Here's a preview of a work in progress. If you like it and would like to read the next chapter, just drop me an email at achieve11@mac.com, ask me for the next chapter, and I will write it!
THE HOUSE SPIRITS CONVENTION
by Rev. Sheila Van Houten, DD, PhD
Introduction
Many world belief systems state that every dwelling has its own house spirit. In this spirited adventure, a house spirit finds himself in a Minnetonka, Minnesota mansion. He loves his surroundings but doesn't know how he got there.
After awhile, he figures out he is dead and wonders if there are any more house around. He takes a tour of the upscale lake community and finds out that there are more house spirits. In fact, he meets 12 of them from 12 different mansions in the Minnetonka area.
These 12 house spirits decide to spend a year collecting information about the lives of the residents of their respective mansions, and about the mansions themselves.
At the end of one year, the 12 house spirits hold the First Annual House-Spirits Convention where they tell each other their stories. Then, they decide to make a movie together by working through a big-name movie director in Hollywood! The director thinks the movie is his own idea when, in reality, he is the one being directed! He writes the entire script himself, then finds a producer, and the movie wins Academy Awards in 12 categories!
Expect mysteries, wisdom, solutions to vexing problems, love, and international intrigue in the pages ahead!
CHAPTER ONE: BEWILDERED BEGINNINGS
It's pretty interesting how I got to be a house spirit. I didn't really ask to be one. At least, I don't recall asking to be one. I just had a fascination with huge old houses that looked like they had character. Then one day I zipped into spirit after a fall from a ladder, and I suddenly found myself in a grand old sprawling mansion on Lake Minnetonka!
The mansion (I think of it as MY mansion) has a huge connecting square room off the main part of the house, and it overlooks the lake. It is screened in with combination windows and a red-tiled roof.
Below that room is a boat house with a 20-foot cabin cruiser inside. I spend a lot of time in the room over the boat house reclining in an old chair, gazing out at the lake, luxuriating in the lake breezes, and reveling in the stunning sunsets over the lake.
For a long time, I couldn't figure out how I ever got here. In my other life, I was a very small book publisher living in a rural, dusty farming town which was going through a terrible drought. As I recall, there wasn't any rain at all for months on end, and then just smatterings of moisture. There certainly weren't any lakes around.
My "publishing company" consisted of me and my computer. I wasn't a well-known publisher by any means. My books were of an off-beat nature, the kind of subject matter that mostly slips through the cracks of mainstream readership. One of my books had to do with edible mushrooms of the Midwest, to give you an example. Occasionally, I would publish books written by other writers, mainly small volumes of poetry. I even created one-of-a-kind elegant little volumes using home-made paper! Talk about your small distributions!
Still, it was a satisfying enough career for me, and my material needs were simple. My publishing provided me just enough income to live quietly in a small house at the edge of a grove of apple trees owned by a neighboring farmer. The apple blossoms in the spring were my biggest outdoor treat.
So it was distinctly a luxury to be so close to such an alluring body of water. I took to it instantly. After a couple of weeks in that breeze-filled room, I decided to explore the rest of the mansion.
I quickly learned there were people living in that mansion besides me. A cute little girl with long auburn ringlets by the name of Sadie was the first person I saw inside in the bedroom hallway. Then, I saw her parents, a laughing, active pair who were gone frequently, a huge, beautiful sheep dog named Sam, and a live-in maid and butler who had rooms on the other side of the estate from "my" room.
The first time I wandered into the living quarters, the dog spotted me right away and growled. The maid and the butler, the only ones home at that time, didn't appear to take note of me, even when I spoke to them in a rather loud voice! Peculiar! At that time, you see, I didn't even realize I was dead! I did feel a bit unnerved when I managed to pass from the kitchen into the dining room without benefit of the doorway, but it was so easy it seemed natural to me.
It finally began to dawn on me that I was, indeed, a spirit when I came and sat on the bed of the live-in maid, and she didn't even flinch!
I began to wonder how I had died, and when. I didn't remember dying! Was it painful? Where had I died?
Suddenly, the ladder accident came rushing back to me. I had fallen while reaching for a particularly perfect apple from the neighbor's tree! I had been helping him harvest his delightful crop of Granny Smiths! It hadn't hurt at all to die! It happened so fast I just snapped out of my body!
But how had I gotten to this strange place with the ability to startle dogs and walk through walls??
It didn't take me long to find out the answers! No sooner had I voiced the questions when a strong, exotic looking man all dressed in gold and looking very oriental appeared before me! He had on an ornate gold hat that came to a tall peak, and his teeth were even gold! He stood before me, his arms akimbo, and said, "SOOOOO......you want some answers, eh? Well, here's the story!", and he proceeded to relate to me the following in a deep, booming voice:
"Every house has a spirit, and you're it for this house. It's a house spirit's job to protect the house itself from dark energies and invaders. Not everyone gets to be a house spirit. You have to ask to be one, and you did ask, even though you don't seem to remember it!
Now that you're in spirit, you can come and go as you please, but this will be your base of operations, unless you request a transfer. So you might as well start getting acquainted with your new digs. I recommend you start with the interior of this room and work your way through the house from top to bottom. Take note of any of the people who live here and what they are thinking and feeling, You're in charge of them, though only the dog knows that! You will be able to intervene in their lives to help them learn their life lessons, and that is how you will begin to even out your karmic debts. You do have some, you know. You will learn more about them as you go along. Be diligent! Be creative! Pay attention! Miss nothing!"
Then, with a great WHOOSH of upward-moving air, he was GONE!
Well, that piece of information shed new light on things! I was a house spirit! I decided to explore what that meant to my ability to move about. I took a run at the open window, and to my great surprise, I flew right through it!
Then I discovered I didn't have to have an open window to fly through! I could just GO! I spent the rest of the morning flying about, inside and outside the house, and it was remarkably thrilling! I soared up to the top of the weeping willow and sat there awhile, looking around the estate.
What a life! This house-spirit business was going to be FUN! I flew back into my room over the boat house and began to look around with great interest and enthusiasm. I had a lot to explore, and all the time in the world to do it in!
