The Headless Man

I was listening to NPR’s "All Things Considered" today (only because it comes on before "Prairie Home Companion." And yes, I do listen to that tax-payer funded, left-leaning, radio station with the liberal, progressive agenda. I like it; it’s interesting even if I don’t always agree with them, and I help pay for it. (The grammatical structure of that sentence is challenged. I know.) In keeping with the season, they had asked their readers to send in stories of scariest things that had ever happened to them. This made me think of the scariest time I remember as a child.

When I was a kid (about age 6) in Ogden, Utah, we truly lived on the wrong side of the tracks. We were on west 31st street, down by the grain silos where the train cars were loaded. About a block away, was our church, the 19th Ward of the LDS Mt. Ogden Stake. The building is still there, but it was sold many years ago to another denomination. I would love to go in and see if it is still the same as I remember. There was a huge mural of the Last Supper on the wall behind the pulpit. Mormons don’t put murals in their buildings anymore. We all use the same correlated art work. Right now it is Carl Bloch. I personally sort of like a little iconography in my house of worship. That is one of the many reason I love the Temple. But I digress.

We had a ward Halloween party that my older sister, Fran, and I attended. My mom did not go to church with us very often, and this was no exception. This was back in the day when kids could wander unfettered after dark and we did only live across the street and 2 houses away.
It was a wonderful, fall evening, as I remember. The air was crisp and the leaves were, too. Just outside the cultural hall (gym to the non-Mormons), was a bush. As Fran and I walked home, I saw a shape behind the bush. It was a man; but not just any man. It was a headless man!! His shoulders were broad, his coat was dark, and he had a small light between his fingers as though he and his missing head had needed to go outside for a smoke. In a few seconds, I saw the light nearer the ground. I was sure that cigarette had found its missing home. We ran, screaming, as fast as we could to the safety of our own front porch. Mom just laughed it off, certain that some one had really needed a cigarette, and being a Mormon, had to hide it.

I asked Fran about it a few years ago. Her memory was vivid, also. But not as vivid as mine. Somehow, that shape had shed it cloak, skins and all its tissues and resided in her memory as a smoking skeleton.

Driving by the area recently, I saw that the church is still there. Even the bush is still where I remember it; about the same size. Our house is gone. It is the garage and yard for the Ogden City School District buses.

There was no sign of the missing head.