 Stories and content in Weird Darkness can be disturbing for some listeners and is intended for mature audiences only. Parental discretion is strongly advised. Welcome Weirdos, I'm Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness. Here you'll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore, the strange and bizarre, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre, unsolved and unexplained. Coming up in this episode, it's my fireside frights episode where each month I come to you without the music or fancy production or even professionally written stories. It's just you, me, this campfire and stories sent in to me by you and our Weirdo family. All the stories are from you listeners. If you're new here, welcome to the show, and while you're listening, be sure to check out WeirdDarkness.com for merchandise, to visit sponsors you hear about during the show, sign up for my newsletter and our contests, connect with me on social media, plus you can visit the Hope in the Darkness page if you're struggling with depression or dark thoughts. You can find all of that and more at WeirdDarkness.com. Now, fold your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights, and come with me into the Weird Darkness. Alright, our first story, it appears, was written by Nancy G. Hi Darren, thank you for sharing my story about my dad, Eddie. In case you're wondering, he's most definitely still around since last time things took a turn for the worse, but as a firm believer in God, I know everything will get better. As I shared last time, I married my girlfriend and moved to the South Bay of Los Angeles, near Unk. I'm a registered nurse while running a spice importing business, which has been quite lucrative, thank God. Since we moved to the South Bay, I befriended one of my neighbors, a young lady by the name of Beebe. From the beginning, I knew that she had a drug problem, but I didn't judge her for that. When she revealed to me that she was pregnant and living in an unfurnished apartment with little to no food, due to my past with a drug addicted mother, I offered to help everywhere I could, or every way that I could. Bad idea. I got her some furniture from Goodwill and even got her in a detox program after she gave birth to a girl named Jasmine. My wife and I offered to help care for the baby girl when she was at risk of losing her and had to finally by law get into rehab. We fell in love with the little girl right away. A few months went by and Beebe did not show signs of improvement and we were awarded temporary guardianship of Jasmine. One night while I was changing her diaper, I felt a warmness come in her room. I knew it was my dad, Eddie. I said, Dad, please watch over Jasmine as if she was your grandchild. I clearly heard my dad in my head say, I'll watch over you all. A storm is coming. Even with those ominous words, I was not scared. And I still felt the warmness until it was gone. The next day, just like my father warned me, the storm began. It started with the young man that I've never met before that looked like he was going through detox as well, came to my door asking to see baby Jasmine. When I asked who are you, he said, I'm David, her father. He showed me his ID and paperwork. I said, let me get her ready. I just got her out of the bath. He said, OK, and then went back to his car. I quickly called Unk. He showed up a few minutes later. Oh, Unk. OK, I guess Unk means Uncle. I quickly called Unk. He showed up a few minutes later with some of my plates to not make it obvious that he was there to protect me. About 15 minutes later, I let him in. Jasmine took a liking to him right away. I'm sure she knew that it was her dad. Unk kept a close eye on him, and David did too. After about 30 minutes, David said that he had to leave, but was it OK to come back to see Jasmine? I said, yes, of course. And we exchanged numbers. Bad idea. He asked to use the bathroom. When he came out, he looked like he had just gotten high. Unk said, let me see your arm. There were fresh puncture marks on his arm. He got high in my bathroom. Unk snapped and said, get out of here. Are you crazy? Your daughter is here. She needed you. David couldn't care. He left, but on the way out, he turned to us and ran his fingers across his neck. I had to restrain Unk from beating him up. That was the catalyst. A few weeks went by, maybe a month, but one night again, my dad, Eddie, visited me in a dream. For the first time, he wasn't smiling. We were doing laundry of all things. He looked at me and said, be brave and strong, baby girl. I'm never too far away. And then I woke up to a window shattering and then alarm going off. My car, someone busted my driver's side window and threw a roach poison bomb inside of it, like the kind exterminators use. There were many cases of vandalism in the area, so the cops chalked it up to that. But I was not sure. Insurance had to get me a new car. Thank God for that. A few weeks went by. One night when my wife was working graveyard shift, I was in my room with baby Jasmine, when my dad, Eddie, knocked on my door and called me by name. I figured I was dreaming. He said, can I please see the baby? With his big smile that he always had, I got up with Jasmine. Right when I was going to hand her over, he looked behind me and all of a sudden, a cinder block was thrown through my window, landing right where I was laying seconds before with baby Jasmine. This was no dream. That block could have busted my head open and most definitely could have killed Jasmine. My neighbors called the cops. I called Ankh, but they found no one. Surveillance cameras, my neighborhood saw a man dressed in all black get out of a car, throw the cinder block, then take off right away, but that was it. I knew right away. I was being attacked and more than likely, it was baby Jasmine's father. My father, Eddie, saved us. We installed cameras for protection and my wife refused to work graveyard shifts anymore. A couple days later, while my wife was at work, I just finished feeding baby Jasmine when I heard some talking in my backyard. I peeked out the window and I saw David with a gas can talking to himself. I text Ankh and by coincidence, he was walking his dog before work. They quickly rushed over here and attacked David. They had a fist fight and Ankh got the best of him when he tried to drag David out. I see him reaching in his pants. It's a gun. I ran towards him and I kicked his hand. Ankh tried to restrain him, but David got away. I called the cops, they came out. David got away, but they picked the gun up. I found out a few days later, the ballistics matched the gun to a murder committed last year. An LAPD unit began patrolling our neighborhood daily. A few more days went by. We went to the rehab center where Beebe was living. She had numerous relapses and overdosed twice. In the short time, baby Jasmine had been alive. Beebe sadly told me that she was losing hope in herself. I felt horrible to hear that. She asked me if I would be Jasmine's mom. It broke my heart, but at the same time, it made me absolutely happy because at this point, me and my wife were already crazy in love with Jasmine like she was ours. I told Beebe about the incident with David. She told me to keep the baby away from him because he was mentally unstable and his drug abuse was way beyond addiction. He was just insane. One night, I got up to make a bottle for Jasmine. I felt that warmness come over the whole house again. I knew it was God and my dad watching over me as I was making the bottle. When I was going back to my room, I noticed my wife was looking out the window. When I asked what's out there, she said people dressed in white, they're glowing. The way she slurred her words, I realized she was sleep talking. I said, go back to sleep, babe. She laid down, but curiosity got the best of me. And I looked out the window. I faintly saw some lights down the streets like if a few people were walking, looking at their phone, it kind of creeped me out, but it didn't scare me. A few weeks went by when I get a call from an unknown caller. I won't say everything the caller said, but he said that he was gonna kill me and my wife and do a lot of horrible things to our corpses. The calls continued for a few days. It was terrible. I went over to Ankh's house one day because I felt like I was being watched. Ankh assured me that he and his homies would look after us. He even took a leave of absence from his job to do so. I love you, Ankh. At this point, my family had no idea how bad things were getting for us, but I had to finally tell them everything in case something happened to us. My parents told us that we could stay with them, but it was really inconvenient as far as my wife and my job went. We both worked only a mile away from home. We walked to work most of the time also. Our babysitter lived directly across the street, so we really can't give up our home. One Saturday afternoon, I text Ankh and told him to come on over for some homemade kebish and a beer. Is it kebish? Is that how you pronounce that? It's a new one on me. Anyway, apparently for food and beer, he said to fix him to go plate and he'll stop buying a bit. I waited for him outside. I seen him walking awfully slow. I get a text from him telling me to go inside that he loved me and to please tell his daughter he loved her with all his heart. I noticed that behind him, a group of four guys, including David, were following him, walking at the same pace. I quickly started dialing the police for legal reasons, I can't say everything. I saw, or I can't say everything that I saw, but gunshots rang out. Multiple people were hit, including Ankh and David. I seen David running towards his car, bleeding. He tried leaving, but his car wouldn't start. He tried to run out, but he couldn't get out. Then he began yelling, get off me. I had a clear view of the car. There was no one in there, or was there? Dad? Cops arrived almost immediately, arresting David. I stayed with Ankh and refused to leave his side until the paramedics arrived. Ankh was having trouble breathing. I thought I was losing him. He looked over at me and said, I told you I got her back, bro. I asked, is my dad Eddie here? He just smiled and closed his eyes, then lost consciousness. I tried to wake him up, but he was gone. When the paramedics arrived, they began working on him right away. I broke down crying because I knew it was my fault Ankh was fighting for his life. As my wife attempted to comfort me, I clearly saw my dad Eddie standing over them. I yelled, don't let God take him yet, daddy. Please, he has a daughter. He looked at me with that beautiful smile of his that I'm also proud to have as well, and said, it's not his time. That's when the paramedics