting the balance from him. He has agreed already to pay me the balance but it is my belief that a Law firm like yours is needed to help me collect payment from my ex-husband or litigate this matter if he fails to pay as promised.



Sincerely,


Ms.Akemi Kobayashi


CHOKO BOVEKI LTD
Address:4 FLOOR, 2-12-23 MINAMI AZABU MINATO-KU,TOKYO JAPAN
Tel: +81-3458-01740
Email: akemikobayashi2002@gmail.com

Property Lawyer

From: Chen Jiang
Subject: Residential property in U.S.A
Date: April 8, 2010 2:10:55 AM PDT
Reply-To: cjiang@rocketmail.com

Hello,

I am interested in purchase a Residential property in U.S.A you as my agentin your country.My retirement is coming soon and i want to relocate to the USA for good with my family.

I need you to represent me for the purchase ofthe property as recomended that i contact you as regards my interest in your services.

I would need a property at lest 4 rooms 3 toilets and above with a swimingpool in any good area provided it is secure. Kindly bear with me that i will want us to communicate by email regularly ifneed be as i am better writing than speaking english but my broker willdefinately contact you by phone as regards this transaction I look forward to your prompt response

Best Regards,

Chen Jiang

Nightmares

Freud's theories  about dreaming suggested that dreams were a way of acting out inner conflicts while staying safely inside our own minds, rather than display our ravaged psyches in the bright light of day. Thus, he reasoned that a "successful" dream - one that was not too traumatizing for the warring superego and id without the guiding conscious hand of the ego - was a dream in which the dreamer stayed asleep. Thus, a "nightmare" (a dream in which the dreamer wakes due to his or her own influences during sleep) was an unsuccessful dream, in which the inner war had become too violent and could not be brought to a successful conclusion.   Modern psychology suggests that nightmares are the result of the random firing of neurons during sleep.  The mind,  needing meaning,  interprets this firing  with images and feelings that are familiar to it.   Thus nightmares are the product of random neuronal activity in conjunction with the anxieties and worries that the dreamer clings to.

Nightmares are the a halmark of certain pscychological disorders,  like PTSD.  Often,  these nightmares are treated with medications that produce deep,  dreamless sleep and thus erradicate the nightmare.

Long before modern psychology or Freud,  people suffered from nightmares.  They awoke screaming or with feelings of something crushing them or holding them to the bed.  In most cultures,  these things were blamed on demons and bad spirits and many still blame such symptoms on bad spirits.   Historically some of the better-known spirits of this sort are; Greek ephialtes (one who leaps upon) and mora (the night "mare" or monster, ogre, spirit, etc.), Roman incubus (one who presses or crushes), German mar/mare, nachtmahr, Hexendrücken (witch pressing), and Alpdruck (elf pressure); Czech muera, Polish zmora, Russian Kikimora, French cauchmar (trampling ogre), Old English maere (mab, mair, mare-hag), hagge, (evil spirit or the night-mare--also hegge, haegtesse, haehtisse, haegte); Old Norse mara, Old Irish mar/more, Newfoundland Ag Rog (Old Hag), and the Spanish pesadilla.  All of these evil spirits entered dreams and possessed the mind and body of the sleeper.   

As I talk to many people who have been tormented by more malevolent hauntings,  they have described symptoms of crushings and pressure while they were asleep that was commonly associated with many of these bad spirits.   The people I interviewed believe that these symptoms were caused by demons or bad spirits.  We know many bad dreams are what psychologists say they are.  They are anxiety and life stress seeping over into our resting minds.  However,  is it possible that these historic interpretations of nightmares aren't all wrong?  Is it possible that some nightmares are caused by these old demons creeping up into our beds and pressing down on us while we sleep?

