Introduction
December 21st, Winter Solstice is the darkest day of the year. In Northern Europe, it’s considered the most haunted time of year, even more so than Halloween, as it’s associated with the death of the sun and light.
Since so many Christmas customs stem from Winter Solstice traditions, it’s not surprising that Christmas Eve was thought to be the time that ghosts could walk the earth and finish unsettled business, e.g. Marley in Charles Dickens' “A Christmas Carol.”
In keeping with the yuletide song “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year,” “there’ll be scary ghost stories and tales of the glories of Christmases long, long ago,” we bring you the 2021 Cavendish Christmas Ghost Story.
2021 Cavendish Christmas Eve Ghost Story
In last year’s “A Cavendish Christmas Ghost Story,” the children spirits had upped the game of scaring the adult ghosts at the annual Christmas Eve party at the Golden Stage Inn. Talk about “tales of the glories of Christmases long ago,” that was one night no one will forget-the living or the dead.
In fact, it was the first order of business at the Cavendish Council of Apparitions (CCA) January meeting. It was agreed that never again was there to be such a scaring and a plan was needed to avoid a repeat of last year’s fiasco. It should be noted that only the adult ghosts thought it was a fiasco, as the children were quite pleased with themselves and talked about it all year long saying, “best Christmas ever!”. Sometimes adults, even in spirit form, just have no sense of humor.
Owl, an Abenaki Indian in life, decided that to restore some equanimity to the Christmas festivities, a fresh start was needed.
She recommended that the annual gathering be moved to an unoccupied brick house on Main St. in Cavendish village. Each of the children were to be accompanied by an adult, and to further reduce their mischief making, the young spirits were informed in July they had six months to come up with a new game for the Christmas Eve festivities. Maybe having a required task would reduce the amount of mayhem they could cause.
Truth be told, the children happily ignored their Christmas Eve task and instead focused on all the fun to be had in the late summer and fall
So many opportunities to spook the living as they sat around fire pits and bonfires. What could be better than teasing the fire into creating marshmallow blazes or tickling the backs of necks? The latter generally led to s’mores being tossed to the ground as people would hop around slapping themselves, exclaiming, “what’s on my neck?”
They particularly liked the young campers who told scary stories while shinning a flashlight on their faces. Causing lights to flicker and creating creepy noises, strange shadows and nasty smells were just part of the arsenal of the “tent devils,” as a crew of young male ghosts called themselves.
Halloween was almost as good as Christmas for trying new ways to make their presence known. The ghost children were particularly pleased to do odd and assorted things to the kids on “spooky paths” or “trunk or treaters.”
Actually, they thought “trunk or treat” was a poor excuse for trick or treating. Consequently, it’s not surprising that car trunks suddenly closed for no apparent reason. Candy and treat bags went missing, with parents swearing that yes they had packed enough, so where could they have gone? Before long, they’d be blaming their children, only to find, when returning home, the bags were on the kitchen table. The ghost children always made sure they were on hand to watch the adults find the missing candy in the most obvious of places.
One year they pestered Jack Frost for icy cold chills. That actually backfired as Jack tended to go overboard. Parents weren’t keen on taking kids trick-or-treating in snow, so the eerie creepy factor was down that year.
Thanksgiving ushered in the holidays and kids being kids-in ghost form or otherwise- they hadn’t done any work on a game. They hadn’t even begun to think about it until just a few days before the party. And they only thought about it because Owl asked them what they had in mind for a game.
The children met at their preferred haunting grounds, Crows’ Bakery in Proctorsville. What could they do that was different?
“Remember when we were alive when we’d play “light as a feather, stiff as a board?” said Tom.
“Yeah, but we can all levitate now so what’s the fun in that?” various kids commented.
One by one they mentioned the various scary games they played when they were alive-Ouji board; Triple Mirror; Hide and Seek, Blind Man’s Buff. One of the newest of the kid spirits, Ned, quietly commented, “I use to love playing “Pin the Tail on the Donkey.” The other kids laughed at him.
Their laughter was cut short, when two male spirits approached them. “We couldn’t help but over hear your comments,” the oldest one said. “My daughter loved playing that game,” he continued. His partner interjected with a quick comment, “We may have an idea for you.”
