It's Halloween

Psst.

Want to hear a true story?

 

I was a teenager, living in the Denver suburbs with my parents and brother, many, many years ago.  We lived in a nice little place not far from where I now work.

 

One day, my mother was out doing something - no one can remember exactly what.  My dad, brother, and I were preparing to go out on a little excursion somewhere on a Saturday afternoon.  Nothing really remarkable was happening, unless you count the fact that all of us were together and it was a nice day.  It takes many years of seasoning to learn to appreciate how nice it is to have memories like that. 

 

But I digress.

 

Well, on this particular day, all of us men were preparing to leave the house - and being just a little silly, from what I can recall.  You know, just being guys.  I believe that I had pulled some dishes out of the dishwasher - they were not hot, as the dishes had been washed some time ago, and had put some away.  I specifically remember putting a clean glass on the counter relatively close to the sink.  But we were in a hurry.  My brother ran upstairs for some reason, while my dad went to the front door.  After a moment, I joined my dad at the front door, in the hallway, which was just adjacent to the kitchen, to wait for my brother to come down.

 

During the course of one's life, I believe that a person can look back on certain events, both large and small, and say without hesitation that sometimes very, very small things can have very, very important outcomes.  Sure, big decisions, like, for instance, where do I go to college, or should I take that job are big too.  But truly, sometimes the tiniest detail can have a stunningly important impact.  And in this case, the tiny little detail that probably changed my life in some fashion was that I had left the kitchen.

 

Why?

 

Because a few moments after I left the kitchen, everyone in the house heard an enormous BANG coming from the kitchen.  It was as if someone had been shot.  My father and I recoiled in shock.  My brother ran downstairs to see what had happened, and with some trepidation we all walked into the kitchen.

 

A glass, one that I had just touched, one that I had left on the counter just seconds before, had exploded.  Not cracked, exploded.  It was as if someone had put a tiny time bomb inside the glass.  The base was mostly intact.  However, the rest of the glass had disintegrated into a million tiny, sharp pieces of glass.  We found shards of glass behind the refrigerator, in the family room 20 feet away, all over the kitchen sink.  Glass was everywhere.  Many months later, I was still finding glass by the fireplace where my family watched television. 

 

What we did not find, however, was an explanation for what actually had happened. 

 

Nor have we ever.

 

The "Story of the Exploding Glass" is legendary in my family.  What I do know is that the glass was NOT hot, it was NOT cold in my house, I did not break the glass, and no one was in the room. 

 

But I do not know what made the glass explode, although we were all thankful that we weren't in the room when it happened.

 

This I do know, however.  There was some... feeling, that we had come shockingly close to witnessing something happen that was... unnatural.  Perhaps supernatural.  My brother, father and I still feel that to this day.

 

Was it someone or something trying to send a message?

 

Was it, like we have all whispered amongst ourselves for many years, a ghost?

 

Perhaps. 

Or perhaps not.

 

 

BOO!

 

Happy Halloween.