Activity in My Apartment (November 23-24, 2019, Burlington VT) (UPDATED 12.16.19)

Initially this began with me wanting to see if someone was coming into our bedroom. We live with a roommate (who was not home at the time of the recordings), and though I doubt they would come in, they often have people over that we don't know and never run into (one of which, I am pretty sure was in the apartment at the time of the recordings). I set up my webcam to take photos based on motion detection, though I hastily downloaded a program a few minutes before I had to leave for work, so as a back up plan I set my room mic up as well.

In the recording you will notice just how loud the doors in the building are. Our bedroom door in particular falls just short of deafening. The apartment door is distinct, and all other doors in the building come off as low thuds. I found that while closing my eyes and listening to the audio I could map almost every cause of sound recorded.

The first batch of audio is from November 23rd, between 1:22 and 2:02pm.

Immediately I would like to note a couple of things; At no point did I hear anyone leave my roommates bedroom. The sounds from outside the apartment are muffled as they should be, and the sounds from inside the bedroom are clear. There is a cat in the apartment, but beyond a small thud, I don't recognize any of the sounds as her sounds.

There are a series of "clacks" that occur over ALL of the audio, beginning around the 8 minute mark. To Elizabeth and I they sound like someone hitting keys on a keyboard and of varying intensities. Sometimes one clack. Sometimes multiple.

As I went to sleep on the night of the 23rd, I noticed that my television makes small pops for a couple of minutes, maybe ten or fifteen. I assume this is an electrical discharge within the unit and could be responsible for the clacks. However, the sounds do not sound similar enough to convince me, and in the audio for November the 24th, as if to punctuate that it isn't simply discharge, the clacks last well over an hour.

In addition to the clacks are several anomalies. On the 23rd, the sound of scraping can be heard at various times within the room. My mind sees it as a coffee cup across the computer desk, that, however, is me assigning responsibility to something. I found nothing awry in the bedroom. There is also an odd digital anomaly in the right channel at one point. A small beep. Another anomaly is the incredibly faint sound of a water droplet. On the 24th, much the same continues except that partway through, the sound of the room mic being tapped occurs. This could be the room mic shifting, despite it being on a flat and stable surface for an hour prior to the tap.

The motion detecting camera, though capturing nothing valuable, is also odd. It captured us leaving the room as expected, however only one shot of Elizabeth entering the room and then nothing after. Not even Elizabeth shutting down the program. A useless or improperly installed software is my best guess. All three shots are in the video at the appropriate timestamps.

Below I have included the notes I took while listening to the audio, as well as the embedded audio via youtube.



November 23rd:

notes:

Whole recording has a low rotating hum that seems to change in frequency over time.

00:00 - Setting down mic

00:15 - We are leaving.

00:44 - Elizabeth shutting the door

00:50-01:14 - us walking down the stairs and shutting the front door.

05:35 unknown noise outside of room. something getting set on the bare floor? possibly cat. possibly unknown person in other bedroom.

06:30 unknown noise, possibly outside of apartment. small thump.

08:09 unknown noise outside room

8:18-8:20 unknown noise INSIDE room. Clacks. Similar to keyboard strikes or tacs hitting the wood floor?

09:30 Same unknown clacks INSIDE room.

10:24 Same unknown clacks.

10:39 Same clack. Louder. 

10:58 Same clack

11:09 a huff? an exhale? very quiet.

11:20 exhale again

11:50 Clacks 

12:58 Clacks

13:25 - 13:56 Car engines outside

14:06 Clack

15:14 two clacks

16:24 Clack

17:22 - 17:42 Car outside

17:38 Clack

18:54 Clack

19:37 Clack

19:43 Something being dragged along with small clacks.
  
19:56 another small drag

20:07 car in distance

20:10 Clack

21:18 Shuffling maybe outside room or apartment

22:18 Clack

23:36 anomaly in right channel. small blip.

23:51 car drives by.

24:24 - 24:40 cars driving by

25:32 low thud. possibly house front door.

25:48 door. possibly downstairs apartment. 

28:08 car noises.

28:52 car noises.

32:18 two thuds. Possibly footsteps elsewhere in building.

33:25 car noises.

33:50 anomaly in right channel. a low rumble.

35:04 - 35:09 Multiple clacks of various intensity.

35:33 something dragged. sounds light. metal? 

