Hear favorite ghost stories, headscratchers and more on this mega-sized anniversary episode of Jim Harold’s Campfire!
I can’t believe it’s been 15 amazing years since I started Jim Harold’s Campfire. To celebrate this milestone, I’ve put together a very special 2.5 hour episode highlighting some of my favorite stories from over the years, one from each year of the podcast. Join me on a journey down memory lane as we revisit tales of ghosts, eerie time slips, haunted objects, missing time, near-death experiences, and much more.
From Dave’s account of a ghostly nurse, to Bruce’s chilling experience at an archaeological dig, to Kelly’s remarkable “God wink” from her late father, these stories represent some of the most fascinating, terrifying, and thought-provoking moments from 15 years of the Campfire. You’ll hear stories that made me laugh, put a lump in my throat, gave me chills, and stuck with me long after we first shared them.
So sit back, relax, and enjoy this bonus-sized episode celebrating a decade and a half of strange and spooky storytelling. I can’t thank all of our incredible storytellers enough and thank YOU for joining me on this journey. Here’s to the next 15 years of Jim Harold’s Campfire and stay spooky!
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TRANSCRIPT
Jim Harold (00:00:00):
15 great stories from 15 years of Jim Harold’s Campfire: up next on the Campfire.
Announcer (00:00:20):
Welcome to our gathering tonight. Here we share stories of ordinary people who have experienced extraordinary things. Sit back, relax, and warm yourself by Jim Harold’s Campfire.
Jim Harold (00:00:32):
Welcome to Jim Harold’s campfire and welcome to our 15th anniversary special, and we are going to spotlight some favorite stories over the years. Now, this won’t be necessarily every one of our favorites, and you might hear some different stories you haven’t heard in a while. We tried to mix it up because we do these bests of occasionally, and some stories get played a lot, and we tried to get a little bit away from that this year and maybe surface some things that maybe you haven’t heard in a while or maybe you’ve never heard. And if you’re new, welcome to the party. I hope you’ll enjoy today. And stick around if you like ghosts, UFOs, cryptic creatures, all of that stuff, you’re in the right place. If you’ve been here for a long time, we thank you. So let’s get on to the first stories. This first one is a Campfire classic from 2009, Dave from the UK. Dave, thanks for staying up late and being on the Campfire.
Dave (UK) (00:01:27):
That’s no problem.
Jim Harold (00:01:28):
So tell us about this mysterious nurse.
Dave (UK) (00:01:30):
Yeah, the thing is, it’s kind of a secondhand story. My partner Paula, her family, they describe themselves as spooky. You know how you sometimes meet people that have got paranormal stories and they’ve got one paranormal story, and then you get one person who just seems to, it seems to happen on a monthly basis.
And their whole family must be, I’m convinced that whatever paranormal experience a person sees, says as much about them as it does about the experience and their ability.
Jim Harold (00:02:05):
I can believe that. Very much so.
Dave (UK) (00:02:08):
Yeah, their ability to see whatever this is, and I’m sure that whatever it is, must be hereditary as well, because I meet so many people that the whole family has these experiences. My partner’s family, they’re just drenched in paranormal experiences. But yeah, her mother has a lot, actually, this great story about, because I was listening to your podcast and a lot of people have got experiences with pets and things, and when they first moved into their family home, her sister saw a dog running around the house and was about to ask whose dog it was until they actually ran through a wall.
Jim Harold (00:02:50):
Maybe you don’t want to know whose dog that is.
Dave (UK) (00:02:52):
Yeah, I know exactly. Yeah, it was a previous tenant, but her experience was, her mom’s experience was quite the most amazing experience I think I’ve ever heard. She quite often has had small operations. She’s not particularly well, so she goes into the NHS every now and again. And I know the NHS is quite controversial in America at the moment.
Jim Harold (00:03:17):
Oh yeah, we’re going to have our own NHS pretty soon, I think.
Dave (UK) (00:03:19):
Well, yeah. I mean, it’s better than having nothing.
Jim Harold (00:03:23):
Well, it’s going to be interesting to see what happens. We’ll see.
Dave (UK) (00:03:26):
Yeah. Well, she had to go into the NHS for a small operation. She lives in this place called the Wirral next to Liverpool, and she was in this ward after the operations that recuperating with lots of people there, but they were all asleep, and she was up quite late, just not being able to get to sleep. And a nurse came around and talked to her for a couple of minutes and asked her if she was okay, and asked her if she wanted a cup of tea. Now, at this point, Paula’s mom said yes, she wanted a cup of tea, but there was something about this nurse that seemed quite odd, but she couldn’t quite place her finger on it at that time. But apart from that, she seemed to be completely normal and she went away and she didn’t come back for ages. Actually, I think it was about an hour before she came back with a cup of tea. It was by then Paula’s mom realized that she had kind of an old fashioned uniform on.
Jim Harold (00:04:21):
Oh, I was wondering that. That’s the first thing that ran into my mind. 1945 uniform or something.
Dave (UK) (00:04:27):
Yeah. When she told me this, I was starting to think, oh, this sounds really kind of stereotypical, like the haunted train going through the town at night and things like that. But she came back eventually after an hour and gave her the cup of tea, and Paula’s mom actually said to her, well, what’s the deal with the old uniform? And apparently she just smiled at her and walked away.
(00:04:51):
Well, the next morning she sort of checked who the nurses were on duty that night, and there was only one nurse on duty that night. And it had been like a North African woman, though, so obviously hadn’t been her. And she became more and more certain that she’d had some sort of seen a ghost. These kind of things happen to her quite a lot. Spooky things happening to her. And she sees psychics quite a lot. This one particular psychic, usually I don’t really approve of psychics; usually in my experience they turn out to be charlatans. But she asked this guy about this experience, she described the experience to him, and he did whatever psychics do, and he said that he was getting a name and it was Lily. So the next time Paula’s mom went to this hospital for another small operation, she actually engaged one of the nurses in a conversation about goings on in this hospital and that she felt that she’d had an experience in this hospital. And the nurse said, oh, what ward was that? And Paula’s mom told her which ward it was, and she went, oh, that would’ve been Lily.
Jim Harold (00:06:07):
Oh, that’s fantastic. Did she elaborate to any extent about it?
Dave (UK) (00:06:12):
I think they had a bit of discussion, but I’m getting this second answer. I was asking the wrong questions, but apparently they’d done some research because apparently this nurse, lots of people had seen this nurse and she’d never frightened anybody. And she’d gone around sort of just asking people if they needed any help, whether they’d made her a cup of tea, all these people, cups of tea. I’m not quite sure, because we’ve all heard about ghosts and we’ve all heard about even ghosts talking to people. But for them to actually –
Jim Harold (00:06:45):
Physically go and get you a cup of tea,
Dave (UK) (00:06:47):
I know. I mean, I said to her, you should have tried to push it as far as you could go and try and get a latte or something.
Jim Harold (00:06:53):
Well, Dave, it’s been a pleasure. Thanks so much for staying up late and for joining us all the way from the UK.
Dave (UK) (00:06:59):
Okay, well, it’s been a pleasure. It’s been nice talking to you.
Jim Harold (00:07:03):
When I started the Campfire, I thought it would pretty much be ghosts and Bigfoot, but there’s a lot of phenomena that kind of creep in that I didn’t expect. And one of those is time slips, when people from different times interact in some way. And that’s what Andrea’s going to tell us about next from 2010. Andrea from England, thanks so much for joining us around the Dampfire tonight.
Andrea (ENG) (00:07:25):
Thank you very much, Jim. It’s a pleasure to speak with you.
Jim Harold (00:07:28):
So you had two great stories that you sent over to me. Let’s start about the one when you were 11 years old.
Andrea (ENG) (00:07:35):
Yeah, sure. This one happened on a very bright, sunny Saturday afternoon in Oldham, which is a town where I grew up, which is Manchester in Northwest England. This particular day, I’d gone up into the town to do some shopping with my mother, which I did every week. And this particular day we were waiting for the bus to come home and it was bustling the people, absolutely hundreds of people everywhere. And I said to my mum, we were waiting at the bus stop, and I said to her, could I go across the road to McDonald’s? Because it had only just opened in Oldham, and it was quite a big deal for us. And all the kids at school were really excited about it. And I said to her, please, can I just go over there and get a strawberry milkshake? I had this fascination with them. I thought they were the best thing ever.
Jim Harold (00:08:27):
I like strawberry milkshakes.
Andrea (ENG) (00:08:30):
After a little bit of persuasion, my mom said, all right, then go ahead, cross the road. It was literally just across the road, and she could see it from the bus stop. She said, but hurry up because you’re going to miss the bus and I don’t want to wait another half an hour. So off I went to McDonald’s, got the milkshake, came out of McDonald’s, and as I stepped into the road, I was messing around with the lid on the cup and tried to get the straw through the little hole in the top. And out of nowhere in the middle of the road, I bumped into a man. Now, at first I thought, well, I’ve not watched what I was doing. I wasn’t paying attention. And I stood back and looked up. But this man that I bumped into, it was as if he just appeared out of nowhere right in front of me, and I hit him head on.
(00:09:21):
So much so that I actually hurt my nose and I hit him. It was like walking into cold steel. That’s all I can describe it as. And I stood back and looked up at him and I just went cold. When I looked at him, he was like nobody else. He was so out of place. He was an elderly gentleman about probably, oh, I would say about maybe late sixties, early seventies. Very slim, very tall. I mean, I was only 11, but he was a lot taller than say my dad was, he was about six foot something I would’ve said. And he was dressed just like a Victorian undertaker. He was dressed completely in black from head to foot. He had a black frock coat, black trousers. He had black gloves, and I couldn’t see what he was wearing underneath the jacket, but it looked as though it was either a black scarf or some kind of silk cravat or something like that. And it was buttoned up to the neck. And this was a really hot summer’s day in the middle of Oldham town center. And he would’ve stood out like a sore thumb.
Jim Harold (00:10:32):
What was his reaction when you ran into him?
Andrea (ENG) (00:10:35):
Well, I stood back and I apologized to him and said, I’m really sorry he didn’t see you. And he just glared at me. His face was very pale, his hair was swept back off his face and sort of Brill creamed down. And he looked at me and he gave me a stare as if to say, what are you doing? Stupid girl, getting in my way. It was that sort of a look that he had on his face, but his eyes were the thing that I can still see to this day. And his eyes were jet black. There was no color in his eyes whatsoever.
Jim Harold (00:11:08):
So were whites in his eyes or was it just solid black or just the part of the pupil, I guess that was black?
Andrea (ENG) (00:11:18):
No, no, it was just a part of the pupil that was black, but he didn’t have any color where we have an iris.
Jim Harold (00:11:22):
Blue in our eye, brown blue or anything like that? Oh my.
Andrea (ENG) (00:11:25):
No, it was jet black and his star just went straight through me and I felt absolutely just terrified, just cold to the bone. (overlapping speech)
Jim Harold (00:11:37):
Go ahead.
Andrea (ENG) (00:11:38):
No. So I apologized again and I went, carried on across the road back to my mother, and I turned around and looked over my shoulder to see him because I was sure that other people would’ve seen him, and there was no one there. And I got back over to the other side of the road and I said, the first thing I said to my mom was, did you see that weird man that I just bumped into? And she said, what man? She said, you stumbled in the middle of the road, but I didn’t see any man.
Jim Harold (00:12:08):
That’s the kicker, because I was going to say, well, is it possible it was someone in costume or something for maybe some play or some reenactment or something like that? But your mother was across the street. She watched the whole thing in real time and she didn’t see any man, but you saw him. Wow.
Andrea (ENG) (00:12:29):
No, she didn’t see anyone. And the really strange thing that I found out a few years later is that on that street, the High street in Oldham, the main street further down, there’s a very big church, Oldham Palace Church. And I had wondered afterwards whether in terms gone by, that would’ve been the main road that undertakers might have used going to and from the church. And I found out a while after that, not only was that church there, but the area where this happened used to be a graveyard that belonged to another church that had been demolished, and all the grades had been relocated while they built the town center. And that happened when my mum was a child, and she remembers it because she remembers all the children sort of being excited because they were digging up the graves and moving the bodies elsewhere. And it would’ve been after I’d sat and worked it out years later, it would’ve been in that area where the grades were that I saw this man.
Jim Harold (00:13:30):
Oh my. Wow. So it was a case where it kind of came full circle and you found out where it may have come from. It’s interesting. On Paranormal Podcast, a couple of shows ago, we had Philip Imbrogno, and he talked about the idea of parallel universes, and there was a story he told of two men passing each other and one was dressed for the winter and one was dressed for the summer, and they were both talking back and forth criticizing the other for the way they were dressed and so forth and so on. Do you think it was something like that, or do you think it was just an outright ghost?
Andrea (ENG) (00:14:06):
No, I do. I heard that actually, and I was intrigued when I heard it because it did remind me of meeting this gentleman. And I’ve thought that, I have thought tha,t I’ve wondered whether somehow you hear of time being a loop and the two opposite sides of the loop touching together, and you get this blending of the two times at once. And I wonder if that’s what happened, because that’s what it felt like to me. I felt like he was a shocked to see me as I was to see him. That’s the impression that I got from him.
Jim Harold (00:14:41):
Interesting, interesting.
Andrea (ENG) (00:14:42):
It was very strange.
Jim Harold (00:14:44):
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Announcer (00:17:34):
If you love the Campfire, be sure to check out the Paranormal Podcast where every week Jim interviews experts and authors about strange mysteries. Find it for free wherever you listen to this podcast. Tune into the Paranormal Podcast today. Now we return to Jim Harold’s Campfire.
