An Actual, True Ghost Story

Ghosts are often portrayed as white, amorphous figures floating dramatically through the air, moaning and rattling their chains or drifting through hallways.  I can tell you with absolute certainty that this portrayal is wrong.  I know.  I’ve seen a ghost and he looked as ordinary as you and I.  Here’s how it happened…

Many years ago, when Al and I still lived in New York we had a friend named Ernie.  Ernie’s mom, Lola, whom everyone called “Shorty” was an amazing Jamaican woman; small in stature, quick of wit, and strong as any oak tree.  She was a fount of wisdom, an amazing cook, and no matter who you were you’d be wise never to cross her!  We always believed that Shorty was a Jamaican witch, and she never took any pains to contradict that idea.



(not Shorty's House)



When I first met Shorty she was in her early 60s and lived in an old, 3-story Victorian house in Worchester, Massachusetts.  Al and I would often to go up to visit her, taking along our Old English Sheepdog, Fosdick. Now, Fosdick, like all dogs of his breed, was a 95 pound bundle of shaggy energy, perhaps a bit too smart for his own good.  Al and I often had to go out of our way to remind him who the leader of the pack was and he never quite believed us.  Once in Shorty’s house though, the identity of the “Alpha” in the group was very clear to that dog!  Shorty would pat him on the head and say, “Okay now, dog – go upstairs and sit in the bathtub next to my room; it will be cooler there for you.”  Without hesitation, Fosdick would quietly obey her command to the letter and not come down again until she called him.

In order to meet the expenses of this large house, Shorty took in boarders who occupied the bedrooms on the third floor, while she and any visiting family stayed in the bedrooms on the second floor.  It was not uncommon for the front door to open frequently during the day as the boarders came and went.

Life in the Worchester house centered around the kitchen because Shorty was, if nothing else, the most amazing cook I’ve ever known.  Half the kitchen centered around a bay window and at any time of day or evening neighbors, visitors, and friends could be found sitting in the window seat there or nearby, chatting with Shorty and just…inhaling the savory aromas of the wonderful mixture of Jamaican and Cuban cuisine she’d be working on.

On this particular day it was my turn to sit in the bay window, and as the conversation went on around me my attention was caught by a man in a leather jacket and baseball cap approaching the front door.  I turned back to the conversation just as this person was reaching for the doorknob, and it was nearly half a minute later that I realized the front door had not opened, nor had the doorbell rung.  I looked back out the window, peering this way and that, not seeing where the man had gone, and Shorty noticed me doing so.

“What you doin’, daater-in-law?” she asked in her beautiful, Jamaican accent (yes, she really spoke that way!). 

“Oh,” I replied, “I saw this guy at the front door but he never knocked or rang and he didn’t come in.  I just wondered what happened to him.”

“Was ‘e wearin’ a red baseball cap an’ a leada jahket?  Kind of short, or not too tall, anyway?”

I agreed that this was an accurate description.

“Oh, never mind, den, chile,” she said, with an offhand gesture, “dat’s just de ghost.”

My eyes widened, so she cheerfully explained that she had seen this same man many times before!  He approaches the door but never knocks or rings.  Many times Shorty had hurried to open the door to see what the man wanted but when she got there, he was always gone. This man appeared as corporeal and you or I – he and I even made eye contact before I turned away but Shorty never found out what brought him to her door over and over again. 

Not long after that visit we went up to Massachusetts again, this time bringing along a friend, and she also saw the unknown visitor approach the front door…and disappear.  Shorty only nodded…she had seen this phenomenon often, and even calling out the window to him had no effect. 

Many years have passed since Shorty died, and I can’t help wondering if, after she was gone, she finally discovered the story behind the mysterious visitor to her front door.