Rain and Ghosts

This article was originally published in my Substack newsletter. If you enjoyed the content and wish to receive my writings directly in your inbox, do consider subscribing :-)

I had written this piece around 3 years ago. Wordpress decided to make my blog private after forcing me to update to the latest fancy version. I am definitely not going to pay for a blog which 2 people from Alaska visit once a month. So, re-posting it here. Note that I am reposting with absolutely zero edits, so if you don’t like the structure/flow of the article and/or find grammatical errors, blame it on the old me. I would like you to think that I have evolved as a writer. Another thing which you should know about me is that I am a serial procrastinator.

Thanks for reading the gibberish above. Now, coming to the article itself, it has had the third highest engagement amongst all the articles I had written on the crappy wordpress blog i.e 1 like from the stranger living in Alaska who was trying to sell me a a coat made from a polar bear’s fur. If you are still here reading this mumbo jumbo monolog written at 2:01AM in the morning you definitely need therapy. Okay so here goes…

I remember reading an article in the Scientific Paranormal which said that the frequency of paranormal activities is at its peak during the monsoon season. It has something to do with energies and ions and stuff….

I don’t believe in ghosts, but I don’t like to take any risks either. I will make it a point to humiliate those who claim to have had any sort of ghostly experiences or those who like to indulge in ouija boards and spirit games. I will also make it a point not to pass the supposedly haunted house by myself. Not even in daylight. You see I am a very pragmatic person at heart.

To derive any kind of insight from this experience, you need to believe in two things: coincidence and ghosts. Now you can’t expect a pragmatic person to believe in either of those.

So, here goes….I was indulging myself in some horror literature. As a kid I couldn’t understand the complex subtlety of HP Lovecraft, so I had to make do The Woman in Black. I don’t remember which part was it, either the original one by Susan Hill or the Angel of death, by an author whose name I can’t recall, or care to search. You see the almonds my mother has been feeding me everyday for the last five years have done zilch to improve my memory. On the contrary, I recently find myself forgetting stuff. Names, places, objects…As for the laziness, I have always been low on enthusiasm. I don’t wake up early in the morning full of energy. I wake up at noon feeling lost and thirsty.

Anyways, coming back to the story…

It was summer vacation and I generally spent my afternoons reading. In the evening I used to go out to play badminton with a friend. He used to live a couple of kilometres away, so I would send him a message around 4:30 in the evening, asking him if he will come.

I distinctly remember the afternoon. I went out to fill a bowl of water which we kept outside our house for stray dogs. It was a typical sunny afternoon. Afterwards, I had my lunch and started with my daily reading session. Now, this happened about five years ago, so I don’t remember the exact plot of the book. There was a scene near the end of the book. It went something like this:

The protagonist and another character are digging up an old grave. It’s raining cats and dogs (just felt like using this phrase. In fiction & in parallel universes, cats and dogs can actually fall as rain. However, in this instance I am referring to actual rain). The night is barely lit. The moon is hidden behind dark clouds. Every step you take, your foot goes down a feet through a mixture of mud, dirt and water. Thunder lights up the sky for a couple of seconds at surprisingly regular intervals.

At this point, the time is around 4:30 p.m, so I pause reading and send a message to my friend, asking him coming to play today? He replies lol, look outside. I got up, went to the drawing room, pushed the curtains apart and looked outside. It’s raining heavily. The sky has turned dark like its 8 in the evening. Wind is blowing crazily. Couple of plant pots have fallen from the ledge and are broken to pieces. Wind is making our main door rock like crazy. The hanging wind chimes seem to dance and produce a melody which closely resembles Bethooven’s fifth symphony (at least to my ears).

Now, what kind of freak coincidence is this. The actual weather closely resembles the book weather. How can a perfectly sunny afternoon, turn into a crazy monsoon evening?

You cannot expect a pragmatic person to believe in freak coincidence, right? But, you can expect him to believe in Climate Change.

Turns out some of the winds from the Himalayas decided to change their route a bit.

Lesson #1? Climate change is real.

Lesson #2? Don’t go past haunted houses alone. Be pragmatic, avoid risks.