Jim Harold (00:17:51):
We’re going to go a little bit out of chronological order here. This is from 2014 Dave, and a lot of Campfire stories don’t fit neatly into a category, and this one fits into that category of being non categorizable. It’s kind of like a Twilight Zone category, I call it. And also I think this call may have the distinction of being the most disgusting we’ve ever had in terms of one particular thing. You’ll know it when you hear it. We call this one the Soft Serve Man from 2014.
Next up on the program is Dave. He is from the western part of the United States. And I got to tell you, this is some story. Dave is a police detective, and he has a story, and I’m not even going to begin to tell you what I know about this story because it is very wild. And Dave, welcome to the program. I know you’ve been listening since around 2007, so thank you for that. And also thank you for your service. I think many times we lose sight of the importance of folks in law enforcement, so thank you for everything you do and tell us what happened.
Dave (W. US) (00:19:01):
I appreciate that. I’ve been working in police for about eight years now, and I came from back east, and then I moved to a pretty large department out in the mountain states out here. And at the time, I was just working on the road and I was working on graves. And typically graves, once it hits around one or two o’clock, it’s pretty dead, and that’s the way it was. And I was sitting there car to car with my buddy, and we get a call and it says, dispatch says that there’s a guy jumping from the overpass onto semi-truck. And you get a lot of weird calls and typically something like that, you’re just like, yeah, whatever. Some guy jumping off of an overpass onto a truck and it’s just stupid. So we get there, and of course there’s nobody there and we’re just kind of laughing.
(00:19:58):
We’re looking down, it’s about 60 feet down to the ground, we’re shining our lights. And I’m like, I don’t see anything. And there’s this little cusp of bushes there to the edge, and I shine my light in it. And this naked man jumps out of the bushes and he looks up at us and he outstretches his hand and he just screams this growl, yell at us. And I can see his hands almost to his elbows are covered in blood, and he’s got blood from his nose all the way down to his chin just dripping. And he’s just screaming. And he starts running toward the bottom of the off onto the on ramp. And so we start running down to the same direction to meet him. And my buddy gets to him first. He’s a lot better runner than I am. And he grabs onto his arm and he starts swinging him in a circle.
(00:20:53):
And later on he told me, he says, well, I didn’t want to touch him. I didn’t have any gloves on. I didn’t want to start wrestling with this guy covered in blood. And he’s completely naked. And the guy’s about six three, and he is actually a well-groomed looking man. He looks either Hispanic or Middle Eastern. I couldn’t quite tell. But the whole time he’s growling at us, he’s bearing his teeth and he’s biting over and over just gnashing his teeth and he swings him enough and the guy lands on the ground and I put my knee on his back to try to hold him there. And I’m holding his arm and my sergeant runs over and he’s like, watch out, watch out. And he shines his light on the guy and the guy is just defecating all over and, I mean, it sounds disgusting, but honestly it looked like some soft serve ice cream just coming out.
Jim Harold (00:21:47):
I’m sorry, I just had to laugh.
Dave (W. US) (00:21:50):
The guy, it is like he didn’t even notice. He had this wild, really, his eyes were really wide look in his eyes and just kept gnashing his teeth over and over. And I kept trying to talk to him, nothing. It just took about four of us. We got him in handcuffs and I turned him over. I looked at him and the whole time, I’m trying to examine him, he’s trying to bite at him. He’s twisting, and –
Jim Harold (00:22:15):
That’s frightening.
Dave (W. US) (00:22:16):
Yeah, he never said a word. And I looked on his hands, I gloved up and I looked on his hands and he has no cuts on his hand. I was, oh, well, that’s weird. And so I look on his mouth. I had him hold him so I could open his lips and everything, and there’s no cuts in his mouth. There’s no cuts around his mouth. He had no injury. And I’m trying to figure out where this blood came from. So I walked over to those bushes and I expected to find a dead body or something. There was nothing there.
(00:22:46):
It was just really strange. And we were all pretty freaked out. It was just such a weird experience. And we kind of just left him there in the ditch, and he just stared at us and his mouth just kept moving up and down gnashing his teeth. And so we called dispatch and tell ’em that we have one in custody. Our sergeant comes over to do an arrest check on it, and highway patrol shows up and they never ride two men to a car. It’s always, each guy has his own car, but this car pulls up and there’s two guys in it. And we work pretty closely with highway patrol in that area. And I know all the guys, because there’s only two or three guys per the area. And then another stretch of road, there’s a couple guys, and I know their alternates, and I had never seen these guys before and they were really rude, which was really weird too.
(00:23:37):
And I’m like, oh, are you guys going to take this since it’s on the highway? They’re like, yeah, we got it. We got it. They wouldn’t talk to us after that. I’m like, what a bunch of jerks. And then an ambulance rolls up and they don’t even examine the guy. They go up there, they throw him on the little stretcher and they throw him in the ambulance, and I look up so I can get the ambulance number so I can put in my report. I still have to do a supplemental report even though they’re taking it and there’s no ambulance number. That’s weird. And they drive off real quick. And the weird thing is, I know all the ambulance guys in the area, they go to all their calls and there’s someone injured, and I’ve never seen these guys either. So afterward I’m sitting there writing my report and I’m just, weird experience. And I call up dispatch and I says, Hey, I need you to give me the names of those two highway guys. She says, okay, I’ll call. And she calls highway and she calls back, she goes, well, highway says they never dispatched anyone. No one ever showed up.
Jim Harold (00:24:34):
Oh, it gets curiouser and curiouser, doesn’t it?
Dave (W. US) (00:24:38):
So I was like, well, that’s weird. Well call the ambulance company and tell ’em I need their ambulance number. And I call up that says they don’t have any record of any of their ambulances showing up. So I’m like, what the heck? So I call all around all the hospitals and none of ’em had any record of anyone showing up with similar injuries or being taken in by highway and this ambulance. And so I have no idea what happened.
Jim Harold (00:25:03):
That is so weird. I just happen to wonder, and you’re not saying this, I’m not putting words in your mouth, but I’m just wondering if there were any three letter agencies involved with any of this, or maybe some men in black dressed up like a highway patrolman. That is just so weird. So this person was essentially acting like a zombie and was picked up by people that were supposed to be troopers and were supposed to be ambulance people, but it looks like they really weren’t. Oh, that is so strange. That is so strange.
Dave (W. US) (00:25:37):
Yeah, I actually asked some of my highway buddies about it, and they were kind of freaked out. They’re like, we don’t have anybody that matches the description of those two guys. Yeah, I never found the guy’s clothes. He had no shoes, nothing just covered in blood and well groomed guy just looked crazy. And I actually, I took some pictures of it, so I have pictures of the guy, but it was very strange.
Jim Harold (00:26:02):
I got to tell you, that is one of the wildest, wildest stories I have ever heard on the Campfire period, bar none. And the thing is, I’ve been doing this particular show since 2009, so you kind of think, ah, I’ve heard it all. I’ve heard it all. And now I could say, I have not heard it all because I hadn’t heard this. What a great story. And thank you for sharing it. I know it’s a little tough when you’re in the job that you’re in, but we certainly appreciate, we thank you for listening for all these years. And if you ever come up with a solution, let us know.
Dave (W. US) (00:26:37):
Okay, thanks Jim. Appreciate it.
Jim Harold (00:26:39):
I told you it was creepy and disgusting. So next up, we’re going to continue to shuffle things, go back to 2017, and this is another story that falls decidedly into that Twilight Zone category.
Bruce is on the line from the southeast United States. We’re so glad to have him with us, and he has such a unique and just neat story that I’m not going to put words in his mouth. I’m going to let him tell you. Bruce, thank you for joining us and tell us this very unique head scratcher.
Bruce (00:27:11):
Alright, well thank you, Jim. I appreciate you letting me share my story. This was an experience I had back in 1989. It was a city in the southeast that was having an interstate bypass built. And as the right of way was being constructed, the Department of Transportation uncovered a historic burial. And I’m an archeologist, and my wife is a forensic anthropologist. And so at the time, we were working with a firm that was contracted to come in and investigate the area. So we brought in ground penetrating radar and detected approximately 70 anomalies in the area. And at that point, our contract was sort of expanded and the scope of the work was to excavate the burials, photograph the remains, catalog the coffin, hardware and burial items, rebury each and provide a history of the area. So the project was going to run about two and a half months long, and at the time we lived about two and a half hours from the site.
(00:28:07):
So on Fridays we would drive home after work. And one weekend while we were there, my Saturday project was to install an extension phone in our spare bedroom. And so I was making it an office. I was doing reports and research at the time, so I wanted a phone in there to work. So I wired it up, set it up, and got it in place. So that night when we went to bed, that was Saturday night. After about five minutes we were in bed, the office phone started ringing, and now I’ve got a phone beside the bed, but it wasn’t ringing. And so it kept ringing and I thought, well, I’m just going to let answering machine pick it up. And it just because we had an answering machine in the kitchen and it just kept ringing and ringing. So when I got up and went down the hallway, I noticed the kitchen phone wasn’t ringing either. It was only the office phone. And so I went in and picked it up and sort of slowly put it to my ear. It was a little bit unnerving to hear just one phone ringing out of three. And when I picked it up, it sounded like such a distant sound. It was
(00:29:16):
Like swirling winds or something like in space or something. And so I hung it up and I picked it back up and there was a dial tone. So I went back to bed and about five minutes later it started ringing again. And so I went back in there and picked it up and it was making the same sound. And this time I said hello and nothing was said. And so I hung it back up, picked it up again, there was a ring to and came on back to bed. So it didn’t ring anymore after that. So the next morning on Sunday morning, I got up and usually having my coffee and my wife joined me and we were just kind of sitting there chatting about the day and she said, I’ve got to tell you about my dream I had last night. And she said that she dreamt a man came out of the bedroom bathroom and said, answer the phone. And she said, she went in and answered the phone and the voice said, stop digging up the graves.
Jim Harold (00:30:19):
Oh my Lord. Oh my goodness. Oh, you just gave me chills.
Bruce (SE US) (00:30:26):
And she says, well, we can’t do that because the graves are being destroyed or going to be destroyed. We’re removing them, removing them from harm, and we’re rebury them in a safe place. And so the voice said, be careful.
Jim Harold (00:30:41):
Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness. Just that, stop digging up the graves. That gave me chills. Oh, yeah.
Bruce (SE US) (00:30:51):
Well, the other part is she finished her coffee and she went on back to get ready. And then about a minute she called me back. She said, Bruce, come back here. And I walked into the office and she says, did you put that there? And beside the telephone was a photograph of one of the burials that I had excavated.
Jim Harold (00:31:09):
Oh, geez.
Bruce (SE US) (00:31:13):
And I have no idea how it got there. Certainly I didn’t put it there. She didn’t. It was just like you say, a head scratcher.
Jim Harold (00:31:22):
Wow, that’s a great story. I love that. Now, maybe you mentioned it and I missed it, but what was the provenance or what was the background of the burials? I mean, how long did those burials go back? Did you have any feel for that?
Bruce (SE US) (00:31:36):
Yeah, they were about 1860s to about 1910. And you had various styles. You had the rectangular type with a viewing glass, and then you had sort of the Dracula, the hexagonal pinch toe is what they call it. You had those and they ran from children. I think about 30% of the 70 plus burials were children and on up to adult. And a little backstory, the historian for the firm was kind of doing research on the land itself and interviewing the senior citizens in the area. And the farm itself was sold in 1925. And when the depression hit, the story was the gentleman that owned the land wanted to increase his crops, grow more corn. And the story was that he pulled all the headstones up and threw ’em down a well.
Jim Harold (00:32:31):
Oh my Lord.
Bruce (SE US) (00:32:33):
Yeah. And that’s why it was just sort of a random thing. They were going through fields in this bypass, and just to hit a grave out of the blue was kind of weird. So that’s the reason for that. But it was about 1860 to 1910 was sort of the range of, and there was about 70, 73,
Jim Harold (00:32:55):
And you completed the job and had no further problems? There was no weirdness on the job site. Everything went okay.
Bruce (SE US) (00:33:02):
Yeah. After that, everything was fine. I mean, it was just a very odd thing that happened. But yeah, we didn’t experience anything else.
Jim Harold (00:33:12):
Wow. And it said, be careful. Wow, what a story. And the other thing I love about your story, Bruce, is this, people tend to think that people have strange or supernatural experiences or just plain head scratchers like this. They think you’re uneducated or you’re not a professional person, whatever. I mean, how much more between you and your wife, how much more professional educated can you get? I mean, and that proves to me, and I say it time and time again, the people in every walk of life have these kind of experiences. And I thank you so much, so much for sharing yours. Has it changed your thoughts or attitudes about the supernatural?
Bruce (SE US) (00:33:52):
Well, I really wasn’t that much into it at the time. I mean, the unknown stuff kind of drives scientists crazy. They like to understand and want to know what’s going on. So it really sort of sparked an interest that is gradually increased. And I really enjoy it today.
Jim Harold (00:34:11):
And I’m not a scientist, but I’ll say this, I have the greatest admiration in the world for scientists. We couldn’t do what we do right here with this simple little podcast without science. And we’re very appreciative. But I don’t think they’re mutually exclusive. I think you can have a very scientific mind, but yet realize there’s some things we just at this point in time cannot understand. And those two things to me can coexist.
Bruce (SE US) (00:34:35):
Absolutely. Absolutely indeed.
Jim Harold (00:34:38):
That’s the best point right there. Bruce, thank you for joining us around the Campfire tonight.
Bruce (SE US) (00:34:43):
Thank you, Jim. Take care.