36:30 a small droplet sound? almost inaudible

37:03 a thud outside of room, possibly outside of apartment

37:23 unknown noise outside of apartment. Vacuum? Noise continues for a while.

37:44 footstep in room? Floor creaks under weight (Elizabeth says it is "the sound of the door downstairs" but I don't hear it)

38:08 Thud

38:29 car

38:35 Noise in apartment. Elizabeth opening door.

38:52 Elizabeth comes into bedroom. (2:02 PM)


I listened to the audio from the first night immediately after returning home from work. The clacking and scraping in the bedroom was intriguing. The best explanation I have is that the person in the other bedroom is making noises in the house, however, knowing my house, the way sound operates here, and the clarity of the recording, I find that explanation inadequate for all of the sounds.



November 24th, part one:

notes:

(note: three times in this audio I heard a sound I could not identify and when I went back to the time stamp there was no sound.)

00:00 - Getting keys and shutting bedroom door.

00:20 - Shutting apartment door.

00:41 - 00:43 Shutting house door.

01:08 - Cat

01:11 - Footsteps. Possibly in Apartment.

01:24 - Footsteps in building.

01:32 - Building door closing.

01:48 - 01:53 People walking up building stairs.

02:13 - Car noises

02:27 - Clack

02:39 - Cat

03:46 - Unknown noise. Possibly airplane? Possibly dragging in upstairs apartment?

04:21 - Clack

05:35 - Clack

06:27 - Clacks

06:36 - Clack

06:42 - notably quiet Clack

06:57 - quiet clack

07:36 - Quiet clack

07:39 - two clacks

07:45 - quiet clack

07:50 - quiet clack

08:35 - Quiet clack

08:36 - Clack

08:51 - Quiet clack

08:55 - Clack followed by quiet clack

09:31 - Clack

09:44 - Quiet clack

09:50 - Quiet clack

10:17 - Quiet Clack

10:23 - Clack

10:35 - Unknown high pitched ringing

10:38 - Quiet clack

11:03 - quiet clack

11:12 - quiet clack

11:15 - clack

11:17 - clack

11:30 - quiet clack

11:45 - tv can be heard quietly in building

11:57 - quiet clack

12:14 - clack

12:25 - quiet clack

12:34 - quiet clack

12:50 - clack

13:02 - quiet clack

13:05 - two clacks

14:06 - clack

14:21 - quiet clack

14:45 - quiet clack

15:08 - two clacks

15:25 - quiet clack

16:30 - multiple clacks (three?)

16:48 - quiet clack

16:53 - clack

17:10 - quiet clack

17:23 - Footsteps outside on porch.

17:30 - building front door opens and closes, a clicking occurs, possibly the mic moving because of vibration from front door, but why didn't it move every other time the front door opened?

17:34 - two clacks

17:44 - Unidentified noise in apartment.

17:51 - Elizabeth uses keys to open front door.

18:04 - Elizabeth enters bedroom.

The second batch of audio seems to have constant clacking, right up to a minute within Elizabeth coming home. There is audio of Elizabeth in the bedroom afterward. No clacking is heard. In fact save for Elizabeth occasionally moving around the bedroom and typing before she shuts off the mic, there are no anomalous sounds. That audio I have not uploaded because it is uneventful, though I have it saved.

Elizabeth, prior to leaving again, set up the mic one last time:

November 24th, part two:

notes:

(note: at this point in the day the television has not been on for over two hours. Any clacking caused by electrical discharge, historically speaking, should have stopped sometime in the middle of the first audio of the 24th.)

00:00 - Elizabeth takes keys and leaves bedroom.

00:13 - bedroom door shuts.

00:22 - soft noise

00:28 - chair/floorboards creaking?

00:35 - Apartment door shuts

00:37 - Creaking again

00:47 - creaking again

01:55 - car noise

02:10 - 02:20 footsteps downstairs. presumably Elizabeth leaving.

02:20 - front door of house shuts.

02:42 - indiscernible voices. possibly television in the building. 

02:52 - 03:01 - voices again.

03:24 - voices again. This goes on through the recording.

03:30 - scraping

03:43 - scraping

03:52 - scraping

03:58 - scraping

04:04 - scraping

04:12 - scraping. This now sounds like a power tool somewhere in the building.

04:18 - Clack

04:25 - clack

04:28 - scraping

04:37 - scraping

04:50 - pulsing scrape. Again, I am inclined to think power tool.

05:08 - scraping and loud clack.