yelled, we got a pulse. Ankh was rushed to the hospital where he made a full recovery. As for David and the others involved, they recovered from their wounds as well and are currently awaiting trial. My wife and I are officially Jasmine's parents. Her biological mother is still fighting her addiction. She has her visitation rights, we gladly gave her. She tries to clean herself up before every visit. I really admire that about her. I mean, Jasmine loves her, I'm happy she does. Ankh still lives near us, we see him all the time. Jasmine tells him, Tio, which is Spanish for uncle, we're considering asking him to be her godfather. Please don't tell him, LOL. And last but not least by my dad Eddie, he is still around, he visits my dreams occasionally. I haven't seen him while I'm awake anymore. He's always around and will always be unless God says different. As I was typing this, my wife told me that the day of that terrible incident, while the paramedics were working on Ankh, she saw my dad Eddie standing next to them. I asked, how do you know who it was my dad Eddie? She said, he's right there. She pointed at the pick of my dad and his brothers, which was printed and put in a timeframe. She says, you have his smile. Thank you, Darren, signed fancy. Wow. Oh my gosh, what a story. Nancy, if you're listening, that is incredible. And I totally get the whole idea about how trying to help somebody in that situation is a bad idea, but good things came out of it anyway. I totally get that. I mean, that's actually somewhat biblical. When Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers and then later on his brothers end up coming to him because he is now like in charge of Egypt pretty much and they're begging for food cause they're starving. They're afraid he's gonna kill them. And Joseph says, what you intended for evil got intended for good. And that's kind of what I'm seeing here. The evil part of course is David and Jasmine's mom and all the horrible rotten stuff that they had to go through. Well, the mom had to go through what David did. So all of that's evil. But the good that came out of that is you've got Jasmine, she's got loving parents, and you're also supporting her biological mom and trying to help her as well. That is really good. I mean, that's godly stuff right there. So what the devil meant for evil, God meant for good in your situation. So I totally get that. We've been in that situation, not we, but my bride has been in that situation before. She actually was trying to take care of somebody who had just given birth to a couple of kids and she was also a drug addict and it was just a horrible, horrible mess. And unlike Jasmine's mom, this girl just did not want to get help. She's, all she wanted to do was sponge off of other people. We finally got that. We finally realized that's what she was doing. As soon as we said, sorry, we can't help you or something, she immediately went to somebody else on her phone list and started begging for them. And all she wanted was money and free stuff. It was really ugly. We don't know whatever happened to her. We still think about her. Robin still prays for her, of course, but I think she did lose those kids. I think they got adopted out, which thank God for that. It's really cool that your dad ends up talking to you through dreams. There was also a couple of incidents here where he showed up in your waking time as well. But the dreaming stuff reminds me of something that my dad went through many, many, many years ago. I think probably even before I was born. My dad, I think I may have told this before, but I'm not sure. My dad was working on a rifle, trying to fix a rifle that his uncle Al had given him. And for some reason, it just wasn't working. He couldn't figure out what it was. And dad was actually a pretty good, pretty good shot. He was in the Air Force. And I can't remember what it's called. It's called the crack shot or sharpshooter or whatever. I mean, he was never in a position where he had to use that, but he would have qualified for it because he was that good with target practice and everything else. But he was like in the top 1%ile in the Air Force when it came to shooting. So he couldn't figure out why this gun wasn't working. And one night, he went to bed and his uncle Al showed up in his dream and told him, this is what you need to do in order to fix the rifle. And so when dad woke up and he went back to the rifle, he did exactly what his uncle Al in his dream told him to do and it worked and it fixed the rifle. So we're pretty sure. Yeah, that was the real uncle Al visiting him. Now that I've recently lost my dad, in fact, we're gonna be going to his actual military service in early December. So we haven't even actually had the technical funeral yet, but it's kind of comforting to see stories like this where people actually have spoken to their parents who've passed on. I'm kind of torn as to whether or not I want that to happen or not because I'm not one to really believe. I don't know, it's really hard. My faith and my desire is kind of a battle on that one. My faith would not allow for me to accept the ghost of a past loved one because absent from the body present with the Lord. But there are also stories in the Bible where the dead do speak to the living. So I'm not exactly sure where I land on that, but and I'm not exactly sure how I would handle my dad just coming out of nowhere and speaking to me. So I only have a couple of items of his. I have a ring of his and I also have a coin that he gave me. And every time I look at those, I keep thinking, I wonder if he's like maybe somewhat emotionally attached to these. I wonder if he's gonna use these to speak to me someday, you know, like kind of like a haunted item or something like that, but I don't know. But anyway, thank you very much for that story, Nancy. Really, really great. Let's see here. This one comes from Steven. It's really short. He's talking about disappearing and reappearing items. He says, October 5th, 2013. My girlfriend Bonnie took her life. Oh man, Steven, I am so sorry to hear that. I had a key to her door, but I could not find the key a week after her death. Even though I searched the house, the key appeared on the floor out in the open. I should have seen this, but the key was nowhere to be found. I heard on your podcast the same type of finding. Go figure. By the way, the podcast I heard this on was July 17th, 2022. So he's listening to some older episodes. Steven, man. Oh, this is October 5th, 2013. I was thinking 2023. Still, I mean, 10 years ago, still, that's probably nothing. It's nothing you get completely over, but I'm sorry to hear that she took her life. That's something that's, of course, really important around here with our focus on mental health and depression and how there is hope and help out there, especially if you know somebody that does struggle, just go to the Hope in the Darkness page at WeirdDarkness.com. That's WeirdDarkness.com slash Hope, if you just wanna type in the URL. But yeah, there's hope there for depression and also thoughts of suicide, too. So, but it's kind of interesting. So even from the other side, she decided, yeah, he probably needs that key. Okay, this next one comes from one of our listeners who's actually forwarding a story from one of his friends who gave him permission to share the story. And I guess the friend is on a website called retrodays.org. Never even heard of this website before, but it's written by Hojou Kulander. It's called The Real Goonies. There are some people in your life that appear almost as if out of thin air, providing magical and memorable experiences before disappearing altogether and leaving a lasting impression. Yes, that sounds like the start of a paperback novel with Fabio on the cover. However, the story I'm gonna tell today is not of romance, but pure adventure with a guy who lived for excitement worthy of the Goonies. Let me start with a little backstory. I met this rogue adventurer during the summer of my freshman year of high school in 97 while I delivered a tour de force performance as Baloo, the dancing bear, and giant number two in a mall-based children's theater production of The Brave Little Taylor. Naturally, you're very impressed. During the first, I love this guy's sense of humor. During the first few rehearsals, I noticed a short quiet guy in the corner who bore a passing resemblance to Brian LaTrell from the Backstreet Boys with Acne. This mystery cast member had not been at the audition, but the director soon informed us that this shifty fellow, Mike, was to be the Brave Little Taylor. As rehearsals went on, we began to notice that Mike mostly kept to himself, only coming alive when he was in character. By the end of the week, rumors were swirling between the cast, the craziest of which being, I heard Mike has AIDS and his dying wish was to star in a play. As it turned out, Mike was 21, still lived at home, drove a minivan and got fun money working at an after-school daycare during the week. Sure, all these signs may have been the description of a serial killer written up in the local newspaper after a murder spree, but instead were the mark of an eccentric who led me into the most thrilling, terrifying, and hilarious moments of my young life. Today, I will share with you the beginning of a series of Mike ventures called The Mysterious Case of the Haunted Marine Base. I should preface this story by saying that my parents were very frustrating, or excuse me, sorry, my bad. I should preface this story by saying that my parents were very trusting of me as a teenager, letting me stay out as late as I wanted, even on school nights. It may also seem strange that they would let me hang out with 21-year-old dude that they knew nothing about. Their lack of concern stemmed from the fact that I never really got into any trouble during my hangouts, that is, until this night. Mike had shown me photographic evidence of adventures that he and his buddies had been on, like sleeping overnight at Disneyland and midnight trips to water parks that were closed for the season. Cautious kid that I was, I desperately wanted some danger in my life and asked if I could come along sometime. The first test was a midnight screening of The Goonies at an old movie theater, followed by a late-night trip to Del Taco to make sure that I could stay up into the wee hours of the morning. Having passed that rite of initiation, I was given the go for tagging along on their next outing. Little did I know what that would entail. The evening began, unassumingly, at 10 p.m. on a Friday night, as I entered the bachelor pad of Mike's crew. Why he didn't just move in with them, I'll never know. This group of 20-something slacker misfits was