Brother Rod, you haven't seen Predator? This is practically canon for Gen X. I worked in a video store in high school and college (the film school of the '90s as Tarantino put it) and so I've seen a lot of movies, but this one cannot be missed. "Get to da choppa!"
My wife was walking up our very long driveway toward me about a week ago. I was looking down and not paying attention when she suddenly shouted. She said she saw a dark solid black figure run across our driveway between us. This was about 2:00 in the afternoon.
I later told my 19 year old son about it. He said "shadow people. Mom saw a shadow person." Apparently that's a thing. There's tons of videos and podcasts talking about them. The Gen-Zers know. 😆
Lol, well not in the 30 years we've been married at least. But between Rod's guy in Alabama and my wife in north Texas, there's strange things creeping around in the south lately. 😆
Those creatures are looking for A/C this time of the year…never had any of this stuff growing up in Houston when houses just had attic fans….you could hear the bullfrogs, crickets, cicadas, cats fighting, June bugs…all through the screened windows…
I haven't had an experience like this personally, but some parishioners have reported things like shadow people or weird shadowy creatures, though they themselves say they haven't used an Ouija board. Inevitably, someone in their sphere has or someone living in the home prior to them has. Or practiced some sort of dark art (at least dabbling in it). Those damn boards....we had a group of middle schoolers take one to their rural school on the last day of class a year or two ago, and while all hell didn't break loose (thank God!), it was truly frightening for a few of the kids and adults. People mess with those things for fun or out of curiosity, and then they call me when dark figures appear over their beds at night, or strange scratching sounds happen in their walls or under their floorboards, or persistent nightmares happen. And of course, very few of them are practicing the faith. They think all they need is a crucifix or rosary around their neck, and they're good. When I tell them that the blessing I impart (or rather the Church imparts through me) is only as effective as the faith they live, they'll show up to Mass for a few weeks or months, and when things calm down, they disappear again. I am amazed at the amount of dabbling in darkness going on among people, including youth and young adults. And of course it's couched in "white magic....not that dark stuff. That's eeee-vllll!" Come Lord Jesus.....and hurry!
It's not just Ouija. Think of Rosemary's Baby and what happened to some connected with the movie. Polanski (and Sharon Tate HelterSkeltered); Mia (and Woody and their brood); Cassavetes drank himself to death and never made it to 60. Then think about all the people who saw that movie.
I went to a Christian college, but Art students gonna be Art students, and a group of 'em held a seance in the arts building. Of course they summoned something, and for a time there were places in that building that got... unsafe. Like on the lighting catwalk, at least one person felt someone shove him. And others saw a figure at night.
This was a Christian college. Many of the profs were pastors. They took this stuff very very seriously. They exorcised the building.
But Art students gonna be Art students, and when a new group came in and heard the stories, they had to put it to the test...
Wash, rinse, repeat. Another poltergeist, another exorcism, and this time they posted night security in the arts building - arts students were still allowed to work very late, but no longer unsupervised, and no more damned seances.
In the short trailer you attached at the end, I recognized the actor whose face appears. I am just now finishing a Netflix series called Lawmen Bass Reeves. It stars the same actor as the main character and is terrific (in my opinion), if you have not seen it.
I saw a shadow person once driving home from a concert. They looked down the road and saw us approaching and very oddly shuffled to the side and hid behind a tree. It was odd behavior and I knew immediately it was not a human being. Just a gut feeling
David Paulides is a former detective who now devotes his attention to investigating and drawing attention to cases of utterly bizarre disappearances in and near national parks and forests. He highlights a sighting like this at the end of his second documentary, "Missing 411: The Hunted," which focuses the disappearances of hunters. (His work might be right up Rod's ally.) He's been good about not trying to offer an explanation for what's behind it. In this case, he interviews two former government employees (CIA, if memory serves) where the wife was a deer hunter. She saw a form like that from her tree stand and attempted to take a picture of it. Her husband found that the picture she took was unreadable and that the resolution of the picture was something to which one could not set the camera. Strikingly, the marching band practicing at the football field not far from where she sighted that phenomenon saw a UAP (a glowing orb) fly low over the field.