Jim Harold (00:34:45):
Jim Harold’s Campfire is brought to you by Grammarly. And no matter what kind of work you do, how you communicate is key. All those emails and reports and presentations are equally important to the collaboration needed to get things done. And Grammarly well, they can help because Grammarly is your AI writing partner to help you communicate more effectively and efficiently so you can make a bigger impact at work. And I use Grammarly to make a bigger impact, and I put my money where my mouth is. I’ve been a paying user for Grammarly since way before they were a sponsor of this show and continue to be from my own pocket. Secondly, I use Grammarly in my kind of weekly newsletter. I don’t always get it out, but when I do get it out, I use Grammarly to check my column that I do every week. And then just recently we wrapped up the writing of Campfire Six, Jim Harold’s Campfire Six, the book that’s coming out on May 7th.
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Announcer (00:37:04):
You are listening to Jim Harold’s Campfire.
Jim Harold (00:37:08):
It’s one thing to maybe see a ghost or see something in the sky, but when paranormal activity starts impacting our physical space and physical objects , then it goes to a whole new level. And that’s the level we went to in 2011 with Thomas. And I must say, this is one where I read just the text of this story, and I just found it to be quite chilling. And I think you will too. Tom, thanks for being around the Campfire again, coming back. And tell us what happened.
Tom:
Well Jim, my grandmother had a picture in her living room that hung on the wall, and it had a bunch of family members in it. Pretty much all the family was in this picture. What happens is – it’s happened a few times before she actually caught on to what was going on – the picture would just fall off the wall. She would go over there, pick it up, look at the back. The wire across the back of it wasn’t broken. The nail on the wall was right there. It wasn’t bent down or anything for the picture to fall off. The nail was still on the wall. So she couldn’t figure out why this picture was falling off the wall.
But that’s not the weird part. The weird part is that after a couple of times, she put two and two together and realized that every time this picture did this, someone in that picture, within a month’s time, would pass away.
Jim Harold:
Ooh. That’s like something out of the Twilight Zone.
Tom:
Yeah, isn’t it? It’s weird. She showed me this picture one time, and I had asked her why it’s not hanging on the wall, and she told me why. Because after like the sixth time, she’s like, “All right, I’m not hanging up this picture anymore because I don’t want to know.”
Jim Harold:
Oh, boy.
Tom:
She always had this kind of sixth sense. She would talk to my great-grandfather, who had passed away. All the time, she would say that he would stand at the foot of her bed and talk to her and stuff. She always kind of knew things, like with my first kid, I got a phone call from her before my wife had gone into labor, and all I got was “It’s a boy” and she hung up. Almost like a trancelike thing. Sure enough, it was a boy. And she would do this to other people in the family all the time.
Jim Harold
It’s an interesting thing, because we’ve had –you’re my third caller tonight that I’ve had, and every one of them has touched on something, and I think you may be touching onto it in a certain way, maybe without even realizing it. This idea of our consciousness creating something ro manifesting something. Let me ask you this: do you think that perhaps that the information was somehow transferring to your grandmother, was transferring to that picture – in other words, almost like a poltergeist. Somehow she was like a radio receiver that was picking up the fact someone was going to die, and then the physical manifestation of that was the picture falling.
Tom:
It very well could be, because the picture, where it hung on the wall would’ve been exactly right across the room from her favorite chair she used to sit in, so that she could just sit there and look at the picture. Yeah, I wouldn’t doubt it at all.
Jim Harold:
And she wouldn’t even necessarily know it, but that was just the way it would come across. You said this happened six different times. It fell six different times, and each time a family member in that picture died?
Tom:
Within a month.
Jim Harold:
Maybe you said this, maybe I missed it – over how long a period of time?
Tom:
This happened over a period of about a year and a half to two years, I want to say.
Jim Harold:
Oh, man.
Tom:
Yeah. Then she just finally had enough.
Jim Harold:
I’d get really nervous if I were in the picture and the numbers were counting down.
Tom:
Oh yeah. (laughs) Exactly.
Jim Harold:
(laughs) It’s like, “Okay, I am not putting this back up because I don’t want to be the recipient of it.”
Tom:
Yeah, that’s what I said.
Jim Harold:
Reminds me of a story we had a few weeks ago of someone who purchased a photo and then the photo essentially came to life. I don’t know if you remember that one. That was a spooky one. I’ve got to say, Tom, this is one of the most chilling stories I’ve ever heard on the Campfire, and I think it’s probably going to be the title of this week’s show. Just fascinating, fascinating stuff.
Tom: Thanks.
Jim Harold:
Here’s another story, this one from 2019, about an object you hang on a wall that, well, turned kind of sinister. This is about a mirror. Well, one of my favorite kinds of stories. It starts with an estate sale. So let your mind wander. Michael, welcome to the show and tell us what happened.
Michael (CA) (00:42:24):
Oh, thank you, Jim. Well, my wife and I moved into a townhouse in West Hollywood, uh, built in 1921. And when we moved in, we decided we wanted older furniture, to sort of fit with the setting. So we hit a lot of estate sales, and ended up at one, and picked up a few things, some chairs, etcetera. And, uh, another item that I had wanted was way overpriced, and the woman holding the estate sale took my card and I took hers, and she says: “Well, you know, this- this sale ends tomorrow; if this is still around, you know, we can negotiate.” So the next morning, I was talking with my wife, and I was like, “No, there’s no way we can afford to go get these other things.” And then the woman called, and she’s like “Hey! It’s- it’s Linda, from the estate sale.” I’m like “Oh, hey.” She goes: “I’ve got the- the- the things you wanted, and, um, I’ll give them to you for fifty bucks.” I was like, “You wanted five hundred…” She says, “Yeah, I know, but, there’s this guy here who’s offering me nothing, and he’s being very disrespectful about my great-grandmother’s stuff. So, I’ll give both of these things to you for fifty bucks flat.”
Jim Harold (00:43:36):
Yeah, probably. You were a nice guy. You were respectful. She figures I got to get rid of it anyway. Why not?
Michael (CA) (00:43:42):
Yeah, exactly. And, um, I’m- I’m trying to- there’s so many details, I’m trying to just pare it down a little bit. Uh, but then she says: “Well if you can come down and get those chairs, I also have a- a very large antique mirror. If you can get it out of here, it’s yours.” And then, you know, horror movie warning: “I think you’re the one that’s supposed to have it.”
(00:44:04):
So, yeah, I- I should know, from watching these movies, not to take such things. So, anyway, we, I had a friend help me get this mirror over, and, it’s say about five feet by three feet, and just far too heavy to hang on an almost hundred year wall. So, I had it sort of sitting on its side in the corner, so it’s like a full-length mirror. And, it’s- it’s very- it’s kind of damaged, it has a gold wood frame, it’s- the date on the back is like 1891 or something. Um, but it’s damaged, it looks like it’s out of a Roger Corman movie, so, of course I had to have it. But I had it sitting up in the corner, trying to figure out how on earth we were gonna mount it, and at the time my wife and I were working opposite schedules, I would get home from work at like 1:30 or 2 in the morning, and she would have to get up and leave by 4:30. She can’t get up in the morning, so I would come home, sleep for about an hour, then get up and make coffee, have a cup of coffee with her, and sleep on the couch with the cat until I could get up. And I was sleeping in the room where this mirror was. And, one morning I was laying there, and all of a sudden there was this big jolt, like the couch shook.
And- Los Angeles, I thought: “Oh, earthquake.” And I was going back to sleep, but I kind of opened my eyes, and there was like this crowd of people standing in my living room.
Jim Harold:
Woah!
Michael (CA):
Uh, and- but- but they were kind of blurry, except for one man who was, uh, just sort of standing there with his arms- hands behind his back, looking at me. Um, wearing you know, really dated looking clothes. He looked kind of dusty, and he’s looking at me. And, I’ll uh- I’ll edit the expletives I used- -But, I like, “What the-?! What the- ’blank’- you doin’ in my house?! What?! What?! ‘Expletive!’ ‘Expletive!’” And he looked at me, and we started this conversation, but it was weird because his mouth didn’t move, but I was getting information from him. He goes: “We came with the mirror.”
(00:46:12):
Like, “What are you talking about?!” He goes: “We came with the mirror. We liked to have parties. We loved to dance.”
Jim Harold:
Dang
Michael (CA):
“We loved to watch ourselves dance in that mirror.” And I’m like, “Woah- what the-! ‘Blank’ ‘blank’ ‘blank’! So what! What?!” So he- he takes a step towards me, and he leans in kinda close, and he says: “We never got our last dance.” And then he leans in really close, and he says: “That’s where you come in.”
Jim Harold: Ohohoho!
Michael (CA):
And I like, swung my arm, and I’m sitting up on the couch, and the room is empty. And, of course, I’m like, “Wow! That was the coolest dream I’ve ever had! That would be a great script, I should write this down!” It’s Los Angeles, everything’s a script. I was like, “This would be a great script, what a great dream, oh my goodness.” And, I was thinking it was just that. Well, then my cat that was sleeping sat up, and looked towards the mirror and started hissing, and then looked around the room, and bolted upstairs and hid for the rest of the day. I was like, “Okay, that’s odd.” Um, over the next- next few weeks I would be at work and my wife would text me and be like, “Wait a second, are you home?” I’m like, “No.” She goes, “There’s someone upstairs, walking around in the office.” Because we had moved the mirror upstairs, I’m like “What are you talking about?” She’s like, “It sounds like there’s a bunch of people up there.” So, for the next- I mean- things kinda went on with it for, uh, a long time. And I was like, “Okay, this- this sounds, it’s probably just echoes from adjoining apartments, and maybe the building next door, this sound echoes off.” And I had to- you know- trying to write it off. And, then things started to get, I guess you’d say “darker.”
Jim Harold:
Mmm.
Michael (CA):
I don’t know how much detail to go into.
Jim Harold:
No, ah, feel free, this is a tremendous, classic story, so if we run a little long, it’s okay, go ahead.
Michael (CA):
Uh, okay, I think it- there were a lot of weird coincidences, um, that sort of popped up. Uh, at one of my- one of my jobs I was working at this private club that was, you know, just chock full of artifacts. And, I was serving a private party, and the place I worked at was supposedly haunted. And there was a guy sitting in one of the rooms, and we started talking. I said: “Well, if you want, I can tell you about, you know, sort of, the ghost stories of this place.” He goes, “Oh, I already know. What’s happening at your house?” I’m like, “What?!” He goes, “You have something happening at your house?” I’m like, “Okay, weird that you would know that.” And, started telling him what had happened with this mirror, and he’s like, “Well, you know, I’ve been doing sort of interviews and investigations of the Laurel Canyon area of Los Angeles for about thirty years, and there’s so much activity in this place, but I’m really curious with that mirror and what was said. I have an old phonograph record, I would like to- if you’re open to it- I could come over, bring a bunch of phonographs, and we could film and see with some of the equipment what happens when different music is played, since what was said to you seems to somehow relate to music.” Um, interesting idea, sadly it never came about. Then, a few years later, while working on a project, I met someone who was a ghost hunter. And I told him what was happening, he’s like “Oh, great, I’ll come over, I’ll bring my equipment.” And I’m thinking, “Okay, I’ve never done this before.” I think, I’m still, despite everything that’s happening, I’m thinking this is- this is my imagination, this is side effects from stress, exhaustion, uh, you know, maybe depression- I’m, you know- I’m hallucinating these things, trying to justify something else. So he comes over and sets up all this equipment, and, you know, we’re recording, and he’s got a geophone, and EMF pumps, EMF detectors, all this other stuff I have no idea what it is. And he’s here for a few hours, and goes home, and I didn’t hear from him for a while, so I called him and I was like, “So, did you go through the recordings?” He’s like, “Yyyeah, I did, we need to talk.” And I’m like, “So I’m hoping you’re telling me that nothing came up, I’m just tired, maybe I should see a therapist, and there’s nothing here, and it’s all just normal.” He’s like, “No, it’s quite the opposite-”
Jim:
Oh boy.
Michael:
“- I’ve been doing this a long time. I’ve never had so much come up so quickly.” I was like, “Well, what did it say?” He’s like “I can’t tell you-” or- “I won’t tell you, I’m gonna come over, I’m gonna bring my laptop, make sure your wife is home-” she wasn’t here when we did the investigation, “-I’m gonna play you the first thing that was said, and, then I want you to decide if you want to continue.” He’s like, “I’ve got-” he says, “so far, I’ve counted nine different distinct voices that came through on the voice recorder-”
JIM: Wow.
MICHAEL: “-And some strange video anomalies.” So he comes over, and he sets up the laptop, and he says “Okay I’m gonna play the first thing, I’ll play it once: don’t say anything. I’ll play it a second time, and when I point to you I want you both to tell me what you hear. And then I’m gonna play it a third time, and I’m gonna tell you what I wrote down. I’m not gonna tell you beforehand, because you’re just gonna hear that.” So he plays the first thing, and it was right when we started, you hear him say, “Hi, this is-” I won’t give his name, “-Michael, it’s such-and-such a time, at this date, this is the address. Um, is there anyone here with us?” And it was immediate. There was just this really, really clear, really calm voice, and it just said: “We’re all demons.”
JIM: Yikes!
MICHAEL: Flat-out. And my wife and I looked at each other, and he played it again, and he goes “What did you hear?” And we told him, he says “That’s what I wrote down. Do you want to hear more, or do you wanna stop? I don’t- maybe you should stop.” And I was like, “No, I wanna hear everything.” He says, “Does this scare you?” I was like, “No, not at all.” It’s like, the room where we had the mirror was the office for a theater company that I was running at the time, and the name of the theater company was Demon Theatre, uh-
JIM: Ahhh.
MICHAEL: -And all the actors and all the people that worked with us referred to themselves as “Demons,” so I was like, it felt like it was some sort of reference to that. And then through the like, three hours of recordings, there was just this really kind of smart-aleck attitude from the primary voice, and then any time my friend would speak, there was a female voice that would come in and just say things like, “Oh, shut up. This guy’s such an a-hole.”