made up of Chris, Tom, Clark, and the data of the crew, whose name escapes me, so I'll call him Kumar. Together with Mike, they were a group of urban explorers who documented their escapades on a website, which is still around, but the old epic tales are nowhere to be found, probably for legal reasons. Around 2 a.m., this gang of adults stuck in adolescence got tired of watching TV and playing video games, so the action moved outside. Upon stepping out into the night, I caught sight of Chris playing chicken with an oncoming semi-truck, on foot. Chris just ran screaming at the massive vehicle as the air horn blared, then made a last second 90-degree turn into the darkness. I was starting to realize that this night was gonna be like no other. Shortly after witnessing that insanity, I was told that we would be heading out on a mission. I noticed the crew grabbing supplies like gloves, flashlights, and video cameras as we piled into Mike's minivan. Once on the road, our destination was revealed. We would be infiltrating a marine base nearby that had just closed down a few years prior. Our first stop was the abandoned military housing, where many of the elementary school classmates had once lived. The real meaning of the term urban explorer became clear to me. It was a nice word for trespasser. Once inside the grounds, it felt like we had entered an episode of the Twilight Zone. Darkened, hollow houses lined the streets with dried-out weeds growing past the broken windows and cracking wood panels. Walking through the abandoned houses was even creepier. The air felt stale and the emptiness seemed endless. Looking out through dusty sliding glass doors at the overgrown playground equipment caused by imagination to dream up ghost children giddily riding the seesaw, then stopping to look at me with deadpan faces and say, you're not welcome here. After an hour of messing around, I figured we would be on our way home, but it turns out the night was still young. We gotta go to the tower, man. Yeah, on the base. There's no guards there, it's closed. With these discussions flowing back and forth, the decision was made to cross the street and enter the control tower on the abandoned airfield. This just happened to also be the site where I was once accidentally left behind by a group of friends at an air show when I was seven. But I was about to learn about a different kind of fear. Approaching the entrance of the darkened airfield, the first obstacle we had to overcome was the massive barbed wire fence. The professionals saw their opening and a foot-long separation between the hinged door and the chain-length barrier. Then with ninja-like precision, the group helped boost each other up through the tight opening. As I put my foot in Clark's hand to begin my climb, I knew this was the point of no return. Was this really what I wanted when I asked to come along? Danger, adventure, forbidden locations? Absolutely. Once inside the compound, we crept into the shadows created by the moonlight. I watched Mike as my guide for appropriate behavior. He seemed alert, but not on edge, so I tried to play it cool too. Our first stop was a large square building that was obviously locked. But Chris pulled out some tools to gain us entry. What happened next was right out of a movie as the door swung open and several bats actually flew out from the opening. Bats! There's no way that just happened, said Kumar, while documenting the whole event through his night vision setting on his camcorder. As we quickly entered the bat cave, there was even more gothic horror imagery to be found. The building must have been condemned at some point because there were classrooms covered in thick cobwebs with yellow caution tape draped across the entrances. Walking further into the dim, mood-lit structure, we saw broken windows, disintegrating ceiling tiles fall into the ground and broken furniture. It seriously felt like Dracula could pop out around the corner at any moment. Thoroughly creeped out, but eventually bored, we made our way toward our original goal, the control tower. Arriving at the base of the structure, we again made short work of the lock and braced ourselves for a greeting from rattlesnakes or killer bees. Instead, we found a narrow and rickety spiral staircase that we quickly ascended. The most surprising thing to find was a haunted bathroom with a decaying toilet just off from the main control room which contained old consoles with tiny computer monitors and keyboards caked in dust. While some of the crew was content to look out the large windows from the inside, the rest of us found a hatch which gave us access to the outer roof of the structure. Once on top, we enjoyed the view and did the only thing that comes natural to men of mischief at 4 a.m. We took a leak from the highest point. We proudly watched our cascading streams reach the ground below, then returned to the glass encasement where it happened. As our behavior would attest, we were fairly confident that there was no living soul on this base besides ourselves until we noticed a light in the distance coming from a shack where we spotted movement. We realized then that we were not alone. As I said before, this whole mission was being documented on video but our exploration was a covert one up to this point. Unfortunately, at that exact moment, somebody taking archival photos forgot to turn off the flash on their camera and the entire glass tower was soon illuminated with flashes of bright light. We froze in disbelief and then reacted. Tom, you idiot, there's a guard down there or something. We're made. Soon, we're all scrambling for the stairwell and cursing our bad luck. The sound of rubber-sold sneakers on metal echoed throughout the tower until we reached the ground level and bolted for the nearest perimeter exit. Unfortunately, the way we entered was exactly the same spot where we now saw signs of life. So we made for the West Gate, only to find a 20-foot high locked chain-link door with no inviting opening. We're screwed, there's somebody coming. In the distance, we could see a car driving our way with no lights on, slowly stalking us through the night. It was here that panic set in for me personally as I realized, oh crap, we are trespassing on federal property. Had enough if it was somebody's business, but this is the government, the military they might put me in prison for life. I didn't have much more time to think as Mike violently whispered, guys, we have to move. What happened next is the most cinematic moment I have ever experienced in real life. Mike ran ahead and waved us over to a series of small buildings which lined the runway, each about 30 feet apart. Arriving behind the first building, we could peek out to see that the enemy vehicle had arrived at the gate that we had just fled from and positioned the car in our direction. For what felt like an eternity, it just sat there in the still of the night, taunting us. We realized we had to make our move and looked to the leader of our escape for guidance. Mike silently motioned that we would have to move for the cover of the next building. Just as we all nodded in understanding, the car turned on its headlights, bathing the other side of our hiding spot in ominous yellow light. As we scurried from one building to the next, we thought luck was on our side, but we were wrong. Arriving at the third building, the car began to lurch forward and the chase was on. We ran and ran and ran. Well, most of us, Clark was a smoker and not in the best shape. While the rest of us sprinted, he lagged behind just briskly walking. Clark, run, I screamed. I don't run, was the terse response I received as he hoffed and puffed. I remember thinking, you don't run? Do you go to jail? The other thing I recognized was that we were heading in the opposite direction of our only way out, Mike's minivan, but the faceless MP, military police car, gave us no choice. Then the game changed. After what felt like 30 minutes running in a straight line, Mike made a sharp left of a tiny metal staircase that led to a platform with a five foot gap between one side and the other. We all followed Mike in leaping the gap and making use of the descending staircase on the other end. I can only imagine that the gap was a drainage canal of some sort, but in that moment, it was our ray of hope. Having left the pursuing mystery vehicle in the dust, we encountered our final obstacle. There it stood, a 30 foot cinder block wall separating us from the road where our ticket to freedom was parked. I remember making my deal with God in this moment. Please, if you get me home, I promise I'll never do anything this stupid again. Jogging along the interior perimeter, we discussed the hopelessness of trying to scale the wall. But then we saw our last hope. The wall ended at a drainage canal with a familiar chain link fence and barbed wire combo. By squeezing through another small opening, we couldn't make it to the open road, but the 20 foot drop into the concrete chasm below had me worried. We agreed to help Mike and Chris drop through first so they could get the van ready to go while the rest of us are more cautiously avoiding the sharpened metal thorns. As I made the final climb, I teetered a bit on the edge of the fence, imagining broken limbs that would come from a fall that far. But the adrenaline gave me enough strength to pull myself over and onto the civilian soil below. Having made our great escape, we sprinted across the street to hide behind some shrubbery. And minutes later, we saw Mike's green van coming our way. There was just one problem. He wasn't stopping. Dramatically, the van door slid open. Chris motioned for us to run alongside the van. Jump, you guys, jump! Miraculously, we all managed to leap inside, slam the door closed and sit in silence. As we contemplated what we'd just survived, the craziest part to me was how these guys took it all in stride. This was their hobby after all. Me on the other hand, I had never been so adrenalized or so frightened. I was completely spent. This was also the first time I had ever been up for a continuous 24-hour period. So I, during the next day at work, passed out every time I sat down. That night marks the most dangerous activity I have ever been a part of. But it's also the teenage troublemaking story I tell the most. Well, to everyone, but my parents. Can you imagine how grounded I would have been? Sure, I did a little more midnight triss-passing in the following years, but that's a story for another time. So tell me, what kind of mischief did you get into that had the cops on your tail? Did you get caught? Did you learn your lesson? And then he gives us the, I'll go ahead and say this. He says, remember, you can catch me on Twitter