The Man in the Checkered Pants

Today's post is inspired by one of my favorite bloggers, Sharon of Mom Generations, and her post yesterday called, I ain't afraid of no ghosts! At the end of her post, she asks her readers if they have ever had a ghostly experience. Which reminded me of the following story...

Once upon a time, when I was just a wee nine year old, I had an experience my whole family still teases me about today. My three siblings and I were home with my dad while my mom was out running errands. We lived in a split level house, and when you sat in the family room in the basement, you could see up the stairs and into the living room above. I was sitting on the couch downstairs watching TV when I saw a movement on the stairs out of the corner of my eye. When I looked over, I clearly saw a man climbing the upper level of the stairs. He continued to the top, and went on into the living room. I was terrified to see a man I didn't know in the house, and I ran to get my dad. I was so completely insistent on what I had seen, my dad asked me for a description of what he had looked like. The most overwhelming feature I could report on were the funny pants he had been wearing, which looked like the checkered pants that men sometimes wore in the 60s. My dad went off to check the house to check for an intruder, but he found nothing.

I never saw him again, and my family decided I was crazy. The man in the checkered pants has come to be one of those family stories everyone loves to laugh about. As I was growing up, if something got misplaced, we said the man in the checkered pants took it. If something strange happened-you guessed it! It was the man in the checkered pants who was responsible.

But you know what? I KNOW I saw that man. To this day, I am 100% positive I saw a man walk up the stairs. I can recall exactly what he looked like. Nobody in my family will ever believe me, but I saw what I saw.

Do I believe in ghosts? Maybe. I'm not sure. But I know I saw something strange that day that I won't forget. And I also know I can hear my sister snorting with laughter as she reads this post! =)