The Ghost Behind You....

Ah haunted houses.  No matter what you believe they are pretty fun for the imagination.  I thought I'd talk about both haunted houses as in really haunted houses with ghosts and poltergeists, and haunted attractions which I have a special fondness for.  Personally I do believe in ghosts so that's the slant that I'm going with here.  Hey, anything is possible in this world. 

So we all know about haunted houses.  Those places where someone or something is showing itself to the people who live there or visit there.  Most of us probably have memories of that one house in the neighborhood that all the other kids swears is haunted.  Haunted house lore has been around for as long as anyone can remember.  Hauntings in general are a lot more of a common belief than most realize.  Locations that claim to be haunted are usually places where violent death has occurred.  Unfinished business keeps these spirits here or they're the residual energies of those who lived and died there.  Haunted locations can be anything from houses to battlefields to cruise ships. 

There's all sorts of arguments over whether or not some place is haunted or not.  It's the same arguments for whether or not ghosts exist.  I tend to keep an open mind about everything.  Like I said before I do believe in ghosts in whatever form they take, and I also think that there is never a simple explanation.

The haunted attraction plays off this.  You take all the elements of horror to create an interactive experience to scare and entertain people.  It's a dream job, getting paid to scare people...seriously how awesome is that?  It's not an easy job and every year you have to come up with new material to keep people interested.  Going to haunted house attractions is the highlight of Halloween.  It's basically the chance to live a horror movie without the actual threat of death and dismemberment.  Doing a bit of research no one really knows where the tradition of haunted houses came from though the oldest haunted house seems to be from about 1915 and they came into real popularity starting at about 1960 or 1970. 

The people that I was always impressed with were those who literally created a mini haunted house on their own lawn/homes.  It was this extra added treat to Trick or Treating that you always hoped for and of course once you know who does it every year that's the house you always make a point to go to.