Lunch with Vera #2: A Nibbling Ghost
I promised to share more articles from “Lunch with Vera,” the advice column written by Vera Van Slyke late in her life. She is the same journalist whose earlier paranormal investigations are chronicled in the Vera Van Slyke Ghostly Mysteries series, available from Brom Bones Books.
Here’s an interesting request for advice, which Van Slyke almost certainly recognized to be the manifestation of a child’s imagination more than something supernatural. It appeared in the September 28, 1938, issue of the Ferness Drum, published in Ferness, Washington.
Dear Miss or Mrs. Van Slyke,
My mommy helped me write this. She does not believe me when I say there’s a ghost in our house who pinches the cookies. She thinks that it is me who pinches the cookies. However, it is not me because it is a ghost we have.
My grandma never scolded me if I pinched a cookie. My grandma, I will have you know, was very nice and sometimes pinched the cookies for me. She gave me one and ate one her own self, too. It was a secret.
I miss my grandma very much.
Please can you tell my mommy that ghosts sometimes eat the cookies? Please can you tell her that maybe the ghost is my grandma probably?
Thank you kindly,
Who Pinched the Cookies
P.S. That is not really my name. My mommy said it is how these things are done.
Dearest Who Pinched the Cookies,
First, please thank your mommy for passing this dilemma onto me. Wasn’t that very considerate of her? You can also tell her that, indeed, ghosts are believed to eat food in some counties. From Mexico to China, people hold celebrations during which families present food to their loved ones who have gone where your grandma is now. These gifts are sometimes called “offerings.”
From what you’ve reported, I agree that your nibbling ghost probably is your grandma. I wonder if your mommy and you might make your own kind of offering. I suggest that, after supper or lunch, the two of you break a single cookie in half. One half will be for you, and other half for your mother. Imagine how pleased your grandma’s spirit will be to see that you’re still enjoying a cookie while also sharing it with others. I bet this would convince her that she can go along to Heaven, knowing that you are polite and in loving hands.
Long ago, my own Granny and I enjoyed inventing tales about a moose and a mouse, who — despite being disproportionate in size — were the very best of friends. I will never forget their names: Droopymoose and Jollymouse. Like you, I suspected that my Granny visited me after she had died, and she helped me continue to conjure up adventures shared by those two animal pals. This was one of the reasons I became interested in ghosts!
Be good, little one.
A.B. Houghton’s illustration of another grandmother telling tales appeared in Robert Buchanan’s
North Coast and Other Poems
(1868).During the hours I’ve spent editing my great-grandaunt’s chronicles about Van Slyke, I can’t say I’ve ever seen this side of the great ghost hunter, and it’s neat to get a glimpse of what first inspired her to explore haunted sites. I’m left wondering if, deep down, Van Slyke’s ghost hunting might have been nudged by a desire to again invent stories with her grandmother.
— Tim
Click on the cover above to learn more about the Vera Van Slyke Ghostly Mysteries.