JIM: Ha!
MICHAEL: And say all these negative things. And the other, dominant voice would come in and say “I don’t know what you’re doing here, this is Michael’s house, we want to talk to Michael.” It was just, it was really bizarre. I mean, that was, that was kind of the midpoint, I mean, this, it- it kind of accelerated from there, and, um, there were incidents of when we started- I had people coming in and try to cleanse the house, because we were hearing these noises, and strange things were happening. And then it kind of ramped up, and kind of, when this scratching started, you know, it’s like, “I must have done that to myself!” Me, with no fingernails. Uh, as we’re discussing having someone come to cleanse, you know, these scratches would appear on my- on my neck, and, I think there were four or five different, um, cleansings that we did on the house, and it must have been about 2015 where it finally seemed to sorta clear it out. So, since then, since then, there has not been much that has happened. Nothing that was super terrifying, but just a few odd things here and there. It’s been a very interesting ride.
JIM: Now, do you still have the mirror?
MICHAEL: I’m sitting looking at it right now.
JIM: Ohohohoho! The- the best thing’s when it says, “We came with the mirror.” So you think you-
MICHAEL: It was stunning.
JIM: Yeah, that’s stunning. Now, you think you have it under control, though, now?
MICHAEL: I- I- I think so. I mean, nothing much has happened, and it’s just- it- these people that I contacted for help, they just- it- it’s- I- even though it happened to me, I still write it off as like, “You’ve seen too many movies, you read too many books, you work in storytelling, this is just your imagination.” But, multiple people that I talked with are like, “You know, you know you can get rid of this mirror. But it’s not going to make a difference, it’s not the mirror, it’s you. No matter where you go, these things are going to happen.” I was like, “Great. Great. How do I- I can’t really sell myself.”
JIM: Yeah. That’s, uh, Michael, that is a Campfire classic, thank you so much for sharing it on the show today.
Michael (CA) (00:56:04):
Well, thanks for having me. I hope I didn’t ramble too much.
Jim Harold (00:56:08):
Well, hey, if you have stories like that, you can ramble as much as you want. Thanks again.
(00:56:13):
Jim Harold’s Campfire is brought to you by BetterHelp. Now, it strikes me that the most precious commodity we have as humans is time. You can’t buy time. You only have so much time, and we always want more time, right? I mean, what’s the first thing you would do if you had an extra hour in your day? If time was unlimited, how would you use it? Well, it seems to me that the best way to answer that question is to figure out what’s most important to you, and whether you get that extra hour or not, it’s really important to find out what matters to you so you can do more of it. And that’s where therapy comes in, because therapy can be helpful for so much. Figuring out your priorities, learning positive coping skills, and how to set boundaries.
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Announcer (00:57:57):
You are listening to Jim Harold’s Campfire.
Jim Harold (00:57:58):
.After years of doing this show, I know many of you have a thing about dolls. They totally freak you out. Buckle up. From 2015, Chelle welcome to the program. Please tell us your story.
Chelle (00:58:13):
Okay. Thanks for having me. When I was about 15, which is like 29 years ago now, so that’s how much this freaked me out. I’d been kicked out of home and I was placed with a Jehovah’s Witness family and were very, very strictly Witnesses. And so anything, even a little bit was not, it was frowned upon and not to be discussed. Anyway, me and my friend, we had over here, we have what we call sleep outs, and they’re like a bedroom but outside of the house.
Jim Harold (00:58:52):
Oh, okay.
Chelle (00:58:53):
Yep. So little room. It’s only the size, a secondary bedroom, but it’s outside of the house. So we’d go out there to sleep at night, and her grandmother, since she was born, bought her porcelain dolls every year for a birthday or Christmas or whatever. So she had 20 dolls set up in room, all up on shelves, all looking very pretty. And I don’t know, there was just something about them sort of walk in there and you’re overwhelmed by dolls. And we’d set up the two beds and everything was good. Went to bed that night and all went well. Woke up the next morning and every single doll was looking in my direction. I was like, yeah. I was like, okay, Michelle’s playing tricks on me. No worries. So I didn’t say anything, just left it. That day we were mucking around and I nudged all the dolls, say they were looking willy nilly because I didn’t like the idea of ’em just all staring at my bed and went to sleep that next night. And the following morning again, they were all looking at me and I’m like, this isn’t fun, Michelle.
Jim Harold (01:00:09):
No, fun would not be a word that would come to mind.
Chelle (01:00:14):
But I honestly thought she was just playing a joke. It was only me and her out there. And because I was like a guest, I suppose, the spare key was given to me. So it was only me and her that had a key to the room. No one else could get in there. And I thought, okay, alright. She’s having a laugh. She knows I’m a bit freaked out by these dolls, so I’ll pay her that. And this went on for a couple of weeks and sometimes I’d wake up and I’d be really sore and Michelle would look at my back and say, she goes, you’ve got bruises. What have you been doing? I’m like, nothing. And she’d okay. She’s like, there’s all these bruises over your back. I’m like, oh, okay. Yeah. So one night she actually decided to go stay at her boyfriend’s house. And I thought, oh, cool. So I locked the door, went to bed that night, and I actually put all the do I said to her, we got to put the dolls away, freaking me out. And so I’d put the dolls in the wardrobe at night, but when I got up, they were back on the shelves looking at me.
Jim Harold (01:01:16):
Oh boy.
Chelle (01:01:18):
You’ve taken the mick. Now Chelle, come on. But this night she went away to her, and so I put all the dolls in the wardrobe, shut the wardrobe door, went to bed, and the next morning, I swear to you, I got up and they were all back on the shelf and they were looking at me and I’m like, that’s it. And I packed my stuff. I didn’t even say goodbye to her. I just packed my stuff and I left. I’m like, this is too, I’m going, this is much for me,
Jim Harold (01:01:45):
I guess. So do you think that the dolls wanted to get rid of you?
Chelle (01:01:51):
I don’t know. I was talking to one of her brothers, she’s a family of seven, so there were a lot of kids, a lot were older and didn’t actually live with them anymore. I think there was about three younger than her that still lived there. And I was talking to one of our older brothers and he said, oh yeah, that’s probably grandma playing around with you. And I’m like, what are you talking about? He said, oh, before you guys had the room, grandma used to live in the room. I’m like, okay. And he goes, yeah, she died in there. And I’m like, oh, okay, thanks. Might’ve told me that before. Just weird things would happen in that room. They had two massive great Dane dogs. And I mean, these dogs were scary all by themselves because they were that big. And they would come into the room and they’d be laying on your bed, and next minute they’d be staring in a corner and they’d just growl at the corner and there’d be nothing there. And you’d be like, okay. We sometimes thought they could hear things outside the room that we couldn’t hear, maybe.
(01:03:02):
What else? Just the mother (overlapping speech)
Jim Harold (01:03:06):
I think that the doll thing is pretty creepy in and of itself. But you were going to say the mother?
Chelle (01:03:12):
Yeah, the mother. It was not her mother that lived there. It was the father’s mother. The grandmother. But the mother would wake up in the house. This was actually in the main house, and she would feel like there was something around her throat and she’d wake up and she’d have physical marks. Somebody had been trying to strangle her around her throat.
Jim Harold (01:03:36):
Oh my gosh.
Chelle (01:03:38):
And I was like, why don’t you people tell me this before I move in? It should be before you come and live here, Michelle. Find out all these things. But the doll one, just when I had my first daughter, my grandmother gave her a doll. And I’m like, no, it’s not happening. No doll. Sorry.
Jim Harold (01:04:01):
Oh my goodness. I got to tell you, dolls can be very, very creepy. And I could understand how that might lead to a lifelong phobia.
Chelle (01:04:13):
Yeah, yeah. And even my daughter, she’s heard the story, and she won’t have dolls in her house either. She is like, no.
Jim Harold (01:04:23):
Yeah, it’s going generationally now. Fool us once. Shame on you. Fool us twice, shame on me. Well Chelle, thank you so much. Can ghosts haunt automobiles? Well, Jim from 2016 certainly thinks so. And here’s his story. Jim has a fantastic story. Now let me tell you something. Anybody who knows me knows I love Stephen King and one of the classic Stephen King tales is that of Christine the haunted car. But what if you had a spirit that seemed to haunt a succession of automobiles? Well, Jim is going to introduce us to Jessica. Jim, thank you for joining us. I appreciate it. I know you’ve been listening for a few years now. Found us out from Coast to Coast. Thank you. And tell us about Jessica.
Jim (IL) (01:05:11):
Well, thank you, Jim. My story’s a little unusual. I came into this quite by accident some of us have in these paranormal situations. Back in 2002, I became the owner of a 1985 CJ7. And if you’re familiar with that type of vehicle, this is the precursor to the Jeep Wrangler.
Jim Harold (01:05:35):
Yep. I remember a friend of mine’s dad had one, and I remember riding in it and it’s like, it’s kind of you and the road’s right there.
Jim (IL) (01:05:43):
Exactly, exactly. It’s a different type of experience than a modern vehicle, definitely. But it was a vehicle that I’d always wanted from my childhood, our family being a Jeep family. And I was a proud owner of this vehicle. And like any old vehicle, old vehicles tend to have a personality, that’s not unusual. And the vehicle did some strange things, but I just chalked it up to old vehicle syndrome. Kind of a tradition in our family was to name our Jeeps, and I’m not sure who started it, but the vehicle had to have a name that started with a J since it was a Jeep vehicle. My dad’s Jeep was named Jezebel. And so I was going to name this Jeep Jenny, maybe towards a nod toward Forrest Gump or a family relative. But just before I had nailed down that name of Jenny, the name Jessica popped into my head quite suddenly, and at the time, didn’t really think much of it.
(01:06:46):
I had a former girlfriend years ago by that name, and figured that’s probably appropriate hearkening back to the days of when the aviation affection autos named their aircraft after wives or girlfriends, didn’t really think much about it. Coming home from work one day I was listening to my favorite radio station and a particular song by Journey came on, and I have nothing against Journey. I just wasn’t in the mood for Journey that day. So I switched the presets on my radio to another station and I just eased back into the seat when Journey came back on again. And I thought that to be odd. Now, one thing that you may remember, the older radios for the old clunk, clunk push button, this one had been upgraded to a more modern electric electronic state type of radio. So at first I figured the Jeep rides somewhat rough, maybe my finger slipped, and I went back to that radio station by accident.
(01:07:52):
So I went ahead and went back to the station that I wanted to hear. And before I could even settle back into the seat again, it went back to Journey. Now this happened three times, and being somewhat familiar with the paranormal and knowing the significance of three, I said out loud, almost in a joking manner, saying, well, Jess, I guess if you want to hear Journey, I’m going to put this radio station back into the precept that I want to hear. However, if you switch it back to Journey, I will allow you to listen to Journey. So I did that and almost on cue it went right back to Journey. Now at this point, I really thought there’s an electrical short, there’s something wrong with the radio. Something of that nature didn’t really put a lot of stock into it. Subsequently, other strange phenomenon would happen. About a year or so after having this vehicle, I needed something a little bit more reliable, and I went and bought at the time a newer Jeep Wrangler and just kind of carried the name over, thinking that my strange old truck tendencies would be behind me, except they actually got more common, which was odd.
(01:09:15):
This modern vehicle didn’t have the jitters and the shakes and the shorts that an older vehicle would, but one of the most disturbing at first things it would do is it would move sideways inside the garage. And as strange as that sounds, I have no other way to attribute it. I would park the vehicle tailgate into the garage first, and being somewhat OCD I would park the vehicle so close to the unfinished wall that the passenger side mirror would just start to touch the insulation of the unfinished wall. The next morning we would open the garage door to find the lights were on, and the Jeep had somehow managed to move sideways three to four inches away from the wall.
Jim Harold (01:10:01):
Ooh, that’s weird.
Jim (IL) (01:10:05):
A little weird. Now, me being the type of person that I am, I was convinced that somebody was breaking into my garage and joy riding my Jeep while I was asleep at night. However, taking diligent records of gas mileage and things of that nature, the odometer had not changed. I hadn’t seen any other signs to say that anybody had been in my garage. And also I had locked both the overhead garage door as well as the side passenger or side entryway door. So this was a little unnerving. And in fact, we would do experiments, my former wife and I, of marking the concrete to see if this was an optical illusion or if this was really happening and it was happening. Some days were far more prominent than others. So that brings me now a little bit further to getting rid of this particular Jeep.
(01:11:07):
Growing up in my life, we traded the vehicle in for a more subdued suburbanite type vehicle called a minivan. And the paranormal activity, all but was gone. There was nothing happening. Jessica, for all intents and purposes, was gone. Jim, I can’t explain this. And really at the time, I just figured I’m being selfish, I’m being ridiculous, but I really missed this vehicle. And I thought that quite odd, it’s not usual for somebody to have a bond that strong with a, for all intents and purposes, inanimate object. But I actually missed this vehicle to the point where my former wife said, you know what? I’m tired of seeing you moping around. We’ll get rid of the minivan, we’ll get you another Jeep. And that’s exactly what happened. And it came in the form of a compromise of the more larger Grand Cherokee version. And that is when the paranormal activity went through the roof.
(01:12:19):
Jessica would do things such as turn on her headlights at all hours of the day and night. She would lock the doors, she would unlock the doors, her alarm would go off. Subsequently through this time, I was going through a very trying time of my life. I was going through a divorce, I was going through some other personal things, and Jessica’s paranormal activity was at its peak at this point, and it came to a head one night when a friend had come over with a Ouija board. And we’ve heard people in the past, Jim, say you shouldn’t play with the Ouija board. It’s like akin to opening your door in a neighborhood and allowing anybody to come in. The funny thing about this, Jim, is Jessica actually warned me not to use the Ouija board. I had dreams of her telling me this, and I could hear it in my head.
