Let’s delve into the fascinating realm of spiritual encounters and see the significant difference between being frightened by an unknown entity and being graced with an ancestor’s presence. The following shared narratives illustrate how awe-inspiring this latter type of spectral interaction can be:
“Here’s an experience I’d like to share. Take from it what you will, but it made me a believer.
When our granddaughter was about four years old, we spent a long weekend holiday on Manitoulin Island with her, in the area my wife had been exploring online, researching her family history.
We found the graveyard from her notes, so we assumed it would be easy to find her ancestors’ names on their markers. But after walking through row upon row of sites, my wife was disappointed that she couldn’t locate them.
When she returned to the car where our granddaughter and I were waiting, she explained why she still held the flowers she’d brought instead of laying them at the gravesite as planned. Our little granddaughter could see she was disappointed and eagerly offered to help her look as we had told her that the flowers were to honour her ancestors’ memory.
I teased her that she hadn’t learned how to read yet, so she couldn’t find the names. She thought about that and smiled but assured us she would know. So my wife started to guide her towards an area near the car, so she could feel she was helping her, as she always loved to do. But she stopped walking with her in that direction, looked over her shoulder to another section, and then nodded. My wife had already walked through those grounds and hadn’t seen their marker, but a few were so faded they were challenging to make out now — even if one could read.
“Over there,” our granddaughter pointed, quickly walking in that direction.
My wife and I gave each other bemused looks, but we followed her as she made a beeline to an old tombstone some distance away. The engraving was faded, but when we knelt down to her level and examined it more closely, we realized it was the correct gravesite with the names my wife had been seeking. We were both so stunned!
My granddaughter proudly beamed with delight but was not surprised when I told her she had found it.
“How did you do that?!” I asked with utter amazement.
“She told me,” was her simple reply. That slightly gave me chills, but I was more astonished than unnerved.
“Who told you?” I asked.
“The lady. Can we give her the flowers now?”
My wife was still holding them, so she passed the bouquet to our granddaughter to lay the tribute to “the lady” who was her many-times-great-grandmother. We then all returned to the car.
“But what about the boy?” she asked as we prepared to leave, though we hadn’t mentioned a boy to her at all.
The ancestors’ markers were spread out amongst many other graves. Finding that first site the way she had was remarkable, even just by chance. It seemed impossible she could randomly do it again, though.
She stood still as though carefully listening to something and then headed back to the first gravesite she had found, where the flowers had been placed. Of course, we assumed it had just been an incredible but one-time fluke.
But she wasn’t done. Taking two flowers out of the bouquet, she then quickly walked with them, several rows away, directly to another tombstone my wife had also unsuccessfully tried to find. She gently laid the flowers against the ancient, moss-covered marker and told us “the lady” wanted her to leave some flowers for the boy too. It was the gravesite of a great-great-uncle who tragically died very young. Still, there was no way she could have known any of that, and certainly not where his gravesite was located. And yet she clearly did know because “the lady” was with her that day to guide her.”
The main distinction between being haunted by a ghost and lovingly guided by an ancestor’s spirit lies in each encounter’s underlying intentions and energies. Ghostly hauntings seem tied to unresolved emotions, traumatic events, or negative attachments, while interactions with ancestral spirits usually carry a loving and supportive essence. Understanding these differences can help process the experiences with wonderment instead of fear, as shown in the following anecdote as well:
“I was once surprised to receive an email from an unknown fourth cousin who found me on a genealogy site. We discovered that our great-great-grandfathers were brothers, and we exchanged old family photos and stories.
She told me my great-great-uncle was a sewing machine salesman in the late 1800s. The brothers reunited on Manitoulin Island one summer when he was working there, and my great-great-grandfather made the long journey from another part of the province to see him.
The brothers’ Island meet-up was an unexpected turning point in my ancestors’ lives when my great-great-grandfather met his brother’s landlord’s daughter, my great-great-grandmother, married her, and remained there for the rest of his life. I found this information especially interesting because, for some time, I had been considering relocating to the Island myself.
There was no further contact with that fourth cousin again after that correspondence, but I started to have a recurring dream about being in an old house a few months later. It was completely empty except for an ornate antique sewing machine in a small room off the kitchen. The dream was always the same with me walking through this empty house and waking up after I noticed the sewing machine. I rarely dream or recall them. But these recurring ones have remained indelible in my memory. I assumed they were somehow triggered by that brief mention of the ancestor’s job as a sewing machine salesman because I had no other connection or interest in sewing. But it seemed apparent in those dreams that the object represented something else, with much more significance.
So, a few years later, I had just bought a home on the Island and happened to pass an antique store in another town one day. I wasn’t in the market for antiques and had a lot to do, but I still felt compelled to stop in to browse.
It was stocked with beautiful old items, but after quickly scanning the inventory, I left empty-handed and headed back toward my car to carry on with my errands. But suddenly, I felt the strangest sensation in my abdomen that might be difficult to describe. It didn’t hurt, but it felt like a rope was tied around my midsection, pulling me back into the antique store. I felt my legs almost running to keep up with the force of that pull until I was back inside and standing in front of a display at the back of the store that I hadn’t noticed before.
Partially hidden behind other items was a beautiful antique sewing machine. I stood there frozen for a few seconds because I was still shocked by that pulling sensation. That recurring dream came immediately to mind because this machine was identical to the one I kept dreaming about seeing in that old empty house.
I asked the shop owner if she could tell me more about the sewing machine’s history. She told me it had been acquired quite a while ago in an estate sale from a home that had een in the same family for generations until the last owner’s death, and then the place was sold. I never knew the distant relatives who lived there. Still, I was familiar with my great-great-grandparents’ house from old pictures and stories. So when she mentioned the house’s location and specific unique features, it was confirmed for me that it was definitely their house she was describing, and that definitely was the sewing machine that came from there that I kept seeing in that recurring dream.
I know coincidences can happen, and no one was a bigger skeptic than myself before all of this unfolded. But I didn’t need more “coincidences” to hit me over the head as I stood in the antique shop staring at that sewing machine. I bought it and brought it home with me, where it apparently belongs now. It’s sitting here on a display shelf — not just an elegant antique from a bygone era, but a symbol of the beginning of my great-great-grandparents’ legacy.”
Do ancestral spirits watch over and guide us? Many cultures worldwide feel they do, and it brings great comfort and reassurance. If our ancestors are still with us somehow, then our past is forever intertwined with our present and future, and the bond with those who came before us is endless.
Do you also have a mystical tale to tell? Whether you’ve experienced a haunting, a mysterious cryptid sighting, or a brush with the inexplicable, share it with Canadian author Dorah L. Williams at dorahlwilliams@gmail.com
Your story, too, could be featured in an upcoming column of Mystical Manitoulin!
