Hi, I'm new here but I've decided to share my own experiences because I've enjoyed many of the stories here. In fact, a few even evoked the real feelings I had as a child when the events I'm about to relate actually happened.

I'd like to preface this account by stating that as long as I can remember I've been drawn to the occult, probably stirred by my grandmother's first person accounts of her own strange experiences as a child in rural Poland and other allegedly true stories I'd heard from family and friends.

My brothers and I loved to scare each other silly -- they grew up to become very solid citizens and I grew up to write horror movies. (Please don't ask which -- you may have seen them on cable or even on a movie screen if you live in a big city -- I only mention it as an interesting aside.)

That said, the following story is 100% unconditionally true. I have had several paranormal experiences during my life, and no skeptic or "amazing" Randi will ever convince me otherwise. I've seen things... I've heard things... I've even smelled things. I've been there.

And so...

I grew up in a very urban working class part of Philadelphia called Port Richmond. Mostly brick rowhouses, with narrow European-style streets. A fairly old part of the city.

When I was very young I experienced waking nightmares -- bizarre green and bluish neon colored hag faces floating near my bed, with mocking smiles on their faces. Once I even saw one staring down at me through a basement window -- I was definitely awake with lights on that time -- visiting my mother as she laundered in the basement. She saw nothing -- and the position of the window made a prank next to impossible.

As time went by there were weird loud bangings on the wall -- my father attributed them to normal physical settling of the building or heater knockings, which seemed logical enough.

I often sensed disturbing presences in the house, and occasionally things like keys would disappear inexplicably, maddeningly, for hours, then turn up again atop dressers or in other highly visible places where I'd already searched. These things happened often when I was home alone (and virtually trapped because I didn't want to leave without my keys!)

In retrospect, I don't believe my brothers or parents experienced any of this, other than the banging noises.

By the age of fourteen I was a committed night person, always the last to bed. One June night, with no school the next day, I stayed up late and was downstairs around midnight watching The Tonight Show.

During a commercial break I hurried into the kitchen and filled a large glass with juice, which I deposited on top of my mother's opened ironing board (with five boys and no maid, she often left it up and ready) before dashing upstairs for a pee.

Returning, I was halfway down the stairs when I saw the juice glass tumble over quite sharply, as if knocked by an invisible hand. I paused for half-a-heartbeat, then rationalized that the fabric cover of the ironing board had probably absorbed moisture or coolness or something and had expanded -- somehow upending the heavy glass.

I hurried down to clean up the spill.

That done, I noticed my pet dog Killer (no joke -- he was part pit bull, which was not quite the notorious breed in the late 60s that it is today -- but he had all the traits) showing interest toward the kitchen.

Figuring he too needed a pee, I walked into the kitchen and opened the back door for him. Expecting him to hurry out like he normally would, I was surprised to hear him growling instead.

When I turned to look, he was hunched in the doorway from the living room, his hackles raised in his fiercest display, his teeth bared like a wolf's. But what rattled me the most were his eyes. They were yellow and shiny with fear -- and were rivetted on the spot right next to me. He was growling at empty air! And growling as if he were challenging Satan himself!

Like a flash I ran past him but he passed me on the staircase going up. At the top of the stairs we both paused, caught our breath, looked at each other and then downstairs.

Now the spilled juice glass seemed a bit more significant.

After gathering my courage I ran downstairs and locked up. Thank God we had lights that I could shut off from upstairs, or I would undoubtedly have gotten in trouble for leaving them on all night.

I was in bed early for me that night, and Killer slept at my feet.

I've had several ghostly experiences in my life since then, in various places, including impossible-to-explain cigar smoke in a tiny apartment where an old man had spent his final years and the unmistakable crying of a cat in a house where a dead cat once lived, but the unseen visitor I shared with Killer that night was without a doubt the scariest. (I've grown braver since then, as well.)

Years later my youngest brother, the last of five to remain at home, killed himself in the same house, and my parents moved shortly afterward.

I often wonder if anything strange is happening there now. I also wonder about the history of the house... and if the oppressive presences I'd felt as a child may have contributed to my brother's premature demise. His death came without warning, and he was truly the cream of our family, on a major scholarship to U of P.

Believe it or not, the above story is true and unembellished. You can make of it what you may.

In closing, however, I have to agree wholeheartedly with the message poster who stated that he finds those skeptics who believe in organized religion to be the biggest hypocrites of all. Especially if they believe that the Bible is God's literal word -- because it is clumsy, contradictory, and far less morally enlightening than the ancient books of India or China -- societies where more of the common citizens get along better, with far less physical resources to appease them -- could it be because of their spiritual base? If America is truly a Christian (or Judeo-Christian) country, why is it so damned violent? By the fruits of their labor?