As I wrote in a previous post, somewhere between the ages of three and five, I saw mysterious blobs of patterned color every morning when I awoke. Those blobs looked solid but I was unable to touch them and they disappeared by entering the wall next to my bed. I mention those events because I now believe them to have been paranormal in nature and they lay a base for the next three short stories.
It seems to me, you see, some of my early childhood memories, like the one above, tell me that I had certain sensitivities. The next three stories support that notion and demonstrate how parents and society in general can force a child to abandon their natural abilities to perceive beyond the norm. I don’t blame my parents for their part in this but it is a fact that after the next three events, to my knowledge, I didn’t have another paranormal experience until my thirties.
To my younger readers, I suggest you hold onto your hats because we are now going way back in time to when I was six-years-old. To be specific, 1949. Yes, believe it or not, someone who lived in the mid twentieth century can still be alive–at this writing in 2012 anyway.
Little Doug with his faithful dog, BB gun and Bavarian hat--in front of his house in Germany
In early 1949, my dad was sent to Germany as part of the occupation forces stationed there after World War II. Once he got situated in his new job and found a house, he sent for my mother and me. The house he finally found was HUGE—three stories and a basement. It was fenced all around and had an electronic door that could only be unlocked for guests by a switch near our front door. It turned out that a former Nazi owned the place and we rented from him.
The following three events are things that happened to me shortly after our arrival:
Noises in the Night
My bedroom was right next to my parents’ bedroom on the second floor. Both rooms were connected by a door my folks often left partially open before going to bed. That first night at the house, I climbed into my new bed, early as usual. My parents left a small light on in their room so I wouldn’t be scared until it was time for them to retire as well.
I wasn’t frightened at all but I just couldn’t sleep. When my parents finally went to bed they turned out all the lights which made my room pitch dark. That was fine for a few minutes until I started hearing something in my room. It clearly sounded as if someone was walking around. There were rustlings, footsteps and the floorboards creaked. My parents heard none of this.
I called out to both my mom and dad, assuming it had to be one of them nearby but no such luck. From their room, they told me I was imagining things and to go to sleep.
That’s when I started getting scared. When all that walking around continued, I screamed for my parents. Here began a long period of time with me hearing those same sounds, my parents turning on lights and assuring me in person that no one else was in the house. Even so, I literally became terrified. I cried and screamed so much, my dad eventually came in and laid down the law. No more crying and screaming. Period. Understandable I say now looking back but it sure seemed unsympathetic at the time.
The only way I was finally able to shut the sounds out and get to sleep was to cover my head with sheets, a blanket and a pillow. I never heard those sounds again during the entire three years of our stay.
The Little City
Something else happened in my room soon after the event above, however, that once more scared the crap out me. As usual, I went to bed before my parents did. I was lying there in the semi darkness when I had the strongest urge to look over the side of my bed. I just knew something would be there and I was right.
As soon as I looked, an entire daytime scene had spread itself across my floor. I was looking down at a little city far below me. To this day, I even recall the tile roofing on some of those buildings. Totally startled and literally afraid of falling from such a great height, I screamed bloody murder.
My parents came running up from the first floor. I don’t remember how long it took them to calm me down so I could sleep but it was a while. Never had another vision of any kind in that house.
My Dad’s Death
This was a dream event, one that was so clear and so frightening, it scared me to think about it for years afterward.
I was sitting by the edge of a very large indoor swimming pool. No one was there but me. Kind of fun having a whole pool to myself, I thought, and then I turned around. There, lying on his back with his eyes wide-open, was my father. He stared not at me but at the ceiling high above us. Suddenly, this weird tone began building all around me until it seemed to fill ever fiber of my being with terror. At that moment I realized my father was dead.
Of course I woke up screaming. Once again, my poor parents jumped out of bed to calm me down. Only when I saw my dad in person did I accept the fact that he was still alive. They convinced me it just an odd dream and nothing to be concerned about. But for a couple of years after that, I wondered if my dream meant my father would soon die.
Conclusions
First of all, that house was very old. I don’t doubt it contained something, some sort of residual energy and/or entities that activated my natural sensitivities. On my first night there, I think I must have immediately picked up on whatever existed there. In that light, my parents were probably in the right by forcing me to shut off my ability to connect with such things. Otherwise, I might have driven myself crazy with fear. Besides, they certainly were not prepared to help me understand it all.
Hmmm. Actually, we had a break-in a year or two after that. Some entered through our kitchen on the first floor and stole a bunch of thing. We all slept right through it. Maybe those noised I heard on that first night were from future events, or not.
Thankfully my father lived a lot longer than I thought he would as a child. Even so, he did die relatively early in life though at age 57 in 1975. His final hour came at the old Orlando Naval Hospital, which was near a lake in those days. The pool from my dream? I wonder. Dad’s death, however, resulted in several paranormal events that forced my wife Barbara and me to change how we viewed life. In turn, those events led to the book we published with Prentice Hall in 1984 titled, An Explosion of Being: An American Family’s Journey into the Psychic.
My parents and me in Spain, high above the Mediterranean Sea
My little city. The only thing I can say about that is this. Later on during my stay in Germany, my parents took me traveling with them to several other European countries. Many of the small towns I saw looked very similar to my little city near the bed, tiled roofs and all—as seen from ground level, however.
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