Visits from Uncle Truman
(Submitted by Nancy W.) We frequently have weekend guests, and we joke about Uncle Truman (notreally my uncle) who built the house. His relatives come to visit "Uncle Truman's house," so I call him Uncle Truman also. We have a photo of him asa young man. I even talk to him. I have never seen or heard him. Butstrange things do seem to happen. Nothing sinister. He reportedly had a sense ofhumor. All the relatives who have visited have spoken very kindly of him. One weekend, when entertaining an unusually large group in the old house, I tookalong extra cooking utensils. At the end of the weekend, I thought I took everything home. But when Iwent to make the Thanksgiving turkey gravy, my gravy making spoon was missing. Iknew it would be at the old house. So I went to get it the next day and couldnot find it. Three more times before Christmas, I went to look for it, even takingeverything out of the utensil drawer. No luck. In May, during our first picnicof the season, I looked into the drawer again. There was the missing spoon, right on top. Also in May that year, I took an antique dealer to the house to look at anoak buffet I wanted to trade for a walnut marble-topped dresser. We entered thekitchen door and walked through the house to the front hall where the buffetsat. Arriving in the hall, we discovered the front door sitting wide open.The old key which is always left in the lock was missing. We have never found the key.The other unusual thing was that the roll top desk, which had been accidentally lockedsix months earlier (and we have no key) was open; the top was rolled back.Neither the lock nor the wood was damaged in any way. The sheriff's deputy who responded to our call to investigate a break-in could not find any sign of forced entry tothe house or the desk. While examining the desk, he looked at me and said,"Do you have a ghost?" A friend recently lived in the house for a year. During her tenure, I broughtback Truman's photo which had been lent to some of his relatives for almost a year. After I returned the photo and hung it back on thewall, the bedside lamp in my friend's bedroom kept turning itself on and off.After I mentioned returning the photo, she started telling Uncle Truman to cutit out; she was tired and needed to go to bed. The light would then go off andon one more time. Then she could go to bed. Now whenever anything seems out of place or unusual, we blame it on UncleTruman. And another Uncle Truman story... Tonight I arrived at the old house and unlocked the side door. But I couldn'tget in because the second refrigerator's freezer door was open enough to preventthe exterior door from opening. I finally got the doors to cooperate. Almosteverything in the freezer was thawed but still cool. Some things in back stillhad ice. The refrigerator was not running. The circuit breaker was tripped. Ireset it three times and it tripped again three times. Finally I left it andjust cleaned up themess. But why would the door open because the circuit breaker was tripped? Musthave been Uncle Truman alerting me to the problem. Wish he waited until justbefore my arrival to open the door.
I live in a newhouse on my farm while working on the old one. We do use the old one in the summervery often, since it is on the water. It is fully furnished and has a complete kitchen.