The children’s mouths hung open, as the spirit making the last comment had no head. More important than any game, the kids wanted to know what had happened to it
Believe it or not there is such a thing as “spirit etiquette.” If a fellow ghost had limbs missing, or other unsightly disfigurements, unless you were playing “3 Guesses- When and How I died,” you needed to keep your thoughts to yourself. And if you are wondering why it was okay to guess when playing a game but not part of a general conversation, ghosts that participated in the game where willing to share that information. Those not participating probably had a reason for not doing so.
In short, the young ghosts knew to say nothing, but continued staring anyway.
With a few suggestions from the elder ghosts, the youngsters were happy to figure out the fine details of the game and to collect the various items they needed.
Christmas Eve night turned out to be unseasonably warm by Vermont standards-just above freezing with no wind, snow or even a little sleet.
Without the humans present, it wasn’t quite as much fun entering the house and if the kids weren’t excited about their game, they might have considered missing it all together. However, with Owl overseeing the events, each child came in with an adult spirit. Once inside, they abandoned the adults saying, “we need to finish our game.”
Gathering in a side room off the main living area, they began preparing the game.
“Did you figure out the heart Tom?” asked Ned. “Lily got the rest of the stuff,” he continued.
“Yup. You can always count on George Thomson to make Gummy Jello for the kids. Easy peasy. I had Emily make the phone ring, so when he went to answer it, I snagged a bit of the red Jello and corn syrup mixture.”
Tom had “levitated” (he actually stole it) a heart mold from a science teacher this past Halloween. It appealed to him and he thought he might find it handy for future scaring.
Keep in mind that when things go missing, only to end up in the most unusual spots, it’s often the work of a spirit who just wanted to “borrow” an item for a bit. Since they don’t really have a permanent residence, storage can be an issue. Basically they have their own form of “catch and release.”
A bit of tubing, balloons and a little bit of water rounded out Tom’s device. In fact the beating heart was so realistic it made the other kids shudder.
Spirits aren’t thrilled to see the “innards of the humans,” so if this was giving the kids the heebie jeebies, it was definitely going to cause quite a stir among the adults.
No to be deterred, they continued to work in setting up. Once finished, they joined the adults who had started playing the first of the Christmas Eve games.
Owl wisely suggested leaving the kids game to last. That way if it went haywire, they still would have a night of fun.
Unfortunately, the kids were impatient and it wasn’t long before they were asking, “when is it our turn?” which began to irritate some of the adults. Finally they decided to let the kids go next, though it meant the absolutely favorite ghost game of “3 Guesses- When and How I died” would be last.
The kids ushered the adults into their “game room,” and were thrilled to hear the gasps and gags as the senior ghosts saw the beating heart. “Oh no,” cried one ghost, while another said “I think I’m going to be sick. “ Oh it was definitely having the desired effect.
Jane, one of the older of the child spirits, floated above the audience, calling for everyone to simmer down so she could explain the game. It took a bit of convincing but finally the adults became silent and Jane provided instructions.
“This evening’s game is ‘Drive the stake of holly through the heart.’ It’s in honor of Scrooge who declared his views on Christmas-before he meets the three spirits- Every idiot who goes about with a 'Merry Christmas' on his lips should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart.”
She then motioned to the younger spirits, who proceeded to hand each of their elders a piece of holly that had a pointy end. It was now becoming obvious to some of the adults that this was going to be an unusual form of “Pin the Tail on the Donkey.” The thought of getting anywhere close to the heart was quite disturbing to the adults.
The participants were told to line up backwards. Ghosts don’t have eyes in the back of their head, though their ability to move in all directions in a split second gives one the impression that they do. A blindfold wasn’t going to work, so the decision was to have them walk backwards to the beating heart. Facing the audience, they lifted an arm over their head in an attempt to drive the holly through the heart.
Since no adult wanted to be near, let alone touch the heart, the holly stakes were ending up hitting the board the heart was attached to and falling to the floor.
If spirits could produce fluids, the place would have been awash in sweat from terrified adults, tears of laughter from the kids and even some who wet themselves from laughter or fear. It was everything the kids could have hoped for and then some.
