Alan the Anguished Ghost

 Alan Reading Over My Shoulder

First, a follow up from last week's blog about Aunt Belle's Harold ghost. A reader asked me how Aunt Belle's daughter, Sammi, reacted when she found out about the new ghost in her house. Actually, Aunt Belle said, she took it well and thoughtfully.

"I've seen this man," Sammi said. "I only saw him as a shadow, though, and from the shape, I thought it was Joey's father." Joey is Sammi's husband, and his father passed away a year or so ago. "He's tall and slender, right?"

"Yes," Aunt Belle told her. "But it's not Joey's dad. It's this Harold guy."

"I've seen him a lot," Sammi replied. "All over our mobile home. Huh."

Aunt Belle also said that Sammi is fine with us coming over to her home to see if we can contact Arthur Morgan, in order not to disturb Aunt Belle's husband. So we're hoping to get that set up one day soon.

Now, as to the subject ghost in today's blog. Readers who have been following me for the past few years will recognize Alan, the ghost who "lives" with my cover goddess and friend, Angela Rogers. Alan is a very strong ghost, and he makes no bones about his feelings sometimes. He also needs a dose of discipline now and then, but this isn't about one of those times.

Recently, I was reading one of the chapters for my current work in progress, Silent Prey. It happened to be a chapter where the characters were discussing an earlier incident involving "Allen." Although we were at my house, I immediately felt Angela's Alan crawling all over me with his energy. She and I looked at each other and laughed, then explained to our friend Amanda what was going on.

"He's all excited, jumping up and down," Angela said. "He's saying, 'I'm in her book! I'm in her book!'" It didn't seem to matter that the names were spelled differently. It was an Alan as far as Angela's Alan was concerned.

Later, Angela took the earlier chapters of Silent Prey with her on vacation, to read and give me some feedback. She was still reading when she got home, and when we talked, she was again laughing about Alan.

"I got to the point where the monster attacks, and Alan was reading over my shoulder. All of a sudden, he started yelling in a really anguished tone, 'I got disemboweled! I got disemboweled!' He's still upset about that."

I laughed with her. Sorry, Alan, you'll just have to get over it. I'm not changing my story because of you. But I'm glad you got such a nice visual from what you read. J

Anyway, there you have a teaser of what's going to happen in the book.

~~~~

Silent Prey will be heading out for editing feedback this coming week! As soon as Angela is ready, we'll show you the cover. It will probably be sometime in mid-September before the book is up for sale.

I've also started my Halloween story, so hopefully, I'll have it ready in October. Then? Well, then another Ghost Hunting Diary and Dead Man Mystery.

Halloween's on its way! And so is our Beckham Spirit Fest for 2015 on October 3 in Mineola, TX. Check out who to contact for tickets at: http://beckhamspiritfest.blogspot.com! And our Facebook events page at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/551949198279029.

See y'all next week, if the creek don't rise.

Boo!

T. M.

Aunt Belle's Silly Harold Ghost

Yep, I know I'm on the verge of breaking my vow of putting up a blog each week the rest of the year. But Aunt Belle was here! So I have a valid excuse. We spent one day checking out estate and garage sales and another day at my grandson's birthday celebration.

Me, Ransom, Aunt Belle

(No idea why I'm bending over.

I think I was laughing at the scantily-clad 

photographer at Redneck Heaven.)

In addition to a couple things that happened to us, she also told me some ghosts stories for your enjoyment. You only get the one this week, and it's about Harold, who she's sure tried to fool her about his name. It happened in her daughter Sammi's mobile home, which is next door to her.

Sammi and Aunt Belle

(Don't we pick good meeting places?)

Here it is in (sort of) Aunt Belle's own words:

Sammi and I take turns leaving for more than a few hours, since we have to take care of my husband and her daddy, Terry. It was my RayeLynn's birthday (my great-great-granddaughter and Sammi's granddaughter), and Sammi left to visit Terrell and go to the party. She would stay overnight, so I took care of her pets. I brought her little dog over to my place, but went over to hers when it was time to feed her cats.

Oh, does Sammi have ghosts there! She's told me about things being moved around a lot. Sometimes they reappear, sometimes they don't. One morning, she woke up and found a can of sloppy joe mix on the washing machine. She asked her husband, Joey, why he took that can out of the pantry and put it there. Joey swore it hadn't been him. Now, a can like that is fairly heavy, so it takes a ghost with some abilities to move it.

Anyway, I haven't even told Sammi about the ghost I saw yet. I went over the next morning after she left to feed the cats. And there was a man sitting on her couch! Joey had, of course, gone with Sammi, so there wasn't supposed to be anyone home. The man was a full-bodied apparition, wearing jeans and a plaid shirt like my daddy used to wear. Despite the fact he was sitting down, I could tell he was a rather tall man and sort of slender.

"Hello," I said. "I'm Belle."

He said, "Hello. My name is Harold Foster." Then he smirked at me.

I just looked at him, because I didn't believe him. I fed the cats as I was thinking about him, but when I got ready to leave, he was gone. The more I thought about that smirk, the more I realized his name was not Foster. I'm fairly certain his first name is indeed Harold, but I believe his last name is Fisher. I'm going to do some research on him in the book I got from the Chamber lady and see if I can find him listed.

Sadly, I had to take Aunt Belle back to her responsibilities on Sunday, and we again met her daughter Sammi halfway in between the journey. I'm sure they are going to have a good talk on the way back, maybe one that Sammi won't really enjoy. You see, Sammi's just not real comfortable with ghosts, although she does see them. After all, she's her mother's daughter.

Sammi brought her son, David, with her. He was Aunt Belle's first grandson and she always calls him Buckwheat. If I recall, he once had a cowlick like that little guy on television when we were in our younger years. You can't see it now, though.

Aunt Belle, David, Sammi

Are any of my readers of an age to remember who Buckwheat was?