at hojucoolander for more retro fun. And hoju is H-O-J-U. Coolander is with a K-O-O-L-A-N-D-E-R. Hoju Coolander on Twitter. I guess I want X now. That is a, what a great story. There's nothing paranormal about it. I had no idea going in that it wouldn't be paranormal, but great writing. That was fun the whole way through. Okay, Jennifer set me in a trucker story, an OTR truck story, as she says. She says, hey, Darren, I have a story that happened to me while driving my Semi. I hope it's something you can use. I was driving westbound on Interstate 90 through Montana during the night. The weather was so wonderful that I had the passenger window about halfway down to enjoy the fresh mountain air. In the middle of the night, there wasn't much traffic out there, I was pretty much alone on the stretch of Interstate. Entertaining myself by singing along to music, I realized there was something alongside my passenger window. It looked like a large black trash bag just flying alongside the truck. My first reaction was that the draw strings of a trash bag got snagged on the large passenger mirror and was hitching a ride. I pulled over and stopped alongside the road, got out of my seat and rolled the passenger window fully down to free the bag. Expecting to see a trash bag hanging from the mirror, I was surprised to see there wasn't one. There was nothing. I thought that it must have freed itself and blown away as I stopped. I got back in my seat, rolled the window to about halfway up and went on my way. No big deal, right? A very short time later I realized that the bag was back. My thought was it must have been caught on the smaller hood mirror and I didn't see it when I stopped the first time because it wasn't caught on the passenger mirror. I pulled over once again on the side of the road, got out and was expecting to free the draw string from the mirror. But once again, there was no bag. At this point, I again thought it must have now freed itself and had blown away. Okay, just a weird coincidence. No big deal. Just started on my way again. Once back on the road, another short time later, there it was again. This time I paid more attention. Anyone who has seen a plastic bag blown around by the wind knows there's a certain way the bag gets blown around like a jerry plastic awkward tumbleweed. This thing didn't act like that. Instead, it was almost soaring next to the truck gracefully as a bird soaring in the wind. It didn't get sucked into the window either as one would expect, like insects or leaves do. It was very strange and bigger than a large trash bag would be. I also observed that it wasn't really close enough to be caught by something outside the truck. It was not really close enough to easily touch through the window, but close enough for me to see it. At this point, I have to admit I was getting a bit spooked. I decided to talk to it. I stated that it was, that I stated that if it was here to protect me, that's fine, but if it had malicious intent, it needed to move along. I'm protected by Almighty God, I said. After that, it was gone. Once the sun started to rise and daylight filled the sky, I pulled over into a rest area. I got out to inspect the truck and still may be expecting to see some kind of remnants of a drawstring or something, but there was nothing. Just a weird occurrence and a weird story. Well, that is amazing. I think I've actually met Jennifer before. I think I may have met you at an expo or something. Anyway, you truck drivers, I don't know how you do it, man. I really don't. That's why once in a while I actually dedicate episodes to truck drivers. That and also because my dad was in the trucking industry for most of his career on the sales side, not on the drivers side, but still, I mean, I had that imagery around all the time. So I have great respect for those who are driving 18 wheels, but I would love, I would love it if you're a truck driver listening to this right now and you've had something weird happen to you, send me your story. I think that would actually be a great episode of just weird trucking stories. I had one sometime back on truck stops, weird things that happened on truck stops and we could include those as well, but yeah, anything on the road, if you're a truck driver, if anything strange has happened on the road to you that you just can't explain, send it in. I would love to do that. We could probably make a fireside fright side of just that, I'm sure. Thank you very much for your story, Jennifer. I really appreciate that. Let's see here. This one comes from LEA. This is about my family's ability to see future events. My mother told me about a dream she'd had in the 1990s. She had found herself suddenly at the foot of my brother's bed. When he awakened, she said, don't go to the beach. That same night, my brother also had a strange dream. Our mother had appeared at the foot of his bed. What are you doing here, mom? He asked, bewildered because of that time she lived about 800 miles from him. He watched as she silently floated away from the bedroom. He followed her into the living room. She came to stand beside the front door. It opened on its own and he could see the ocean surging outside, even though he was living in the mountains. Don't go, she said, then disappeared. They both had the same dream that night. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention my brother had not told her that he was going to the beach that weekend. He did the smart thing and stayed home. My story's just as strange but sad. Many years ago, I had a very strange dream. In the dream, I was suddenly visiting my brother, but I had not taken a plane, train or automobile. I had just appeared unexpectedly on top of a garage and noticed that my brother was standing on a ladder beside that garage fixing something. I was delighted but I lived 400 miles away from him back then and it was so awesome to be able to just appear unexpectedly and be with him. I thought this would be a lot easier way to visit without having to make the long trip. While I was watching him work, to my horror, I saw him fall from the ladder. I woke up at two o'clock in the morning screaming, that was real. I did a real stupid thing. I never warned him about that dream. Two days later, it really happened. If I had told him about that dream, would he have been spared falling off that ladder? He sustained quite a bit of damage and it seemed to take him more than a year to recover. I don't know, Ellie, would that have... All right, coming from a guy, if you had called and told him don't get on the ladder, he would have done it anyway. That's the way, that's human nature. If you tell somebody not to do something, chances are they're gonna do it anyway. Unless they happen to be somebody that believes in prophecy and stuff like this, like what you're talking about seeing into the future, if your family already had that reputation and he knew about that, then he might put some weight into it. But if it was just a random dream, the first time he's ever heard you say something like that, he'd probably just chalk it up to you having a strange dream and there was just a coincidence that he'd have to be on a ladder a couple of days later. So I don't think you can blame yourself for that at all. And on the plus side, he's okay now. So he didn't die, so that's great. He's recovered and he's moving on with life. That'd be a weird thing to have. I don't know if I'd want to have the ability to see into the future because if it's real, if you can interpret it, if you know that it's real, that is a great responsibility to have on you. Because if you don't tell somebody of something negative that might happen, then it kind of would be, yeah, you would feel guilty. If you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that something's going to happen to somebody and you don't tell them, something bad's gonna happen to somebody and you don't tell them, then it's kind of on you. I mean, it's like you knowing a crime is about to be committed but not calling the cops and somebody being hurt in that crime, that's you, that's on you as well. You did not step in to do what you could in order to keep that from happening. So that would be daunting because you would always be second guessing yourself. You would never know if it really was a real vision of the future that you saw or if it was just a bizarre dream. And the only way to be sure was is to consider every dream a vision at which point you would go nuts. And plus you'd also be driving everybody else nuts because every time you had a dream about somebody you'd have to call them or text them or whatever and tell them. And then they're stuck with this and they have to wonder, was that a dream or was that a vision? How am I supposed to act? You know what, that's not a gift. That is a curse right there. So I guess in a way I'm kind of sorry for you, but that's not a gift that I would want to have. Not at all. Okay, this next one comes from Karen. She says, hello, happy November. I just wanted to update you on my husband, Kevin. I've written before and felt that you'd like an update and a couple of short experiences that I personally have had. You see, I have a gift that I'm not too fond of. I can sense spirits around me. It's been a struggle for me to walk into an empty room and know that others who I can't directly see are present anyway, back to the experience. I'd say the one Halloween season we had a lot of spirits come through. My grandmother forced a channel just to tell... Oh, I'm sorry, okay. Yeah, my grandmother forced a channeling just to tell my mother who was afraid of birds that she, my grandmother, knew that my mom loved this little crippled bird that my grandmother had raised. This was not a pleasant experience. I had no control over my own body for about 10 minutes while my mom and grandmother argued using my body over this little insignificant bird. During this same night, I saw what looked like a Native American chief in full war headgear and war paint looking in at us through the kitchen window. We also had an angry something in our back bedroom that was scaring the girls, my two cats, Missy and Eva. I had to go through the house smudging with white candle to get rid of it. I also poured saltwater around all the outside entrances in what was a wild night. The second story is just a little short experience that we had. We went to bed with a clean closet door and woke up to a small handprint, about the same height. It would be a child that had come by and placed a powdered hand on the lower part of the door. It'll include a picture of the handprint. And she actually does send the picture. She has a screenshot of her and her hubby and also the handprint. And yeah, that looks like a child's