From: “Janell Haycock” shoeclue@yahoo.com
To: obiwan@ghosts.org
Subject: Don’t know if you are still accepting ghost stories…..
Date: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 6:19 PM
I’m not quite sure if this website is even active anymore, or accepting stories, but I’ve been checking out this site for a couple of years, and I’ve finally decided one story I know of might entertain a few out there.
First note, forgive me, but this isn’t an experience that happened to me directly, although my source is credible. Stories that go through the grapevine, in my opinion, become even more skeptical so again, I’m sorry. It’s an awesome story though whether you believe it or not.
When I was growing up, my family and I used to be very close to my dad’s cousin and his own family. My dad’s cousin Gary was married to a woman named Sarah. They had two kids, boys that weren’t too much older than myself. Nearly every summer, before I had even begun to grow into my teenage years, all of us would go down to Lake Powell for a few days and hang out in the sun. My dad and Gary would have contests of who could catch more fish, who could win more money during a card game, and so on. Those were some of my fondest memories–memories of hanging out with my cousins while our parents got drunk upstairs, playing poker and the like.
When my parents got divorced, I hardly ever saw Gary, Sarah, or my cousins. It just wasn’t the same without my own family being whole. About two months ago, I was hanging out at my house with a guy that I hadn’t seen in couple of months. We
were just catching up, and it was nice to see him again. Right after he left, my cell phone rang. It was my dad.
“Sarah passed away tonight.”
Sarah has always had really bad back problems. She had had another of multiple surgeries that day. To be honest, at first I felt nothing but pure shock. I didn’t know how to feel. I once knew Sarah very well, but it had been so long since I had had a decent conversation with her that I was confused with my emotions.
Sorrow came, of course, after I reran memories of my “aunt” in my head. Technically, both her and Gary were my cousins, but them being older than me and around my own parents’ ages, I always just thought of them as an aunt and uncle. I was sorry that I hadn’t been around her more, and I was sorry for her sons, both of them now about 22 and 24. Most of all, I was sad for my uncle Gary. I don’t think I ever realized how much he loved her until I saw him at the funeral. He always seemed kind of emotionless and serious to me, and to see him crying the way he was had me bawling like a baby.
The funeral was sad, only about a week before Christmas. I could see that my uncle was having a hard time. My dad actually works for Gary so my dad is still close to him and has to see him everyday, thus keeping me updated on my uncle’s wellbeing.
One day though, my dad came home with a story. My dad related this to me while we munched on chips and salsa, an unspoken tradition that we do everyday after we get off work.
Sarah died in her bed while she was taking a nap after getting home from her “successful” surgery. Gary found her upstairs a few hours later and called the
ambulances, whom then declared her officially dead. They took her to the hospital anyway, and there my dad, his wife, and a lot of my other relatives met up with my uncle Gary and his sons, giving them their condolences and trying to comfort them in any way they could. My dad said it was one of the hardest things he has ever had to experience.
After a long night, Gary finally decided to head home, riding along with his parents since he had ridden along in the ambulance to the hospital. They made it home only to find that the front door was locked, and Gary had forgotten to take his keys with him. Telling his parents that they always left the back door open, he told them he’d go around back and let them in the front. As he moved around the side of his house and stepped inside their back gate, Gary said the most beautiful white snow he had ever seen was falling only in his back yard. And all he could do for the moment was watch it while he cried. My dad said that Gary ran into the front to grab his parents, but when they went back into the backyard, the snow wasn’t falling anymore.
I’m sorry that was so long, and that it wasn’t a typical, spooky story. I find this story extremely touching though, especially since it came from my uncle.
Whatever “logical” explanation can be thought up, I know Gary believes and likes to think that it was his wife, giving him a little bit of something special to
let him know that she loved him, and that she was okay.
Janell