The Bizarre and Beautiful Haunts of Rural Alabama

Travelling through rural Alabama is much more interesting than it sounds.  In between the cow pastures,  rolling hills, and red necks are little pockets of beauty and wonder and some of the best ghost stories ever to send chills down the spines of a ghost hunter.   Today, I travelled through North Alabama to the University of North Alabama in search of her many ghosts.  Along the way,  I encountered a closed down haunted house and a year round Christmas castle.  There were acres of old cemeteries and a historic polo club.   

The campus itself is unexpectedly beautiful.   It's gothic revival style architecture makes you feel like you have stepped back in time and across an ocean to someplace far older that it really is.    There are fountains sputtering out crystal clear water at every turn and a lion habitat sits in between two gothic buildings.  There are a multitude of ghost stories hiding in the shadows of this old University.  The University was founded in 1850 and was occupied by Union forces for several years during the civil war.   Many of the ghosts that haunt this campus date back to the civil war, others are much younger,  like the ghost of a little girl that wanders the off campus book store looking for her lost puppy.

One of the more famous ghosts of UNA is the ghost of a beautiful young woman that wanders the site of old O'Neal Hall.   The young girl lived at the University in the late 19th century.   After her gentleman caller left her broken hearted,  she decided to take her own life and hung herself from the tower.    The pictures I took of the campus today show the beauty of the many buildings that settle into the sunlight of this picturesque University, but I'm saving many of these stories for my book.

Where are the Easter Horror Movies?

I love b-grade horror movies.  It is a guilty pleasure.  One thing I love about horror in general is that there is a horror movie for every season.   My bloody Valentine for Valentines Day,  Silent Night Deadly Night or Gremlins for Christmas,   Halloween for Halloween, there is even a mutant, killer turkey movie for Thanksgiving.  But where are the Easter horror movies?  I've never seen or heard of one of these rare gems.   Is it so hard to make a holiday that was originally celebrated for the fertility goddess Oester into something scary or is it that Easter is simply too holy a day to be used for horror?  In the Philipines,  people are literally nailing themselves to crosses to celebtrate Easter.  It seems like there might be room for a horror movie in that.  Maybe I've missed something. Maybe there is a killer bunny movie out there, but where?

The Haunting of Holy Trinity

It is Holy Saturday and as a cradle Catholic,  I should be at the Easter Vigil right now.  I should be at church.  The Catholic Tridium of the days leading up to Easter Sunday calls for spending the duration of the week-end at mass.  I thought I would write about one of the more haunted churches in the world instead of going to church tonight.  This way,  I will be in church in spirit if not in body. 

One of the most haunted churches in the world is in York, England. Construction on the Holy Trinity Church began in the 12th century and was initiated by the Prior and Convent of Durham and the Archbishop of York.  Like most churches of this time,  it took centuries to complete and became a living part of history for the residents of the area.  If you have read much about Queen Elizabeth I or even seen the movie Elizabeth,  you know who Thomas Percy, Earl of Northumberland was.  He was a prominent Catholic aristocrat who fought to restore Catholic rule to England in the 16th century.   Elizabeth I had him beheaded for treason and his head was put on a pole in Micklegate Bar.  Years later, his head was removed and buried in The Holy Trinity Churchyard.  His ghost is  said to wander this church and many witnesses have seen him wandering the grounds of The Holy Trinity.   The headless ghost of Thomas Percy, has been seen in the churchyard searching for his severed head.

The apparitions of two women and a child have been known to appear usually in front of the east window of the church. There are two stories about the three ghosts. One story is of a mother, her child and the nanny. The mother and child were buried miles away from each other and the nanny brought them together. Another story is the mother and child are buried in the same graveyard and the ghost is an abbess who was killed when she tried to prevent Henry VIII’s army from entering the church during the reformation and taking all the holy relics that the protestants claimed were heresy.

I chose this particular church not only for its history and wonderful haunts, but because it is stunning and beautiful and if I were at church tonight,  this would be the one I would like to be at.   So for now, I'm going to close my eyes and imagine myself in it's haunted halls gazing up at the stained glass portrait of St. Gerome and hope that the imagining counts for this holy day of obligation.