All paranormal experiences are unique, with no two occurrences being the same, but they all share one thing in common and that’s an encounter with the unknown. With the Halloween season wrapping up, people are storing away their ghost decorations for the year and haunted attractions are closing down. But those who have had real supernatural interactions cannot simply “store away” their ghosts. Although ghost experiences are often glamorized or dramatized for the “scare” factor in movies, they can be far from pleasant. 

Paranormal experiences can be a taboo, a topic that not many people want to talk about. A lot of these experiences can be terrifying and this was no exception for junior Abe McIntosh.

“One night as I was sleeping I woke up completely frozen,” said McIntosh. “I couldn’t move any part of my body so I squeezed my eyes shut hoping that I would be able to move when I opened them, but when I opened them back up there was a figure standing at the end of my bed and it had red eyes.”

As you can imagine an experience like this left McIntosh feeling terrified. This experience has changed his sleeping pattern and disturbed his usual night routine. 

“I was really scared and I haven’t slept in my bedroom since. I’ve actually moved by bed to a completely different room,” said McIntosh. “I’m more timid when I go to sleep now and I have to take melatonin otherwise I can’t fall asleep. I’m just afraid it’s going to happen again.”

For some, the spirit world should not be seen as something to be frightened of. Senior Kadence Burhenne agrees.

“I have had several experiences in my house but one in particular was when I was in my kitchen getting ice to fill up my water cup, and out of the corner of my eye in the hallway area, something was walking by,” said Burhenne. “It was this little girl and when I blinked she was gone. She was in a short sleeve black and white and dress and she had two braids but I couldn’t see her facial features because it happened so quickly. I think she is friendly because you think seeing something like that would scare you but I felt comforted in a way. I never felt endangered by her and when I finally saw her I was kind of excited. I always believed in that kind of stuff but it really cemented my belief that something was in my house.”

You can’t make a story about the paranormal without talking about urban legends. La Llorona, also known as the weeping woman, is a very well known urban legend throughout Mexico. The story goes that this woman met this man and they fell in love and got married. They ended up having two children together. One day this woman finds her husband with another woman and in a fit of rage she drowns her children. After realizing what she had done she drowned herself and she now haunts the towns at night crying and calling out for her children. She is known to be seen wearing a sheer white dress. 

Senior Jessica Solorio travels to Mexico often and she firmly believes that she encountered La Llorona on one of her visits. 

“I was visiting Mexico when I was in 5th grade and I decided to stop by my aunt’s house which is in a deserted part of the town,” said Solorio. “Nobody was home so I grabbed what I needed and I heard movement in the backyard so I decided to check out where the movement was coming from and when I was looking around I looked up at a tree in the backyard and there was a figure of a woman wearing a dress standing in the tree. I quickly left but when I glanced back it was no longer there. There is a popular Mexican conspiracy of a woman named La Llorona and supposedly she cries at night for her kids, but because of the dress she was wearing I believe it was her.”

Students aren’t the only ones who have paranormal experiences. Assistant Principal Jeff Novotony had a creepy experience back in college that still leaves him wondering what it was to this day. 

“I went to Hastings College and there was an old house across the street and my friends lived there. There were five guys that lived there altogether and I was friends with three of them so I went over there often to hang out,” Novotny said. “At 2:13 a.m. every night, everyone in the house would wake up at the exact same time. They also had a cat who would go to the corner of the living room and would just start freaking out and jumping up and down. We knew a guy who was really into the paranormal type of stuff, so they invited him over to do some research. At one point, he said that there was a spirit in the corner; the same corner that the cat would freak out in.”  

Paranormal experiences can be hard to talk about and even harder to explain. There will always be those who are skeptical of the supernatural, but that doesn’t take away from those who have their stories of things that go bump in the night.