Boo

When I told my Marty Sunshine (my husband) I was going to write about this, he asked if I was poking fun at Carolsue. Just for the record, I am not. I have no reason not to believe her. I am just reporting a day in the life. And yes, I realize it is cliche', but I am posting this on Halloween anyway.

Carolsue is convinced there is a ghost in Wayward's former home. I have no evidence to the contrary, nor have I had a chance to ask a neutral third party, such as Baseball Guy or Mr. H., about this. Nor do I have no way to verify her claim. In defense to Carolsue, she has been credible on all sorts of other things, so why not this one? Besides, she is much more open minded than I am on all sorts of things. So, unless I have evidence to the contrary, I will go with Carolsue's assessment.

At first, our ghost--Ms. Rose--was really getting to Carolsue. Poor Carolsue was working the basement one day. She was alone in the house, but she kept hearing footsteps on the first floor. Finally, after walking upstairs for the umpteenth time, she got nervous. Calling over the neighbor and his shotgun, they combed through the home, checking closets and other spaces looking for the intruder. Nobody was found. Five minutes after the neighbor left the footsteps started again.

There have been other strange things. A can of paint mysterious appeared in the middle of a room. And, in another instance, the lid was missing and the paint can tipped over while she was in another room--alone in the house. Just for clarification, I checked to see if there had been any earthquakes in the area recently. Nope.

Recently, Carolsue was at the home working on the floors, when she felt a hand on her back. Thinking it was Baseball Guy, she turned around to find out nobody was there. She screeched so loud Baseball Guy came rushing in from outside to her rescue, only to find Carolsue alone and totally weirded out.

Now that Carolsue is aware she isn't alone, she finds Ms. Rose ok. However, there are misunderstandings. For example, while downstairs, Carolsue called to Jon, her nephew, asking if he could come down and help her. She heard, "yes." But Jon never showed. As she explained to me, if she knew it was Ms. Rose answering, she would have hauled herself back up the stairs and hunted down Jon herself.

After some deliberation, Carolsue and I have come to the conclusion Ms. Rose isn't there to cause destruction or harm. She is just merrily living there, relieved Wayward has moved on and grateful for all the work Carolsue is doing in the property. Carolsue now interprets the hand on the back event as Ms. Rose was really thanking her for taking care of the place.

As a responsible landlord, I want to make sure I am on good terms with all the occupants of my property. I have asked Carolsue to relay a message to Ms. Rose, telling her I am very sorry about the former tenants and how they treated the home. Assuring her the new folks seem to be much more together. Hopefully that will quell any potential tenant-phantom issues.