handprint. It's small because she puts her own hand up as per comparison on size. That really does look like a child's handprint. What I will do is when I post this to the web, the blog post at weirddarkness.com, if you look inside the fireside frights section, you'll be able to see the blog post for this episode. I will put that picture in there so you can see it. Because yeah, that really does look like a child's hand. Thank you very much for your story, Karen. I appreciate that. And she goes on a little bit and tells me a little bit more about what's happening with her husband. And Karen, I'll be praying for you guys tonight. Let's see here. This one comes from Liz saying, a my true scary story. In 1978, we lived in my childhood home in Elkins, West Virginia. All the neighborhood kids would gather in our yard because it was larger than most in the neighborhood. We loved playing spotlight. One summer night, about 10 a.m., we were all playing and having a great time. We began to play the game, so we did. But little did we know this night would be different and terrifying. Running around, we were all gathering on the backyard behind the garage. Suddenly, everyone stomped and watched in horror as a large, what we assumed was a woman in an old school bus that my dad was converting into a camper for our large family. This woman walked through the middle of the bus down the aisle toward the back of the bus. She was huge in height. And we refer to her as the Wendy's girl because if the two pigtails that stuck out of each side of her head, looking much like Wendy's girl pictured on the sign in those restaurants. We were all terrified and took a few moments for us to realize that we should not be out there so we ran into the house. But all too scared to speak of what we had just seen. We all just sat there in silence. Eventually, everyone had to return to their own homes. Back then, everyone knew if the kid didn't get home, a parent would surely come looking for them. The next morning, we all gathered again in the light of day to check out the bus. We were all horrified to see muddy footprints approximately 14 inches long, leading down the aisle of the bus, then just ending. The mud perplexed us because it was not muddy outside. We told our parents, and of course, they said, oh, one of you were all tricking the others, but no, we were all there in the yard together. We never played spotlight again. I'm now in my 50s and still get chills just thinking about it. My sister and I talked about that experience occasionally, but neither of us like to think about it. Hoping you can share the story, and maybe somebody can tell me what we saw that night. Thank you, signed Liz. I don't know what you saw, Liz, but I do believe you. And size 14 for a woman, that is a huge woman. So unless it was Peggy Hill from King of the Hill to the TV show, you had a giant shadow figure woman in there, so I don't know what that was. Shadow figures don't normally leave evidence like that, so maybe it was a real person. So I think you did the right thing by running. I think that was probably the wise thing to do. You mentioned your yard and about how it was larger than most of the neighborhood. Ours was kind of the same way when I was growing up in Olathe, Kansas. Not necessarily larger, but it was the flattest. And so our backyard ended up becoming the football field if anybody wanted to get together because ours was the flattest and the most square. And you say, you call it spotlight. We called it flashlight tag, and yeah, we played a lot of that. That captured the flag and ghost in the graveyard was something else that we played. And it was almost always taking place in our yard, and it was a lot of fun. You brought back some fun memories there for me, so thank you for that, Liz. All right, this one comes from Mark. He says, I have had one and only one experience with the paranormal, but it is one worth telling you about. I should note before I relate this, I'm a lifelong Christian. God designed as a realist and not a conspiracy theorist. I have very little tolerance for those who make things up. Like God and Jesus, I love the truth. Back in 1985, I was an industrial technologist, yeah, okay, I'm sorry, industrial technologist educator working at the Indian Valley Vocational Center. IVVC in Sandwich, Illinois. My subject area was drafting and design, which included the new field of CAD. IVVC was the first secondary school to introduce CAD to high school students in Illinois in 1982. Because CAD or CAD systems were so expensive when they began, I developed a policy, whereby I would do custom commercial work with my students for donations to my vocational program at the center. One job that came in the school year of 1984 and 85 was to do as built floor plan drawings of the very old and historic Von Klein-Smid Mansion in Sandwich, Illinois on the west side of town. The mansion was built in 1865, but had become multifamily apartments in more recent years. Several murders were also committed in the home. One had happened between 1980 and 1984, which involved the shooting. The Sandwich police had the street blocked off as we returned home with our daughter from her grandparents late one night. Some sandwich local later told me, okay, some sandwich local later told me that that was the third murder committed in the house. At any rate, a carpenter friend of mine by the name of Ronnie Thomas Sr. bought the home to restore it and hold it as an investment. He wanted to get it registered on the National Registry of Historic Places in America as it would reduce his property taxes. To do so, he was required to jump through some hoops, the first of which required us to determine the original floor plan and return the home to that state of being as built in 1865. It was not very hard to determine the new partition walls from the old ones as the new ones to be torn out were covered in drywall while the older ones were made with plaster and lathe. I determined it was most probably the first house in Sandwich with indoor plumbing due to a cast iron pipe sticking out of the roof, which would have been an early soil stack. I also found the plumbing in the house for calcium carbide wall gas lamps as this was before electricity was available. We even found the cast iron vessel in the basement where the calcium carbide rocks were mixed with water to generate acetylene gas. So the fall of 1984 offered some hot October days and when I was done with school and teaching I would make numerous trips over to the house to take measurements and see what new revelations and builders have found. One day, Ron Jr. met me at the door all smiles and said, wanna see something neat? I said, of course I would. Ron instructed me to follow him and follow his hand signals but to keep my mouth shut while in the house. He took me upstairs to a bedroom that faced west where we had found a nest of honeybees in the walls earlier when we tore the plaster and lathe off. So the door was shut when we came upstairs and Ron put his fingers up to his lips for me to be quiet as one last reminder. It was about 85 degrees outside and in the house as all utilities had been shut off and disconnected waiting new ones. Ron opened up the bedroom door and a cold blast of air hit us both in the face like air conditioning. He then said out loud, well, I guess we're done here for today so we can go home now. He then motioned for me to follow him down the stairs to the front door. He opened the front door and shut it without us going through it. All of a sudden there was the tremendous sound of a door slamming upstairs. He ran upstairs and I quickly followed. The bedroom door had been slammed shut by some force unknown and unseen to us. We opened the door and again the cold blast of air to our faces hit us. Ron left before I was done in the house that day but I hung around an extra half hour replaying what Ron had showed me until I got tired of running up and down the stairs. I looked for a logical scientific reason to explain the phenomena but there was none. For a time I thought it had to do something with the front door opening and some kind of draft going through the house but the house was airtight as we had not replaced the windows yet and the old ones were all painted shut. On top of that the door slammed after the front door was slammed shut. I went through every room of that house including the basement and up the roof hatch to see if somebody was playing a trick on me. The house was clear the phenomena was real. We my students and myself got the as built floor plans done as it would have been in 1865 and the Thomas family gave us a generous donation. It was classified as a mansion in 1865 as it was so much larger and more expensive than all the other homes at that time. My take on this experience. While I was raised Lutheran most of the rest of the family I will mention his last name was raised Catholic. As such I attended a lot of Catholic funerals where I learned about purgatory. I got a theory perhaps the souls of some people do not go to heaven or hell but get held up here due to the fact that they're not ready to leave here. I think earth might be purgatory for some souls. I once heard of a rich man building a mansion for the woman who would become his new bride. She died unexpectedly. I do not recall how before they consubated their marriage on a honeymoon in their new home. The mansion was said to be haunted by her ghost as she could not get over her perfect day being ruined by her untimely death. I do not think ghosts run contrary to the Bible. I also do not think space aliens if they exist run contrary to the Bible. I think God has all the answers and we're not meant to and I'm okay with that. I was told that the husband and father of unclined Smith was the town doctor back in the day which explains his money. Doctors were like gold back then. I lived over in the next town east which was Plano and the doctor's home there was part of the underground railroad complete with basement tunnel out of the house and everything. That house dates back to 1854. The deal is no doctor was ever going to be charged and jailed for harboring slaves as doctors were. As I said, like gold. I met you and your wife at the trunk or treat Saturday. So that's how I now know you. We attend state line church at 11. Oh, hey, very cool. He even attends my church. Your van was opposite our orange Jeep. Yes, thank you. I appreciate you mentioning that. So I know who you are, Mark. Thank you very much. Great story too. Wow. He includes a, who's a picture of the mansion. It is gorgeous. I will, I'll go ahead and put a link to the house or to the mansion in the show notes for you as well. So if you go to the website and look up this episode