~~~~

As to the writing, well, I'll just say it. I hate changing computer programs, but it didn't appear Windows was giving us much choice. So I installed Windows 10. Ha! Everyone said it was a good program. I guess it is, but it sure gave me fits until I figured out why it was locking all my documents files! If any of y'all have the same problem, you have to sign in every time as administrator. At least, that's what I've had to do to get them unlocked and be able to save the changes.

Therefore, there wasn't a whole lot of writing done this week, given my wanting to enjoy Aunt Belle's visit. But I figured it out, so I'm back to writing again.

I intend to have Silent Prey finished this week, for sure. If the creek don't rise. (Does anyone remember who said that?)

We're selling tickets still for our Beckham Spirit Fest, which will be Aunt Belle's next trip to visit. I'll also have my friend Dianna Miller and her buddy, Earl, with me then. For the tickets, get 'em while they're hot! http://www.beckhamspiritfest.blogspot.com

As I leave you, here are a couple more pics of the party.

The Family at Redneck Heaven

The Riders Leaving

See you again soon.

Boo!

T. M.

Confirmation of Arthur Morgan Ghost

I know I haven't posted a blog for a while, and I really apologize. Sometimes life gets in the way. To make up for it, I'm going to try really hard to post weekly from now on until the end of the year. I have quite a few notes about some recent paranormal incidents, which I believe you'll like. The most fascinating one for Aunt Belle and me was the following.

On August 3, 2015, I got an inquiry from a really nice buy named Ronnie Morgan, who has given me permission to blog about his story. Ronnie had read my post from March 15, 2014, titled "Aunt Belle's Ghosts." After we chatted for a while, I was so excited that I went to the computer to memorialize this. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did and am still doing.

Aunt Belle and Daughters,

Sammi and Shari

Home in Background

Aunt Belle moved to a new home and, of course, she started to become aware of some of the ghosts who were around her. This happens to both of us, and really, it's not as if we spend our days talking to ghosts. There are times when they appear and communicate, times when we go about our day-to-day activities without any paranormal incidents at all. After a few weeks in her new residence, Aunt Belle reported on several ghosts she'd become aware of. One of those that she saw clearly was an African-American man. She said he appeared in the corner of her bedroom and was as real as if he were still alive. She thought he was a miner, because he wore one of those hats with a light on it, like underground miners used. He even introduced himself to her: Arthur Morgan.

She responded with, "Hi, Arthur. I'm Belle."

