This year, I mixed things up. And by mixed things up, I made plans, left my house and socialized while taking a 'ghost' tour in a local community.
I should rewind. A year ago I struck out and joined a local writing group. I met people. We started hanging out (focused on our laptops while slurping copious amounts of coffee). Happy/relieved/stunned to meet others with similar interests in our neck of the woods, we talked about getting out and exploring the world around us. Writer's style. Politely taking tours, going to other coffeehouses, watching everyone and noticing everything. (It's all fodder, folks.)
One of the first, if not the first, suggestion was to take the night time spooky tour over in Cassadaga. Um, yes, please! Cassadaga is a small, four corners kind of community in Central Florida, the epicenter of metaphysical Florida. It was founded in the late 1800's by a gentleman from NY who purported to be a medium. If you have an interest in psychic phenomena, Spiritualism (specifically, not just being a spiritual person) or just weird Florida, you may have heard of it. It started as a camp for people who were a part of the Spiritualist movement to devote themselves to the study and practice of communing with spirits. I'm sure I've oversimplified that, but there are better articles about the full history in other places.
For my purposes, I had visited previously only during the day. On one corner is the hotel/restaurant/bar/coffee shop that also offers psychic readings. Anyone in town will stress that it's independently owned and the psychics there are not affiliated with the rest of the town. Opposite the hotel is the bookstore/community center. Here you can find everything from books to incense, local psychics and/or mediums currently available for readings and even classes or tours. Probably the best place to start when you get there.
This visit, a small group of writers grabbed a cup of coffee each and headed out on the coldest night of December (A brisk 50-something degrees - sweatshirts and socks were necessary. It was brutal, but we did our best to be brave.) to our destination. One of us thankfully thought ahead and brought conversation starters which kept us animatedly entertained on the drive over. Conversation, boys and girls, that's how you tickle the fancy of people like me, good ole conversation.
To our surprise, parking was almost a problem. Not from all the others lined up to take the tour (we were the only ones brave enough to venture out on such a frigid night) but from folks indulging in karaoke at the hotal/bar/restaurant. We snagged the last open area along the road (in front of a line of pick up trucks, naturally) and headed over to the after-hours door at the community center for tours and meetings. Our tour guide was surprised to see us, noting that there usually isn't a turn out on the cooler nights.
We were given a brief history of the town and the basics in terms of beliefs and practices. I personally find the study of other cultures, religions, etc to be interesting (Or they can be. Because I'm a nerd. You have caught on to that, right?). Now I've seen plenty of ghost hunting shows. I tend to like a certain variety of spooky. From the safety of my perfectly normal house viewing a perfectly ordinary television. So when the guide pulled out two small flashlights and a little electric meter called an EMF or K-2 meter, I knew exactly what was coming. And I was entertained. The flashlights were turned on and then unscrewed, with the idea that spirit energy can manipulate the flashlights and turn them on and off to reveal an unseen presence. The meter has an arch of lights on the top, and as an unseen presence interacts with it or passes by it, the lights will flash on.
During the explanation of the history of the community and what might occur on our tour, one of the flashlights did turn on and off. Suddenly light flashed to my left, and then slowly the light would dim until the light faded completely. Is there a scientific explanation for that happening? Probably, but it sure is kind of fun to see it actually happen live and in person. As for the meter, it was unremarkable until one of us leaned forward to examine a photograph the guide was sharing. It lit up like a Christmas tree and then stopped. We tried to recreate it, couldn't, and told our slightly unsettled companion that she had a visitor with her. Because I'm an asshole easily amused. And also, it didn't happen to me. The spooky stuff always happens to me. But not this time. Mwahhahaha!
Our tour around an old Florida community at night was interesting. It wasn't spooky or eerie. It was comfortable - because it was cool enough that there weren't any bugs and the neighborhood cat kept the possums at bay. I kid about the possums. Maybe. (Possums? Legitimately creepy.) Either way, thanks for the company, Simba! Florida is made up of cookie cutter, zero-lot-line subdivisions. Cassadaga is the exception to that rule. Beautiful old homes of various sizes and built for various purposes line the streets. Some used to be old boarding houses for the seasonal influx of Northerners. Some used to be meeting houses. Some... well plenty of them were just houses that happened to be built so that the second floor could be used to hold seances. And for the two story variety, you'll notice (or maybe you won't, I won't judge) a strange frame on one of the upstairs windows. Others have either replaced or kept what looks like, to Northern visitors or transplants familiar with lake effect snow, a snow door. A full size door on the second floor, leading out to the roof over the front porch or, to nowhere at all. Back in the day, when a medium was inviting spirits to seances, they believed the spirit would need to literally come through a door to join them.
This is the kind of info that I take away from educational tours and pick at until I find a use for. How do you keep a group of writers entertained? Weird, random details. Totally love those.
Completely accurate representation of me, each and every time I come across a randomly interesting factoid.
We wandered the streets on our guided tour. We pet the cat. A lot. We took pictures. So many pictures. Because, we were told, you should take 3-5 pictures of whatever you're clicking away at because an orb (departed loved one, higher being, pollen - you decide) might only show up in 1 of those images you took. Like trying to catch lightening in a bottle. Or hunt fireflies. Or... where am I?
Anyway, the point of this endeavor was to take pictures into the inky black night in the hopes of capturing orbs. I'm not here to debate what they are, because as a writer it behooves me to be open to interpretation (Look for my next book series on the fictional interpretation of orbs this spring. Espresso's kicked in, apologies for the excess shenanigans. Sort of.) You (or I should say most people) cannot see orbs with the naked eye, but if they're there, they can show up on pictures. Digital or film. Again, this is something I've seen on tv, in movies or read about in books.
We stood between two trees near a lake, the location referred to as a portal, to see if we experienced any kind of sensation. It's supposed to be a high energy spot and a great place for orb pictures. Two thirds of us felt something, but the sensation varied. There were plenty of orbs that came out of those pictures as well. I didn't need to take 3-5 shots in a row, this area orbs showed up in every image. But the kind of cool thing, something that didn't happen in any other area where we caught orbs in our pictures, was that in successive pictures, the orbs moved with the person who stood in the portal.
We were also given the opportunity to enter a few of the buildings in the area, a kind of backstage tour if you will of important meeting places. Nothing jumped out to scare us. No doors or floors or stairs creaked with an air of menace. They seemed like your garden variety church or fellowship hall, that just so happened to hold seances and call forth departed family members to give messages each Sunday. All in all, a very interesting and enjoyable evening for our group.
Here's where I stand on this area of the paranormal or spiritual realm. I am skeptical by way of my father. But I am also open to the idea of just about anything being possible from him as well. There's a lot of bullshit and snake oil salesmen still out and about. There are a lot of people looking for something more to believe in. There are plenty of things that were once deemed impossible that are now so commonplace that most people forget what life was like before them. And there are plenty of things that have been disproved time and again. Whatever may or may not be out there, our tour was definitely a great way of adding to info and experiences to pull from for inspiration in the future.
Always, Nessie. Always.
I should also say that after going through all the pictures and showing them to the rest of the group, a couple interested even the most skeptical among us. There were no faces or gentile Victorian apparitions stuck in time immortalized on my simple camera. I ended up with a lot more orb pictures than I expected. But a few gave us all pause, even if just for a second. Whatever an orb might be, wherever I happen to fall on the skepticism spectrum, a night tour of Cassadaga was completely worth it.
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