of fireside frights, you can see that as well. That is beautiful. And definitely during the day, gorgeous. At night, totally haunted. I could totally see how this would be a haunted house. And you've got some good points there when it comes to the door slamming. If even if it had been a breeze or something that had shut that door, even if you were able to find that out, it still would not explain the very cold air hitting you in the faces when you open that door with it being 85 degrees outside and inside with no air conditioning in that house because nothing was hooked up. So that's creepy. That is, that is very creepy. Thank you for sharing that, Mark. I really, really appreciate that. Okay, this next one is very short. Says, hello, Darren, Alice here. I hope you're well. Here's a true story of something happened to me a few years ago. Trigger warning, the blink of existing. So what kind of a trigger warning would this be? I don't read these in advance, so I don't know. A few years ago, following a suicide attempt, I was rushed to the accident and emergency hospital. I ended up dying for a few seconds. I was walking and all of a sudden I collapsed and stopped breathing. I found myself in a very dark, blank, black room. I heard my nan talking, well, what I thought was my nan. All around me I heard screaming and growling. There were chains rattling as my nan got closer, whose face had changed and so did her soft voice. I've been back in that scary place not so long ago, following a seizure. I don't understand why I find myself there, but it scares the hell out of me. Really, it does. Thanks, Darren. And as always take care, Alice in Worcestershire United Kingdom. Alice, nice to hear from the UK. That's terrifying. That is. I can understand why you said trigger warning. Not just because of the suicide. And I'm so glad that you actually did live through that. But yeah, for the whole near-death experience thing and that you've actually re-encountered that. So I have to ask you, you listen to this podcast, you know where I come from when it comes to spiritual stuff, you know, something eternal value. Where are you with your relationship with Christ? That's what I need to ask. And you don't mention it here at all, so. But that, well, you say it right here. You say it scares the hell out of you. Literally, that's what it should do. If that's, I mean, you probably, you only got just a tiny little glimpse of what hell might be like. The fires of hell may not even be real. It might be complete blackness. It's complete aloneness. You are completely separated from anything and anybody that you love or loves you. You'll be alone for the rest of eternity. You might hear the screaming and everything only because it scares you, but you're not going to communicate with those people except for your own screaming. That's about all. And that's just my take on what you envisioned there. I don't know what hell's gonna be like. I don't know what heaven's gonna be like. But that's just my take on what you saw. But that should be enough to turn anybody's life around and say, okay, if this is real, then heaven must be real as well. And if that's the case, then there must be a God. And if God's real, then his son is real and I need to get my life straight. So I would highly recommend you picking up a Bible, look through Romans through the book of Romans first, just start there and get moving. You can also go to my website. On my website, at the very bottom of the page in the right hand column, there's something that's called escape eternal darkness. If you click on that, it'll actually give you some links on how to become a Christian, what the gospel message is. There's actually a couple of videos there that you can check out as well. I very rarely promote that, but I think here it's definitely warranted. So if you go to WeirdDarkness.com, just scroll down the page and you'll see escape eternal darkness. But Alice, I really do hope that you take my advice on that and I'm really, really glad that you did not die completely, that you have an opportunity now to get your life back on track and to make the right decisions. Okay, our next story comes from Ross. He says, I'm a retired police officer. My career ended after I was struck by a car. My injuries ended my career. God provided a lot of healing and I'm capable of working just not as a police officer. I work as a security guard for another retired officer. My current assignment is in a parking structure near a busy center. I see shadows moving in the garage at night. No big deal. I've seen these for years. My son tells me that the parking lot next door that they're digging up had actually contained a grave. I asked and everybody said, yeah, it did. A barista that I consider a friend said the grave belonged to the original mayor of the town. One night I was a little uncomfortable driving the garage that night. I was going up a ramp to the next level when I saw a female, I'm sorry, I think he says I see a black female sitting in the back seat of a maroon Cadillac. I think that's what he's saying. She was wearing a white t-shirt and a white face mask like folks were wearing during the pandemic. She seemed to be happy but I stopped to check on her. I parked in front of the car, started to get out when I noticed no one was there. But I looked, no one was in the car. Every time I passed, I would see her back and see her in the back of the car. But I stopped and looked, no one was there. I left in the morning. The next morning, the Cadillac was still there but it was gone the following night. Thanks for a chance to tell the story, signed Ross. Well, Ross, before I go any further, thank you very much for your service. I greatly appreciate it. I'm very sorry that you were hurt on the job and had to walk away from that. Sounds like you're still being able to use some of the skills that you learned as an officer when it comes to being a security guard. It's also, I think it's also really cool that you're working for another police officer. So you're working for somebody who can relate to what you enjoy doing. I think that's really cool. So I have to wonder if going through the, if like there's a strange glare of light that hits the back window of that car when you're driving past to make it look like there's somebody in the back seat. And then when you get to, when you get out of your car and walk up, you're at a different angle so you don't see it. That would be the only thing that I'm thinking of. I'm sure you already considered that and have already ruled it out. But that's just the first thing that popped into my head. But that would, I can understand why driving around, it would be a little creepy that night, but you even had the creeps before this happened. So almost as if like the spirits around you was saying, mm-hmm, yeah, just here's a heads up. Thank you, Ross. I appreciate that. Okay. This one comes, this one is not signed. So I'll just, I'll just leave them anonymous. Oh, there it is, candy. She calls herself candy. I enjoy the fireside frights. It was 10 or more years ago. I used to have this spirit of a soldier stand in front of my closet in my bedroom every night. I would see him as a black silhouette. I saw the outline of his rugged uniform, boots and helmet. One day I told him, look, I don't need you anymore. You can move on or something like that. Haven't seen him since. The next day my mom told me a soldier used to live in my room and passed away in there. Another night around that time, my name was called three times in a fast whisper. I turned around in my bed to look, no one was there. As of this year, I lost my grandma. It's a month or a few days later. I hear whispers in my room. I couldn't understand any of it. Earlier that week I saw a white figure in my room that had disappeared. Hope this works and it's proper enough punctuation for you to read. Thank you very much. Well, Candy, yes, the punctuation was great and I truly appreciate it when somebody includes punctuation with the stories. It makes it so hard sometimes to read the stories if there's no punctuation, no capitalization. When people are just talking into their phones and they're just letting the voice to text take care of everything and then they send it without editing it, it's really hard sometimes to make sense of it. And sometimes I just will not use those at all. I'll start recording here for fireside frights and I don't pre-read these, but if it's really bad, I'll just stop reading it, move on to the next story and then edit it out after I'm done recording because some of the, yeah, some of it's really hard. So thank you very much for using punctuation and capitalization. I appreciate it, Candy. Very, very cool that you were growing up in a house that had a soldier that died there and in a way I guess he was looking to protect you, which I'm sure that's the conclusion you came to because when you told him that you no longer needed him, that's when he disappeared. Those are the weird ghosts that I have a hard time understanding or explaining away. I believe in the stone tape theory where like your surroundings in a strange way could record something that happened, especially if it was something that was really emotional or energy driven. And so it might like replay like a movie and you're seeing something being reenacted in that like that kind of a ghost story. I could see that happening. I did an episode of Paranormality Magazine. Their podcast, which you guys hear, here in the Weird Darkness podcast as well. And there's something called Water Tape Theory, which is the same concept, but water instead of solid surfaces. Little harder to grasp that one, but apparently it's a theory. But in this case, it's almost like it was like an actual entity there that was intelligent. It wasn't just a recording because you spoke to it and it no longer appeared at that point. So that's what makes me think that you had something there, something there more than just like a spiritual recording. And then for your mom, and if you not to know that at all, and then your mom tells you like the next day that a soldier used to live in the house, strange timing on that. Unless you told her that there was a soldier that went away, if you told her that and then she admitted it to you, that would make sense. But for her just to bring it up out of the blue and tell you that, very strange timing. And you don't mention it, but I'm sure you're assuming that the white figure in your room after you lost your grandma was your grandma. And that I don't know, but if you felt peace and felt that it was her, like she was saying goodbye, that she loves you, I don't see any harm in that. And I'm very sorry that you lost your grandma. I was never really close