Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Anybody there?



Ran across this old favorite the other day at the store -- it seems stock increases just in time for the holiday(s).

I had a Ouija board when I was little, which I loved and thought was just the greatest (mine did not glow in the dark - which seems to be the newer incarnation - but was all black and brownish and appropriately mysterious looking). I received it as a gift from my parents when I was in elementary school, so I never had the inclination to be scared of it or even think twice about it, really. It was just something fun and kind of silly, the idea of talking to ghosts was exciting, along the same lines as attempting to stay awake on Christmas Eve to catch Santa in the act. I have a clear memory of hauling the board into school when I was about 9 or 10 years old to try to get my friends to use it during snack time or indoor recess. That was around the same time I conducted "Bloody Mary" seances in the school's bathroom (we always chickened out before seeing her face).

My Dad recently told me, "I got one for Christmas when I was young -- everybody my age had one back then." Hm. In the 1920’s the Ouija board was so popular that many of the large newspapers ran weekly columns on how to use the boards. Ouija boards were extremely popular parlor games and outsold Monopoly in 1967. It's fascinating to me that hardly anyone seems to have one anymore, when for over 100 years they were so popular and widely used. Mine is still around, in the basement of my childhood home. I'd be a bit reluctant to use it today, though, unfortunately. I'm afraid my grown-up beliefs in more sinister things would yield different results than I was met with when I was a child.

3 comments:

kater said...

I'm scared of these. You are shocked, I know.

I never had one, too scared, but once when we stayed in a vacation house on Montauk they had an old one in a closet somewhere that we tried to use. We got too scared though and hid it somewhere and tried to forget about it while watching the original Clash of the Titans.

Kim said...

i wasnt scared when i was little - back then i didnt know that ghosts could be dangerous or bad. i had no idea about evil, etc., and the fact that my mind is no longer as innocent is the reason i'd be reluctant to use one today.

if i did use one now, even if nothing bad really came of it, i would interpret every little noise in my house differently, be afraid to fall asleep, start imagining things, etc. basically i think it would make me paranoid and i'd start inventing silly things in my head like, "oh god, what was that noise? i shouldn't have used the ouija board, i've let a ghost in!" haha

amy said...

have you heard of this? http://www.playdeadnyc.com/
wha ha ha ha!

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