Séances and Ouija boards

[Desdemona]

I truly don't know exactly what I believe (it's a subject I try not to delve too deeply into because of the possibilities), but I do remember about 25 years ago watching a documentary where a husband and wife team were working to stop a young girl from being tormented by the spirit she let in through an Ouija board - it was creepy. I believe it took place in England, and the spirit she contacted was a sailor from about the 18th century that had been convicted and put to death for crimes committed on children in the cities where his ship had pulled into port. He held conversations with her and physically abused her - sometimes in front of others who swore they could see the imprints of fingers on her arms where an invisible hand was squeezing and her parents said she couldn't possibly have learned the things she talked about at home or at school and the couple trying to exorcise him agreed - she had suddenly become sexually precocious and used some archaic naval terms that she couldn't have picked up on the street. The couple was successful, the sailor went back where he came from, but the little girl was never going to be the same. I remember the couple saying that it just wasn't worth the risk - playing with an Ouija board. And didn't it come up, after the book was out, that Carla Moran might have opened the door for the entity to harass her by toying with an Ouija board? I don't remember, just know I don't want to take any chances.

[SpookShowBaby]

Regardless if one is responsible and sets the proper protection, Ouija boards are not to be dabbled with!!! I don't care what your religion is, somethings are better left alone. And for those that 'see' things, there are ways of dealing with that not involving Ouija boards . . . .

[Pumpkin_Man]

It is actualy forbidden by the Church to dabble with ouije boards or participate in seiances, and IMHO for very good reason.

Yes, some people are more "in tune" to the realm of spirits then others. I am the least likely candidate to ever experience anything out of the ordinary, and I could probably play around with seiances and ouija boards until the next ice age and never have anything come of it, but I never would. I wouldn't even want one of things in my house. My niece wanted to hold a seiance at my house, and I refused to allow it.

Again, I am not trying to convert everyone here to Catholicism, but any time you open yourself to the realm of spirits, you are taking a very dangerous risk.

Mike

[theicewitch]

Regardless if one is responsible and sets the proper protection, Ouija boards are not to be dabbled with!!! I don't care what your religion is, somethings are better left alone. And for those that 'see' things, there are ways of dealing with that not involving Ouija boards . . . .

I do not deal with things I see via an ouija board. This is a topic that is best left to each persons discretion and research. We all have our beliefs and experiences.

[Andybev01]

Thats an awesome pic!

Thanks, I made it.

I should have slowed it down a little so you can tell it spells something, but hey, I know it spells my name.

[Haunt Master]

An old friend of mine long time ago, he told me in Arizona in Tucson, he has played that ouija board game with 3 other friends while drinking beers. After they finished playing that game board, somebody banged the door so hard, he meant REALLY LOUD knocking on the door... he and his friends were scared to open the door, so he thought he was going to try and open the door... when he opened the door and the strong storm air blew on him to knock him down, then his friends ran to help him and picked him up. He said he was all right. He looked around outside and see nothing out there. He refused to play that board again, ever!

[Ghoul of the Graves]

One of my friends named Freddie and some of my other friends did a Ouija board at his house and he has been seeing a little girl that nobody else can see following him ever since.
I wasn't there but I do believe him. His house is also haunted.

[Midnite Shadow]

This old thread was an excellent read...I too have had some experiences with the Ouija board and at the beginning it was fun and a game...it did not end that way unfortunately. It was kind of scary and mind blowing...I doubt I would ever do it again...it just seems like something that is better left alone...

[Andybev01]

It's one of those 'forbidden fruit' scenarios.

You really are curious but not too eager for demonic possession.

[Midnite Shadow]

Yes...that's a big negatory. I like my soul where it is...

[MacPhantom]

Back when I was eleven or twelve, my brothers and I used to hang with a group of neighborhood kids. The area where we lived used to be know as "Alice's Pitch-in", because supposedly decades ago it was all farmland owned by a woman named Alice, who would have a big party once a year, where everyone "pitched in" and brought something. Of course, my older brother, M, was always a creative fella, and he came up with a new story. Alice was a witch, who had a giant fire pit in her back yard, and after neighborhood pets and small children went missing, the locals tracked the disappearances to Alice's fire pit, where she had "pitched them in" and burned them. Honestly, I always preferred M's story.

Our neighbors who lived in the house behind us had a big, fancy, custom built tree house in a wooded area. It was really just a small patch of trees, about an acre or so, but we thought of it as "the woods". There were trails running through it (made by the neighborhood kids' foot traffic), and we liked to play flashlight tag there in the summer.

