Banshees and Ghost Tales

My grandfather passed away in 1984, and along with his passing were the tales he used to tell us.

Where I grew up in Alabama there was a woods behind our house.  Thick with trees and a small dark swamp I often thought it was a spooky place when I was young.  My grandfather often spoke of a woman with long, stringy white hair and long fingernails.  She was stooped over and if ever we encountered her, certain doom would befall us.  If she screamed and we heard no sound, death was our destiny.

While this was certainly a frightening story for us as kids, he had other stories of the supernatural that he swore to be true.  One such tale was about the time when he was a young boy.  He was walking home before dusk when he saw a friend of his running down the dirt road.  He called out to his friend, but his friend ignored him, crossed between the barbwire fence and ran across the field to get home.  He found out the next day that his friend had died (drowning, I think) not long before he saw his friend on the dirt road.  A ghost?  He believed so.

As a child you never realize the importance of the tales your grandparents tell, until you're older and often too late to ask them.  I wish I could sit and listen to him tell those tales now.  It's no wonder why I have a vivid imagination.