is another thirty minutes before anyone comes in, and his or her presence is announced and punctuated by the heavy door opening and slamming shut.
The stuff that we witnessed and heard is also there: the file cabinet slamming shut is heard on several devices. More chilling was the shape I caught on one of the cameras. Upstairs, in what used to be the principal’s office, a shape blocks one of the lights for a full ten seconds, and then you can see it move away to the left. It disappeared into a storage closet that has no exit and nothing comes out the entire time afterward. Of course, there are things that can be explained right away. The moaning or crying that Kennedy and I heard most assuredly was a dog howling outside. There are whines that slowly materialize into car engines. Nine times out of ten, footsteps turn out to be Stubs—that boy has the heaviest feet of any person alive; he sounds like Frankenstein rolling out for a morning jog. There is a glorious moment on one of the devices when someone—and I will not say who—is sitting in a room alone and they cut one of the raunchiest farts known to all recorded history. This was a Roman fart, a fart that could conquer territories and topple governments. It was fucking funnier than hell and was made even more hilarious because that person not only says “excuse me” to no one in particular, but they also start to giggle uncontrollably. Someone else ends up coming in the room, and they must have gotten a whiff, because you hear a quiet little “what the fuck . . . ?” and the perpetrator loses control altogether. I laughed out loud myself when I came to that bit. It made my fucking night.
My analysis for the Farrar schoolhouse is simple but complicated, to say the least. I believe something is there. But I also believe that it has nothing to do with a murder or a death. I just think this building has become a home, a safe place, for a wayward spirit. I will explain it like this: aside from the dark feeling we felt in that second-floor bathroom, none of us had the impression that something bad had happened in that building. There is something to be said about that, because many people can really tell when a location has that kind of sinister feeling—places like Dachau and Neely Plaza in Dallas have those vibes, like the violent events cause something to change in the very environment, giving it an edge and a sadness that was not there before. My team did not feel that anywhere other than that bathroom. So my opinion is that, yes, there is something there, but it could easily be a spirit who resides in the cemetery across the street and has returned to the schoolhouse because that was where it was the happiest. It could also be the spirit of the child who had something happen in that bathroom and that torment has tied it inexplicably to this building in the middle of nowhere. It could be a shadow of someone’s life, like a teacher who both attended and taught at the school and returned because so much of their life was spent treading those hallways. Who knows, really? To me, it would most likely take someone from that same time to find out exactly who or what that person is and why its soul has chosen this place to replay and relive its days. I may never know, and quite frankly it will not cause me to lose sleep. But someone has that knowledge. Who knows if that question will ever be answered to the best of our abilities?
As I sit here months later thinking about it, I am struck by several notions. That schoolhouse felt like it had a personality unto itself. The more we spent time in it, the more we got to know it and to appreciate the adventures and the experiences beheld during our stay there. I remember walking around outside by myself, getting the lay of the land and just taking it all in. The sky still had that ominous hue about it, and all the playground equipment was rusty and dark, threatening us more with tetanus than anything resembling a good time.
The stuff that we witnessed and heard is also there: the file cabinet slamming shut is heard on several devices. More chilling was the shape I caught on one of the cameras. Upstairs, in what used to be the principal’s office, a shape blocks one of the lights for a full ten seconds, and then you can see it move away to the left. It disappeared into a storage closet that has no exit and nothing comes out the entire time afterward. Of course, there are things that can be explained right away. The moaning or crying that Kennedy and I heard most assuredly was a dog howling outside. There are whines that slowly materialize into car engines. Nine times out of ten, footsteps turn out to be Stubs—that boy has the heaviest feet of any person alive; he sounds like Frankenstein rolling out for a morning jog. There is a glorious moment on one of the devices when someone—and I will not say who—is sitting in a room alone and they cut one of the raunchiest farts known to all recorded history. This was a Roman fart, a fart that could conquer territories and topple governments. It was fucking funnier than hell and was made even more hilarious because that person not only says “excuse me” to no one in particular, but they also start to giggle uncontrollably. Someone else ends up coming in the room, and they must have gotten a whiff, because you hear a quiet little “what the fuck . . . ?” and the perpetrator loses control altogether. I laughed out loud myself when I came to that bit. It made my fucking night.
My analysis for the Farrar schoolhouse is simple but complicated, to say the least. I believe something is there. But I also believe that it has nothing to do with a murder or a death. I just think this building has become a home, a safe place, for a wayward spirit. I will explain it like this: aside from the dark feeling we felt in that second-floor bathroom, none of us had the impression that something bad had happened in that building. There is something to be said about that, because many people can really tell when a location has that kind of sinister feeling—places like Dachau and Neely Plaza in Dallas have those vibes, like the violent events cause something to change in the very environment, giving it an edge and a sadness that was not there before. My team did not feel that anywhere other than that bathroom. So my opinion is that, yes, there is something there, but it could easily be a spirit who resides in the cemetery across the street and has returned to the schoolhouse because that was where it was the happiest. It could also be the spirit of the child who had something happen in that bathroom and that torment has tied it inexplicably to this building in the middle of nowhere. It could be a shadow of someone’s life, like a teacher who both attended and taught at the school and returned because so much of their life was spent treading those hallways. Who knows, really? To me, it would most likely take someone from that same time to find out exactly who or what that person is and why its soul has chosen this place to replay and relive its days. I may never know, and quite frankly it will not cause me to lose sleep. But someone has that knowledge. Who knows if that question will ever be answered to the best of our abilities?
As I sit here months later thinking about it, I am struck by several notions. That schoolhouse felt like it had a personality unto itself. The more we spent time in it, the more we got to know it and to appreciate the adventures and the experiences beheld during our stay there. I remember walking around outside by myself, getting the lay of the land and just taking it all in. The sky still had that ominous hue about it, and all the playground equipment was rusty and dark, threatening us more with tetanus than anything resembling a good time.
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