Ronda's Encounter at Montpelier Mansion

Ronda wrote me with an experience she had, and has allowed me to share it with you. She wrote: "While reading your book I came across the section about the Montpelier Mansion in Laurel, Maryland. I use to work the "Needle Art" show there every year around July. I would get there early before all of the people arrived, open the doors turn on the lights, etc. One day while I was there alone waiting for the people to arrive, I was sitting in the breeze way (the one that goes between the house and the room with all the book shelves) cross stitching. When out of the corner of my eye I could see the bottom of a dress. The dress was a robins egg blue color and had a pattern kind of like herringbone. When I looked directly at door the where the person was standing, no one was there. This happened 3 different times, there was no doubt that there was a lady watching me sew."

I'm wondering if anyone else had a ghostly encounter at the Montpelier Mansion in Laurel, as Ronda and I have. Please write in and share them!

Entertaining Fiction Book for All: Dead Person Following My Sister""

I recently went to a Scholastic book warehouse sale with a good friend who found the paperback "There's a Dead Person Following My Sister Around" by author Vivian Vande Velde.
I just finished the book (142 pages) and although its written for kids and young teens, I LOVED IT!
I learned the Ms. Vande Velde has written others like it, which I intend to read (even though we have no children). The Publisher's Website says of the book "Vande Velde continues her string of historical ghost stories, this time focusing on the Underground Railroad. The first-person narrator, 11-year-old Ted, is certain that his house in Rochester, NY, can't be haunted because it has been in his family for generations and there have been no secrets to speak of in its past. Then his five-year-old sister Vicki's imaginary friend Marella and the "bad lady" who seems to be chasing her prove themselves to be all too real. Ted decides to get to the bottom of the mystery and finds a journal belonging to one of his ancestors that recounts the tragic story of two runaway slaves, a mother and her five-year-old daughter, who drowned in the Erie Canal, which used to run through the family's backyard."
I HIGHLY RECOMMEND this book. It was a fun and enjoyable read.

Karma- It Will Get You on the Road!

I was driving to a doctor's appointment this morning on a road that was dropping down from 4 lanes to 2 lanes (one lane going each direction) and I was in the appropriate lane for the merge to go straight. As the lanes came together a young woman in a silver sports car raced past me on the shoulder and quickly swung in front of me, cutting me off (and forcing me to brake). She startled me, and I gave a quick toot on my horn. Of course, she put her arm outside her window and gave me the finger. Lovely.
Here's where the Karma part comes in;
1) There was a truck 3 cars ahead of her, so she couldn't speed excessively.
2) When she turned off, I followed (because that was the road I had to go on), and she must've been driving about 80 mph (it was a 40 mph road). She took off like a bullet and was out of sight. A couple of minutes later, I drove past her as she was PULLED OVER by a Police Officer for speeding! KARMA!!!

Wesley's Spirit Gives Me Messages

Our friend Cynthia's dad Wesley passed this week. He was 88 and suffered from memory loss and dementia. On July 1 he was waked, and Tom and I went to the wake. As we were driving toward it, her dad came to me with a number of messages, many of which took me and Cynthia by surprise.
The first one was "Cindy Lou." That came to me over and over, and I didn't know who that was... turned out that it's what he called Cynthia. I was blown away by that! The next message was about one of her brothers and she understood what it meant.
The third thing he told me was what happened as he passed. He had bleeding on the brain, and he told me that he "heard a pop" in his head, and the next thing he knew, he (his spirit) was standing up in the hospital (ER) while the doctors were working on him. He stayed for a brief time (I believe 1-2 days) and then was ready to move on (that's when he passed). He said he feels no pain, and doesn't remember any (spirits typically don't remember any pain associated with passing).
He said that now that he's transitioning to the other side (he was still at his wake) he can think clearly now, like a great fog has been lifted from his brain. Now that he's passed he is free of the dementia, so his thoughts are clear.
He mentioned how he had missed "Honey Bun" (his wife) who is hospitalized in a different care center, but would now be watching over her.
The last thing he said was to "thank Cindy Lou" for all of the love, care and attention she provided to him, especially since he fell ill. When I told these things to Cynthia it brought her to tears, but happy tears. She's comforted to know he's okay.

BOOK: Gift : Understand and Develop Your Psychic Abilities

I just finished reading the book "Gift : Understand and Develop Your Psychic Abilities" by Echo Bodine. This is a good book for people who are developing mediums. It will give you a good sense of what kinds of messages to expect and how to interpret (or not over-interpret) them. If you're curious about what the Bible says about mediumship there's a long chapter included, where Ms. Bodine has done extensive research. She has also authored a number of other books that also sound interesting.

