Creepy, Scary, Spooky Post--Week 2: Haunted Houses and Woods of Terror!

Now for a real-life haunting--or at least, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. As a kid, I lived out in the country, and all my friends talked about this road way up in the woods. People described all kinds of weird goings-on there. Stories of murder, mayhem and mischief. As soon as I could drive, well, of course I had to check it out!

Which I did on several occasions, mostly with my one friend Kenneth (he was the bravest). Thought I would share a few of the stories about the locale as well as what happened to me personally.

First, you couldn't have picked a better location for a haunted tale. This road was truly off the beaten path--it wasn't even paved and wound around and around through the hills. Most of the land was just woods except for a lone abandoned tobacco barn here or there. We hardly ever saw any other people or cars. All the scary stuff happened just on the unpaved part. Plus there were acres of corn fields (an easy place for deranged killers to hide!). But the focus was this empty (or was it?!) 2-story white house.

The legend goes that the family who owned the farm land experienced a great tragedy. Variations abound, but essentially, a matriarch of the family went nuts and killed a few of her brood in the house. She then fled to the woods out of remorse, and the family abandoned the house. But it was said that the old lady still lived in the wood and would kill anyone who ventured too close to her or the house. Some stories say another unrelated person was found hanged in one of the old barns, and on some nights, you might see a light in an upstairs window of the house and the figure of an old woman by the window! There were also stories of suicides and, naturally, Satanic rituals.

There was also a little creek that ran by the house and a rickety 1-lane bridge. If you stopped your car on the bridge (and why would you do such a thing?), the legend said it wouldn't start again and the old woman would crawl out from under the bridge and attack! So of course, we tried this on several occasions--and survived! The car even restarted!

However, I did notice one odd thing. As we drove down the hill and the house came into view, if the radio was on, it would go dead! Then just as you passed the house and crossed the little bridge, the radio would come back on! Being 16 and wired for sound, this just drove us wild.

Kenneth and I made it our goal to sneak into the house. We wanted to see what was inside--you know, dead bodies, zombies, vampires--whatever. So we would try to find a place to hide my car. Once, we parked the car way up the road and walked toward the house. Now we usually never saw any cars. You might see dust kicked up that hung (mysteriously!) in the air but never any cars. So here comes a pick-up with a man and a woman. They stopped and asked what we were up to, and we were afraid they might the owners. But we were on a public road, so no law against that. We just weakly replied we were out for a walk--and then they sped off like we were demons! Never did figure out what that was about.

Another time we tried to hide the car behind a barn but it got stuck in the mud. We just knew we were monster toast! The car was in plain view and stuck! Soon this tiny car drives by and stops, and 2 very large men and one tiny woman tumble out (imagine one of those little clown cars). They were the definition of redneck--and we just knew they must be part of the cursed family out to claim another victim! Instead, they asked us what happened and proceeded to literally pick up my car and set it down so we could drive away. That was enough for one day!

We even tried to get into the house at night (stupid!). Once we came by and the front doors, usually boarded up tight, were wide open (we didn't go in). Another time, there were several cars parked near the house (next!). Yet another night, we discovered a couple of those star-thingys that martial arts guys use--stuck into the boards on the front door (ummm, time to go!). Determined, we kept coming back like the aspiring vandals we were. One night, we finally did find a window that we decided would be the easiest way to enter, but that attempt was thwarted by approaching headlights. We hit the dirt and flattened ourselves out just like you might imagine. A close call.

One calm Sunday afternoon, we finally did it! We climbed inside the window with our hearts in our throats. As you might expect, however, no mummies or beasties--just trash, old furniture and an old house that might have been nice once upon a time. We rummaged around and found our way upstairs. We inspected all the rooms, and then I came to one last door at the end of the hall. Without even thinking, I flung it open only to discover that it opened onto the small upstairs balcony. Which would have been fine if 2 people hadn't been walking just down below on the dirt road. Surprised and fearing we would be caught trespassing, I slammed the door shut (not so smart!). Kenneth and I hid in the house until we were sure the strangers were gone. We had to laugh, however, that we probably scared those 2 to death and did our own little part to help keep the legends alive.

With that goal reached and high school graduation approaching, we lost interest. There was college and life to attend to. But I kept hearing about the legends. Several years later, I was telling a friend about all this, so we decided to take a drive. Everything looks pretty much as it did over 20 years ago, except the house had been torn down and the spot cleared. I did a little investigating and read that the family had grown tired of all the vandalism (oops) and wanted to put a stop to it. But the articles I found still indicated that the legends about this little dirt road still held sway in the local imagination. Long live the fright!