Whether you believe in ghosts or hauntings, dilapidated houses that have stood long empty are creepy places. They exude the feeling of crumbling corpses—the decaying remnants of lives past. If you dare, step inside this one with me.
Look around, there’s nothing left behind but discarded furnishing, little creatures that scurry at the sound of footfalls, and the dance of dust reflected by the light streaming through tattered curtains. Do you hear the whisper of that old chair telling the story of the old man who sat there or the toddler who scarred its arms with his budding teeth?
You can feel the air here. It is alive with the echoes of love and loss; depression and joy; fear and faith that press unwary visitors. The walls are cracked and weathered. The damage was done more by lightning flashes of memory than the slow passage of time. Time here is uncertain, folding in on itself until the past has become one moment.
Phantoms do dwell within these not-always-friendly confines, misty shadows of dead things. Ghostly images, more impressions that substance, that have not quite faded away still haunt this place. The sense of a collision between the heavenly and the hellish creates an odd eeriness that fills this place. Walking here, the hold on reality grows tentative and who knows what lurks in these shadows.
Passersby walk quickly passed this house, but not without a brief glance and a shiver. The welcome mat is still on the porch. I keep it there for those who open the pages I write and wonder what’s wrong with the soul that lives in the place. To me, it’s just home—the mind in which I live. Creepy, huh?
Maranatha
