Living in a haunted house has become second nature to Tim McMahon of Geelong, Australia, although he admits that sometimes the resident spirits still surprise him at times.
Tim said his family moved into the house in May of 1989, when he was 8 years old and for the first three months everything seemed fine.
“Then some time in August in broad daylight, Amelia appeared to me for the first time,” he said.
Tim explained that he used to just call this ghost a ‘spook’ but later decided that might not be appropriate, so he gave her a name. He added that when he first laid eyes on her, she appeared very real.
“When I first saw her, she looked like a living person. She wasn’t transparent or anything like that. In her first appearance, Amelia would have been about five feet, five inches in height. She had light brown hair and wore a dress that looked like it was made around the early 1900′s. She also looked to be aged in her early to mid-’20s.”
Tim admitted that the experience was frightening.
“I think the only reason I was afraid of her was because I didn’t know who she was. I became even more frightened when she suddenly disappeared.”
As if that was not enough to rattle a child, Tim soon discovered that Amelia was not the only resident spirit.
“Not long after I met the other ghost – a male, who looked like he was in his ’40s and about six feet in height. He always appears wearing a fancy striped suit and he has a long, thick mustache.”
This ghost shook Tim up even more.
“I remember how terrified I was of him as a child,” he said. “How he used to stand at the end of my bed. He would then lean over the bed, so he was almost face to face with me and I would just freeze petrified. As I got older, I would hide under the blankets and hope he’d go away.”
Aside from appearing to Tim, the resident ghosts had a few tricks up their proverbial sleeves as well.
“For example, I was given an electronic piano keyboard for my 13th birthday. Shortly afterward during the night, I was trying to get to sleep and the keyboard turned on by itself and played the song Beautiful Dreamer. I got up, turned on the light and the music stopped playing. I checked the keyboard and it wasn’t even turned on abercrombie outlet !”
That first night of music turned into many, he explained. “The keyboard kept playing like that every night for years, until eventually I just lost it and screamed STOP! The funny thing is, it did stop. It never did play again after that.”
Tim added that he was so freaked out that he sold the keyboard soon afterward.
In another incident, Tim explained that he had about twenty hardcover books lying on his chest of drawers.
“I was just about to go to sleep when I heard this loud whooshing noise and then a whole heap of objects hit the wall on the opposite side of the room from where I was lying in bed. I quickly got out of bed and then turned on the light to see all twenty books lying scattered on the floor against the wall on the opposite side of the room.”
Over the years, Tim said not all of the ghostly activities have been so unsettling.
“Amelia has also helped me out quite a lot throughout my life,” he said. “I remember always running late for the school bus and I’d find after coming back from brushing my teeth that all my clothes were set out across my bed ready for me to wear. Mum was asleep at the time. I could hear (her) snoring from the bathroom and dad was at work…”
When Tim was 18, he said the two ghostly figures appeared together.
“In 1999, I saw Amelia (and) she was not alone. The creepy male ghost was with her, although they did not appear to like each other.”
He added that their appearance seemed to have changed.
“They now were semi-transparent and glowed with a bright blue and white color to them.”
Tim had lost some of his fear and decided it might be the right time to approach them, “but as I did they began to fade away until they disappeared completely.
Today, Tim is a writer, artist and part-time student, who still lives in the same house. While the male ghost still “creeps me out,” he said Amelia does not despite her ongoing antics.
“One of the things Amelia is doing at the moment is throwing the lid of my laundry basket across the room.”
Since experiencing what he calls a “mental awakening” in 2005, Tim said he sees Amelia and her not-so-friendly sidekick all the time. As well, he said there are “weird blue orbs” in the home as well.
“In fact, I saw a lot of them just last night. They looked like tiny flashes of blue ball lightening – only thing was the orbs were all different shapes and none of them were exactly circular in shape.”
Tim said he has tried to find out more about the house that has been home to spirits for so long.
“Before my house was built, there were lots of dairy farms in the area with little swamps all over the place. A local historian once told me it is possible that a dairy farm may have stood where my house is now.”
Tim said he has found “old rotted horse and cart wheels buried in the back yard and what appears to be bits of rusted chicken wire, bones from various animals large and small all buried in roughly the same place.”
Tim explained that the swamp areas were later filled in and the dairy farms were razed in the ’30s or ’40s.
“The new estate became a government commission estate that was built in 1949… My house was rented out for many years, until it was sold to the public some time during the early 1960′s.”
From then on, he said the house changed hands many times.
“The Greene’s were the last family living in our house before we moved in… It’s strange they were only here for just over six years.”
Tim said he is what is called ‘emphatic,’ as he can easily pick up the emotions, ideas and even thoughts of others. As well, he said he has visions that often hit him without warning. He calls them “flash forwards” and said they can sometimes be frightening. However, he added that they “always come true.”
As well, he is able to bi-locate seemingly being in two places at once. To bi-locate means that the physical body is in one place, while the spirit body is somewhere else.
Martha Jette is a former newspaper and magazine publisher, now author of seven books, several focusing on paranormal topics. For more information, please visit her sites:
Paranormal Books
Totally Scared: The Complete Book On Haunted Houses
Blood Vengeance: (Cold Case #4-183) Not of this World
Boomers Write
She is also a regular columnist on paranormal topics for the Examiner.com.
If you live in southern Ontario and have a paranormal story to share, you can contact Martha at marthajette@yahoo.com.