Happy Halloween...

We come to it at last...

The great night of the dead...



It is in this day that I play...

In this day that I swim in the social inversions...and the many perversions...

of my fellow man.



That is not to say that I conduct myself improperly,

Or that my celebration of social ironies ventures into the criminal...

No, but I do enjoy getting closer to the darkness than normal.



In the spirit of this great night I will share a story.

It is a true tale- as I remember it- of a shadow...

Whispering in the dark...



What feels like many moons ago, when I was a boy, there was a house.

There are many houses in New Mexico but this one was unique to me.

It was unique because it scared me...it scared me from the moment I saw it as my parents drove over the hill along the long dirt roads on the mountainous outskirts of Santa Fe.



New Mexico is large...we have counties that are bigger than states...this emptiness can be a vacuum...it can be lonely. This house was lonely...

A night with no moon could mean a night so dark you would have difficulty making your own outline.



My Aunt, Uncle and cousin lived there. We would often go and visit- but even during the daytime if I found myself alone the hair on the back of my neck would begin to stand...there was something not at rest in this house.



The house sat on a couple of acres of land and consisted of the house, a barn, and stables all connected in one structure.



One night my sister, my cousin, and I decided to spend the night in the stables. There was a large open area in the center of the stables, surrounded by the pens for the horses. It was dark, and there was no moon.



Even with our flash lights the dark seemed to hover...as if trying to push the light from existence. We set up a tent and began the usual discussions of children in their early adolescence. Above the laughter there was a sound...ever so subtle at first...but became undeniable. Someone was in the stables with us.



We could hear the footsteps on the thin layer of hay on the ground. At first we thought it was our Uncle because he was a bit of a prankster, but it was not him.



The steps began to circle our tent. Slow at first, then faster and faster...until it was running...then running so fast the it would take two or three steps to completely go around us. I unzipped the front of the tent a couple of inches but did not see even a shadow moving...but I heard it.



We put up our lights on the side of the tent but did not get a shadow cast...



Finally my cousin screamed at the top of her lungs causing the running noise to stop...instantly...

A person would have to take a couple of steps to slow down from that kind of pace...but it just stopped...and all was silence...a loud silence that suggested you weren't alone.



After a few seconds...it just walked away. Not long after that my relatives moved, and I never saw the house again.