Spirits in the Sky

Choogie has been visiting old structures on the reservation looking for evidence of spirits ever since he could drive, but there is one place he’s never been ready to visit until now at age 20, the old churchyard. The building was torn down decades ago, but he was told by a church elder that what he’s looking for, it’s still there. He just has to turn the doorknob.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:04Glynn Washington?

  Old MacDonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O. And on his farm he had an axe, E-I-E-I-O. With a chop-chop here and a chop-chop there. Here chop, there chop, everywhere chop, chop, chop, chop, chop, chop! Old MacDonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O. List of spooked, stay tuned. Life is all about making decisions.

• 0:48Glynn Washington?

  Sometimes you make questionable ones, like buying a new TV that's too big for the wall because the electronics store employee was a little too good at their job. And sometimes you make great ones, like protecting your home and auto with Progressive. You get customized coverage options so you can be sure you have the right coverage for you, along with 24/7 claim support and great customer service. So, when you think about it, that's like four great decisions that more than makes up for the TV debacle. Get your quote today at progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company, affiliates and other insurers, not available in all states.

• 1:27Speaker 01

  Do you like scary stories? Think you've heard it all? Well, you've never heard it like this. Radio Rental is a horror podcast featuring true scary stories told by real people.

• 1:40Speaker 02

  He's tapping, tap, tap, tap. He's tapping on the door. He wants us to open the door.

• 1:47Speaker 03

  Then the mirror light turns on, and then the mirror light turns on in the shape of a triangle. And I'd say it's probably about the length of a school bus, you know, right above my head.

• 1:55Speaker 04

  She had long, ratted hair. She was wearing a dress. Her ribs were showing, her fingers were long, she looked shriveled, partially decayed.

• 2:06Speaker 05

  I'm starting to freak out a little bit. I'm pleading with them to just please let me out. These eyes started opening. They were pure white. And I lose it. Radio Rental returns October 23rd. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

• 2:35Glynn Washington?

  Okay, so I had two brothers. I'm the oldest, three of us. And one summer, two of us were waiting on the porch for the younger to show up. He'd just finished his first year of college, we're so proud of him. Wanna hear everything. He walks up, grinning, hugs, laughs. "Okay, so how'd it go, little bruh?" "Oh, it was good, real good." "Classes?" "Most of the As, couple Bs, right on, right on." "But socially, how was it?" "Here you join in fraternity things." "Yeah, yeah, I did." "So how was it, what y'all do?" "Well, you know, we really shouldn't talk about that." "Huh? What you mean?"

• 3:19Glynn Washington?

  "Well, certain things, you know, I can only speak to with my brothers."

• 3:26Glynn Washington?

  "Your who?" "My brothers, my fraternity brothers."

• 3:33Glynn Washington?

  Now, I don't recall saying a word. Didn't have to.

• 3:40Glynn Washington?

  Just a look.

• 3:42Glynn Washington?

  Just a nod of the head. Then we jumped, my little brother, and let our fists do the talk. "Oh, he's big and muscular, and he tried to fight back." "But I swung with older brother energy and absolute confidence." "Your brothers, huh?" "Understand, I took no joy out of delivering the whipping he most certainly had coming." "No, I swung out of a sense of duty. I swung out of a sense of familial obligation. I swung to let him know that there is a different type of brotherhood "that will never demand fraternity fees. A brotherhood that doesn't care how many shots you can consume in sixty seconds.

• 4:22Glynn Washington?

  And this bond, though, this bond will be respected." "Huh? What, huh?" "Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay."

• 4:37Glynn Washington?

  We picked him up off the ground. We brushed him off. We let him fall back into the lawn chair that nurses hurts then. It was all smiles.

• 4:49Glynn Washington?

  Now let's start over. I'm gonna ask you again.

• 4:55Glynn Washington?

  How was school?

• 5:07Glynn Washington?

  Spooked starts.

• 5:12Glynn Washington?

  Now.

• 5:56Glynn Washington?

