March 29, 2024

Ghost(s)

I was dog tired, both physically and mentally, from the stress of moving. Ginnie was staying overnight in Ottumwa, getting her house ready to put on the market. This would be our first night apart since we were married. Feeling like a crusty old zombie, I crashed and went to bed early.

Around 1 a.m., the bathroom fan came on. At first, I thought the furnace had kicked in, but the noise was much too loud. I got up to see what was going on and discovered the exhaust fan in the master bathroom running. Strange. It wasn’t running when I went to bed. I don’t walk in my sleep, as far as I know, so what was going on? A sticky fan switch, maybe?

We have a lot of stuff boxed up and stored in the barn, so we keep the barn locked. The barn is insulated, has no windows and is pretty tight. I started noticing the lights on in the barn when I unlocked the door. “Okay,” I told myself. “I left the lights on.” So, I made a point of shutting the lights off. The next time I unlocked the barn, the lights were on. Hmm. Ginnie does not have a key to the barn. What’s the deal? Finding the lights on when I open the barn door has happened so many times that I come to expect it. I could go out to the barn right now, unlock the door, and the lights will be on, even though I know I turned them off.

The prize winner, however, has to do with the key to Ginnie’s lock box. She couldn’t find the key after the chaos of moving. And her passport is in the lock box. Since we’re going to England in May for our honeymoon, it’s imperative that she have her passport. Ginnie looked high and low for weeks for that lock-box key. Finally, we discussed going to town and having a locksmith open the lock box. I came in from walking Buddy, and there the key was on the garage floor, right in front of the door. We have been in and out of that door maybe a thousand times. The key is on a large key ring. It would have been impossible for us to miss it.

Conclusion: we have a ghost or ghosts. But they’re friendly ghosts, and enjoy playing tricks on us. They hide the lock box key. Then, when they hear that we’re going to town to have the locksmith open the box, they place the key in an obvious place. They turn the bathroom fan and barn lights on.

Ginnie does not believe in ghosts. But, in her words, she, “May become a believer.”

Ginnie leaves real early in the morning for her job in Ottumwa. After she leaves, I often nap for a short time. One morning, I had just laid back in the recliner for my morning siesta, when a very distinct, female (?) voice hollered quite loudly, “Curt!” I nearly jumped out of my skin. But there was no one around.

Innumerable times, I’ve been searching for an ink pen, or the remote. I’ll leave the room, come back, and it will be right there where I was looking. Cute. At least they’re not mean ghosts.

I talked to my neighbor, who is in his eighties, and has lived close by all his life. He knows the history of our little acreage quite well. Yes, there was an old farm house on the property that was torn down. Yes, a little boy was killed crossing the highway. This would have been in the 1950s.

There you go. Even though the house we live in was built in 2007, the ghost, presumably, has stayed with the property and now inhabits our house and barn.

But the voice I heard was female, or could it have been a little boy’s voice? There have no doubt been other deaths along the highway over the years. Maybe the little boy has friends.

I wonder what the ghosts will do when they hear they will be in the newspaper?

Have a good story? Call or text Curt Swarm in Mt. Pleasant at
319-217-0526 or email him at
curtswarm@yahoo.com.