One summer night, we were all hanging out by the tree house, and my older brother got the idea that we should try out the Ouija board in the woods. We took the board up into the tree house. There was me, my older brother M, my younger brother B, Michael (who was B's age) and his sister Lindsey (a year older than me), Heidi (Lindsey's age) and her brother Nick (a year younger than me).

Now according to tradition, or legend, or the back of the Parker Brothers box, the board is most effective at contacting the dead when it is used by one male and one female, preferably unrelated and of similar ages (gee, I wonder why Ouija boards are so popular at parties?? ). It was decided that Heidi and I would be the ones with our fingers on the planchette. M, as the oldest present (and most imaginative) would ask the questions.

When I was twelve years old, I didn't yet call myself an atheist, mostly because I'd never given much thought one way or another to questions of religion or afterlife. If someone had asked me then if I believe in God, I probably would have said "Not really". But I was somewhat more open to the idea that ghosts or spirits might exist, and when you're sitting in a dark and spooky tree house at night, lit only with flashlights, in the middle of a wooded area, you can't help but think that anything could be possible.

I remember that Heidi and I sat across from each other, put our fingers on the planchette, and for a minute or two, the tree house was silent save for the sound of breathing. Then M began asking questions; "Is there anyone with us?" "Are there any spirits present?"... those kinds of things. At first there was nothing. You are supposed to have your fingers resting gently on the planchette, just barely touching it, and I know that's how my fingers were. It was dark, and I couldn't see very well, but I could see that Heidi's fingers were also relaxed, and didn't seem to be putting any pressure on the device. M continued to pose questions, and nothing continued happening. I don't remember any of the specific questions asked that night, and I don't remember exactly how long M had been asking with no result, but I specifically remember glancing up at Heidi, at the exact same time she glanced at me, and then the very slightest twitch of a smile touched the corner of her lips, and a twinkle, perhaps a stray flashlight beam, crossed her eyes. And suddenly, the planchette began to move! At first, it was a slow, creeping movement, drifting up the board to point to "YES", and I remember hearing Nick, Lindsey, Michael, and B start to giggle. I remember M looking at me with a nervous smile, and asking me if I was moving it. He asked Heidi the same, and though we both said "No", I secretly suspected that Heidi may have been doing it, because it certainly seemed to move as though some purposeful force were behind it.

The planchette drifted back to center, and M asked again "Is there a spirit here?" This time, the planchette moved swiftly to "YES", and the other four stopped laughing. I was becoming more and more convinced that it was Heidi having a laugh, but when I glanced up, her face was very serious. M began asking more specific questions, and the planchette revealed that the "spirit" had died in 1786, had been a soldier, and had been in his forties.

After several minutes, I glanced around the tree house, and could see that Michael and B were nervous, but that Lindsey and Nick, while having a good time, weren't really buying it. I couldn't tell if M was genuinely intrigued, or just having fun being in on the gag, but he certainly was acting like a believer. For my own part, I was believing less and less, because it felt to me like Heidi was moving it, and I even wondered if I myself was adding a bit of propulsion without being entirely aware of it. Besides that, the story that was emerging of the dead soldier seemed increasingly fantastical.

Finally, M thanked the "spirit", and gave it leave to return from whence it came. The planchette stopped moving, and Heidi and I dropped our hands, exchanging a very brief smile in the near total darkness. M asked us each again if we had moved it, imploring me to "swear to God I wasn't doing it", and we both replied in the negative. As far as we were concerned, something unexplained, if not unexplainable, had happened in that tree house one summer night, and none of us who were there will ever really know for sure if we talked with the dead in the woods of Alice's Pitch-in.

[Andybev01]

That was thoroughly enjoyable Mac.

'M' and 'B'?...positively Poe-esque.

[Ciuin]

Cute again.

I made one (a Ouija board) when I was little out of a cereal box and some crayons, and I used a lens from my sisters glasses as the planchette. I pretended to contact our dead cousin in front of my siblings and they told on me. It was fun.

[MacPhantom]

'M' and 'B'?...positively Poe-esque.

I figure that the other kids we hung out with over fifteen years ago won't care if I use their names. As for my bros, I'm sure a dedicated stalker could track down their real names easily enough. I just don't want to link them to me more than necessary. Don't want to ruin their reputations.

[Midnite Shadow]

That was a great read Mac...sounds like most people have that same 'experience' their first time around. I still haven't been able to place my experiences into a coherent story but it did a number on my psyche as young adolescent. It was powerful, exciting, scary and something I felt I better leave alone...