05:16 - scraping

05:28 - unidentified noise

05:32 - scraping (tool, almost without doubt now. From here on out I will refer to it as "tool".)

05:55 - Tool/scraping? Here it does not sound like a power tool.

07:49 - quiet inhale

08:25 - unidentified sound

08:36 - small clack

09:14 - 09:20 - car sounds

09:26 - unidentified sound

10:24 - quiet clack

10:55 - unidentified sound. Phone notification??

11:22 - quiet clack

11:48 - creaking in building

13:17 - nearly inaudible inhale

13:32 - car noises

14:24 - 14:27 - slight breathing? again nearly inaudible.

14:31 - droplet sound and more slight breath

14:33 - car noise

15:01 - unknown noise

15:14 - creaking and more slight breath. Not to be gross, but if my roommate has someone hidden in their room, they may be crying and/or masturbating, hence the sudden breathing being picked up.

15:56 - clack

17:42 - House front door closes.

18:22 - Thump in building

18:44 - unidentified noise. Exhale? TV?

19:08 - unidentified noise

22:42 - inhale

22:50 - creak

22:56 - scrape

23:04 - TV?

24:19 - TV? Phone call in another apartment? This continues for a while.

30:16 - car noise

30:40 - two quiet anomalies in right channel. small pops.

32:21 - car noise

32:29 - tv noise continues.

32:39 - small thump

32:47 - another apartment door closing

34:18 - car

35:04 - very quiet unidentified sound. similar to droplet. 

35:49 - high pitched tone

37:09 - inhale/creaking? Hard to determine.

37:25 - car noise and slight creaking

38:53 - Clacks. Three again.

39:12 - 39:22 - slight breathing

40:14 - TV?

40:27 - car

41:15 - low thud

41:29 - car horn

41:36 - house front door opens and closes

42:08 - two small droplet sounds

42:25 - tv (continues)

44:22 - unknown sounds

44:47 - tv?

45:03 - thump

46:27 - loud clack

46:30 - footsteps in building

46:35 - front door of house shuts

46:57 - Click in apartment. Footsteps.

47:31 - door in building shuts, followed by footsteps.

48:15 - footsteps in another apartment

48:33 - tv

51:12 - tv

51:55 - Tap on mic. sounds like a tape ending, but this is a digital mic. Sounds plastic, which the mic is, but has no moving parts. I have no explanation.

54:54 - creaking in apartment.

55:17 - creaking in apartment, walking down hall. No door has opened in the apartment.

56:08 - Elizabeth opens apartment door. Walks to bedroom and opens door.

Again, I find most of this easily explainable as a person squirreled away in my roommates bedroom. Most of it. The clacking I don't really have an explanation for that I believe. I feel like the discharge is most plausible, but falls apart due to the fact that it is only a similar sound (not an exact match), and that when I notice it at night it lasts under 20 minutes, and here it lasts for a couple hours, and even takes a break while Elizabeth is home. Also of note, the tap on the mic in the third audio and the scraping in the first audio. Again, no suitable explanation that I have found yet.

Of course, the curious enthusiast in me wants to jump to entities and whatnot, but the investigative, over-analytical skeptic in me refuses to accept anything without evidence.

UPDATE 12.16.19:

Last night, somewhere between 3 and 5 am, though presumably closer to 3, I was awoken by the clacking noise. There had been no notable oddities in the apartment or room, or in my life save for a number of synchronities. I had vaguely thought of the audio recordings over the last two weeks, but in no meaningful or thorough way. I had taken note however of exactly what the electric discharge pops sounded like, and had nearly resigned myself to saying that the microphone I had set up had somehow made the discharge pops sound different in the recording, even though that has never been an issue with this microphone (Zoom H1). I had also been half-heartedly attempting to explain to myself the other noises on the audio, to no satisfying conclusion.

Elizabeth and I were asleep. Our roommate was out. I woke suddenly to the clacking. Immediately I knew it was not the discharge pops I had been listening to over the last few weeks. It was loud and quick, as if someone hastily typing some stroke of genius on a mechanical keyboard. It was brief, but enough for me to be awake fully before it stopped. Afterward, the odd water droplet sound. Next to my bed there was a half empty seltzer can. It is possible that maybe a bubble popped in the can, though a popping carbonation bubble and the water droplet sound are not the same. I laid in the dark listening for another minute or two, and then I heard our roommate and his guest come up the sidewalk, into the house, up the stairs and into the apartment. 