(01:13:21):
And again, trying to think through this rationally, I’m just making this up. This is just my inner dialogue making this up. But it wouldn’t go away. It was like a nagging presence. You should not use this Ouija board. But this friend of mine was very insistent. And on a Friday night, she stopped by with this Ouija board, and out of my mouth came something that I had not planned. And it was basically, we can use a Ouija board, but we will use the Ouija board in the Jeep where we’re protected by Jess. Seems kind of odd, honestly. I’ve always been very skeptical of boards. I’ve always thought, well, it’s the other person willing it to go to the letters or something of that nature. I’ve never really considered it a scientific study to actually prove paranormal activity. But we set the board up in the back of the vehicle and we shut off all the lights and did the ritual, if you will, charging of the board and things of that nature. And at first, nothing happened. And I was pretty much convinced that this is just all in my head, this isn’t real. And my friend says, well put the keys for Jess in the ignition. Don’t turn the vehicle on. Just put the keys in the ignition. And I did. And we sat in the backseat a little bit, and right out of Christine, the radio glowed orange.
Jim Harold (01:15:00):
Oh boy. Wow.
Jim (IL) (01:15:02):
And both of us could tell there was a total different feeling in the air. And I mean, it seems impossible even as I’m telling you this story, because it’s right out of a Hollywood movie. The board spelled out, are you ready?
Jim Harold (01:15:24):
Yeah. I think that would be when I would close the board.
Jim (IL) (01:15:29):
Yeah. I was really looking at my friend at the time saying, you’ve done this right? And she says, no, you’ve done this, correct? I said, no, this is going to get really interesting, I think. And throughout the course of I’d say about a half an hour, we just asked simple questions and they would be answered. And a lot of the things that I know about Jessica personally, I’ve kept to myself what she looks like, likes and dislikes, because I was always afraid that not only would I get skeptics that would not believe me, but I would get some people that would just want to bandwagon and say, oh, yes, I saw her. She’s this tall, she has this color, eyes, those type of things. I didn’t want to put anything into somebody’s head. I wanted them to actually prove to me that they are seeing or experiencing what I am experiencing. Right. And my friend was experiencing that. The answers that were coming across were answers that only Jessica knew.
(01:16:31):
As most vehicles nowadays, they have the little courtesy lights above the doors, the entryway doors. And my friend point blank asked, Hey Jess, if you’re here, go ahead and turn the light above me on. And on cue Jim. It turned on. And I just kind of sat there with this sheepish grin and I said, Jess, why don’t you shut the light off if it’s really you? And the light went off. The last thing that she did on the board that night was really kind of interesting. And it’s not an advertisement in any way. It was purely coincidental. She started spelling out two numbers, followed by another number. I don’t remember if she spelled out period or she pointed to it, period. But I do remember these numbers over and over and over and over again. And we didn’t know what these numbers were. And finally, one of us asked, is this a radio station?
(01:17:37):
It went to yes. Do you want us to turn on the radio to this radio station? And it said, yes. Keep in mind, this is Friday night. And we turned the radio station on, and it is Coast to Coast Radio. And it was open lines that night, and people were talking mainly about communicating to the dead. That was the point, Jim, that we did put the board away. We figured, okay, we’ve experienced enough for the one night, we’re going to put the board away and let Jess, leave her alone, and we’re going to move on from this. And really, throughout since 2002, Jessica’s spirit has been with me for whatever reason, always connected to one of these vehicles. She doesn’t haunt the vehicle specifically. I’ve been told that she’s basically like an attached spirit, but for some reason she gravitates towards to that vehicle. And not exactly like Christine, but she has done some things that have actually damaged other vehicles or even property. You can imagine in my single years trying to bring somebody new into my life, it was kind of hard to explain to people what was going on because one way or another, Jessica was going to make herself known to this new individual.
Jim Harold (01:19:07):
Wow. So let me ask you this. Now, this is one of those questions. If you could press a button and Jessica would go away, would you do it?
Jim (IL) (01:19:20):
That’s a great question. And it’s a question that’s been asked to me plenty of times. And to some people, they would probably be horrified by my answer. But quite honestly, no, I would not. I don’t know how to explain it, Jim. It’s a very strange phenomenon, and I’ve tried to have it explained. I have had parental researchers at my house to do investigations, but she’s so much a part of my life now that it would almost be like losing a family member, if that makes any sense to you. And
Jim Harold (01:19:57):
Jim has a request for our audience. Jim, what was it?
Jim (IL) (01:20:01):
Basically, we’re still not sure exactly what Jessica is, is Jessica, a tulpa? Is she a spirit? I’m seeking answers as being somewhat of a scientific background. I still want to know. So if anybody out there has experiences that are similar to mine or would like to bring fresh ideas to the table, I’d be more than willing to hear them. And I appreciate this opportunity to bring my story forward.
Jim Harold (01:20:26):
Thanks Jim, for being a part of the Campfire. Hope you’re enjoying the show so far. If you are and you’re new, please follow wherever you are listening to this podcast. Also, also know that I have a series of Campfire books, and I hope that you will check them out. And the latest one is coming out May 7th, True Ghost Stories, Jim Harold Campfire Six. Now don’t worry, you can read them in any order. And I would recommend starting with this newest one coming up on May 7th, that will be available on Amazon and both ebook and print. And also we’re assured that it will also be ebook at places like Barnes and Noble. And we’re working on getting the print edition set up for places like Barnes and Noble and so forth. So it’ll be all over the place, and we hope that you’ll check it out.
(01:21:19):
It’s basically very much like this show. Some of our favorite stories from past Campfires, and people really seem to love the book series, haven’t done a book for several years, but we’re back on the horse. And again, you can read them in any order. They’re just like this. They’re a collection of stories, actually this time, 65 different stories. So please check that out. True Ghost Stories: Jim Harold’s Campfire Six, pretty much any place online you buy books. You can also ask your bookstore to get it in, and we’d appreciate it. Now, one thing about the campfire is we have all kinds of stories. We have scary stories, we have happy stories, we also have very sad stories. And this is one of those sad ones. This is from 2018.
Next up on the Campfire is Felicia from California. She had a neat story. She said that her son wanted to hear ghost stories, and she got tired of reading them, and she found the Campfire podcast and they’ve enjoyed it on road trips and so forth. And they still listen when they get in the car. So Felicia, we thank you and your son, and I’d like to say hello to your son. So hello. Thank you for listening. And you have an interesting story about a dream. Tell us what happened and welcome to the program.
Felicia (CA) (01:22:38):
Hi. Well, I had a visitation dream. This was probably about, I’d say 20 years ago, 20 plus maybe. I used to work at an elementary school, and I started off doing after school daycare and substitute teaching, and I was also a teacher’s aide, so I got to know this group of fourth graders really, really well. And we were very close. Well, the following year they went up to fifth grade and I was still doing after school daycare and all that stuff with them as well as some other students. And it was in October. I just remembered coming to work one day and there was a note. This is how I found out. It was horrible that one of the students had died in a fire. And I was devastated because I had just seen him the day before. We were playing around, and we would play games after school and put on little dance parties and dance shows and stuff.
(01:23:42):
And he was, I just saw him the night before. So I was devastated and I couldn’t believe it. I thought it was just a mean joke, somebody, it was just a horrible way to find out the note in my box. So I was devastated. I went home and I was just crying. I couldn’t stop crying. It was on the news because his house had burnt down. It was on the news, and I couldn’t handle it. I was crying and it was just awful. Well, that night I went to sleep and it was so hard for me to sleep because I was just so devastated. But when I fell asleep, I had this really, really, really vivid dream. It was so real. He came to me in the dream. I’m sorry, I might get a little choked up because it’s still emotional. But he came to me in the dream and he said, I’m right here.
(01:24:41):
And I said, what are you doing here? You’re dead, we’re at your funeral. And my dream, we were at his funeral, and I said, why are you here? You’re gone. And he said, I just came to tell you I wanted to come and tell you that I’m okay. And he’s like, I just want you to let you know that you can stop crying. I’m still crying today. But he’s like, it’s okay. I’m okay. And I was so thankful. And he said, I didn’t get burned in the fire. I wanted you to know that I’m okay. I didn’t get burned. The only thing that got burned was my hand.
(01:25:23):
And he said, I’m okay. I just want you to know that. And then I woke up, but it was so real. So then later on that week, I ended up going to his wake and his funeral. And I didn’t know any details about the fire. I just knew that his house had caught on fire and he had died with his father. His father had also died in the fire. And so when I went to, I know, it’s devastating, and he was only 10 years old. It was horrible. So when I went to, not the funeral, but the wake before, the night before the funeral, they had a, and his casket was open, his father’s was closed. And I didn’t know exactly what had happened, but apparently, I think his dad had been smoking and fell asleep in the front room with the cigarette lit the house on fire.
(01:26:23):
He had a closed casket. But this little boy, his name was Rex, his casket was open, and I was confused. He looks fine. What happened? And so one of my fellow coworkers had explained to me what happened was he had died of smoke inhalation. And by the time the fire department found was able to rescue him, he was at the back door trying to get out and couldn’t get out. And his hand was the only thing that was burned because he grabbed onto the door handle trying to open the back door, and the handle, the doorknob burnt his hand. It’s exactly like he told me in my dream. And there’s no way. I didn’t know that. I had no idea. So to me, that was just confirmation. That wasn’t a dream, that was really Rex. He really came to visit me. So yeah, I was just shocked. And they said the firefighters did try to resuscitate him, but he passed from smoke inhalation.
Jim Harold (01:27:33):
Well, I got to tell you something that’s chilling and so sad, so sad. But a remarkable story, and I want you to take this in the right way because I absolutely believe this. But when you talk about the skeptics, there are two explanations for your story. I happen, now, I’m going to tell you, I believe the second one, number one, you’re making it up, or number two, it’s absolutely true. I believe it’s absolutely true because the skeptics, how else can you explain this? But this young boy, because of the bond you had forged with him, want to come back and let you know that this is absolutely, to me, this is proof. This is proof that we live beyond and we can communicate and people can communicate when they have an important reason to communicate. And this to me is proof of it. Either that or you’re not telling the truth. And you absolutely, I believe are telling the truth. I mean, it’s just an amazing story.
Felicia (CA) (01:28:31):
I’m telling the truth. There’s no way.
Jim Harold (01:28:32):
Right, exactly.
Felicia (CA) (01:28:33):
There’s no reason to make something up like this up. Yeah. And it made me feel better though when I woke up, I felt better. Of course, I was still sad. And to this day, I still get sad thinking that he’s gone. But I did feel better when I woke up. And then when I went to his wake and they told me what had happened, I was just amazed and I felt even more better. I felt like, oh, then it’s true. He is okay. So yeah, it was a really interesting experience. I haven’t told that many people. I didn’t tell anybody at work. I’ve told my husband and my family.
Jim Harold (01:29:18):
Well, thank you. Thank you for having the courage to come on the show and share your story with the audience and with me. I appreciate it. It’s one of those things where it’s a horrible thing and goodness knows, we wish it never would’ve happened, but there is a certain assurance knowing that this child came back to let you know he’s okay. And like you said, that tells you that he is okay and he is somewhere and he’s happy.
I believe that our loved ones can show up in our lives in many different ways after they pass. And that’s what we’re going to talk about in this next story. Kelly joins us from 2023 and really love this story so much so that we were going to do a video version, and I just lost touch with Kelly. So Kelly, if you happen to be out there listening, please do get back in touch. We’d love to do that video version of this story that we had scheduled. And with no further ado, here we go. It’s a campfire classic for sure. Kelly is on the line from Ohio, a fellow Buckeye, OHIO, and we’re so glad to have her on the show, and she’s going to tell us about something unique, in a unique way that maybe her dad got in touch. Welcome to the show, Kelly. Thank you for joining us and tell us what happened.
Kelly:
Thank you so much, Jim. I’m so excited to be here and to finally have a story that feels worthy for the show. This actually happened very recently. It was April 19th. It was a Wednesday night. My husband and I were just sitting and watching something either on Netflix or History Channel, I don’t know what, but it was about séances, and in particular they were talking about Houdini and how he often tried to debunk the spiritualists and went out of his way to do so. But he and his wife had still figured out a code for when he passed on to show her that he was there on the other side, that he’d made it, essentially. So they did the séance every year – gosh, he died on I think Halloween; they did it for like 10 years in a row, and she finally gave up. I think someone did figure it out at one point, what this code was, but she never heard him, so her assumption was “not sure if he made it or not.”
So I said to my husband, “You know, I wonder sometimes.” I was thinking of how when my father had passed, he actually was suffering along for about two years, and we knew that the end could come pretty much at any time during the two years. But we said to one another, “If you can come back, here’s what I want you to do.” He’s like, “Okay, what do you want me to do?” I said, “I want you to knock a book over. We’ve always enjoyed books. Find a way to knock a book over just randomly, and I’ll know it’s you.” So this is what we had agreed on. I don’t know, it seemed like a good idea at the time.
So we’re watching this Houdini show, and I said to my husband, “Maybe they made it too complicated. Maybe the way to let your loved one know that you’re coming back in this case was too difficult. Maybe it’s not possible for everybody to come back and say hi.” But the other thing I think about is when you do pass over, maybe there’s a period of time there where your memories might get a little bit mixed up, and what if you forget what you’re supposed to do? If you have very specific things that you’re supposed to do so that your family members know you’re there, then maybe you can’t remember them. I don’t know, it just occurred to me, so I said, “My recommendation would be to come up with the simplest thing possible. I wish, wish, wish that I had given my dad an easier way to let me know.” Because I’ve never really had a sign at all in 10 years. It was really frustrating.