We hadn't really talked about Arthur much more over the following months, except for her saying now and then that he was still around. Then out of the blue, I received the email from Ronnie. He told me that he believed Arthur was his great-great-great grandfather! He gave me some more information, which included the fact that his g-g-g-grandfather had lived in Rockdale, TX, in Milam County. I wrote him back and said that Aunt Belle now lived in Gause, which is very close to Rockdale. I also said I would put him in contact with another friend of mine, Karla Lang, who is a genealogist. In addition, I decided to see if Aunt Belle minded if he called her, which I was sure she would agree to. She and I love to follow up on situations such as this one.

I called Aunt Belle, and she gave me permission to give Ronnie her phone number, plus told me some more information she had found. She said Arthur had fascinated her so much, she did some more research after the first time she told me about him. One day she went to Rockdale, TX, and visited the Rockdale Chamber of Commerce. The lady there gave her a book on the area, and in it, she found out about the Black Diamond Mine, which began operation in 1890 in the Rockdale area. Indeed, according to the book, it was the first coal mine in Texas.

She also mentioned that Arthur carried one of those round lunch boxes, like her Daddy and mine had carried to work years ago. Her daughter, Sammi, said that, while she hadn't seen him, she had smelled Arthur now and then, that he smelled like coal dust. Since we all grew up in Ohio, where our houses were heated by coal, we are all very aware of how coal dust smells. It was stored in our basements and shoveled into our coal-burning furnaces in the winter.

As Ronnie, Aunt Belle and I, and even Aunt Belle and Arthur, all chatted and exchanged information, there was no doubt in any of our minds that yes, Arthur was Ronnie's ancestor. Karla reported in, too, saying that she had found Arthur listed on a census report and sent Ronnie the information.

Ronnie Morgan's g-g-g-Grandparents

Headstone

Ronnie has asked Aunt Belle to try to talk to Arthur and see if she can get any more information about both Arthur and Ronnie's g-g-g-grandmother. His initial email to me said he and his family want to find out more about their ancestors, so they could properly honor them. I felt really blessed, as did Aunt Belle, to have someone request this of us, and to possibly be able to help them. As it stands now, we're hoping I can go down to visit Aunt Belle and have Ronnie come over at the same time. We'll do what we consider a semi-séance, where we sit down and talk some more with Arthur.

Aunt Belle doesn't think we need to do a crossover, since she has a strong feeling that Arthur has gone into the light and is coming back as a spirit. So even though I refer to Arthur as a ghost in my blog, it's for clarification for my readers. She doesn't feel that he's one of those lonely lost souls wandering around looking again for the doorway into the light. We are always glad when we have an encounter such as this. We enjoy the chats we have with souls who come back to visit us, plus on the other side of the light is where we believe all ghosts should go.

In addition, this is one of those very special situations where we get confirmation of a person whom she or I have communicated with having definitely once lived. We both continue to be in awe of these encounters. It reaffirms the fact of life after death.

~~~~

As to my writing life, I'm hoping Silent Prey will almost be a book by the time you read this. Most of it is already with Angela Rogers for an initial read. She doesn't have the last few chapters, but they are nearly ready for her. She's also working on a dynamite cover!

Angela, Amanda, Me

Silent Prey Cover Photo Shoot

The book still needs to be edited further, both by me and with another read-through from a couple other friends. I'm picky about my books, and I never want to put them up for sale until I'm totally happy they are the best they can be for my readers. Keeping my fingers crossed that I'll have another book for you by the first part of September.

What's next? Well, another set of ghost hunting diaries, for one thing. Ghost Hunting Diaries, Volume VI, is pretty much mapped out. I have the index of stories I'll be putting in it, and some of them are partially written. Lots of work yet, but I should have something by the end of the year.

There's also my 2015 Halloween story to write. I know what it will be about, and I'm hoping to get it done in time for an October release date.

October is always busy for paranormal investigators. October 3 is our Supernatural Researchers of Texas crew's 2^nd Annual Beckham Spirit Fest. Wow, it's really rolling up on us. We have such a wonderful lineup of speakers! Tickets are for sale now, both for the paracon and the ghost hunts afterwards. You can find out more information at http://beckhamspiritfest.blogspot.com.

Busy, busy! And for real I am totally enjoying everything: the writing, planning for the Spirit Fest, visiting with my readers, and getting my blog back on track. Hang in there with me.

Boo!

T. M.