Airing July 5 on HBO: Mediums: "No One Dies in Lilydale"

HBO is airing a documentary tonight, JULY 5, called "No One Dies in Lilydale." The program showcases a town in upstate New York and the large number of mediums that reside there.
Whether or not you believe in people being able to cross over or communicate with the dead, you have to admit, the subject’s kind of interesting, especially when it involves a town with a concentrated population of so-called Mediums.
Located just south of Buffalo, tiny Lily Dale, NY, is home to the world’s largest concentration of mediums, people who claim to be able to communicate with spirits of the deceased. Every year, thousands of visitors from all over the world flock to this quaint Victorian community to have their questions answered and grief assuaged. Directed by Emmy® winner and Oscar® nominee Steven Cantor (HBO’s Devil’s Playground), NO ONE DIES IN LILY DALE follows visitors on their emotional quests, chronicling their mysterious and deeply personal interactions with the town’s unusual residents, when it debuts MONDAY, JULY 5 (9:00-10:30 p.m. ET/PT), exclusively on HBO.

Good Book! Haunted Nantucket Island

I just finished reading a good book about 22 different haunted places on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts. The book is called "Nantucket Haunted Hike Presents: the Haunted Nantucket Island: Twenty-two True Nantucket Ghost Stories" by W.B. Alexander, a man who lives there and runs the ghost tours of the island. The book is extremely well-written, captivating, and has some really great stories in it that will make you want to visit Nantucket!
ISBN-10: 1413488935. I highly recommended it!

Dread and Anxiety Drive us from Haunted New Hope, PA

Tom and I visited New Hope, Pennsylvania this past Saturday and as soon as we crossed into the town line I started feeling anxious, nervous and miserable. It was like I walked into a thick blanket of negative energy. It didn't help that the bed and breakfast that we were going to stay at (but we didn't) was full of negative energy either, which is why we drove home that evening.
First, however, we walked through the town for about 2 hours. The first hint that things were screwy was a restaurant we went into. I sat while Tom went to the restroom for a minute. During that time (which was about 3 minutes) a waitress and her husband (they owned the place) walked up to me and asked for the order. Not knowing what Tom wanted the man said "you come to the cash register when you know." Um... so when Tom returned to the table I had to order at the cash register. Weird.
New Hope, Pennsylvania runs along the west side of the Delaware River (yes, the one that George Washington crossed on December 25, 1776, and he did so just south of New Hope). As I've mentioned many times before running water near a town adds to ghostly activity. This was off the charts for me and I couldn't block it out. The tell-tale headache I get that signals ghosts or spirits are around hit me when we came into town. The negativity, the sadness, the fear, anxiety, nervousness I felt were making me really, really uncomfortable.
In terms of the haunts, here is what Unsolved Mysteries.com says about New Hope, PA: "The New Hope area has been rumored to be haunted by a number of ghosts. So many, in fact, that it has been named “America’s Most Haunted Town.” Most [haunts] originate in “downtown” New Hope surrounding Bridge Street and the New Hope-Lambertville Bridge." (That's especially where I felt miserable and where we decided to leave the town that night and return home!
Unsolved Mysteries.com goes on to say that many places have ghost stories: the Inn at Phillips Mill, the Pickett House, the Logan Inn, Odette’s Restaurant, and the Van Sant Bridge. Each place has its own specific legend and the witnesses to back it up.

"The Inn at Phillips Mill is known for having a couple of ghosts spending their time inside its walls. There is rumored to be a woman who wears a long dress with a high collar roaming about around the staircase and the upstairs hall of the building. A rocking chair in one corner of the Inn is also claimed to have a spiritual presence about it."

"The Logan Inn also has a reputation for being haunted; in fact, so much so that the place has four ghosts. If you stay in room six, watch out for a man’s reflection in the mirror which disappears when you look around. Two children are also said to stay in this room sometimes. A Revolutionary War soldier also wanders about the Inn, taking refuge in different rooms including the bar, the basement, and the dining room. A portrait of a woman who enjoyed wearing lavender perfume hangs in a hallway, and many claim that they can still smell the scent when they pass by it. For men who wish to use the restroom, be wary if the steps leading to the one in the basement: it is believed that a man in knee breeches waits on them. And in the parking lot, a little girl who was known to have drowned some time ago lurks in the shadows."