A short while goes by silently, ten or fifteen minutes and then the clack. Not as heavy or loud, but it happens. Three clacks. Then two water droplet sounds. Only a minute or so later the roommates door opens and the guest leaves, and leaves the house. Then silence for a while. I fell asleep.

Speaking this morning to Elizabeth about it, I noted how it was odd that it happened in the first place, but also that it only happened when there was about to be a change in environment. 

Elizabeth leans closer to the idea of it being a warning system for me, based on past experiences I have had.The reasoning being, this is a situation that gives me anxiety, so it is saying "hey, wake up, be aware that there is a change happening." I find the idea romantic, and on the surface plausible, but at this point, I have no evidence for that. The timing is most likely coincidental. The origin of the sounds however I am currently unable determine.

Brian. (Spring, 2003, Kingsbury NY)

I've written about this (although heavily masked for certain peoples privacy) years ago on my other blog. I will retell it here briefly and coldly with some dates and names slightly changed to maintain that privacy.

Kingsbury, NY is mostly farmland. Patches of trees and brush outline large and mostly empty fields.

I was living in a modular home with my then girlfriend (we will call Lynn), her parents, her sister, and her sisters boyfriend, Brian.

On the night of April 8th, 2003 Lynn and I had the house to ourselves. Her parents were out on a date night, and her sister and Brian were line dancing in Saratoga NY. We made a bed on the living room floor and watched a movie. We fell asleep and just before midnight Lynn shook me awake.

She was sweating and distraught. When I asked her what was wrong she recounted a dream she just experienced;

She woke up (in the dream) and saw Brian sitting on the couch behind us. He was all black. Like ashes, and not shadows. He looked at her and said it was okay. Then she woke up.

I assured her it was okay, and then ten minutes later the phone rang. Lynn answered it and it was her mother.

Brian and the sister had been driving back from line dancing. It was freezing rain on the interstate and their defroster wasn't working. They pulled off to the right on the interstate and Brian had stepped out of the car to scrape the windshield.

As he did a car tried to pass between them and the guardrail and hit Brian. He was thrown into the air over the car and hit the pavement. He was rushed to Albany Med.

Lynn cried and I assured her he would be okay.

We got dressed and drove to Albany med.

Brian was brain dead. He was bruised, swollen, and though alive, gone.

We wept around him for two days until they took his body off of life support and declared him.

I am skipping over personal and private details.




The activity began almost immediately, though I equate much, if not most to mourning. Grief is a monstrous emotion and wreaks havoc on sensibility, reason, logic, and even perception. However;


It began slow. Lynn, her sister, and I would sit either on the back porch or in her car facing the dark if the nights were too cold and talk. It wasn't a few days after the funeral that we began to see Brian. At first only a shape of a person in the field behind the house in the dark. The first night we were scared it was something more nefarious, a person staking out the house was an early thought. The shape stood in the field, then walked into the dark. It moved like Brian.

We brought it up to Lynn's parents, who thought as I do now that it was a trick of the brain.

This "trick of the brain" continued.The shape would be seen in the field from time to time.

A week or so later Lynn's sister came into our room crying because she had walked into the kitchen for water and Brian was standing behind the counter. She ran and when we got up to look nothing was there, of course.

Then, leaving the bathroom, I saw Brian walk from the living room into the parents bedroom. Only a glimpse, and at this point, I could easily chalk it up to me becoming wrapped up in the excitement and grief.

Lynn saw him in the house.

Her parents.

The dogs in the house began to act oddly. For example one would be in the living room and begin rolling and shaking her leg as if someone were playing with her.

Then Lynn's father felt someone grab his shoulder. When he turned around he said he saw a glimpse of Brian and then it disappeared. By the time he relayed that story it had already been a few days since it happened.

We were all seeing him.

However, I still contend that this could all be grief and hysteria.

To that point.

A couple weeks had passed and now it was the end of May.

We were all home and just going about our normal routine. A phone rang. A ring unlike the normal ring. More of a bell sound than a digital ring.

In the house there was a landline connected to two wireless handsets. One in the kitchen, one in the parents bedroom. We were unable to find the kitchen handset and so Lynn's mother went to the bedroom to get the other. She came back out confused and holding the extra handset. It was not ringing or lit up, but the ringing continued. She even went so far as to answer the handset, but of course was met with a dial tone.