For my part, I've encountered a territorial spirit in the woods on a property near my parents in western North Carolina while hunting on three separate occasions, but it wasn't a visible entity. (To the territorial comment: The mechanics of demons occupying houses and properties is not dissimilar to their occupying people--they can be invited in or have access through the things that have occurred there. As noted below, the encounter always stopped when I stepped off the property line.) One the first encounter, it started with a strong sense of being watched, followed by the feeling of something right behind me, something where looking behind me wouldn't be a good idea. I finally ran for home, and it stopped at the property line. At the time I was a teenager with a high-powered rifle, so getting as frightened as I was at the time shouldn't have happened that easily. The second time I was hunting on the same property with a friend. He didn't know about the incident, so when I started feeling like was being watched, I said nothing to see if it was just me. He spoke up first, saying he felt like he was being watched. I confirmed I felt the same, and the same thing happened--it was like something sinister approached us. We ran for my place, and it stopped at the property line. The third time I was over a decade later and I was exploring a different area on the same property (tracking a creature in the snow, if memory serves). This time it felt like something approaching near where I was, moving like it was going to pass by me but didn't. By this point I'd been involved in spiritual warfare ministry and wasn't utterly terrified, though it still felt like being near a dangerous creature that didn't want me there. I opted to just walk away, because it's unwise to engage a spirit on someone else's property without their knowledge and consent. Even if it has no right to do something to you, those with authority over the property might have given it a right to be where it is, even if unwittingly. Most engaged in spiritual warfare ministry who get called in to deal with spirits in houses try to get the full permission and usually participation of those who own it for precisely that reason. Some also teach that depending on the extent and source of the spirit's attachment to the place, the property owner can potentially engage in deliverance prayers or minor exorcisms over their property and that suffice. (While major exorcisms are limited a bishop or an appointed exorcist/authorized priest, apostolic churches allow one to exorcise, i.e., command demons to leave, oneself or things over which one has authority.)
Yeah, if there's one thing I've learned from my friendship with exorcists over the years, it's that evil spirits are incredibly legalistic, and operate on permission to inhabit a person or place.
I've told in this space before a story about a simple working man from my hometown, father of a friend, who talked about his family's property up in Mississippi. It included part of the woods in that county that has a reputation of being haunted, though nobody knows why. He was out deer hunting one day in that woods, when he felt he was being watched. He turned and saw what he says was, I kid you not, a leprechaun, sitting on a log, beckoning to him to follow him.
I am open to believing in the woo, but a Mississippi leprechaun? (Please don't post a link to the Alabama leprechaun story, which is hilarious, but we've seen it.) He acknowledged that this is crazy, but he swore that's what it was, "just like you expect them to look. Little suit and everything." It absolutely shocked him, and he got the hell out of there.
I would say this was some sort of territorial spirit that chose, for whatever malicious reason, to manifest as a leprechaun. I just looked up the man's family name, and it's not Irish. But he might have had some Irish forebears, who knows? My great grandmother's last name was Kennedy -- I'm distantly related to the Louisiana senator -- which is where the red hair in my family comes from (my beard was for years red).
100% on the legalistic aspect of the enemy. Some models of liberation focus almost entirely on addressing the things that give the enemy access to the person rather than on engaging in a direct confrontation with them. There's a bit of controversy amongst practitioners about the prudence of some of the mechanics involved with that, but the reported outcomes, not just by the ministers but also by the ministry recipients, are sufficiently notable as to suggest those approaches aren't utterly invalid.
I remember reading your story about the leprechaun--it's a curiosity for certain. While the suit and hat bit are odd, so many cultures have a belief in some type of spiritual "little people" that there's got to be something to it. At minimum it seems to be a spiritual archetype of sorts. In the case you described, if it was purely a territorial spirit, then perhaps something connected to the Irish occurred in that location. Witches and a type of folk healers called "fairy doctors," folks who blended Christian, naturalist, and often occult elements to cure people of issues attributed to the fairies, were all things in Ireland. If some like that came to or through that area, it's not outside the realm of possibility that their activities on that land could have invited such an entity. Similarly, if someone dies who was severely demonized from engaging with territorial spirits, might the enemies associated with them linger in that area? Conceivably.
