I am scared shitless.

I have been reading this new diary I found and oh my gosh, the ghost stories.

First I read this and practically crapped my pants. Then she had to go using the word "bodies" a whole bunch of times in this entry and I kept looking over my shoulder every five seconds. And if that wasn't bad enough, she had to go adding these horrifically frightening pictures here just to make sure my pants were sufficiently full.

I'm scared of evil but I love the supernatural. Ouija boards - bad. Psychic mediums - good. I remember as a child actually VOMITING from fear over movies like "Carrie" and "The Exorcist". I was terrified to sleep over at friends' houses, especially the dark, old, creaky city houses many of my friends inhabited. In short, I was a wuss.

So you'd think I'd have been terrified by what happened to me when I was around 11 or 12. Strangely, I wasn't. And I, the woman whose memory is currently a giant sieve, remember every detail of the experience as if it happened ten seconds ago.

My brother had bunk beds in his room, and I would frequently sleep in the bottom bunk while he snored up in the top after a busy night of playing Warlords or Breakout on the Atari.

Once, in the middle of the night, I awoke. I'm talking that sit-straight-up-in-the-bed kind of wide awake feeling you get when you have a startling dream or hear a loud noise. But I was awakened by neither of those.

I sat up on my elbows and looked toward the doorway. My dad was leaning against the frame with his arms folded across his chest. He was just staring at me. I said, "Dad. DAD. Stop staring at us. Go away! Dad! Stop it!" He just stood there. I couldn't really see his face in the smudgy darkness but I thought he was smiling.

Attached to the headboard was a clip-on reading light. I turned it on. Light flooded the room. No one was in the doorway. My dad was asleep in his bed in the next room.

I never met my paternal grandfather. He died when my dad was eight years old. In the pictures I've seen and the tales I've heard, my dad is the spitting image of his father. My dad isn't a psychic medium junkie like I am, but he's visited a few. Every single one has told him his father stands behind him, with his hand on my dad's shoulder.

When I turned out the light to go back to sleep, I was completely calm. No heebie jeebies, no fear. I sensed that I was safe and protected.

To a kid who barfed at sleepovers, that must have been one friendly ghost.