The Real Ghost Whisperer at my house!

My husband is a writer on the CBS show The Ghost Whisperer (try saying that five times). Most people don’t know that this show is based on the real life “ghost whisperer” Mary Ann Winkowski. Not only is she the inspiration for the show, she is a creative consultant and she comes to Los Angeles a few times a year to visit the production offices and demonstrate her dead people seeing abilities to the staff. She’s renowned for her ability to “clear houses” of unwanted spiritual entities, and my dh immediately volunteered our house (after consulting with me).

So this afternoon, Ms. Winkowski, the entire writing staff of The Ghost Whisperer, their assistants and an news reporter and cameraman will be descending on my house to communicate with our resident ghost(s).

According to Winkowski, we have two — a full timer and a part-timer. She had a preliminary phone conversation with my husband to ascertain if we did have ghosts, and this is apparently something she can sense over the phone. Her immediate impression was that we had a young woman who died a violent death attached to us and she guessed that she died in the 50s because of the hairstyle she wears. She also saw a man, but he comes and goes. I’m not the least bit surprised. We’ve lived in our house for almost 9 years now and we love it. It has a peaceful, happy vibe and I feel safe and most at home here. But ever since I became pregnant with my oldest, who is now 6 years old. We’ve had some unexplained events. Nothing too spooky, but odd and inexplicable nonetheless.

I have four bedrooms, and two of the bedrooms, which are now my boys rooms, are in the back of the house. There’s a set of double doors that separate the family room from this back section. From time to time, when those doors are closed at night. They will shake violently as if somebody is having trouble opening them and they are stuck. This first happened when I was pregnant with my oldest and I was having insomnia. I was up watching tv at 3 am and I kept hearing strange noises coming from my husband’s office (which is now my baby’s room). It sounded like someone was sitting in the aeron office chair and I could hear the creaking of weight as if someone leaned back on it and swiveled it. I kept coming in and turning on the light but could find nothing to account for the noises so I closed off that back part of the house to watch tv in peace. That’s when the double doors started to shake violently. Startled, I opened them expecting to find my cat. But nothing. I went back to my bedroom and found my husband and all my cats sleeping peacefully in bed. I decided to join them since I was too spooked to stay up alone. The next night, I had insomnia again and decided to go watch some tv. As I walked into the tv room, the tv turned on by itself. I did an about face and decided I’d had enough tv and went straight back to bed.

As I was telling my husband about these odd events, he tried hard to find a rational explanation. Just then, we heard a loud crash in his office and found a window that was closed and locked, wide open. Now this was an old casement window with an old handle that needs to be cranked clockwise in order to open. But whoever opened this window skipped right over this step and wrenched it wide open and broke it.

If it was an intruder, who would break into a house where the inhabitants were home? We live in a very typical mid-century modern home with lots of sliding glass windows on a quiet cul-de-sac in a canyon. Not a lot of stranger traffic and everyone on this street knows each other and it’s hard to get up here without a car. It was 8 o’clock in the evening and all the lights were on, tv blaring and cars in the driveway.

We checked around outside in the backyard and front. Our neighbors were outside walking their dogs and chatting with each other. They didn’t see anybody around our house and believe me, they would’ve noticed. Suddenly, my dh was ready to believe me. And years later, when I was pregnant with my now 9-month-old, he was up late writing a script in the family room and he closed off the double doors so he wouldn’t disturb our son and had the exact same experience with the doors rattling violently. He opened them quickly but found nothing to account for the noises. My son and the cat were both roused by the noise and were sitting up in bed sleepily. Even my babysitter confessed to the same experience when she was over one night. She too, thought it was the cat trying to get out but found them asleep in our bedroom.

Also, we have fire alarms that go off at all hours of the night. We are constantly replacing them with new ones in the hopes that the old ones are defective. We would remove the batteries and toss them into a growing pile in my husband’s office closet. One night, when I was home alone with my son and pregnant yet again with a baby I would later miscarry, I heard a fire alarm beeping in my husband’s office. Not again, I thought and looked up at the ceiling. But it wasn’t coming from there. It was coming from the closet, from the pile of old fire alarms without batteries. I sifted through the pile, found the offender and tossed it outside. As soon as I came back in, I heard the beeping again. Yet another alarm, and another. Soon, the entire pile of fire alarms WITHOUT batteries was beeping! I just gathered them up by the armload and took them outside to the garbage. I was shaken and perplexed. How do fire alarms beep without batteries? And why would all of them go off? Different models and everything? Weird.

Since then, my son and I would hear the sounds of my husband coming home. Door opening and closing and footsteps and my little boy would rush out to greet him only to find that my husband wasn’t home. It could be our imagination sure, but both of us? My nanny also experienced this. She was in the backyard with my baby when she saw a figure pass through the kitchen. “Mommy’s home,” she said to my baby, but when time passed and I didn’t come outside to greet them, she came inside to look for me. But nobody was there. I came home an hour later.

Last week, I was in my office when I saw a book literally come flying off the top shelf and land on a pile of boxes. Sure, books can fall, but this one wasn’t placed in an unsteady position and it flew a good two feet away from the shelf as if thrown. The title of the book was “Haunted America,” a collection of real life hauntings compiled by folklorists. Was someone trying to tell me something? I heard another thud, and from the bookshelf on the adjacent wall, one of my husband’s action figures fell off the top. I replaced it and went to the kitchen for some coffee. When I came back, it was on the floor again. I decided to leave it until my husband came home.

So that’s the short, sordid history and I’m really looking forward to what Ms. Winkowski has to say. I’m a believer in ghosts, but I don’t necessarily believe everyone has the ability to communicate with them.