On the red hair front, I'm a McEntire (which is Scottish) and I'm distantly related to Reba. (You can decide whether that's a bad thing or not!) Some of my uncles are redheaded, while I inherited the "sunburn at the drop of a hat" side of the red hair traits.
Nearly fifty years ago, my friends and I got a little plastered and went looking for the Goatman of Prince George's County down Lottsford Road in what was the rural countryside. Goatman is reportedly half-man and half-goat and roamed the wilds of PG County. He was alleged to have killed a honeymooning couple and some others. The coward never revealed himself to our calls so we had another beer and left.
Sounds kind of like the Bunny Man around Clifton. He supposedly is an escaped mental hospital patient who throws axes at people. Then there’s Mothman. Next Saturday is West Virginia Day. Don’t forget to leave out pepperoni rolls & Mountain Dew for Mothman.
Really…welcome home Rod. The woo is always just around the bend
You’re not from north Alabama in the Limestone County area are you? I haven’t seen that surname for many many years.
Texas born and bred 5 generations
I guess one of the reasons you needed to leave Europe and come back here, Rod, was to talk with that man.
Brother Rod, you haven't seen Predator? This is practically canon for Gen X. I worked in a video store in high school and college (the film school of the '90s as Tarantino put it) and so I've seen a lot of movies, but this one cannot be missed. "Get to da choppa!"
Predator and Terminator are the definitive 80s Ahnuld movies
And Conan the Barbarian, of course.
What is good in life?
"To drive your enemies before you and hear the lamentations of their women."
“Crush your enemies. See them driven before you. Hear the lamentations of their women.”
"Hot water, good dentistry, soft lavatory paper"
- Cohen the Barbarian
Watched it again not long ago. Holds up well.
I know right?! I'm suspending Rod's Gen X card until he watches Predator in its entirety. Might throw Commando in there too.
Yeah, I was surprised by that considering Rod was a film critic for so many years.
They only played movies like that in FtWorth - Dallas is too pretentious…a ‘World Class city’ dontcha know…
Not in the 1980s I wasn't!
Ah yes, Predator...great flick...Schwarzenegger at the top of his game.
My wife was walking up our very long driveway toward me about a week ago. I was looking down and not paying attention when she suddenly shouted. She said she saw a dark solid black figure run across our driveway between us. This was about 2:00 in the afternoon.
I later told my 19 year old son about it. He said "shadow people. Mom saw a shadow person." Apparently that's a thing. There's tons of videos and podcasts talking about them. The Gen-Zers know. 😆
Has she ever used a Ouija board?
(😆jk)
Lol, well not in the 30 years we've been married at least. But between Rod's guy in Alabama and my wife in north Texas, there's strange things creeping around in the south lately. 😆
Those creatures are looking for A/C this time of the year…never had any of this stuff growing up in Houston when houses just had attic fans….you could hear the bullfrogs, crickets, cicadas, cats fighting, June bugs…all through the screened windows…
There’s some crazy stuff going on in the Maine woods too apparently
Graham Platner sexting?
Call Steven Spielberg
My only connection is that I, too, enjoy meatball sandwiches.
I haven't had an experience like this personally, but some parishioners have reported things like shadow people or weird shadowy creatures, though they themselves say they haven't used an Ouija board. Inevitably, someone in their sphere has or someone living in the home prior to them has. Or practiced some sort of dark art (at least dabbling in it). Those damn boards....we had a group of middle schoolers take one to their rural school on the last day of class a year or two ago, and while all hell didn't break loose (thank God!), it was truly frightening for a few of the kids and adults. People mess with those things for fun or out of curiosity, and then they call me when dark figures appear over their beds at night, or strange scratching sounds happen in their walls or under their floorboards, or persistent nightmares happen. And of course, very few of them are practicing the faith. They think all they need is a crucifix or rosary around their neck, and they're good. When I tell them that the blessing I impart (or rather the Church imparts through me) is only as effective as the faith they live, they'll show up to Mass for a few weeks or months, and when things calm down, they disappear again. I am amazed at the amount of dabbling in darkness going on among people, including youth and young adults. And of course it's couched in "white magic....not that dark stuff. That's eeee-vllll!" Come Lord Jesus.....and hurry!