Soon, Lynn's sister realized it sounded as though the ringing was coming from her bedroom and as she led the way there, we all followed, first Lynn, then me, then the parents.

The ringing was in the sister's room, buried somewhere in the closet. She pulled laundry out, boxes, everything. Eventually finding a box and opening it up and emptying its contents all over the floor. The ringing was louder.

She pulled out an old regular wired telephone, wrapped in a phone cable, unplugged, and it was ringing loudly.

She unwrapped it quickly and answered it.

She asked hello twice, her face went white.

She handed the phone to Lynn, who seemed to be listening intently but confused.

Lynn handed the phone to me, and on the other end was silence.

Not as though I were listening to an unplugged phone, but as though someone on the other end was just remaining quiet. Their was an atmosphere. Then it clicked off, as if they hung up.


There was never any more activity.

A "Dream" and Missing Time (Summer 2003, Granville, NY)

The following entry was initially written in June 2010, seven years after the event described. I have no explanation, assuming everyone involved was being honest.






In the summer of 2003 I was 19. I was staying with a girlfriend in her parents house, in a small town with no prospects. I was unhappy, but it was where she wanted to be. I was there for four months or so before my father called.



It was a normal phone call. How are you. What have you been up to. Somehow or another, I expressed that I was miserable in my current situation, and I needed to get out. He offered me a job working for him installing tile floors, and a one bedroom apartment underneath his, while I saved up enough money to move us into our own place. I took the offer, and after talking it over with Her, I moved out the next day. The deal was that she would visit me as often as possible, and a constant reassurance that we were not broken up. 



So, I moved into my one bedroom apartment in a smaller farming town, an hour away. It was a wonderful feeling to be out, alone again. Quiet. I decorated my apartment. I unboxed my shit that had been packed away for months. I played guitar at two in the morning. I watched porn and smoked in the house. I felt great. Work was hard. Cutting stone. Moving pallets of it. Washing, placing, grouting, sealing. It was hard work, but it felt wonderful. I would wake up at six in the morning, smoke a joint, go to work, work all day, come home, eat dinner, and go to bed. On days off, I would write music and lay around enjoying my life.



She and I, we had a system. I couldn’t afford a phone, and since my father lived directly above me, she would call him, and he would come to get me. She only called after six, but before ten, that way I would be home from work, and it wouldn’t be too late to have my father go downstairs to get me.



One day, after a very long day at work, in very hot weather, I came home around six, and decided to take a shower. I did, and afterward, I figured I would take a quick nap. I laid down in my bed at about 6:30. I went to sleep.



When I woke up, the clock on my dresser said it was 10:46. I got up, turned on my bedroom light, and decided to head upstairs to see what my father was up to. I went outside, knocked on his door (“It’s open!”) and walked up his stairs.



I walked into his living room, and he looked up at me and said “Hey, where’ve you been?”



“Oh, I took a nap. I was fucking beat.”



“You sure?” he asked me.



“Yeah, why?”



“Well, you got a phone call and when I went downstairs you weren’t around. I figured maybe you walked into town.”



“What? No. I was in bed,” I said.



“No, you weren’t. I checked. I even called your name a few times.”



I was a little spooked by the situation, but then realized I was about to have a fucking argument with Her. “So, she called?”



“Yeah. She called a few times after. I told her I’d have you call her as soon as I saw you.”



“Fuck,” I said.



“Come up with something good,” my father said. He still believed I went out.



I went in the other room and dialed her number. She picked up, and immediately lit into me. Where was I. Who was I with. Did I fuck someone.



I tried to explain to her that I was in my bed, asleep. She said my dad went looking for me. She could hear him call my name through the phone. I told her he was probably just too lazy to go downstairs, but he had never been before, so, even I didn’t buy that.



We argued, we made peace, I hung up, and went back downstairs, confused. I didn’t think too much of it, and decided to just go back to bed.



I turned off my lights and laid down. It took a while, but eventually I fell asleep. 



In my dream, I woke up and looked at the clock on my dresser. It read 8:05. I noticed that my bathroom door (which was in my bedroom), had light around it, as if I had I left the light on. I sat up to go turn it off, but then my body froze. I couldn’t lay back down, I couldn’t move my arms or my neck, I could only stare at the bathroom door. The light got brighter and brighter, until eventually, it filled the room, and the door all but disappeared. I was terrified. My heart was pounding, but I just couldn’t breathe, and then in my dream, I passed out.



