Simple question: Have you ever read 50 good books and...

[briarcreekguy]

I'm a life long reader. All the flat surfaces in my house are covered with books. I'm not sure how many books I currently own, but I recently gave 20+ books to a friend that is going through dialysis. I used to read a book or two a week, but I've slowed down as I've got older. Thank goodness for the Kindle and the Kindle App on my phone! Like someone already mentioned, I believe in the spirit, but I'm not sure about ghosts (though I have experienced a few weird things in my life).

 

[Okie4570]

I'm not a reader whatsoever. Pretty sure the last 2 books I've read were in Jr high/high school. Magazine articles and newspaper articles are more my length. Wife, daughter and son on the other hand, can be found daily with faces buried in their Kindles.

 

[mugsy]

Have read 50 books several times over but as to ghosts...does the Holy Ghost count? I most certainly believe in that one.

 

[dlbleak]

i have a stack of unfinished books on my nightstand. don't believe in ghosts but the boogey man skeers me.

 

[Cohiba]

Yes to the books question, heck no to the ghost question!!!



***Growing up, I was raised on a farm North of Chandler and a few miles East of Carney. My nearest neighbor was a mile from my folks house and I pretty much knew all the families(and relatives) in a 6 mile square region. I had free reign to hunt, fish, and generally roam this area.

In this area were old abandoned homesteads, cemeteries, WPA /one room school houses, and even a family cemetery next to an old deserted school house. I walked many a mile by myself with nothing but a Stevens single shot .22 rifle, some blue tick coonhounds and a helmet headlamp light. I started hunting by myself at 7-8 years old and wasn't scared of "nothin'" except my hounds treeing an angry bobcat.


There were many a night I walked alone in the middle of no-where tracking down my hounds. I did short cuts through old cemeteries, abandoned farms with a lonely old house, close by to old one room school houses.........even though one night walking close to an old school.........the old merry-go-round was slowly creeking and spinning with the few wind gusts, I still wasn't scared....It caught my attention........but I wasn't scared.

One summer night I was hunting with the hounds and a heavy storm came up on us. The one where lightning blinds you, the thunder deafens you and the rain is starting to blow sideways.

It was three miles as the crow flies back home or less than a mile to an old one room school.........the one with the family cemetery about 300 yards to the North of the school.

The school it was, so I called to the hounds and they were followed me. I was starting to get concerned that we were caught in the beginning of a tornado with no shelter.

We all made it to the old school and went inside. It was dusty and had some leaks in the roof but it was shelter to wait out the storm. I had played in this building before..but it was in daylight and with a few of my friends. We did play on the slide and swing(or try to) in the single swing......all while knowing and seeing the cemetery a few hundred yards away.

The cemetery didn't scare me, I had walked through it during the day reading the names and remembering my granddad talking about a few of the people he knew that were laid to rest there. Some of the last names were common to my school mates and probably were related some how.

Any ways.......In the middle of a storm, in an abandoned school house, and with a cemetery just North of the school........it made my 9 year old mind start to wonder and doubt myself.

I found a corner......facing the entrance door( so no one or thing could come in and surprise me)......sit down with my back to the wall and my hounds curled up next to me.


During the first 30 minutes I did question myself if there were "things that went bump in the night", if there were ghosts in the old school house, and if the dead did walk around at night. I 'm sure my eyes were as big as a full moon.......but my hounds were fast asleep, warm next to my cold and wet clothing/body.

It was then.......after those fearful 30 minutes........that I made a deal with myself. I stood up and walked to the entry door, I opened it and shined a beam of light out onto that stormy night. All I saw was trees being blown by the wind, sheets of rainfall, lightning flashes and thunder sounds that shook the ground.

It was then I made up my mind...........THERE WERE NO GHOSTS!!!!!!!!! If it was going to happen it already would have, I knew some of the people in that graveyard and the others I probably went to school with their relatives.........why would they (their ghosts) hurt me??!!

I had a .22 rifle with 10 rounds in my front pocket and three coon dogs that would tear the living daylights out of anything that tried to harm me.

I went back to that corner, laid down on that old wooden floor, and curled up next to three blue ticks.

The next morning was a soggy walk back to my house with a renewed AND current to this day..............I don't believe in ghosts.

 

[Toney]

Yep...

 

[criticalbass]

Cohiba, some of my happiest times were when I would curl up with my dad's wolfhounds. The smell of those guys is one of my favorite memories. I would often spend days like today in the dog house, which was an old box van with lots of prairie hay and Sevin dust in it.

As to books, thousands. As to ghosts, never saw one, keeping an open mind.

 

[mightymouse]

My own definition of a good book has changed throughout my life.

That's close to my own definition of a good book, which is: A good book is one that reveals something different to the reader as he changes throughout his life. In other words, a good book yields new meaning with each new reading.

 

[Dalejbrass]

yes. I've read at least 50 good books and do not believe in ghosts. Yeah.........I'm special!!??!!

 

[druryj]

Patterson, Clancy, etc are favorites.

And all the books by John Sandford. "Mad River" was one of the best in the suspense genre I've read in a long time. I have read hundreds of good books, so not believe in ghosts even s little bit, and have been told I'm quite special.


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