It's not just Ouija. Think of Rosemary's Baby and what happened to some connected with the movie. Polanski (and Sharon Tate HelterSkeltered); Mia (and Woody and their brood); Cassavetes drank himself to death and never made it to 60. Then think about all the people who saw that movie.
Ruth Gordon went on to make the cult black comedy Harold & Maude, and almost made it to 90.
You ought to make all of them listen to this episode of the exorcist Father Carlos Martins's podcast. It focuses on a case with a Ouija board: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3wxcwTGsrqIqieGYUo14Hf?si=Q0l5TO9GT_amrsUEolwceg
I went to a Christian college, but Art students gonna be Art students, and a group of 'em held a seance in the arts building. Of course they summoned something, and for a time there were places in that building that got... unsafe. Like on the lighting catwalk, at least one person felt someone shove him. And others saw a figure at night.
This was a Christian college. Many of the profs were pastors. They took this stuff very very seriously. They exorcised the building.
But Art students gonna be Art students, and when a new group came in and heard the stories, they had to put it to the test...
Wash, rinse, repeat. Another poltergeist, another exorcism, and this time they posted night security in the arts building - arts students were still allowed to work very late, but no longer unsupervised, and no more damned seances.
In the short trailer you attached at the end, I recognized the actor whose face appears. I am just now finishing a Netflix series called Lawmen Bass Reeves. It stars the same actor as the main character and is terrific (in my opinion), if you have not seen it.
I saw a shadow person once driving home from a concert. They looked down the road and saw us approaching and very oddly shuffled to the side and hid behind a tree. It was odd behavior and I knew immediately it was not a human being. Just a gut feeling
David Paulides is a former detective who now devotes his attention to investigating and drawing attention to cases of utterly bizarre disappearances in and near national parks and forests. He highlights a sighting like this at the end of his second documentary, "Missing 411: The Hunted," which focuses the disappearances of hunters. (His work might be right up Rod's ally.) He's been good about not trying to offer an explanation for what's behind it. In this case, he interviews two former government employees (CIA, if memory serves) where the wife was a deer hunter. She saw a form like that from her tree stand and attempted to take a picture of it. Her husband found that the picture she took was unreadable and that the resolution of the picture was something to which one could not set the camera. Strikingly, the marching band practicing at the football field not far from where she sighted that phenomenon saw a UAP (a glowing orb) fly low over the field.
For my part, I've encountered a territorial spirit in the woods on a property near my parents in western North Carolina while hunting on three separate occasions, but it wasn't a visible entity. (To the territorial comment: The mechanics of demons occupying houses and properties is not dissimilar to their occupying people--they can be invited in or have access through the things that have occurred there. As noted below, the encounter always stopped when I stepped off the property line.) One the first encounter, it started with a strong sense of being watched, followed by the feeling of something right behind me, something where looking behind me wouldn't be a good idea. I finally ran for home, and it stopped at the property line. At the time I was a teenager with a high-powered rifle, so getting as frightened as I was at the time shouldn't have happened that easily. The second time I was hunting on the same property with a friend. He didn't know about the incident, so when I started feeling like was being watched, I said nothing to see if it was just me. He spoke up first, saying he felt like he was being watched. I confirmed I felt the same, and the same thing happened--it was like something sinister approached us. We ran for my place, and it stopped at the property line. The third time I was over a decade later and I was exploring a different area on the same property (tracking a creature in the snow, if memory serves). This time it felt like something approaching near where I was, moving like it was going to pass by me but didn't. By this point I'd been involved in spiritual warfare ministry and wasn't utterly terrified, though it still felt like being near a dangerous creature that didn't want me there. I opted to just walk away, because it's unwise to engage a spirit on someone else's property without their knowledge and consent. Even if it has no right to do something to you, those with authority over the property might have given it a right to be where it is, even if unwittingly. Most engaged in spiritual warfare ministry who get called in to deal with spirits in houses try to get the full permission and usually participation of those who own it for precisely that reason. Some also teach that depending on the extent and source of the spirit's attachment to the place, the property owner can potentially engage in deliverance prayers or minor exorcisms over their property and that suffice. (While major exorcisms are limited a bishop or an appointed exorcist/authorized priest, apostolic churches allow one to exorcise, i.e., command demons to leave, oneself or things over which one has authority.)