to my grandparents, not nearly as much as I probably should have been. So, but close to my dad, obviously, and he just recently passed away, getting ready to go to his service. I think I already said it earlier in this episode. Sorry, Bob, I'll be going to his service in early December. We're doing a military service for him because he was in the Air Force. Yeah, I did tell you that. That's right, yeah, okay. Sorry, I'll just move on. Now that I know that I'm repeating myself. Okay, this one comes from Alayna. I believe it's Alayna. Beautiful name, by the way. I was writing a song back when I was at college called Alayna. I don't know why, well, I know why because there was a German girl, one of my classes that I had a bit of a crush on and her name was Alayna. And I never spoke to her ever, but I wrote a song. Okay, anyway, she says, I have a couple more short stories to share with you and the fellow weirdos. The first one happened a few years back while living at our old house. The next door neighbor passed away. Our sideyards were divided by a fence and our garages were detached. So in order to get to my car, I had to walk from the back door along the fence. But the first 10 or so years we lived there, I would see the neighbor. I'll call him M. Almost every morning on the way to my car headed to work, we would wave, say good morning, have a good day, et cetera. All I could ever really see was from his forehead up, unless I stood in the flower beds and chatted over the fence. A few months after he passed, I was headed to work as usual, said my good morning, waved hi to him because out of my peripheral vision, I saw him on the other side of the fence as I always do. The first time it happened, I was halfway to work before I realized M passed away a few months prior. I saw him a few times after that, and that was all. Although I'm pretty certain as we were moving out of that house, I caught a glimpse of him over the fence one last time. My second story takes place in that same prior house we lived in. For starters, it was built in 1907, so a lot of history. Both my husband and I are certain it had a ghost dog. Now, mind you, we did have a real living dog. At the time, I would work from home in the dining room and would hear the clear sounds of a dog trotting back and forth through the rooms in the hallway upstairs. However, our living dog would be snoring at my feet under the table. One other time I was laying in bed and felt the dog jump up on the bed and lay down as she usually did, only to have my husband come in a few minutes later with the actual dog from taking her outside before bed. A third instance, middle of the night, only my husband, myself and the dog, no kids yet, were awakened by our actual dog crying at the bedroom door that's open. We lay there listening and hear the sounds of the dog walking down the hall. Then we hear the distinct sound when a dog shakes and the collar jingles. We both are no strangers to that sound, so we knew exactly what it was and knew that our actual dog at the time did not even have her collar on. That's all for me this time. Take care, Dara, and to keep up the fantastic work, signed Elena. Elena, that is, that's really cool about the dog. It's weird how pets can see things that we can't and you wonder, are they crazy or are they truly seeing something? Like when your cat, well, not you specifically, I'm just mentioning you in general, all encompassing you. Like when your cat's running around the house and suddenly stops and stares at a wall or a corner or part of the ceiling or something and you have no idea why they stopped like that. I mean, it's almost like they hit a wall and stopped dead center. Well, it's stopping on a dime like that, doing 90 miles an hour and then boom, stop. And then they're looking at something that's invisible. It's almost like their brain has got so much going on in it that they had to stop and let all the synapses firing, calm down or something before they can move on. Our cat will do that once in a while. She'll look down the stairs and just stare. And I don't know if she's debating whether or not she wants to go downstairs or if she's actually seeing something down there. Never had a dog, so I don't know. I don't know that particular aspect of it, but the dog jumping onto your bed or at least the feeling of that. I've not had that, but my bride has. We were staying in a hotel. I think it was in Springfield, Missouri. I think it was at a holiday in Express. Well, this actually happened to her a couple of times, but she actually felt a cat jump onto the bed and she knows that feeling because that's exactly what happens when we were at home with Miss Mocha jumping up onto the bed wanting to sleep with her. In our previous cat, patches would do the same thing. So she's very familiar with what that feels like. And it wasn't like half a sleep type of thing. She hadn't been in bed very long at all. Wasn't even drowsy yet. She just knew it was time to go to bed and this has happened. And she just rolled over and went to sleep anyway. It did not faze her at all. I'm amazed because she's not into scary stories. She doesn't like murder mysteries and stuff like that. She won't watch horror movies, but apparently a real ghost of a cat jumping onto the bed. No sweat, no big deal, whatever. Okay, let's see, moving on here. This one is from Jane in Erie, Pennsylvania. What a great name for a town, Erie. I wanted to share something that I've experienced quite a few times in my life, but I guess it kind of borders on the spiritual side. A few months ago, I had written to you about the dream I had where I had a visit with Jesus. These experiences are on that same level. You think it's possible that when we lose a loved one, they're able to visit us in our dreams? I ask because I've had these experiences happen to me on more than one occasion. Well, it's interesting, before I even continue on with your letter, Jane, it's interesting that you would bring that up because I told, I was speaking earlier about the dream that my dad had with his uncle Al, giving him the answer to a question that he had regarding fixing that rifle. So yeah, I think maybe it is possible. I think it's rare. I don't think that's the norm, but if God wants to allow a spirit from the other side to reach out and talk to you, then yeah, I think so. I think that could possibly also explain some of the visions and dreams that people have had in the Bible when they're talking about something. I think maybe that could be one way that God communicates with us is through a loved one in that way. He created the angels as messengers for us, even though they were created before us. He used the angels as messengers. So there's already that spiritual aspect of sending a spiritual creature to us in order to communicate. So yeah, I think so. So anyway, we'll go on with your email here. She says, here are my experiences. My very first experience happened when I was 13. This involved the stepfather I had that was really cruel to me and the one my mother was trying to leave. He had ended coming back to live with my mother but he had congestive heart failure. The very last weekend that he was alive, I was leaving to spend time with my grandparents and I went to say goodbye to him. He turned to me to say goodbye and told me that he wouldn't be alive anymore when I returned. Normally, when people say things like that, you'd be freaked out, especially if you're only 13, but I wasn't and in my heart, I actually knew that was gonna happen. Well, that Sunday, just as my grandmother and I entered church, I actually felt him leave the earth. I knew the minute he passed. When my grandfather picked us up from church, I saw him whisper in my grandmother's ear and I knew they were talking about my stepfather. My grandmother turned to tell me but before she said a word, I told her I knew my stepfather had passed. I told her that he passed when we went to church. She just sat there with huge eyes and didn't say a word. He and I did not get along. He was very abusive to me but I did feel bad that he had passed. Several months after he passed, he came to me in a dream. He said that he was checking in to make sure that my mother and I were okay and for me to take care of my mother. This was something he would always say to me. That dream sat with me for years. Here's my second experience. About five years ago, I lost my favorite uncle. His passing never set well with me and I never really got to say my goodbyes to him. He did pass rather suddenly under circumstances that were never really explained well to me. A few months after his passing, you guessed it, he came to me in my dreams. In my dream, he was young and dressed in his favorite blue flannel shirt and he had a happy smile. He told me not to worry about him, that he was happy and safe. I woke up happy but in tears, missing him all over again. Here's my third experience. My dad passed three years ago. My dad and I never had the typical father-daughter relationship but we did try to reach out to each other as much as possible. He lived on the other side of the state from me. My dad had passed very suddenly and very quickly from heart failure. It just happened out of nowhere. About a year later, I'm still missing my dad and thinking about him but I finally had a visit from him. He came to visit me along with my stepmother, his wife, who had passed in 2016. They both spoke to me and said they were happy and they were together. I was kind of surprised to see my stepmother but was happy to see her. There are other loved ones that I have lost like my grandmother and grandfather that I was extremely close to that I would love to have a visit from but never had. I just receive visits from those who wanna pop into my dreams. Some people say it's just my subconscious working out my loss but I'm not so sure. Can our love, loved ones who've passed come and visit us in our dreams? Given my experience, I like to think so. Thanks for letting me share my experience. I love listening to your podcast and have lost myself in it. I've shared your podcast with others. I went on a ghostly cemetery walk a couple of weekends ago and told people there to tune into your podcast. They were very excited to listen to you. Thanks again for all you do and share with us. Not sure if it's okay to say but I send my heartfelt condolences for your father as well as my prayers, hugs, signed Jane. It's totally okay for you to send your heartfelt condolences and prayers. In fact, I'll take prayers all day long. I will never turn down prayers. Thank you very much, Jane. I appreciate that. It's interesting that you're having these experiences and it could be subconscious that happens with this. I'm not saying that you