The Family Girl Blogs (aka "The New Working Girl Blogs") Blog #6: Ghost Girl To see all of Bobbie's Family Girl Blogs, click on this link: http://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/book/28818/family-girl-blogs

It's 2:30am now as I start writing this - a dark, windy and rainy early Sunday (or is it late Saturday evening)   Appropriate, I guess, for what I am writing right now.   Yes, honey - this is a ghost story.   It's even true.   And I'm all alone right now, writing about it.

First off, people shouldn't worry about us here.   Though we are near the path of Hurricane Irene, we aren't in it.   But thank you to those who worried. ;)

What we DO have is a whole lot of rain, strong winds and a lot scary moaning and groaning.   Our house was built in the late forties, so it's full of a lot of creaking and groaning boards, doors and windows.

Moe had to leave Friday evening for her regular reunion with her friends.   A couple of them went to our house for dinner so they could ride to Baltimore together for their flight to Washington state all the way on the other side of the country.

Anyway I've been alone in the house since and Moe will only be flying back later tonight (or maybe Monday or Tuesday, depending on the weather).

Along with being lonely, my insomnia, the weather outside, and the creepy sounds in the house, I have the TV and all the bedroom lights on, and I'm watching a DVD trying to stave off my loneliness and, let's face it, being scared.

Anyway, I was gonna tell you guys about my scary story, which is appropriate, I think for a night like this.

Three days ago, I had to go to DC for an afternoon meeting with my bosses. Nothing major - just one of those meetings where the big dogs feel like slumming with us regular folk.   So I thought, while I was in the city, I might as well pass by my old apartment on 17th St. (Andy the building manager called a while ago asking if I could check my old place and see if I had anything I wanted to get or forgot, before the new tenant takes possession of the place on September 1.)

So after a boring late lunch with some of my fellow managers and the bosses in a hoity-toity restaurant on Pennsylvania Ave. called the Occidental Grille (at least the food was great and the service was top-notch: it pays to have lunch with the boss heehee), I went over to my old place.

I parked in the street coz I didn't have my old parking spot inside anymore, and went to Andy's office.

After living in the building for more than seven years, it sure felt comfortable and familiar being in the old place again.   Even the smells felt familiar and oddly comforting.

Anyway, after a short and pleasant chit-chat, Andy gave me a key to the new lock for the apartment.   He didn't offer to come with me but that was okay (he had a stroke a long while back and though he has mostly recovered from it, he prefers not to strain himself much nowadays).

Anyway, I went up, saw some familiar faces and went to my apartment.

Opening the door, I felt the place very welcoming.   I spent almost eight years here, and everything seemed so friendly and familiar despite the six months worth of stuffiness and staleness.   (no dust anywhere, though - Andy did a good job of cleaning up the place)   The place smelled a certain way, slightly musty, a bit sweet with my old potpourri scent, a hint of SwissMiss chocolate and so many other things that I never knew was there. Coming back after being away for six months, I instantly recognized the scent of, I guess, home.   Even the feel of the light in the room - it was oh, so familiar.   The place felt like a person, I guess. Someone you know and love, and once again meet after a long time being apart.

So I turned on the lights and went around, looking at and touching all the fixtures and furnishings, touching all the familiar things - the old electric oven, the faucets in the kitchenette's sink, the bathroom (I flushed the toilet once and heard the familiar gurgling), and the bedroom.

The furniture that was there when I moved in was still there, but the bedroom felt empty without my old bed in there.   I saw an old cookbook on the shelf in the kitchenette as well as a few odds and ends in the bedroom (small pieces of costume jewelry and some little trinkets In the dresser drawer, though I left the old Altoids tin with its no-doubt stale mints).

There were no curtains or drapes so the place looked very bright and sunny in the afternoon sunlight, and I had to sigh in melancholy contemplation.   This was my first apartment, the place where I became "independent," where I transitioned, where I broke up with my ex, and where I almost died in loneliness.   But this was also where I got back up again, where I picked up the pieces and where I met Moe, and where, I guess, I found myself.

Sad-happy days and long lonely-happy evenings rushed through my mind.   Indeed, it was like home.   No, it was home.

But as I was by the door, about to turn off the lights and leave the apartment, I looked though the familiar view out window that faced the street. As I was doing so, I saw the very transparent, fluffy-looking ghostly image of a blonde girl (or maybe a girl with silver hair. I'm not sure) sitting at the old second-hand study table I kept there, where Moe and I liked to sit while we read the paper or write or just look out at the sky.   I guess I say "fluffy" because she and her clothes had very light, pink and yellow and white pastel colors that made me think of pillows on my bed, or soft fluffy things.   It was more a feeling than an actually looking literally fluffy.

She was looking at me, sort of smiling, sort of sad.   In my fright, I stepped outside into the hallway and slammed the door.   

No one was in the hallway so I didn't embarrass myself.   After a few moments, the logical part of my brain kicked in and I said to myself, get a hold of yourself, girl - it's probably just your imagination.   I took a few minutes to get myself together.   As I did, I realized I couldn't leave yet because I left the key inside.   So, talking myself into believing that she was just my imagination, I slowly opened the door.

I couldn't stop myself and my eyes immediately went to the table by the window.   And there she was.   She was standing this time, still looking at me with that melancholy smile of hers, and she faded like smoke.

It wasn't even ten seconds, so in a way, I could rationalize that it was just my imagination, but the thing was, the apartment key was on the window table, and I never even got close to the table the whole time.   So I rushed to the table, grabbed the key, turned off the light and slammed the door...

Anyway, I went down to Andy's office and dropped off the key.   We had a long chat and I wanted to bring up the mystery, but in the end I didn't bring her up.   I guess I didn't want Andy to come away thinking I was some weirdo, but I tried to drop hints and try to fish for some info, or maybe he knew something, but he wasn't taking the bait, or maybe he was just playing dumb.

Anyway, his last words were, "take care of yourself.   We miss you. She'll miss you."

I didn't really pay attention to that (I didn't recall him saying it actually, and I only remembered it as I drove home).

I don't know who Andy meant by that, and what he really meant.   Truth is, though, that ghost, if she really was real, wasn't really scary.   I guess It was the shock of seeing the transparent apparition that got me.   When I think about her, in my mind, the image wasn't really scary.   Actually, she somehow seemed familiar, like someone I knew, and that she has always been in the apartment. She felt familiar and friendly.

Wonder who or what she really was, or was she just my imagination?

Gosh, it's 8am now... It's unbelievable it took me six hours to write this... I guess this had a larger impact on me than I realized...

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