When Rich DiCarlo of the Derby Cultural Commission invited me up into the inner recesses of the Sterling Opera House last week to show me some evidence of what he believes are ghosts in the building, I was as excited as a little kid.
It was the first time I had been in the building since 2008, before anybody said publicly it was haunted.
Now that the famous paranormal investigators from “Ghost Hunters” are checking the place out, my question is — what exactly are ghosts?
I have photographed wisps of smoke and balls of light in reportedly haunted cemeteries, made multiple visits to haunted houses until I at last saw something tangible, and even recorded a disembodied voice, playing it back for family members who promptly got chills up their backs.
I am not so much cynical about ghosts as a little familiar with them. For me the question is, are they a form of residual human emotional energy? Are they manifestations of our own psychic energy, dependent on us to show themselves?
I know they are something. What exactly that may be is the big question.
Rich told me that in the balcony of the opera house there was a hand print of a young boy he believes haunts the building, one of more than a dozen spirits he believes call the place home.
I was anxious to see this evidence and photograph it, to say the least. So we walked up the creaky, dangerous and narrow passway to the balcony.
Truth be told, I am far more afraid of heights than I am of ghosts or anything supernatural, so as I climbed the narrow pass I reached out with the back of my hand to lean a little on some woodwork, so I would not feel so much like I was going to fall off.
It was dry, wooden, and probably a little dusty.
But after I returned to the Valley Independent Sentinel office, I noticed some writing on the back of my hand. It was typographical writing, like the kind you find on a newspaper page.
This struck me as peculiar, because we are an online news organization and barely have any printed matters in the office to touch, hold, brush against, etc., that could cause my hand to pick up an impression.
I checked my desk and saw no piece of paper that had any typeface of that style or size, that I possibly could have touched, to leave the imprint.
So as soon as I could I photographed the imprint on the back of my hand. The letters appeared to be in reverse, like a mirror image.
They spelled out the letters I‑N-G.
Also visible, but not so clear in the photo, was a childlike scrawl that seemed to be written with charcoal or black ash, but I figured that could easily have been from touching the dusty balcony.
Ing, of course, is part of the word Sterling. Sterling, as in Sterling Opera House.
I like to think of it as a message, if you will. It is a message that tells me that if there actually are ghosts in the Sterling, they are intelligent enough to know where they are, and probably, what they are doing there.
Now I want to know how they have access to a damned typesetting kit and ink.
CLICK HERE TO READ EUGENE DRISCOLL’S TAKE ON IT.