That was on a Wednesday night. Saturday, early, my mom was calling me. She’d been calling a few times and texting, so I finally answered, and she was like, “Honey, I want to show you something, but I don’t want to upset you. I don’t think this’ll upset you, but Marsha captured something the other night.” Marsha is my mom’s best friend, and she happened to be watching a late-night news show that my mother usually watches. She does intermittently. I don’t watch it, but she does sometimes. Now, her friend Marsha never misses it, and she sees a quick clip on the screen where they’re trying to make a joke. The host is making a joke, and a stock photo comes up of a man in a white van. She says, “Oh my God, that looks exactly like Jim.” My father’s name was Jim. She had it recorded, so she hit pause, took her cellphone out, snapped a shot, sent it to my mom.
My mom sends me the snapshot. It is the most unbelievable likeness of my father. In my mind, it can’t be anybody else but him. Just unbelievable. So I go out and I’m like, “I want to figure out when this happened. I want to find the episode. I want to get better pictures so I can study this and really look at it closer.” So I got out there, I found where the show was on YouTube, I took a snapshot of that, blew things up, put a picture of the man’s face next to my dad’s face. Hopefully Maddy got those to you, because I had actually sent them. Do you remember getting those?
Jim Harold: Mm-hm.
Kelly: Yeah, so here’s an example. I’ll hold it up here. The resemblance was absolutely astonishing.
Jim Harold: Wow. Wow.
Kelly: It’s absolutely astonishing. My mom and I were – the best word I can say is flummoxed. She’s like, “Yeah, honey, I don’t know. This is really crazy.” I get off the phone with her and I can’t stop thinking about it because this is the craziest thing that’s ever happened.
Jim Harold: I’m looking again at these. Folks, this is just remarkable.
Kelly: It is.
Jim Harold: That’s the same person.
Kelly: It is, absolutely. You figure my mother was married to him for 40 years. She’s the one that cut his hair and everything. And I knew him for 35. He passed away 10 years ago. And she and I, the two closest people to him, we cannot see a difference. This is my father. And the funniest thing is, this showed up on the Wednesday, April 19th show – the same night that I said I wished I’d given him an easier way to let me know he was okay. And then you see he’s got this little smirk on his face? That’s my dad’s smirk.
Jim Harold: And he’s almost holding like a thumbs up.
Kelly: Yeah, he’s got a thumbs up, which is exactly what he would do.
Jim Harold: Whoa.
Kelly: Those smiling Irish eyes. If you look at the hairline, you look at the ears – look at the shirt he’s wearing. I mean, it’s unbelievable. It’s possible, Jim, that a stock photo exists of my dad doing this in a van. He worked in the automotive industry, he was always in and out of a million different cars. This could’ve easily been in a snapshot that somehow got to Fox or however this happens. I just don’t even know. But my mother and I can’t find one thing that says this is not him, and he’s been gone for 10 years. So I don’t know. Every time I look at it, I just can’t even believe it.
Jim Harold: That is amazing. Wow. Wow, wow, wow. [laughs]
Kelly: Share those pictures with the listeners.
Jim Harold: Yes, we’re going to figure out a way to do that, whether it’s a YouTube video, whatever it is, we’re going to do that, because that is just an incredible, incredible story. Wow. So you think that it was either him somehow creating the picture, or having been in it but somehow pushing buttons from beyond so it had been featured on that very popular TV show.
Kelly: Right. I’ve had a lot of time to think about this, and I knew you would ask. Here’s the funny thing. That weekend, I was searching through your Paranormal Podcast. I was trying to find something on synchronicity, coincidences, things like that. On your December 27th show last year, you did an episode called “Meaningful Coincidences” and you had Bernard Beitman on there.
Jim Harold: Yes, Bernard Beitman.
Kelly: Did he mention on your show – or I’m wondering now if I went out and found it – did he say something about God winks on your show?
Jim Harold: I don’t remember it specifically. Maybe, but I don’t remember it.
Kelly: He said that when there are coincidences like this, you really need to think about the real message that’s there, and that sometimes little things like that he calls “God winks.” If he didn’t say it on your episode, I’ve listened to a few other things that he’s got out there too, after I heard that. I was like, God winks. That’s interesting, because if it’s not possible or hasn’t been possible for my dad to find a way to say hi, maybe God was like, “I hear you,” and it was just – because it’s just a little flash, a little picture with a little thumbs up. It has that kind of “wink” aspect about it.
Jim Harold: It does.
Kelly: It’s like, “Yeah, he’s okay, he’s fine.” And even though my dad can’t come and tell me – maybe he’s busy. I imagine he’s probably busy on the other side. He was always a busy guy. But I just feel like – you always say the universe is so much stranger than we realize. But I think it was that hopeless tone in my voice that night where I was like, “I really wish I’d given him an easier way to let me know.” [laughs] So he shows up on a TV show.
Jim Harold: Wow, that is pretty cool.
Kelly: And with the personality my dad had, actually that would’ve been probably the way that he would’ve wanted to say hi to my mom and I anyway.
Jim Harold: I love it. What a great story. Kelly, thank you so much for being a part of the Campfire, and stay spooky.
Kelly: Thanks for having me, Jim.
Jim Harold (01:40:26):
Those time slips, they keep showing up time and time again. Dave joins us from 2020 to tell us about this very interesting story. Dave heard about us several months ago on the great Coast to Coast am and tip of a cap to them, they’re always so kind to us, tell us about this time slip, because I love this topic.
Dave (01:40:47):
Well, this started back in 92 is when it occurred. It was my wife. It was before we got married. She had just graduated from medical school and she had a friend in medical school. She was going to go visit out in San Diego. She lived in San Diego, we lived on the east coast. So she flew out there and she said to her friend, well, I’ve always wanted to go to the Grand Canyon. So it was fine. Her friend bought a couple tickets, cheap tickets, flew to Phoenix, and they rented a car and drove from Phoenix up to Sedona, which kind of, I think it was a midway point between there and the Grand Canyon, but it was late at night. They got in late, they rented a car, so they probably didn’t start up the road till 10 o’clock at night. And so my wife was driving and she was tired, but she felt bad for her friend. Her friend had gone out of her way to accommodate her. So she let her friend go to sleep while she drove. And then all of a sudden she said that it was dark out and there was nothing. It was the middle of the desert, nothing going on. All of a sudden it got kind of like a hazy white black and white dawn type of thing. And she started seeing dinosaurs.
Jim Harold (01:42:03):
Whoa.
Dave (01:42:06):
Yeah, dinosaurs and primordial plants. And she said she could still see the road, but everything else from the barren desert turned into jungle with these dinosaurs stepping over her. But she said they look kind of ethereal, and they’re black and white from what I read about time slips. It’s kind of typical to have either black and white or kind of subdued tone. So anyway, she’s like, well, I’m really tired. This is ridiculous. She doesn’t think about dinosaurs. She’s not like a dinosaur fan, so it’s not like she didn’t understand why she’s seeing dinosaurs, so she must just be tired. So she tried to tough it out, but she didn’t want to bother her friend to wake her up. But finally she’s like, and it literally went on for 10 minutes, she said. Finally she just pulled over and woke her friend up. By the time she pulled over, she wasn’t sure where the transition went back to desert, but she woke her friend up and said, Terry, this is crazy.
(01:43:03):
You’re going to have to drive because I’m hallucinating. And my wife is a surgical resident. So it wasn’t uncommon for her to be tired. So when she told me the story after I met, we’re like, ha ha, surgical resident, you’re really whacked, you don’t get any sleep. Until 1997, 5 years later, after we’d been married, I heard the story and we joked about it a lot. We didn’t think too much of it. So I was watching one of these discovery shows like Discovery or History Channel or something, and they were talking about the vortex sites at Sedona, and they were interviewing a lady who lived there, and she said, sometimes I go out on my porch or my deck and I look across the valley in the desert. I see dinosaurs.
Speaker 14 (01:43:46):
Oh boy.
Dave (01:43:47):
Yeah. So I was sitting watching the TV and my wife was doing something. I’m like, you get in here and see this. And so we watched it like, yep, that’s pretty much what happened to me. And my wife’s had some other little issues with time slips, not quite as dramatic, but in retrospect, we’ve gone over it a million times. She was awake, she was driving, and she’s not crazy. Well-educated, well-grounded person, and she saw dinosaurs.
Jim Harold (01:44:15):
Dave, I don’t doubt it because I believe, and I’ve said this many times on the shows, I think that reality is far stranger than we understand. And there’s these little glitches or these little happenings that kind of are outliers that happen to us that I don’t think that we can understand. And I think it’s kind of silly to discount them. As you said, your wife is a learned woman down to earth, her feet are on the ground, not given to flights of fancy, but she saw dinosaurs. I don’t doubt it for a minute.
Dave (01:44:51):
Yeah, that’s cool stuff. And there’s some other things we got. Maybe I’ll call you back at another time. Little time. She’s like a time slip queen, this girl. It’s very strange.
Jim Harold (01:45:00):
Oh yes, please do. And folks, if you have a time slip story, we’d love to hear more of them. And Dave, I really hope you come back and tell us that. I love that story, a time slip, and your wife, she saw dinosaurs, and again, I believe it 110%. Thank you so much for being on the Campfire tonight.
Dave (01:45:18):
Thank you, Jim. Bye-Bye.
Jim Harold (01:45:20):
Black-eyed kids. One of the most terrifying things we talk about on the show, the idea that there are these kids with solid black eyeballs that show up at your door, and if you let them in, bad things happen. You’re kind of cursed, you might get sick, maybe even worse. It’s a terrifying phenomena that we’ve talked about multiple times on the shows. And we talked with our guest in 2021 about it, and here it is.
Norm is on the line and he is in law enforcement. And hats off to our good folks in law enforcement that we appreciate everything they do. And Norm, I’m sure in the process of his work interacts with many people every day. This may have been one of the strangest. Norm, welcome to the show. Tell us what happened.
Norm (01:46:11):
Sure, Jim. I appreciate the opportunity to tell my story. I think like most people who have had an encounter, they typically don’t tell people just because they don’t want to sound crazy. So the situation never quite sat well with me because I didn’t want to sound crazy as well. I spent a lot of time over the years thinking about it, trying to figure out what exactly happened that night. And after going over it, trying to unpack it and make it make sense a million times, I just kind of gave up until I kind of discovered podcasts. I know you’re a big fan of Astonishing Legends, and it wasn’t until I listened to them and there are three part series on black eyed kids that this all kind of came full circle and clicked and made sense for me. So a little bit of back about me, I am a state trooper in one of the states over here in New England.
(01:47:01):
I’ve been a trooper for almost 15 years. I got on 2007. The incident I’m looking to share today happened back in 2009. It was summertime. Like a new trooper, I was out there trying to be proactive stop cars. I was up on a highway doing some motor vehicle enforcement, and it was the third car of the evening that I had stopped. I’ve never been big for getting people for speeding just a couple miles over. You had to be doing at least 15 miles an hour over the speed limit for me to even consider stopping you. And this car was coming, it was doing 87 miles an hour. And I remember thinking to myself, oh, I got a good one. So I waited for the car to pass me. I pulled out behind it, hit my lights. I didn’t even get the 30 miles an hour on the highway to try to catch up to it or even turn on my sirens.
(01:47:52):
And the vehicle immediately pulled over, no big deal. I thought to myself, all right, that was easy. Sometimes it’s easy, sometimes it’s not. One of the things that hasn’t sat well with me over the years that I’ve thought about over and over again is what I didn’t do next. And as a police officer, I guess you could say it’s cop 101, it’s drilled into you from day one. When you pull over a car, you call dispatch, you tell them where you are, what you’re doing. You call on the plate, you’re out with, quick vehicle description, in case something bad happens, help knows where to come. For some reason, I didn’t do any of that, and that’s never sat well with me. And I’m not sure what the reason is behind it. Maybe it was just, well, let me get on with the story and we’ll see if we can figure it out.
(01:48:40):
So I said, I go to pull over this vehicle. It pulls over immediately. I pull up behind it about 20 feet like I always do, and the second I put my car in the park, all the hair on my arms and neck stood up on edge. It was like an immediate flight or fight response, and I didn’t take that physiological response lightly. I’m kind of a book nerd. So I literally had just got done reading the book called Gift of Fear by Gavin Becker. And the premise of the book is trusting your gut. It was recommended me by my field training officer when I first got on, told me it was an important read. It was something that could save your life. The premise of the book is just trusting your gut and it makes a difference. So when all the hair on my arm and my back of my neck stood up just from stopping a car with no apparent reason, I paid attention.
(01:49:33):
I started scanning the car, watching for traffic, trying to figure out what is my body trying to tell me? What can I not see that’s here? And nothing really stuck out to me. So the car’s in park, I’m getting ready. Alright, I got to make my approach. There might have been a little bit of cockiness, a little bit of new cop arrogance about me at that point. Now to kind of put it further in perspective, at this point, I’m 27 years old. I’m in the best shape of my life. I could do pushups forever. I’m pretty fresh out of the academy, like a year and a half, six foot tall, 210 pounds wearing a bulletproof vest, armed with a sidearm, 32 rounds of ammunition, a taser, pepper, spray, a baton.