I woke up the next morning, and I had no idea what any of it meant. I still don’t, but I believe something happened to me at 8:05 that night. I was gone.








It's been almost twenty years and I remember the dream vividly. I remember the look of confusion on my fathers face. I remember arguing with my ex. The only explanation that makes sense to me is that my father did not want to go get me for the phone call for whatever reason and lied about it. However, the confusion on his face then, and when I questioned him about it later tells me that isn't the case.

The Black Entity, 1987-2019

As is usually the case, I wish I had kept better records while I was growing up. 

Throughout my life I have been witness to many, many strange things. Most of which I am sure that the majority of people have also been through but never quite paid attention to. Missing Object Phenomenon, disembodied voices and sounds, the occasional shadow in the corner of the room. All of which seem to be fairly run of the mill "brain trickery". Except when it just can't be.

This entry will be a brief recounting of a number of those moments throughout my life. Though, as I said, I wish I had better record keeping skills when I was younger, because a lot of this entry will be very loose dating.

From my perspective (more on that in a minute), the beginning of the story is in Granville, NY, 1987. My family (Mother, Father, newborn sister) had moved into a three bedroom apartment on Morrison Avenue. I was starting pre-school. The apartment was two floors, with the three bedrooms on top. My sisters at the far end of the hall, then mine, then around the staircase and at the other end of the hall, my parents. 

I had always had nightmares and odd dreams. In fact, my earliest memories are from when I was in a crib and dreaming. Maybe a year or so old, 1984 or 1985. In that first memorable dream there was a car. A convertible (though I'm not sure I would have had any reference point for one at that age). In the car are four large male or genderless yet imposing creatures. The driver is a large bird like creature. Beak. Grimey and unhealthy looking green feathers. Behind him in the back seat is an entity I can't quite make out or remember if I ever could. In the passenger seat is a pig-like creature. Thin, though with loose and mashed skin, a snout like nose. Could even be described as dog like, I suppose, though my brain always labels it pig-like. The last in the car is a thing all black. Imposing. Featureless. The group all wanted me to get in the car. To come with them. I remember nothing else of the dream, though I have one memory (dream?) shortly after of the bird-like character in my room and looking into my crib.

A recurring theme in my dreams has long been (and continues to be) getting lost in labyrinthine versions of the houses where I live. The first occurrence of this to  my memory is the house in Granville, 1987, shortly after I first encountered the all black entity while awake.

I had climbed into bed. The light from streetlamps meandered in and my room was all fairly visible. My closet was directly in front of my bed. 

I remember hearing clothes move and I looked at my closet as the entity (whom I assume is a male) exited and stood in my room. He was the size of an adult. On the other side of the closet, a second entity came out, who was a bit smaller of frame and I felt was female. They stood in my room for a moment then came to the foot of my bed. They both took my blankets in hand and dragged them into the closet and disappeared. 

I remember being too terrified to move.

I have memories of this happening multiple times in that house. 

I do not know if I ever told anyone at the time.

(An important, and odd side note; 20 years later, the fall of 2007, my youngest son, who was five at the time, came to me frightened one night that a large all-black person had come out of his closet and stood over his bed. This also terrified me because I had absolutely never recounted what happened to me two decades before. On top of that, I recently was speaking to my mother about some of these events and she told me a story of when she was a little girl, about seven, black creatures, she called them ghosts, would float out of a hole in her bedroom wall. My mother was seven in 1967, twenty years before my encounter.)

I never saw the female again after leaving that house. Only the male. However, years later my sister took me aside at a family gathering and asked me quite concerned if I ever felt like someone was with me all the time and messing with me. She then described many things that I had also seen and felt. I playfully assume that the male took me, and the female took my sister. The theory will have to do for now.

Making a rookie mistake, I began to associate the entity with all odd occurrences in my life. Voices in an empty house. Footsteps outside of my door. My name being called from time to time. A general sense of not being alone. I attempted to name it a few times, but nothing ever stuck and I am glad for that. 

