#3 - Go To a Haunted House

SPOILER ALERT:
We survived.

I've had several people ask me, "You've seriously never been to a haunted house?"  So... yes, but not many.  This is the only one I remember.  But that was just a over a year ago.  So I suppose maybe not a haunted house but a "haunted" thing, for sure.  But with this list item, I didn't mean scary.  I meant haunted.

A few years back I was pretty obsessed with ghost shows.  I watched them all the time.  All of them.

Do I believe in ghosts?

No.

However, I do believe in things that can't be easily explained, like quantum mechanics and memetics.  There are all kinds of things that science can't explain that still exist and happen at macro, meso, micro, nano levels.

Does that mean I'm "spiritual?"

No.

The courtroom.
Because obviously every haunted house has a court room.

I just believe that we'll never understand everything.  So I also believe that it's possible that there's something about spaces.  Some may carry a good energy and give way to love and happiness.  Others may carry the opposite.  And, more likely, every space carries both.

So when a place has seen a lot of bad things, I wonder what that energy does to that place.  Or if it's the place that already holds the bad energy and then bad things happen there.

I don't know.

Regardless, a little over a year ago I was walking through Old Town to meet some friends for Taco Tuesday, and I passed a dark, quiet house on an otherwise touristy, gimmicky street.  And I recognized it.  Then I read the sign, which said, "The Whaley House."  I thought to myself, I think I know that name and this house.  So I later looked it up on my phone, and I did.  Several articles and shows have listed the Whaley House as the most haunted house in the United States.

Very scientific.

The next year, 2014, I put it on my list to go.  But then I didn't.  Even though it was super simple and really close to my school.

This year, I had the fortune of having two of my very favorite people, Chris and Holly Zann visit me in January.  They are Top Ten'ers on the list, and they were determined to scratch a few more off with me during their visit.  Most of the items required a little more planning, but the Whaley House did not.

After a lovely hike of Torrey Pines on a beautiful day, we battled the crowds of tourists in Old Town on a Saturday, bought some tickets, did some brief reading, and toured the house.

The downstairs was full of old stuff.  I'm not that into old stuff.  But there was a courtroom.  That was random.

Then we went upstairs.  Again, I don't believe in ghosts or paranormal activity, at all, but standing on the landing at the top of the stairs felt heavy or gross or off-balance or something.  I just felt out of it and lost the hunger that had been sitting in my stomach in anticipation of our lunch at In and Out.  Then in one of the bedrooms, another tourist had an EMF detector  that was kinda going a little wacky.  However, EMF detectors weren't created to detect ghosts, so I still believe that maybe it's the electro-magnetic fields that are weird in a place that can make people then report the symptoms associated with the presence of the paranormal.  Also, he was using a cell phone.  Not an actual EMF detector.

Zann listened.

Then we listened to one of the staff's stories.  She told us of her own experiences, experiences of visitors, experiences of investigators.  She told us to be aware in case the child ghost held our hands or another ghost played with our hair.

Holly judged.

The other rooms upstairs weren't as heavy as the stairwell, but I felt uncomfortable upstairs.  And that feeling left when I went downstairs.  Everything felt incredibly light when we walked out.  But we also walked out to a 74 degree, sunny San Diego afternoon.  I'm pretty sure I feel that same lightness when I walk out of my own house into that weather.

I didn't "like" it in there.  I probably won't pursue visiting other haunted spaces.  I do hope the energy of spaces means something and can be carried with a person, but in hoping that, I'd rather pursue visiting happy, healthy, light places and hope the good energy there is contagious than to risk the heaviness of sad, tragic places.  I do believe in recognizing both the light and the dark, but I just don't want to dwell in the dark.  I want to dwell in the light.

I assume this door under the stairs hides the bedroom of their secret wizard nephew.