Spooky sessions at the Writing Center
Ki Russell
Issue date: 10/24/05 Section: Culture
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During the day the study areas and free coffee don't seem indicative of anything sinister. However, many of the employees would argue there is something eerie going on.
Jenny Guthrie, who often works both early in the mornings and late in the evenings, reports hearing footsteps climbing the staircase just outside the door. But no one ever comes through the door and she never hears the footsteps descend.
When she gets up to see if someone is in the hall, Guthrie says, "There's nobody there. The hall is silent even though I heard feet on the top step a minute ago."
Guthrie is not the only Writing Center employee to report strange occurrences.
Many of the 15 tutors have experienced minor oddities during their shifts, such as the electric teapot turning itself off - despite having no setting for that purpose. Other times it has turned on after being intentionally shut off by an employee.
In tutor Rasheeda Plenty's words, though, "It isn't turning itself off. Something is turning it off, we just can't see who."
Still, all of these incidents could be explained away as the quirks of an older home.
Maybe the teapot turns on and off because an electrical issue, right? Perhaps the footsteps are just sounds of an old house settling.
But Melissa Hampton, another tutor, has a story that is a little harder to explain away. One evening last spring, after shutting off the lights to leave the Writing Center, Hampton paused at the door and glanced into the kitchen.
She doesn't know for sure why she looked in there, but Hampton was just in time to see the silverware holder on the counter float out over the floor before crashing down in the middle of the room.
The holder definitely didn't just fall from the counter, Hampton said, because it traveled out several feet before dropping. She didn't wait to see what else might happen.
"I just turned around, opened the door and walked out. Then I locked the door and got in my car and went home," said Hampton.
The Writing Center doesn't have any mysterious music or an ethereal dancing lady like the well-known Epperson House, but it definitely has its share of mysterious events.
krussell@unews.com