It has seemed to become active when I am either in turmoil or about to be. People have suggested it feeds on that but I don't have any evidence of that. For a long time I felt like it was looking out for me. Friends saw it in my apartments without me telling them about it. Some heard their names called. One former roommate ran from his bedroom in the middle of the night and into mine because "something was in [his] room". Later, an ex of mine would have art thrown at her from across the room. A tea kettle once flew from the kitchen and into the living room toward her. We would see doubles of each other walking through the house on a semi-regular basis. The activity was strong in that time (2009-2013ish). At one point I was on a twelve hour shift at work and got a panicked call from her because she had seen its face staring at her from upstairs. She described it as large, pale, unhealthy, and angry. This was the first time a "face" had ever been a part of the equation and I wondered if she made it up, but I knew her well enough to know she was terrified and she did not go back in the house until I came home. After, I wondered if there was more than one thing following me around. 

A cell phone went missing for three days and reappeared one afternoon on my pillow. 

A decorative "witches ball" that we had purchased from a yard sale had begun snapping and popping. 

The relationship didn't last and after that the blatant activity seemed to stop. However, my own well being quickly deteriorated, not just emotionally, but physically as well. Mold was discovered in the apartment and I attributed what I could to that. My declining health, my paranoia, my poor memory. All are symptoms of mold poisoning. 

Months later, bringing Elizabeth to my apartment for the first time, I had of course not told her the tales, she said heavily upon entering; "the air is thick here." I moved shortly after that. 

The first night (Christmas eve, 2015) in the new place I had a dream. The black entity was sitting on my couch in the new house. I came into the room and we had a discussion. I lived there. He lived with me. We would be good to each other. We would mind our own business.

Activity was at a minimum for a while after that. 

Occasional footsteps. 

Occasional voices. 

At one point I heard my son come down the stairs at night and begin using the computer. The hard clacks of mechanical keyboards. When I opened my bedroom door he, of course, wasn't there. At one point My son was home alone. When I came home he ran downstairs and asked me if I had come home just before. He had been in his room and heard me call up to him. He replied but I didn't. He heard me walk through the house (creaky old floors) and he called to me again. Then he heard the front door open and shut and I called to him again, this time, the actual me.

These sorts of events slowed in recent years, however they still make their presence known. I, apparently, sat up in bed one night after a few months of sobriety and meditation, and in "someone else's voice" told Elizabeth sternly "I'M BORED."

I don't know if I will ever sort out if all of these things are connected, and I am sure a large number of them can be explained away as "brain trickery", however, some in my experience just can't.

 

Triangle UFO (October 19th, 2016, Saratoga, NY)

This entry, though brief, is one that has sat with me heavily since it happened.

At the time Elizabeth and I were sharing a car. We were living in Glens Falls NY, and I was working in Wilton, NY (just north of Saratoga). 

My shift ended shortly after 9pm and Elizabeth picked me up. We drove to I-87 and took the Exit 15 on-ramp north, toward Glens Falls.

We spoke and I was playing with my phone. Shortly after passing the area where we had our accident a year before, we were in a lull in the conversation and Elizabeth said:

"Asa, what the fuck is that?"

She was looking up out through the windshield and at the sky.

This is my Facebook post from immediately after:

I wrote that post quickly, attempting to get all the important details recorded.

"The Northway" is the local name for that stretch of I-87, and "Just below 16" means exit 16. 

To my memory (an important factor, momentarily) the event happened like this:

Elizabeth said "Asa, what the fuck is that?". I looked up at her, then to where she was looking out the windshield.

Above us, just above the dim treeline, was a large black triangle. If I were to approximate a guess at size, I would say each side ran 250 to 300 feet, based on the approximate distance above the trees. The bottom of the triangle was faintly illuminated by greenish lights, one on each point and smaller ones (though my memory is hazy the more I think about it) along the edges. The faint glow of the lights revealed what I would describe (definitely inaccurately) as gridwork. The bottom was not smooth, but made up of parts. 

The craft then banked to the right quickly and flew quick enough away to the south east that I would nearly describe it as disappearing. 

The entire event took place over the span of less that 10 seconds.

Now, as I said, memory is an important factor here, and the more I consider this event, the hazier it becomes. I have trouble reconciling it with reality, and I often question if it ever happened. I know it did. I have a memory, though hazy. I have this Facebook post from immediately after. My mind just does not want to accept it.

Also, interesting notes regarding Elizabeth; 

While spending time with friends and retelling this story recently, Elizabeth mentioned that she never saw it. However, I watched her looking at it. I spoke with her in depth about it. We both saw it. She also expressed to me on multiple occasions how before seeing it, she was suddenly "compelled" to look up at that moment. On an "instinctual" level. However, since she has for whatever reason wiped the sighting from her memory, she now believes that she was compelled to ask me to look up, as if she was unable.