(01:50:19):
There’s no reason for me to have been out or nervous for any reason whatsoever. I get out of my vehicle, I begin the approach, and from the second I make my first step, it just feels like I’m wading through water. It feels like this 50 pound block weighs on my feet. Every fiber of my being was just screaming at me. Don’t go to this vehicle, don’t do it. But again, it’s my job. I stopped the vehicle. I got to follow through. Well, I’m still not completely ignoring all these physiological responses. I’m scanning, I’m watching for traffic. I’m looking for anything on the side of the road. I’m looking for furtive movements by the operator, something being thrown out the windows, he trying to hide something. And these are all things we kind of normally do. But because of my reaction, I’m really looking now. So I approach this vehicle, I get to the back window of the driver’s side, and I’m looking in the whole back of the car is just packed full of stuff, bags.
(01:51:20):
There’s nothing that I can see. I got a good visual of the backside of the operator. He’s motionless the driver’s side window’s down. His hands are at 10 and two on the steering wheel, and he’s just sitting there and I can only assume waiting for me to interact with him. So I take another step closer. I’m now at what we call the B pillar of the vehicle, which is the pillar between the front door and the rear door. And that’s kind where we stop. It’s like a tactical thing we do. It gives us an advantage. The operator can’t see us, doesn’t have a direct line of sight of us. So if they decide they want to try to hurt us or do something, it’s more work for ’em. So as I step to that B pillar, I see the operator just slightly lean forward, kind of look down and just cock his head slightly in my direction so he knows I’m there.
(01:52:07):
He doesn’t turn, look at me, he doesn’t acknowledge me. He says nothing. He just kind of slightly cocks his head to acknowledge that I’m there. And now also while I’m at this window, I’m looking for anything still. I’m smelling the air, obviously, see if he’s a drunk driver. Was there any narcotic smell in the air? And the only thing that I picked up on was this horrific smell coming from within the car. It just smelled horrible. And I hope the audience forgives me. I’m probably going to sound a little stereotypical and maybe a little off. And that’s not my intent. I’m just doing my best to describe what I was relating it to. So where I worked is a lot of farm communities. I know a lot of farmers, and for some reason I start to size him up obviously. And I’m thinking, all right, this guy’s a farmer. That’s what this smell is. It’s like he’s been stomping around in the barnyard, right? And that’s my thought. And then I start sizing him up. Like I say, I take notice of his clothes. I’m looking at him, I’m like, all right, white male, probably thirties. And I’m thinking, all right, this guy’s maybe 5’7, 5 foot eight, a hundred fifty, a hundred sixty pounds at best. There’s no reason why physically I should be scared of him that I can see so far. There’s nothing crazy going on.
(01:53:31):
I got this bad smell. And then I noticed his clothing again, never really picked up on this before until having listened to stuff after it looked like he dressed himself from the Salvation Army. He looked like he did all his shopping at a thrift store. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But again, that also kind of reinforced my idea that this guy might be a farmer. I know farmers, they work outside. They destroy their clothes. They really don’t, sorry about that. They really don’t care what they’re wearing if they’re just around animals and doing what they need to do. So that was my sizing him up. So I feel like, all right, he knows I’m there. And all this happened in a couple seconds. This isn’t like five minutes of me standing there in silence. And I finally decided, all right, it’s time to interact with this guy.
(01:54:14):
So I introduced myself, and again, I’m just going to throw out a fake name. My name is Trooper Mann with the state police. Do you know why I stopped you this evening? Now again, he’s sitting in his car hands at 10 and two on the steering wheel. Still, his head is just slightly cocked in my direction, and he just turns a little bit more so he can catch me off his peripherals. But he is not looking at me, and he just gets this giant creepy Cheshire cat grin on his face, and he doesn’t say a word. So I repeat myself, Sir Trooper Mann with the state police, do you know why I stopped you this evening? Silence. Not a word. Not a move. No motion. Just a big creepy grin. Sir, I noticed you were doing 87 miles an hour tonight. The speed limit’s 65.
(01:55:05):
Is there a reason for your speed? Is everything okay? Silence. No response. Just a creepy grin. Sir. I can tell you were in a hurry. I just need your license, registration, insurance. We’ll get you on your way as soon as we can. Silence. No response. Big creepy grin. This guy doesn’t move a muscle, doesn’t make to reach into his glove box to get any paperwork. Doesn’t motion for a wallet to pull out an id, nothing. He is a statue. He just is looking down, slightly out the car and grinning. Now, I can’t see his whole face because of the way he’s kind of positioned himself. So now I’m kind of thinking to myself, all right, is this guy being passive aggressive? Is he just trying to give me a hard time? Is he a sovereign citizen and doesn’t believe I have the authority to stop him?
(01:55:55):
So he is just kind of going through the motions. I didn’t know what was going on. So at this point, I’m trying to determine what my next best course of action is. So I’m thinking, all right, maybe this guy’s not going to help me identify him or even work with me. I’m going to ask him to step out of the vehicle to the back of the vehicle. I’m going to take him into investigative detention and then figure out who he is and why. I got this horrific feeling in my stomach and all the hair standing up on the side of my arms and back of my neck. So I tell him, sir, I understand you’re upset. It’s never fun getting stopped by the police. If you’re not going to give me any identifying information, I’m going to ask you to step out to the back of the vehicle with me. Now, when I said this, this is the first time he gave any indication that he was hearing what I was saying. Almost his hands were still at ten and two on the steering wheel. He pulled himself forward by using the steering wheel like two or three inches. And then he turned and he looked directly at me. And when he looked at me, his eyes were completely black. There were just voids.
Jim Harold (01:57:03):
Oh boy.
Norm (01:57:04):
Now I literally put my hand on my gun. I didn’t draw it. I took two or three steps back without even realizing it. Next thing I know, I’m standing in the middle of a travel lane on a highway.
Jim Harold (01:57:16):
Oh gosh!
Norm (01:57:17):
It’s 10:30 at night. Thankfully, traffic was, like I said, it’s a rural area. It wasn’t that busy. And he’s just staring at me with these black eyes in this giant Cheshire cat grin on his face, not moving, not doing anything. And I continued to back up. I got all the way back to my car. I corrected myself to get back to my car. I got in my car, I put it in drive, and I’ll throw myself under the bus. I probably did 90 to a hundred miles an hour all the way back to the police station.
(01:57:50):
I was so freaked out by what I saw. I didn’t even realize my emergency lights were still on red and blues flashing all the way down the highway for 11 miles. I pulled into the back parking lot of the police station, still didn’t realize my lights were on, and I sat in my car. What just happened? A coworker of mine came out, knocked on the window, scared the crap out of me. And it’s like, Hey, your lights are on. Everything okay? And I, yep, sure enough, I shut my lights off. Yep. I said everything was okay, and that was my experience.
Jim Harold (01:58:22):
Wow. Now, something people might ask, I think I know the answer, but it wasn’t like somebody, people who maybe on drugs or something, the pupils or their eyes may get large and dilate or whatever. It wasn’t anything like that. It was the whole eyeball, right?
Norm (01:58:41):
It was almost like there was no eye, they were just like, the best way I could describe it is black voids. It was the most unsettling thing I’ve ever seen. And like I said, I thought about it after because I made some, what could have been fatal errors. As a young trooper, you always call on the plate. You always tell the troop what you’re doing and where you are. I didn’t do any of these and I don’t know if it was because of that flight or fight response that kicked in when my car went and parked, or if it was something else or if it was just pure stupidity. I honestly don’t know. But it was creepy. The most terrifying thing that has happened to me on this job ever. And I’ve done some pretty involved things.
Jim Harold (01:59:26):
Yeah, I mean, being a cop that long, a trooper, I’m sure you’ve come into some dangerous and scary situations with very kind of normal people, let alone some kind of whatever a black eyed kid is. Whew, man. What a story. Well, Norm, thank you so much for your service to your state and your community, and thank you for sharing a Campfire instant classic.
Norm (01:59:53):
Thanks, Jim. I appreciate the opportunity,
Jim Harold (01:59:56):
Doppelgangers, the idea that there could be a perfect double of someone you love, or maybe even you, yourself. This story from 2021, it is a doozy and one of my all time favorite Campfire stories. Now, Lily has worked in a healthcare environment and I’m fascinated by these kind of stories. We’ve had stories in hospitals and things in the past, and I can’t wait to hear this one. Lily, welcome to the show. Thank you for joining us from Ohio and tell us what happened.
Lily (OH) (02:00:28):
Alright, well thanks for having me, Jim. So, yep. Like you said, this was in Cleveland, Ohio. At the time I was working in a very large hospital downtown. I’m a respiratory therapist, so we do all kinds of stuff. At the time I was working in the ICUs, we managed the ventilators, the life support machines. And when these patients have to, you know real, real critical ICU patients, if they have to be transported to x-ray CT scan, you have to have a respiratory therapist accompanying you with the portable ventilator. So on this day, I was helping, assisting getting a patient to the CAT scan and I’m rolling the portable ventilator. And so we roll into where the elevators are, and on the right there’s a large cargo elevator and then the left, there’s a couple of smaller passenger elevators and we are taking the larger elevator and the door’s open and we back in.
(02:01:52):
So I go in first with the nurse at the head of the bed, and at the same time there’s a small group of people loading into one of the passenger elevators. And then so we’re backing in into the elevator and I’m at, I kind of have my back against the wall of the elevator. And then this other group of people, there’s probably like five or six people getting into the passenger elevator and they walk in. And at the back of that group of people, I see someone who looks very familiar. It was me essentially. And I’m looking at this person and I’m just staring. We’re making eye contact. So we’re staring at each other with the same expression. Am I seeing, really seeing this what’s happening?
(02:02:54):
And then the door to the cargo, the big elevator that I’m on with a patient and a couple of nurses and the doctor and everything, it starts closing and it’s sliding shut and I’m leaning as far as I can to the side to maintain eye contact with this other me because I’m just so weirded out and what am I looking at right now? And I’m leaning, laying the door’s finally shut and we go down to the basement and we get the patient where they need to go and everything. And this whole time, I’m thinking that was really strange.
Jim Harold (02:03:30):
So let me make sure I understand and make sure the listeners understand. You were loading a patient for transport onto a freight elevator. Essentially they are. Across the hall is the passenger, the passenger elevator, where you would just normally go up and down the floors if you weren’t transporting somebody, you are transporting, you’re facing out towards the passenger elevator, you’re looking and you see yourself looking back at you.
Lily (OH) (02:04:00):
Yes. Myself, looking back at me is at the rear of this small group of people, five or six people. So it’s not like I’m looking at a mirror image or anything. There is a group of people and that’s why I was bending over as much as I could to get the most time viewing of this other me that I can. I’m just so weirded out. It was like the weirdest thing I wasn’t expecting. It had caught me off guard. It was strange. So yeah. Yeah, super weird. So it doesn’t end there too. So eventually the day’s busy and everything, I kind of stop thinking about it. And then at the end of the day, I clock out, I walk with the usual group of people I do to the elevator to go to the parking garage to go home. We go into one of the small elevators across the way from the freight elevator, the cargo, the big one. At the same time, there are a group of workers still on the clock rolling a patient into the cargo elevator backing in. And I go into the passenger elevator, the smaller one, and I’m at the back and I can see across the way into the cargo elevator, the big one. And there is this person standing at the back of the elevator rolling the portable ventilator, and it’s myself again.
(02:05:45):
It’s like another, then the door to the big elevator starts closing. And this person in the cardo elevator, the very similar person to me, leaning over, leaning over, trying to get the best look of me in the passenger elevator as they can until the door shut. And same thing, I’m just kind of staring at ’em like this. It’s another me staring at me from across the way and I can’t look away either. We’re making eye contact and just kind of staring with no expression at each other. And finally, the now elevator, I’m in the small one, the passenger one that I am in with a group of my coworkers. And we’re going down to the parking garage. I just kind of was taken back for a second thinking. Okay, this was in the same day.
Jim Harold (02:06:49):
Yeah. That’s amazing. That’s amazing.
Lily (OH) (02:06:50):
Yeah. This was just maybe five or six hours earlier from when I was leaving work. And first of all, of course I wasn’t expecting the first thing to happen and then I see it again. So I’m like, okay, did I just see my doppelganger? Did I have time travel?
Jim Harold (02:07:09):
Well, I was about to say, it seems like the first time you looked into the future and saw yourself in the passenger elevator, and then when you were actually in the passenger elevator, you were looking back in time and seeing yourself transporting the patient.
Lily (OH) (02:07:27):
Yeah, that’s exactly it. Everything. It was like the same group of people. I didn’t pay attention to many details or anything, but it was the same kind of circumstance. They backed into the elevator. There was the same amount of people transporting the patient and so on. And the first time when I went down with the patient earlier when I saw the meat, I’m like, oh my God, did I see my doppelganger? I thought that was bad luck to see your doppelganger. Well then when it happened later on in the day, I am thinking, well, was this just something I somehow managed to be in two places at once? Was this a glitch in the universe? It could be. Really to this day, I’m still bamboozled by it. This was several years ago.
Jim Harold (02:08:22):
I get it. I get being bamboozled. The closest thing I’ve ever heard to that, or one of the closest things I’ve heard a couple things, but the one that comes to mind was a Campfire story, but there were years separating it. And basically the story was this, and you may or may not have heard it, it was a young man who remembered when he was a little boy, he was running through the hall and went by his kitchen and he saw a hooded figure who was appearing to make a peanut butter sandwich. And he ran away right away because it scared him. Was like, who’s this person in a hoodie in my kitchen making a peanut butter sandwich? Fast forward several years later, he’s minding his own business. He’s in the kitchen, he’s a teenager, he’s making himself a peanut butter sandwich with his hoodie on and he looks and he sees this little figure run through the hall and then run away just as fast.
