Revel in the Dark, Hope for the Light, and Don't Kill the Witch
An urban legend about Marsh Road and a dead teenager has been circulating for almost 40 years. Stories of bizarre events have been afforded time to flourish, but not enough to alleviate the eeriness of the stretch of road along an unlit ravine. Its quintessential components- murder, love, silence- keeps people wondering and making yearly drives along Marsh Road to see if what they’ve heard is true. The appearance of the girl in her boyfriend’s letterman jacket is unsubstantiated. So is the one of her crying on the road. Urban legends like this spark the ongoing curiosity about the event, the dead, the visions, and their juxtaposition to reality more during times of year when we entertain ourselves with the eerie, dark, and mystical.
Haunted sanitarium slumber party, anyone?
The murder of a 14-year-old girl by her 16-year-old boyfriend that occurred on November 3, 1981 was interpreted in The River’s Edge starring a young Keanu Reeves. Some still see her, others seek her.
Dearly Departed
Our obsession with the paranormal, otherworldly, and unexplainable is certainly not new and we have come to embrace it with annual traditions.
Honoring those who have passed. Portrait of My Dead Brother, Salvador Dali, 1963
Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, has been celebrated for at least three thousand years to pay respect to the dead as they returned to Earth for one night. The Aztecs were among the first to start this Fall tradition of welcoming returning spirits with marigold, incense, and candlelit altars. Celebrators, dolls, and murals are still colorfully displayed as skulls and skeletons. The once month-long observance has been shortened to three nights and re-scheduled to coincide with Halloween. Like Halloween, it was regarded as a festival for Pagans.
Sometime in the 10th century, the Celtic people began to commemorate Saints during Samhain and intended to get rid of the old and welcome the new at the end of summer. It was a time that coincided with the beginning of winter and revered as the return of ghosts, spirits, and other otherworldly creatures to trick Earthlings in the human realm. Bon fires parried Satan and his compeers. Now called Halloween, we celebrate the eve of All Hallows’ Day by dressing up as political figures, watching scary movies, and expecting and eating candy. Our modern festivities have evolved from two customary acts done to protect oneself over the course of festivities: 1) the original trick-or-treating consisted of exchanging food with neighbors by knocking on the doors of their homes; 2) traditional costumes were worn to fool visiting ghosts in order to escape their tricks. Like Dia de los Muertos, some celebrants also light candle vigils at graves.
The Evolution of All Hallows’ Eve: The Sanderson Sisters are upset with children dressing as goblins and treating Halloween as amok, amok, amok. (Hocus Pocus 1993)
I Always Feel Like Somebody’s Watching Me
What do we do when the reality of celebrating death is overshadowed by hearing voices and noises, and seeing the unseeable? After several centuries of partaking in paganistic festivities and despite witnessing medical and scientific innovation, a decent share of the population believes in the paranormal. History has documented the extensive lack of scientifically evaluating cases of witches, ghosts, and goblins. Thus, the rationale of these persisting beliefs remains unclear.
Paranoia: Is it me or is someone there? Somebody’s Watching Me Rockwell 1984.
Regrettably, economic standing and education level does not necessarily equate to sound logic in dealings with the paranormal. In 1874, an assistant surgeon received backlash and was basically called an idiot for not concluding that a woman was a witch after her wealthy neighbor burned, beat, and stabbed her to death due to unsubstantiated suspicions of amulets in her stomach. Many scientists and doctors of the 1600’s in England believed in the existence of witchcraft, and, as members of The Royal Society, they persisted in discussing the importance of analyzing and classifying it. During a time when most people believed in witchcraft and devils due to the word of religion, some medical and scientific professionals were interested and believed in the otherworldly in order to explain it, treat it, and stop it.
Recent studies have shown that belief in the paranormal decreases credence in statistics, and is associated with connecting unconnected events. In fact, so-called experts may have been more biased due to their belief in the existence of witchcraft. People who believe in the paranormal are more likely to make causal relationships than those who are skeptical, which definitely does not work in the scientific realm. Choosing which samples to gather information from is also compromised due to a slanted view. Some level of irrationality and inability to fully utilize cognitive functions may allow some to hold a high regard for the unexplainable and pseudosciences.
Differing levels of perception into the paranormal also causes issues in treatment, which dates back to forever ago when doctors and scientists were called as experts in cases of “demonism”. Witch-hunters would use any excuse to torment, test, and treat people who were presumed to be witches by marks, behavior, and living situations. In 17th century Scotland, so-called witches’ marks of a brown coloring were actually moles on the scalp, hairline, eyebrow, or mouth- think Damien’s birthmark, Harry Potter’s scar, or Cindy Crawford’s mole. Ministers and lawyers accused men and women of making pacts with the devil and receiving these marks as a result. Some witch-prickers were jailed for torture and became so notorious for their inhumane treatment that laws were passed to enforce prior permission for each inspection. Only if these highly trained professionals devised a rational method of distinguishing between moles, tattoos, and Satan’s imprint. After all, a modern scientific investigation has revealed that magic might be hereditary as a dominant gene… in Harry Potter’s world.
I Ain’t Afraid Of No Ghosts
Stories of experiencing paranormal activity, some explained and others not, have been shared among friends, colleagues, psychologists, etc. A fine line is drawn between what is real and what is palpable, and Ghost Hunters may not exist without it. When a believer does not sense that line, then the near-terrifying experiences are enough to get scientists to ask “what’s up?”
Out of many debatable explanations for seeing and believing in the paranormal, science has revealed that fear of the unknown might be linked to the amygdala and dopamine. The ability to distinguish, and thus respond to real and illusory threats is partially regulated by the amygdala– known for survival, emotion, and memory. It is proposed that damage to the amygdala lessens fear, which can eschew jumping at ghostly noises, but can also inhibit fighting off legitimate attackers. In one case, researchers exposed a 44-year-old female patient with amygdala damage to typical fear factors- snakes, spiders, haunted houses, scary movies. Instead of being frightened, she found humor in the standard fright-night factors. Contrarily, perceiving an excessive amount of the scientifically unexplainable as real might highlight defined psychiatric abnormalities linked to the cognitive inability to discern reality. Paranormal beliefs and senses can be regulated by the dopaminergic system, specifically dopamine, but it can also convey that someone is schizophrenic, as there has been a link between these. So, if you're a scaredy-cat, then the good news is that your amygdala is a-ok, but you might need to ease up on the dope (-amine). The bad news is that Halloween is an annual spooktacular event and CGI technology is getting better at provoking your worst phobias.
Bunk-A-Dunk-Dunk
Oh, this hocus pocus is nothing but a bunch of bunk to level-headed STEMmers, right? Whether or not the apparition of a slain young lady appears on a seldom-used pitch-black road is not up to us to verify. Illuminating the causes of major fear and irrationality can lead to better therapeutics that would put witch-prickers to shame.