Yeah, if there's one thing I've learned from my friendship with exorcists over the years, it's that evil spirits are incredibly legalistic, and operate on permission to inhabit a person or place.
I've told in this space before a story about a simple working man from my hometown, father of a friend, who talked about his family's property up in Mississippi. It included part of the woods in that county that has a reputation of being haunted, though nobody knows why. He was out deer hunting one day in that woods, when he felt he was being watched. He turned and saw what he says was, I kid you not, a leprechaun, sitting on a log, beckoning to him to follow him.
I am open to believing in the woo, but a Mississippi leprechaun? (Please don't post a link to the Alabama leprechaun story, which is hilarious, but we've seen it.) He acknowledged that this is crazy, but he swore that's what it was, "just like you expect them to look. Little suit and everything." It absolutely shocked him, and he got the hell out of there.
I would say this was some sort of territorial spirit that chose, for whatever malicious reason, to manifest as a leprechaun. I just looked up the man's family name, and it's not Irish. But he might have had some Irish forebears, who knows? My great grandmother's last name was Kennedy -- I'm distantly related to the Louisiana senator -- which is where the red hair in my family comes from (my beard was for years red).
100% on the legalistic aspect of the enemy. Some models of liberation focus almost entirely on addressing the things that give the enemy access to the person rather than on engaging in a direct confrontation with them. There's a bit of controversy amongst practitioners about the prudence of some of the mechanics involved with that, but the reported outcomes, not just by the ministers but also by the ministry recipients, are sufficiently notable as to suggest those approaches aren't utterly invalid.
I remember reading your story about the leprechaun--it's a curiosity for certain. While the suit and hat bit are odd, so many cultures have a belief in some type of spiritual "little people" that there's got to be something to it. At minimum it seems to be a spiritual archetype of sorts. In the case you described, if it was purely a territorial spirit, then perhaps something connected to the Irish occurred in that location. Witches and a type of folk healers called "fairy doctors," folks who blended Christian, naturalist, and often occult elements to cure people of issues attributed to the fairies, were all things in Ireland. If some like that came to or through that area, it's not outside the realm of possibility that their activities on that land could have invited such an entity. Similarly, if someone dies who was severely demonized from engaging with territorial spirits, might the enemies associated with them linger in that area? Conceivably.
On the red hair front, I'm a McEntire (which is Scottish) and I'm distantly related to Reba. (You can decide whether that's a bad thing or not!) Some of my uncles are redheaded, while I inherited the "sunburn at the drop of a hat" side of the red hair traits.
Being related to Reba is crazy cool.
Or he was having a psychotic break. Or he was taking drugs. Or just yanking the Dreher chain.
Sasquatch are cloakers:
https://youtu.be/eFNHMrYDQQk?is=PVDicrvDpyVmHXc7
In Florida they are called ‘Skunk Apes’
He probably just saw a southern flying squirrel.
We had them in the islands near Savannah, GA in the mid 60’s
You mean you didn’t have to assemble your furniture? Imagine that…
Well, that's one advance over not buying IKEA. But I've still got to put together these damn floor lamps.
Nearly fifty years ago, my friends and I got a little plastered and went looking for the Goatman of Prince George's County down Lottsford Road in what was the rural countryside. Goatman is reportedly half-man and half-goat and roamed the wilds of PG County. He was alleged to have killed a honeymooning couple and some others. The coward never revealed himself to our calls so we had another beer and left.
Sounds kind of like the Bunny Man around Clifton. He supposedly is an escaped mental hospital patient who throws axes at people. Then there’s Mothman. Next Saturday is West Virginia Day. Don’t forget to leave out pepperoni rolls & Mountain Dew for Mothman.
You haven’t seen Predator? For shame, sir