29 October 2018 | Your Stories, Your True Encounters
I wanted to submit my personal experience that I can only describe as being paranormal. I am not a guy that is quick to blame every weird experience on the paranormal, and I like to think I could debunk many “paranormal experiences”.
My personal story goes back 20+ years, to a time when I had a young family. We didn’t have a lot of money, but we did own a small house in a small city in Massachusetts. It wasn’t big, but it was ours, and we tried to fix it up what we could.
I had been wanting to build a little brick walk that would lead to my back yard. I didn’t really have the money to go buy bricks, so I had decided to go to the site where the remnants of an old factory that had burned down to the ground 40-years earlier. There were old bricks strewn all around from the walls that had collapsed during the fire. The word around town was the grounds of the old factory had become so contaminated with chemicals that they had worked with during its heyday, it would have been very costly to remediate the ground, so it was left undisturbed for years.
My son, who was around 4-years old at the time, asked to go with me to get the bricks. I said,
“You can come, but stay in the car because there is a lot of glass and nails all around, and I don’t want you to get hurt, so I want you to stay in the car while I get the bricks”.
We drove to the factory and into and old gravel driveway. I must admit, even in the light of day on a Saturday morning it had a creepy feel to the place. It was the first time I’ve been there, other than driving past this place every day.
I pulled over to an area where I thought I’d have the least chance of getting a flat tire. I told my son to sit tight, and I’ll be back in a few minutes. I wasn’t going far and was only 75’ from the car, so I was always within ear shot if he needed me. It seemed as soon as I got out of the car, I had this uncomfortable feeling, like “I’m not supposed to be here”. So, I walk my way over to some bricks on the ground and start collecting. Many were broken and there weren’t as many full bricks as I had hoped, but picked what I could. As I’m collecting bricks, I am becoming more and more uncomfortable being there. There are no houses in the area, but I kept looking around to see if anyone is there, but I see no one. It had finally gotten to the point where I had become so uncomfortable I decided to load the trunk with the bricks I had collected, and would make another trip some other time.
After loading the bricks in the car, I shut the trunk and the heavy load made the car squat in the back and I hoped I wouldn’t bottom out on the dirt drive on the way out. As I got into the car, my son turns to me and asks,
“What did that man want?”
I looked at him and said, “what man?” being, we were completely alone.
“The man that was talking to you, the man with the big-big belly” he replied.
I looked at him completely bewildered. “the man that was just talking to you!” he said in a determined way.
I asked if he could see him now. He said he wasn’t there anymore. As I’m driving out, I kept looking in my rear-view mirror, and trying to scan the area for this man with the “big-big belly” I was completely creeped out at this point, and just wanted to leave that place. The thirty-foot driveway, felt like it was a mile long. I told my son I didn’t see the man, and maybe he told me that I was trespassing on private property (which I was).
When I got home, I told my wife the very creepy story our son just told me. She just looked at me, and the story creeped her out as well. I later researched the factory, and the fire that brought it down. But there were no deaths involved. The site was left undisturbed for 10 more years, before the city came in and cleaned up the site and built a brand-new Department of Public Works facility.
During those last 10 years before the city clearing all the debris, I never returned. I had no desire to go back and try to see the man with the “big-big belly” To this day, I am absolutely certain we were alone out there that morning, at least in the physical form. My son’s persistence, and reaction about the man talking to me, left me unable explain the experience, but remember it like it was yesterday. I’ve heard, and believe, that a child’s eyes are more open to spiritual things, and tend to grow out of this stage as they get older.
I hope you enjoy my story!
Submitted by Mike
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