"Joseph Pickett is a deceased artist who hauntes what once was his bedroom in the house he owned on Mechanic Street. He also, like many residents of New Hope, enjoys strolling along the towpath. Joseph likes to visit a house on Mechanic Street once owned by his cousin. Odette’s, which used to be called the River House and used to serve boatmen in the late eighteenth century, has occurrences of a ghostly woman who was rumored to be murdered during the time when the restaurant was called the River House. There are also moments of chills and voices in the restaurant, accompanied by a strong smell of perfume, much like in the Logan Inn."

"The Van Sant Bridge is also haunted by an unmarried young woman with an infant, who was thrown out of her house by her parents. She jumped to her death off the Van Sant Bridge, with her baby in her arms. The legend says that to this day, when you stand on the bridge, you can hear the baby crying. Horse thieves also used to be hanged from this bridge, and people can often still see one of them hanging there."

So, it's no surprise to me that it was especially walking over that bridge that I felt the most negative energy and we decided to leave the town. Between the suicide and the hangings from that location, there was way too much negative energy for me to block out.

Information from: http://www.unsolvedmysteries.com/usm464955.html

Tony Communicates at his Wake Tonight

Tonight we attended a wake for a former high school teacher of Tom's. I haven't been to a funeral home since my dad passed in August, 2008. As soon as we walked in the door, I got my tell-tale headache that there was a ghost or spirit present. In fact, I know there were at least two there (there were two wakes going on). One wake was for an older woman and the other was for Tony, Tom's former teacher. Tony passed from a brain tumor and had 5 sons.
We were standing in line to sign the guest book and I kept hearing "Maura, or Mara, or a female "M" name. I don't know who that is, and checked that Tony's widow's name is Pam and his sisters' names don't begin with "M." I got the sense that the name belonged to an older woman that was being waked down the hall in another room.
Once we entered the crowded and noisy room full of people talking, laughing and carrying on, I stood in the back. I didn't know anyone and Tom knew many people (former classmates, teachers, and people that belonged to that church school). I was standing with my back to the wall talking with my father-in-law and I felt a finger poke me in the back so I turned around. No one was there. It poked me again, I knew that it was "Tony" playing around to let me know he was there. My father-in-law noticed someone else he knew came in, so he walked over to talk with the man.
I wound up standing alone at the back of the room and sensed that Tony's spirit was poking his head into small groups of people talking, and turning his head as if he were trying to hear what they were saying about him. It was pretty amusing to watch. He really seemed to be enjoying the crowd of people there to honor him. When I later told Tom about this behavior, he said "That's exactly the kind of thing that Tony would do! He was a prankster in life. He loved to joke around."
The other thing was that whenever various younger men walked by me (there were a lot of younger men from 20 up there), Tony "told" me which of them were his sons. I knew that there four sons, but Tony pointed out three. One was a taller man wearing tan slacks and a checkered button down shirt. He then showed me another of his sons that was wearing a dark suit that walked by me. The third son was standing in the hallway wearing a black shirt, tie and pants.
Tony kept nudging me to tell that son dressed all in black that he was still here and actually enjoying seeing who came to honor him. I was reluctant to do that, however, because of the religious beliefs of the family (which is very sad). The family's religion thinks that mediums "talk to the devil." It's really frustrating to me, because I could've provided some comfort to the family. I heard and "saw" Tony, and know that he was grateful for the show of love and support during his wake.

Negative Energy and Sensitive People

During one of my recent book events, a woman came up to me and started talking about her abilities as a developing medium (like I am).
We talked about how ghosts utilize negative emotional energy and spirits (those who have crossed over into the light) use positive emotional energy to power up.
She mentioned that she's also an emotional person and talked with me about how being around people who are pessimistic tends to make her physically sick. The person she mentioned was her elderly mother, whom had grown from a loving mother into someone who was bitter, negative and never had a good word. The woman I met mentioned that when she goes to visit, she can't stay long periods of time, because the negativity actually affects her physically. For sensitive people and mediums who feel negativity and positivity more than the average person. In fact, the same thing happened to me. I was in a situation where I was visiting with an extremely negative, bitter person for two days (years ago) and I came home physically sick to my stomach with a headache that didn't abate for days.
So, if you do have mediumistic abilities, you're likely emotionally sensitive, and just know that a pessimistic person can drain your energy and actually make you physically sick.