Checking on New Tenants

Name:            Tiny Dancer
Email:           tinyd@idirect.com
Location:        Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Anonymous:       
Type:            Ghost
Date:            Sunday, December 19, 1999
Time:            08:48 AM

Back in the early 80's, before my son was born, his father and I were living in a beautiful apartment near the area known as The Beaches, here in Toronto. It was actually the top floor of a house, and the kitchen area jutted out over the backyard of the house, with the bathroom right next to it, on the other side of the wall. It had been added after the house had been built, around 1945, and the landlady made a point of telling us that it may be haunted, just in case we didn't want to move in. Yeah, right, whatever, entertaining tale for the benefit of the old lady, we thought. Boy, were WE wrong!

A point you need to be made aware of here, is that I am very near-sighted and wear glasses all the time. Without them, I am blind as the proverbial bat, can't see anything beyond vague shapes and outlines. Got it? Let's continue.

In the early hours of one spring morning, after the sun had risen, I woke up to what sounded to me like the noises of someone in the washroom. No big deal, thought I, but why are the sounds so loud? What the heck are they doing in there? I don't know what compelled me to look into the kitchen area, which could be seen from our bedroom, but I did. What I saw shook me to the core. Not a half-dead ghostie, or bleeding ghouly, but a man, standing in front of our stove, making breakfast! Doesn't sound scary to you? Get this. As I had only just woken up, I didn't have my glasses on yet, and I could see this man perfectly clear, as if I *was* wearing my glasses! He was wearing work-like boots, dusty and dirty, and was dressed in a dull brown outfit, pants and a shirt. He stood there at the stove, leaning so that his face was not in my line of sight. My heart was beating like a scared rabbit, who was this man?! Why was he in my kitchen?! Was I in danger?!

After a few seconds staring at him, hoping he didn't see me and come at me with a butcher knife, I had to turn away as I fumbled around for my glasses. It was only later, when I remembered this incident, that I recalled how *he* was the only shape that was crystal clear to me, everything else was in its usual blurry condition. Anyway, I found my glasses, turned around to get a good look at him .... and he was gone.

We lived there for another year and I never saw him again. The landlady told me that before we moved in, they had never rented the apartment before, but that a man had lived in the house, alone, before the kitchen had been built. Who knows, maybe he just wanted to check out the new tenants, see if we were worthy. It seems we passed, thank goodness, and I'm sorry now that I didn't just jump up and run into the kitchen to confront him.