The first blog of the year...and it's already February!

Yes, I measured snowfall with a bottle of Wild Turkey. Call me creative. :-)
 Besides, it's handy to have around for medicinal purposes...of course.

Yep. It's February and I am blogging for the first time in 2013.

 I am not the resolution type of person...I never have been. Sure, I'd like to lose weight, be a better wife and mom, find more haunted locations, blog more than I do, improve my work writing habits, spend more time discovering the roots of my family tree and solve world peace, but where do the hours fly to? If I could do ANYTHING this year it would be to figure out how to get more hours out of the day.

Snow days in the years of my childhood meant sitting around watching TV, reading a good book or sled riding. I LOVED ice skating when I was in my teens and couldn't wait to hit the local ice pond at the park. The snow days of the last few years seem to revolve around getting more work done....cleaning....catching up on more work and if I am not working...I am THINKING about work. Aye, yi, yi! I thought as you got older you were supposed to slow down a bit?

Today was another snow day off from school for my son, Mason. There were 3 snow days last week and just yesterday I told my husband and son that I would love to go sled riding. We have about 10 inches of snow on the ground and everything is pristine, white and crisp. Did I go sledding? No. What did I do? I came into the office on a Sunday, worked a bit on the next book, organized my office a little and signed a few boxes of books for the next book event.

 Sigh....I looked out the window today at home and saw a huge hill calling my name while I wondered where my sleds were at.

Fog and snow on the hill

 

Even though we have had massive amounts of snow this year, the cats seem to enjoy it. We have 5 outdoor cats and they all weather well. Please don't think they stay outside in the horrid temperature's. Perry has a lovely 8 car garage with a cat door. They have it made!

 

Petey

 

I am looking forward to spring time this year as I never have before. The warmth of the breeze and the promise of warmer days, more sunshine and no more bone chilling nights with air so cold your nostrils stick together! It cannot get here fast enough.

 

                               The deer seem to not mind the snow

 

 

With spring arriving I look at my haunted calendar for 2013. I cannot wait till my first overnight ghost hunt of the year! April 20th will find me haunting the halls of the West Virginia Pen in Moundsville. I cannot wait to see old familiar friends, the great staff at the Pen and my home sweet haunt!

 

The West Virginia Pen cover shot from my book

"The Haunted History of the West Virginia Penitentiary"

 

Today, the sky is gray and there is hardly any sunshine. One day this week, I am hoping to go find my sled and perhaps steal a few hours away from the work schedule. I hope to dig my heels into the snowy slope and perhaps fly as fast as I can on that plastic saucer sled that keeps calling my name. I hope you get time to steal a few hours as well and perhaps do something fun. Snow Angels anyone??

 

 

 

 

March already?

It's March?

Gosh.

I just got done packing away the last of my Christmas wreaths last week.

Well, not really but has time flown by or what? May be that time went by so quickly as I had my little head buried in my new little book.

The new book

Me at the "haunted" office with the first of the books rolling in. Happy day!

It published December 31st 2011, and just in time for me to celebrate New Years Eve! Actually, it's not THAT little. 618 pages and a weight of 2.2 pounds make it's a tad bit bigger than my "Birds of West Virginia"  manual. Seriously though...it was a labor of love. What is it with me and old prisons? My mom is starting to worry!

That would be me at the Pen in the "alamo" section of North Hall.

With all the hubub about 2012, polar shifts, planets aligning, and the Mayan calender, I think it'll be an interesting year for sure! How about you? I thought about planning an End of the World party on Friday December 21st and thought twice about it. Hey, why tempt fate?


So March is here and with it the arrival of spring is sure thing. Outdoor chores will start back up and oh....nice weather arrives and beckons me to explore some haunts and old cemeteries. Not that I don't mind checking out old buildings and cemeteries in sub zero weather but these bones are getting, dare I say it, old? If I can't have heated truck seats and a thermos of hot coffee, I may actually think twice about heading out anymore. HA!

Well, it felt good to stretch the typing fingers a bit today. Everyone keeps pestering me to blog more and I promise I will try harder!

I've been a bit out of commission with bronchitis this past week and it put me behind. I'm ready to open up the widows, breathe deeply, and get outside to investigate haunted locations and spooky cemeteries. Just as long as I can sit on those heated truck seats and sip my coffee outta my favorite WV Pen travel mug. :-)

 Life is....haunted.

Now how about some suggestions for places to explore???

Prison Ghosts

The Ohio State Reformatory

Okay. I know it's an old creepy building. I know it has a dark history and that many men were murdered and felt their last breath slip away while incarcerated in this place. But what....and why would you linger is such a hell hole like this in the afterlife? Wouldn't you want to "go" somewhere pretty with green fields, birds singing and the sun shining? Why spend eternity slithering around in a dark and dreary building like a prison?

The Ohio State Reformatory

There seems to be a general consensus among prisoners that if you die in prison, your soul stays in prison. You are serving an eternal sentence with no chance of parole.

Eastern State Penitentiary

Take for instance this photograph I took of an old door at Eastern State Pen. My husband and I visted this historic prison in the summer of 2009. Roaming the halls was one thing, but stepping into a cell gave you a completely different feeling. Your body knows the difference between a "happy" place and a "not so happy" place. Stepping over the doorway and into a cell gave me an overbearing sense of dread and a mild claustrophobia-like feeling of suffocation.

 Can you even imagine what went on inside the heads of those men who were not mentally insane ? Feelings of desperation, anger, hate, resentment and fear?

Solitary confinement cell at Eastern State Pen

What a recipe for a haunting!

Eastern State Pen prisoners in the yard

And what of those prisons who executed the condemned? What kind of spirits haunt areas where men- in the name of justice- snuffed out other mens lives? The firing squads, the hangings, the electric chair and the needle. The list of the executed in America is sadly a long one. Both men and women were put to death legally. I have come across records of men...and women being burned at the stake in Colonial America. Not to mention to hundreds of illegal lynchings that took place in small town America.

Whitegate Cemetery, West Virginia

And what of the locations where the prisoners were buried? Would they be haunted as well? Would the souls of those hung and electrocuted for their crimes wander the burial ground? Whitegate cemetery in Moundsville West Virginia is a great example of a prison cemetery. Hundreds are buried here with only a simple license plate style marker. These were the bodies of men who were not claimed by their families after dying in prison...or after their execution was completed. Just a simple field, no fancy statues or marble markers...just little white plates with names and dates.

The paranormal field tends to be a subject that offers more questions than answers. Why do we haunt? Are we really stuck in the Afterlife? Can we help ghosts?

One thing is for sure. Prison's are haunted. They have been...and will continue to be.

Maybe that's why I like spending so much time investigating them and writing books about the subject? Who knows? Maybe I was a prisoner or a guard in a past life?

Now THATS another Blog!