don't have experiences because I think maybe you probably do, especially as often as it happens to you. But I also know that people can have dreams when something is weighing heavily on their mind. I lost, well, she was a friend back in my college. And we were pretty close. We didn't really date, but maybe just a couple of days but she was a very dear friend of mine. And she had passed. And I'd say maybe a couple of days after I found out because I wasn't really that affected when I heard that she had passed. I didn't, I mean, it was very surprising because of how young she was. But I wasn't truly affected. At least I didn't think I was. But a couple nights later, I saw her in a dream and she was speaking to me and she was happy. And I kind of knew in the dream that she had passed and it was kind of her saying, hey, I'm okay. We had not spoken. Gosh, well, even before I even met my bride. So close to what, all the time 25 years more than that. So it's not like I would have been on her mind except maybe she knew, you know, being on the other side, maybe she knew how I was reacting internally to hearing her passing. And so she decided to reach out to me. Right in high school, that passed away. A female friend, she and I were in the theater department together and we were just friends, that's all we were. But she passed away and I did not find out until months, even maybe even a couple of years afterwards because we hadn't been in communication with each other in that long and her brother had to break the news to me. And that had hit me a little bit harder than I expected. Just again, because it's so surprising and she showed up in a dream too. It's weird though, because with her, I completely forgot that she had died. And I went to her Facebook and dropped her a message saying, hey, how are you doing? Hope you're doing well, I miss you. And it was only after that that I realized, oh my gosh, she's gone. So she probably still has that message waiting for me there on her Facebook account. I don't know if they get Facebook in heaven or if that would be a hell thing. It depends on the day and how Facebook is acting. But yeah, I think people can talk to you through your dreams. I think that's very possible. I can't tell you whether or not your particular dreams were that happening, but yeah, I think it's possible. And here's one from Blake. It says, Darren, I'm currently listening to the latest fireside frights. And first off, I just want to say that I'm sorry to hear about your dad. I'll be praying for you and your family during this time. When we had you on When Words Fail, Music Speaks, by the way, yeah, that's a podcast, by the way. That's a podcast called When Words Fail, Music Speaks. And Blake is one of the co-hosts on that. So way to plug your podcast there in the fireside frights, Blake, nicely done. When we had you on When Words Fail, Music Speaks, we talked about how I lost my own dad when I was 16 years old. I'll be 32 in December, and since my dad's passing, I've struggled with depression, but I'm happy to report that since we had you on the podcast, I've been seeing a therapist once a month, and it has helped tremendously. Oh man, that is awesome. While this whole process has been quite sad, I have a story that actually makes me smile. My dad had many little quirks and phrases that he would say. One of them was this motion that he'd make with one hand where he would hold his index finger and thumb together with the remaining fingers pointing up, wave his hand from one side to the other and say, okay, just like buckwheat from the little rascals. Okay, I should probably say that as buckwheat then. Okay. When my dad was sick, we found out that my sister and brother-in-law were pregnant with their second child. Unfortunately, my dad passed away before my niece was born, but my sister placed an ultrasound photo in the casket at his funeral. Fast forward a year or so, my brother-in-law gets up one morning as he walks by my niece's room. He finds her standing up in her crib, making the same motion with her hand and saying, okay, all while staring across the room. Keep in mind that neither my niece or my nephew ever watched a single episode of the Little Rascals, nor did my sister continue using these little phrases my dad would commonly use. There was simply no way my niece would have seen this anywhere else. In the new Haunted Mansion movie, they talk about things called ghost winks, simple, small instances that occur in your daily life that remind you of loved ones who passed, almost as a little acknowledgement that they're okay and that they're still around in some fashion. I truly believe this incident with my niece was his ghost wink for all of us who miss him dearly and his own bonding experience with his granddaughter that he never got to meet in this life. We'd love to have you back on the podcast. Moving on, moving on, moving on. Again, you're in our thoughts and prayers. Thanks for doing such a great job bringing the podcast to us weirdos on a daily basis. You have no idea how much it means to all of us. Your brother-in-Christ, Blake. Man, Blake, that story about your niece doing the okay with her hand. That is incredible. That really is amazing. Yeah, what other explanation would there be? Because you're talking about what she would be like maybe a year old? Maybe? Even if somebody were to do that around her, would a child understand that and be able and have the dexterity to do that with their hand and say, okay, combining the two like that? That is really cool. Thank you for your prayers, man. I really appreciate that. As I mentioned in the podcast, my dad's in a better place now. And yes, I miss him. He was my best friend growing up. I know I'm not gonna see him again very soon. At least I hope not, but I will see him again someday. But he's no longer struggling physically and mentally and that's really the most important part. He was in a lot of turmoil in the last, well, really, almost a couple of years. His body was just, he would say it, his body was betraying him. He'd have his mind, but everything in his body would start to go. And then finally, he started getting confused there in the last few months. So I'm really sorry to hear that you lost your own dad, so young in life too. That had to be really hard as a teenager. Here I am an adult. And so you know that your parents passing, that this is part of the life process, even though it sucks, but being a teenager and having that happen, especially if it came out suddenly, that would be really hard. So, but yeah, thank you for those prayers, Blake. I really, really appreciate it. That was our last story, but before I leave, I was reminded by my bride that I need to tell y'all that I have a new album, well, a new album, the album, I've only got the one. I used to be a singer and songwriter and there's an album now out. You can find it on YouTube Music and Amazon. It's called Social Security Blanket. And most of it's not gonna be anything that you guys probably would be interested in because it's mostly Christian rock and a very, very 80s Christian rock. Cause that's about, that's what I was into at the time when I was, when I was making it. I mean, we're talking like 25, 30 years ago, did all of this stuff. But, Where Wolf Girlfriend is in there. And so for those of you who enjoyed Where Wolf Girlfriend from the Halloween live stream a couple of years ago, yeah, you can actually find that online now. And like I said, it's on YouTube. I think it's pretty much anywhere now, I think the way it's released. But I found it on YouTube Music. I think you can find it on Amazon. I think it's in iTunes. But if you look for Where Wolf Girlfriend, Darren Marlar, you'll be able to find it. And if you wanna listen to the rest of the stuff, you can, if not, no big deal. That's totally cool. But since I had so many positive reactions about Where Wolf Girlfriend specifically, thought I'd tell you guys about that. All right, well, thank you very much for listening. That is the last one that I have for this month. And that means that I am completely out of fireside fright stories. So if you feel inspired, if you wanna send me a story that's happened to you or somebody you know, if it's paranormal or strange in nature like this, please send it my way. I try to use as many as I can each month. But if you like this show, do me also another favor, share the podcast with those that you know, those who like the paranormal, strange stories, true crime, monsters, unsolved mysteries, all the stuff that you hear on Weird Darkness, sharing it with others really means the world. That's better than any advertising I could do is you just, by word of mouth, just telling your friends and family about the show. So thank you very much. If you do wanna send in your story though, you can go to WeirdDarkness.com and click on tell your story. And you can send the story to me that way. One of the stories mentioned, do I believe, we talked about dreams and can the dead talk to you after death? Actually, I did an episode on that in Church of the Undead. I did an episode back in April of this year. It's called Can the Dead Come Back to Visit. And it's just a little over 10 minutes long, very pretty short, but it kinda gives you some thoughts that I found online about the topic and what I was narrating it. I was thinking, you know what, this makes sense. I think I do agree with this. So just look for, actually you could just use the search function at WeirdDarkness.com and look for Can the Dead Come Back to Visit. If you type that into the search, you'll find the episode for Church of the Undead. So that'll help. So all stories in Weird Darkness, fireside writes are submitted by listeners. They're all purported to be true. Weird Darkness is a registered trademark. Copyright Weird Darkness. And now that we're coming out of the dark, I'll leave you with a little light. Matthew 6, verses 26 and 27. Look at the birds of the air. They do not sow or reap or store away in barns and yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you, by worrying, add a single hour to your life? And a final thought from Chuck Swindall. What are the greatest character traits you can provide your husband, wife, or family is self-controlled, determined to stay strong? I'm Darren Marlar. Thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness. Hey Weirdos, be sure to click the like button and subscribe to this channel and click the notification bell so you don't miss future videos. I post videos seven days a week. And while you're at it, spread the darkness by sharing this video with someone you know who loves all things strange and macabre. If you wanna listen to the podcast, you can find it at WeirdDarkness.com slash listen.