Most people who know me know that I am the easiest person in the world to scare. I’m very jumpy. If you say something and I didn’t know you were there, I jump. If there’s a noise, I jump. If I see something I wasn’t expecting, I jump. You get the point. The only person who might be easier to scare and be more vocal about being scared is my big brother (who ran from the room, shrieking, while we tried to watch Pet Semetary).

In spite of knowing that I’m a big sissy, I love watching scary movies, reading about scary things and watching shows about ghosts. I’m obsessed with ghost stories. I love them. I love reading about them and hearing them. I like to imagine where they started. I think that today’s legends have a grain of truth somewhere in their history, but like the telephone game, it gets distorted and blown up.

I’ve never seen a ghost. I’m not entirely sure I believe they exist, though I believe other people when they say they’ve seen them (in other words, I believe they believe). I love hearing ghost stories, though. I even watch the tv shows with other people telling their ghost stories (A Haunting, Celebrity Ghost Stories, etc). And some of those shows scare me. Big time. Like, I turn off the lights and sprint upstairs before a ghost gets me. So why do I watch them? Why do we all watch them? I know I’m not alone in this, look at how many people saw the Paranormal Activity movies.

I’ve heard theories that people find comfort in ghost stories. They find the idea that spirits go on after death comforting. I personally don’t find that idea comforting, but I guess I understand the thinking behind it. Some people use ghost stories as morality type stories, like A Christmas Carol. Some people tell the stories to be scared, just for the sake of being scared. To feel that adrenaline rush, but in a safe environment.

According to the History Channel’s Web site, one of the first notable ghost stories was recorded in the first century A.D. by Pliny the Younger, a Roman author and statesman. He wrote about the ghost of an old man with a beard and chains (like Dickens) haunting about his house. Other Greeks wrote ghost stories, too.

Also according to history.com, the first poltergeist was reported in 856 A.D. in a farmhouse in Germany. Clearly, we have enjoyed hearing and telling ghost stories for a long time.

Whether we do it for comfort, for the rush or out of curiosity I guess depends on the person. But tomorrow, we’ll be dressing up in costumes, getting candy, watching scary movies and telling ghost stories. A day where we celebrate life by acknowledging death and speculate that perhaps the dead are still here, not just in our hearts and minds.

Have you ever seen a ghost? What’s your favorite ghost story? Does your town have a famous ghost?

I grew up in a small town called Montross in Virginia. Population 300 or so. There’s a road in Montross called Wild Sally Road and there was a ghost story attached to that road. Like most small town legends, there were about three versions of the ghost story. In one version, Wild Sally was an escaped slave, in another story she was a hermit who lived alone in the woods and was tormented by the townsfolk and in another version she was a high school student who died in a car crash on that road on her way to the prom. My best friend told that story the best, at the end, she would lower her voice and say, “If you’re driving down Wild Sally Road at night and you’re going too quickly, she’ll try to stop you and if you’re going to slowly, she’ll try to get in the car with you.” Of course, there’s no telling what the optimum “Wild Sally speed” would be. I would usually hear the story while we were walking through the woods off of the road named for the legend. I was always the first one to suggest that we head home : ).

So, share your stories! I’m dying to hear them.