This is the first installment on this blog and I?d like to make it clear just how important your input is. Your thoughts, criticism, ideas and stories are always welcome. While this is being written to entertain as well as educate, anyone suffering the effects of a paranormal disturbance and requiring professional and discreet help is urged to get in touch with me immediately.
As a member of the New England Society of Paranormal Investigators / NESPI.net, the opportunity arises often to speak with a lot of people, of all ages, about ?the other side?. Most everyone I talk with believes there is ?something ? after death. A continuance or survival, in some respect, of our thoughts, feelings and emotions on some level. This is true of myself, as well. But I never believed you could interact with them because I have never seen a ghost! Most people haven?t. But I have smelled them, heard them and even spoken with them. In fact, I was turned from hardcore skeptic to devout believer in six seconds one summer morning in 2000.
It?s about 9:00AM in late August. I?m in the office which is a converted bedroom in our home in Yarmouth Port. Our family has lived in this house since it was built so there is nothing strange or spooky here. I?m installing a new software program on my computer named ?Cool Edit.? The reason for this stems from a TV show my wife, Ann, and I watched the night before on either The Discovery Channel or The Travel Channel I don?t remember which. This show has a segment with a gentlemen standing in a field, quite alone, in Gettysburg with a micro cassette recorder. He asks ?Does anyone remember General Lee?? and allows the tape to record for about fifteen seconds. On playback you can hear the question being asked again followed by a faint but totally discernable ?Yes?! I?m genuinely amazed. I had always believed, or hoped, that there was some sort of existence after this life but I was quite certain there was no way to interact with it. Ghosts? Talking to the dead? No way! It turns out that this gentleman standing in the field is author Mark Nesbitt who has written several very successful books on the Ghosts of Gettysburg. The segment following Mark highlights a ghost hunting groups who gather these voices and filter them through a computer program called ?Cool Edit?. They call these voices EVPs for Electronic Voice Phenomenon which is the capturing of spirit voices on digital or analog recorders. This whole thing appeals to me even as a skeptic. It?s scientific with little or no subjectivity, it?s inexpensive and it?s easy.
So now Cool Edit is installed, I have a microphone attached to the ?Line In? plug on the computer so I can record right onto the hard drive, my headphones are on and I am a real ghost hunter! After hitting Record, Dave, The Ghost Hunter, says ?Is there any friendly spirit or entity that wishes to communicate?? Note I throw the word friendly in there just in case, certainly not because I?m afraid. No No. It?s just for safety! I allow about 25 seconds to pass and hit Stop and then Play. The question is heard once more and the hiss of white noise is all that follows. I knew it! Just a bunch of bologna and a huge waste of time. I stomp off to the kitchen, a little disappointed, for breakfast.
After a bagel I?m feeling a little better, I decide to give it one more chance so the fearless Ghost Hunter marches upstairs, dons the headphones and repeats ?Is there any friendly spirit or entity that wishes to communicate?? I wait only about fifteen seconds as I know nothing will be there anyway and hit Stop, then Play.
Immediately I hear myself ask the question and then? I HEAR THE ANSWER!
About 6 seconds after the question is asked there is another, adult male voice on the harddrive and he says ?Did anybody answer?? The fearless Ghost Hunter jumps up, the chair goes flying, rips off and drops the headphones while simultaneously backing up across the room against the far wall in abject terror. You see I know that no one occupies either of the houses abutting ours, my office windows are closed and I?m totally alone in the house. I also know that someone or something I can?t see answered me.
I went down the stairs rather quickly and the fear was continuing to build. When I entered the kitchen the ceiling light was flashing on and off. The microwave oven display was also flashing eights all across. I ripped the microwave right off the counter and headed out the door beside the garage. I dumped the microwave and waited for my heart rate to slow down. When I finally pulled it together I went into the house and the kitchen light was no longer flashing but it was another 3 hour before I would go upstairs.
In retrospect I can see how the flashing kitchen light and microwave display were most likely the product of some sort of electrical surge or failure and completely explainable. Not so, the voice on the hard drive.
This was my initiation into the strange world of Electronic Voice Phenomena and I was going to find out exactly how strange and addicting a world it really is. Since that August morning, I have recorded thousands of hours of EVP sessions, investigated may haunted buildings with NESPI and worked with people experiencing EVP disturbances all across the country.
http://www.capecodtoday.com/blogs/index ... initiation
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