Lily (OH) (02:09:16):
That’s it. That’s exactly,
Jim Harold (02:09:17):
That’s it. Except it was years later, not hours later. But it’s the same principle. Same principle,
Lily (OH) (02:09:25):
Yeah, exactly. And I always thought, I don’t know, I heard this thing in the stories I’ve read or heard or things like that. I’ve always heard people say that they think that mirrors are portals. And I thought that was interesting, but that I always thought that elevators were portals in some kind of way because it’s like a closed off, tiny space where things can happen. You have that anxiety being stuck. I don’t know, that might sound weird to some people, but that’s what I always thought too. And I thought that before this whole weird story happened.
Jim Harold (02:10:03):
You freaked me out. You freaked me out so much. I’m in my spooky studio and it’s soundproof. But I do have a window here that I have open and I’m looking out and it’s nighttime. And as soon as we get off the phone, Lily, I’m going to close the window. I’m afraid of what I’ll see.
Lily (OH) (02:10:19):
Yeah. I dunno what chill. Yeah. I mean, my mom who introduced me to you, she was always very spiritual. She still is. And that peaked my interest kind of passed down to me and everything. So that might be why that happens. But I’ve had various other interesting things happen like that. This was probably one of the weirdest.
Jim Harold (02:10:44):
I think so, Lily, this is an instant campfire, classic story all time. Great story. And thank you so much for joining us tonight on the Campfire and sharing it with us.
Lily (OH) (02:10:56):
Oh, absolutely. Thanks for having me. It was fun.
Jim Harold (02:11:01):
Missing time. We’ve had some classic stories over the years about this subject. The idea that you’re someplace and all of a sudden you’re maybe at the same place and hours have passed. Maybe you’re someplace else. What in the world’s going on? Well, I don’t know. But we have great stories like this ring from 2012 to ponder the possibilities. Well, one thing that I absolutely love are our international callers, and it’s the late hour over in the UK, but Jason has stayed up late. He’s going to tell us about some missing time. Now, this is an interesting phenomenon we’ve talked about in the past on the show. Now I want you to listen closely because Jason emailed me kind of asking my opinion on what was going on. And I’m merely kind of a conduit, not necessarily an expert. So folks, if any of you have had the experience Jason’s about ready to explain, please share it with us and give your thoughts. Jason, welcome to the program and please tell us this remarkable experience.
Jason (UK) (02:12:02):
Great. Thank you. Thank you, Jim. Thanks for giving me a platform to share it on as well. Yeah, it was a very strange experience. It was a normal night. It was a Sunday, Sunday evening. It was about six o’clock, and I’d just been rendering some YouTube videos for my artist on my record label. I was doing a tutorial for them. And as soon as I started rendering the video, I decided it was time to take the dogs out for their evening walk. And yeah, I always walk the dogs in the evening and it’s their third walk of the day. So I always make sure it’s quite short. Takes about 10 minutes, 10 or 15 minutes, I go onto the field, I take ’em off their leads, I smoke a quick cigarette, put them back on their leads and come home. And I do this every evening. And yeah, it takes about 15 minutes, no more than 15 minutes. So yeah, I went to the fields, it was dark, there was nobody else around, nothing out of the ordinary happened at all. It was just went, walked the dogs, smoking a cigarette, put the dogs back on the lead and came back home. And it was as if nothing had happened.
(02:13:16):
So I walked through the door and the first thing that my wife said to me when I got in is she said, where have you been? I was getting really worried about you. I thought you’d lost the dogs or something. And my immediate reaction was, well, what are you talking about? I’ve only been gone like 10 minutes. And she said, well, no you haven’t because the dinner’s already cooked. And the thing is that she literally just started cooking the dinner as I left. And I thought, that can’t be right. So I thought, well, maybe she’d started cooking it way before I’d left or something. So I came back in and I checked the time, and it was about half past six, about 35 minutes past six in the evening. And I thought, well, what time did I leave? So what I did was I went back to my laptop and I checked the file that had started rendering just before I left.
(02:14:16):
And the time of the file, it was created at five minutes, 5:58, which meant I must have left the house at around about six o’clock. And I got home. Well, yeah, about 35 minutes later, which is impossible. That can’t have happened because I was gone. I know that I remember every single step of the way. There was no way that I could have been gone 35 minutes. No way. Yeah. So I didn’t see anything. Nothing weird happened. I didn’t see any lights in the sky, but yet I know that I was only gone like 10 or 15 minutes. I know that. But somehow I seem to have lost somewhere like 15, 20 minutes and it was just really weird.
Jim Harold (02:15:07):
And what possible explanations have gone through your mind? What could have accounted for, if anything?
Jason (UK) (02:15:16):
I can’t think of any. I mean, I really can’t. I can’t think of any because I know that I went to the fields. I remember going to the fields, I remember taking ’em off the lead, and I know it was quite dark and there was nobody around and nothing. There’s nothing, you can’t think of anything. I mean, where I go, it’s a field directly under pylons. There are pylons that go directly overhead. And I know that a lot of people have strange experiences where there’s a lot of electromagnetic radiation or energy, and I guess that there’s a lot of that under pylons. But I dunno. I dunno, Jim, some somewhere, there’s nothing to explain that I’ve lost 20 minutes somewhere. There was no way on this earth that I was gone. 35 minutes. No, it’s impossible.
Jim Harold (02:16:10):
Any further reaction from your wife?
Jason (UK) (02:16:13):
No. No, not at all. She’s just, well, you’ve been gone 35 minutes. The son, her son came out of the bedroom and said, yeah, no, you’ve been gone ages. And I said, well, no, I haven’t. There’s no way that I’ve been gone ages. So all I did was went and smoked a cigarette and came straight back. But yeah, obviously it’s not the case. And what was really interesting was to go and check the file.
Jim Harold (02:16:36):
Yeah, that’s proof. And it’s a clock basically is what it is, yeah.
Jason (UK) (02:16:40):
Yeah. Well exactly. I don’t really wear a watch or anything like that, so I don’t know. It’s just weird.
Jim Harold (02:16:48):
Well, certainly if anybody in our audience has any possible explanation, we’d be more than glad to hear it. You can send me a note at Jim Harold dot com and Jason, if you figure it out sometime, let me know and we’ll let you know. And I thank you so much for staying up late and getting in touch all the way from the uk. And that’s an invitation to all of our other international listeners to go over to Jim Harold dot com and sign up. Jason, thank you again.
Jason (UK) (02:17:15):
You are welcome, Jim. Thank you.
Jim Harold (02:17:16):
I love when we get someone who has a scientific background and they have a story or multiple stories. And we had just such a caller back in 2013, and I always appreciate it because I love being able to look at things from both sides and leaving open the possibility of the unknown even for a person of science. Next up on the Campfire is Yarid from Puerto Rico, and I think you may be the first caller we’ve had from Puerto Rico. I know we have some listeners down that way. So thankful for you. One thing I want to preface this about is Yarid is a physician. I love when a man of science, a man of medicine, can also look at the other side and say there are also may be some things that we can’t quite explain. Yarid, welcome to the program. This is a fascinating story that does tie in to your medical background specifically when you were a young child and you fell ill. Thank you for coming on the show. Tell us what happened.
Yarid (PR) (02:18:19):
Thank you. Thank you, Jim. It’s awesome. I’m a big fan. So basically what happened is that when I was about 17 years of age, I had a severe case of chicken pox. And that lasted about six weeks or so until I completely recuperated. But initially after the first six days that I was undergoing the sickness on that sixth day, a few things occurred that later on as I graduated medical school, I reprocessed and pieced together what had happened and realized I had undergone something of much greater significance than just a bad case of chicken pox. And on that particular day that the sixth day I was really weak, I had undergone already numerous bouts of prolonged fever. And since I was, I was a very poor origin and I couldn’t go to the hospital. I believe my mom took me to some clinics where basically the doctors back then, they didn’t have all the resources they have nowadays that we have in our hand to help patients.
(02:19:47):
So basically it was just supportive care, so to speak. No antivirals, no other, no IV hydration, none of that. So on that sixth day when I was really, really weak, I remember laying down in my bed and I was just watching my hands and I was completely awake and just in a really, really weakened state. And I remember my hands. I felt that I was closing my hands, but at the same time I was watching them and my hands were completely open. So I felt like as if I was just closing, so to speak, the projection of my hands, that wasn’t my physical hands. And at the time I just remember thinking, oh, this is neat. I’m closing my hands and my hands are completely open. What is this? And what happened afterwards is that I just kept doing that because I remember it feeling me. But I kept dozing into what seemed like like a trance at the moment. And I remember just closing my eyes and I was so tired that I could not just keep my eyes open.
(02:21:05):
I felt as my body was almost levitating on top of myself. I didn’t have this looking at myself experience thing, but I did physically feel that I was levitating above the bed. I couldn’t control it. And I remember it felt, it’s just pretty weird, like an experience that you’ve never had. So I remember I briefly felt like I levitated what could be six to eight feet, and then slowly came back down. And what happened afterwards, I just had this ire sensation that there was a lot of people around me just talking in an intelligible language that I couldn’t understand.
(02:22:02):
I could compare it to Japanese or just Mandarin, you knowJim, when you see foreign movies, like action movies, something like this. But initially I felt scared, but as I progressed a little bit and I could open my eyes, I didn’t see shadows, I didn’t see anything. But I just heard this overwhelming, all these voices unintelligible so many that it was unintelligible. And after 10 to 15 minutes of this, it just felt warmth and it felt comfortable. It felt like it felt like I was being taken care of. Yeah. This night passed and sure enough, I started to get better. And I remember just the next day, I woke up at almost one in the afternoon, woke up really, really, really late. And I remember going straight to the bathroom and I was about to, it didn’t sound weird, but it’s something physiological. I just felt the urge to go to the bathroom.
(02:23:21):
So I had an episode of urine that was really dark. I just left it there. As a child, I couldn’t understand what just happened. But as I graduated medical school and I was studying the renal conditions, there’s a renal condition that’s called acute tubular necrosis that when your body is very hypotensive, your blood pressure is really low, your vital tissues are under perfused. By perfused, I mean for the people that are not common with the lingo, there’s not enough oxygen being delivered to the tissue. So basically tissues are dying. And then the kidneys, what this does is that it creates this tea colored urine. And that’s just one of the phases before just not urinating at all and having renal insufficiency or even renal failure. So if I took that information in and I just realized, wow, I was really close to kicking the bucket. So it validated that experience as just being really, really near death.
(02:24:41):
And as I’m a man of science, like you said at the beginning, I could just subscribe to the parapsychological explanation of behind near death experience or just try to explain it in a physiological way. Like authors like Gallup and Proctor have done. And there’s some neurobiological model by Juan Sebastian Gomez, which is a Chilean scientist, and he explains it through the limbic system and whatnot. But that feeling, you have to be there to understand. But that feeling, warmth of you belonging there, it just makes you try to keep an open mind to try to explain what had just happened.
Jim Harold (02:25:31):
And I love the fact that you’re kind of joining your scientific side and obviously being erudite on that side and then with being someone who had this experience. So I have to ask, do you think based on your experience and your medical knowledge, that there’s something more to the NDE than just physiology?
Yarid (PR) (02:25:55):
Yeah, definitely. I mean, I wouldn’t be doing justice to my background of science if I didn’t take into account that there could be another explanation that’s the scientist just described to that, to the model of just not quickly disproving something without having evidence. And since there’s been a million papers written, not a million, I’m just exaggerating, but there’s been plenty of literature written on near death experience, but it’s not ethical to replicate –
Jim Harold (02:26:36):
Right, of course.
Yarid (PR) (02:26:38):
– for an experiment. So we won’t know for sure. I’m pretty sure that in animal models, like with little rats or monkeys, we could replicate some of the changes, some of the physiological changes growing in the amygdala or the limbic system. But we won’t know for sure completely. So I’m a man of science. I had leave some space for the unexplained, you can call it parapsychological, you can call it paranormal. But there is something there and there’s a little tidbit of information. I remember all this experience I told you at the beginning. I remember being at my grandmother’s house. I remember all those statues around. She was a Catholic, but in the Caribbean, Catholics, the Catholic, they mix it with some of a little bit of Santeria. And then they have little, they subscribe to different modes of thought in terms of their religion. So I remember there’s the statues my grandma had and all the religious stuff she had around the house. And I was telling my mom this the other day, and she’s like, you weren’t at Grandma’s house when this happened. You were at our house. So for all of the story, I’m like, oh my God, my memory, the memory that I have is at my grandma’s house. And this episode happened in my house. So I can’t explain it, but it’s just there.
Jim Harold (02:28:14):
Well, Yarid, I’ve got to say, that’s one of my favorite stories. And your background makes it all the more fascinating. Thank you for taking time to talk with us all the way from Puerto Rico. We certainly appreciate it.
Yarid (PR) (02:28:27):
It’s amazing that I was the first caller. Yes, I got dibs on that. Thank you, Jim.
Jim Harold (02:28:34):
Well, thank you for tuning into this supersized edition of the Campfire. And if you made it this far and you’re new, please, please, please make sure you follow in the app of your choice. Tell your friends and welcome to the party. And to those of you who have been at the party for months or years, thank you so much. Because without you, we could not do this. And certainly a big thank you to all of our storytellers over the years, to our sponsors, to our plus club members, to everyone who has helped in any kind of aspect. Also, big shout outs go out to Maddy, my wife Dar, my kids, and all the people who’ve hired for a little one-off jobs, Jim, who has done the voiceover for many years for Campfire since its inception. We thank them. We just thank everybody involved because it’s just been a joy. And it was one of those things I just kind of started for fun. We thought, oh, this will be a fun little thing. And it turned out to be the thing. And so grateful for the Campfire and so grateful for you. Thank you so much. We’ll talk to you next time. Have a great week, everybody. Stay safe. And of course, as always, you know what I’m going to say: stay spooky. Here’s to 15 more years.
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