The line of “stake holders” was dwindling until it was down to one ghost, who in life had more than a heavy dose of machismo. “I’m not afraid of any beating heart,” he said as he turned around to face the heart, plunging the holly straight in.
Unfortunately, the combination of force and the sharpness of the stake punctured the tubing just as Tom was pumping. Consequently, red goo spurted everywhere. Kids and adults alike screamed and went running from the room.
Owl had been amused, and truthfully a bit impressed by the kids ingenuity. At the same time, she didn’t want another Christmas Eve party to dissolve in chaos, and besides she, more than any of the ghosts, loved guessing how people met their final end. She was quite curious about the headless spirit and his traveling companion who had come to the festivities at the children’s request.
“Everyone needs to calm down,” Owl commanded. “There is nothing to fear. It’s just some red sugar water. It can’t hurt you. Besides, we have one last game to play-“3 Guesses- When and How I died!”
She then invited the children’s guests to participate in the game. And since everyone wanted to know about the headless man, order was restored and the game began.
The headless spirit went first and soon questions were coming from all over the room.
Most centered on some form of execution, such as Guillotine. “I’m not French!” said the headless man. Try as they might, the questions were always responded to with an emphatic “no!”
If any of them had cared to observe the older spirit with the headless man, they would have noticed how uncomfortable he was with the questioning.
After all spirits had exhausted their three guesses, it was time for the headless spirit to fess up.
“My name is Phineas Gage,” he said. “Many of you know how I was in Cavendish working on the railroad in 1848. In a blasting accident, a tamping rod went through my head. Through the care of my friend here,” and he pointed to the older spirit, “Dr. John Harlow patched me up and I lived for almost 12 more years.”
“I saw those pictures of you,” piped up Tom. “You had a hole in your skull but you still had a head. What happened to it?”
“Ah,” continued Gage. “While in life, Dr. Harlow tended to my head, but in death, he wanted it to prove a point.”
He then described how Harlow, learning about his death, had convinced Gage’s mother to have his body exhumed, the head (skull) removed and shipped to him along with the tamping rod.
By now Dr. Harlow was visibly squirming, “I didn’t know how these things worked,” he started to say.
“It’s okay John,” Gage interrupted. “I know that and truthfully I loved sitting in on the medical society conference where you had the last word. As the youngsters would say, “neener-neener!” Finally your skeptics were proven wrong once and for all. Besides, I have little use for a head.”
What a curious comment the spirits thought, but before they could ask him why he didn’t need a head, they heard the cock crow. It didn’t matter what a spirit was doing, when the cock crowed it signaled day light and required the immediate departure, or ceasing of current hauntings.
While many of the spirits were curious why Gage didn’t need his head, those questions would have to remain unanswered. Pushing the envelope of spirit propriety, Tom did ask the two visitors if they would return next Christmas. While Harlow nodded in the affirmative, Gage shrugged his shoulders.
History
The first people of Cavendish: There is archaeological evidence at Jackson Gore, Ludlow, VT that dates back 11,000 years, shortly after the ice age ended. Judging from the tools uncovered, these hunter/gatherers were highly skilled craftsmen who traveled far and included trading with other groups, as a high percentage of the stone used for the tools came from Maine. Cavendish would have had Indians traveling through the area via the Black River and/or what became known as the Crown Point Rd. The Paleo-Indians would have fished and hunted game depending on the time of year, and may have spent days or weeks here depending on whether food was plentiful. Learn more about Cavendish’s first people by clicking here.
Phineas Gage/Dr.
Harlow: Gage’s accident
in 1848 ushered in the modern understanding of the brain. Consequently, his
story is in many psychology and neurology text books, to say nothing of
continuing stories in the popular press.
Learn more about Gage’s accident, recovery, and Harlow’s reporting of
the case by clicking here. Note that the annual Phineas Gage walk
and talk takes place every September on the Sunday closest to the accident. This year it will be Sept. 11.
George Thomson: Former Cavendish Town Elementary School (CTES) principal, George’s Jello Jigglers for potluck suppers was legendary.
How to Construct a beating heart: Just in case anyone would like to replicate Tom's beating heart.
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