  Community, belonging, tradition, family. It's the weekend. Twenty-year-old Chugi Kingfisher and his friend, they've been hanging out, driving around the backroads in their Oklahoma hometown at night. This one does. They're just about to head home, but Chugi's at the wheel and he's got one more stop in him. A spot near the church he grew up attending in the 1970s.

• 6:24Glynn Washington?

  Spooked.

• 7:11Speaker 06

  As a child, I was going to church there in Cherokee County.

• 7:20Speaker 06

  It was a traditional Cherokee church. Services were held in Cherokee in English. The bell rung, that's when you knew church was beginning. You entered the church from the back. The men sit on the left side and the women sit on the right side. When I was 12, it was time for me to sit on the men's side. Though I wanted to be on the other side with mom and my grandma. It was quite a different experience as I sat there next to my grandpa, listening and singing the songs.

• 8:02Speaker 06

  He was a strong song leader. Right outside this new church building, there used to be an older church. The building itself hasn't been there since the 1970s. But I have heard it described so many times, I can tell you what it looked like. It was an old one-room church with a double door and the lock where you had to use a skeleton key. They didn't need anything fancy to worship God.

• 8:43Speaker 06

  It was basically a meeting place. What remains of it is just the foundation. It was stones picked up from the yard, put together with cement. I would walk that foundation along with many of my cousins and many of my friends.

• 9:10Speaker 06

  Back then at family gatherings,

• 9:14Speaker 06

  storytelling was always

• 9:17Speaker 06

  the last part of any gathering. Many of the stories that were told were skeeley stories or boogerman stories, and even some about our old church. I asked many of the elders of the church if they knew anything about the old church. I got tidbits here and there, but there weren't too many of those that

• 9:47Speaker 06

  even entertained the idea of the supernatural around the churchyard. But this elder man, he seemed to know just a bit more.

• 10:02Speaker 06

  I was in my late teens, and we were at a church gathering. This older gentleman, he was a part of my extended family. He pulled me aside. He said, "I've been watching you." He said, "I've been listening to the questions that you've been asking." "I was waiting to find someone just like you."

• 10:29Speaker 06

  He began to share the story of the old church.

• 10:36Speaker 06

  He said, "That's where we used to be."

• 10:39Speaker 06

  "That place is still there."

• 10:43Speaker 06

  "Even though that building is not there, that's still a part of that spiritual world." "'Cause in our world, as Cherokee people, there's no separation between the spirit world and our natural world."

• 10:58Speaker 06

  "The old legend says that you can step on those steps,

• 11:05Speaker 06

  that you can actually reach out and grab that door handle,

• 11:12Speaker 06

  that you can actually open that door and step inside."

• 11:19Speaker 06

  I begin to laugh because the hairs on the back of my neck were standing up.

• 11:26Speaker 06

  I'm overcome with excitement. And so I asked him, I said, "Have you opened that door?" He said, "No, I just couldn't bring myself to it."

• 11:42Speaker 06

  He said, "But I did grab the doorknob."

• 11:47Speaker 06

  So I knew that it was possible.

• 11:51Speaker 06

  I asked him, "Can you go inside?" He said, "They say you can, but I can't tell you if you can come back through."

• 12:05Speaker 06

  He said, "There's something in you that tells me that you might be able to go just a little bit further than I did."

• 12:19Speaker 06

  As I got a little older, I began to explore those things.

• 12:24Speaker 06

  And now here I am, a twenty-year-old, new to fatherhood, wondering about that rectangle in the ground.

• 12:53Speaker 06

  Somewhere around two, three o'clock in the morning, a friend and I pulled into the churchyard.

• 13:02Speaker 06

  It was like coming through a veil.

• 13:06Speaker 06

  The air was heavier, there was a mist about everything, it was a full moon.

• 13:19Speaker 06

  There in front of me was the old foundation.

• 13:24Speaker 06

  Like a rectangle in the ground. Beyond the old foundation, I could see the old headstones from my family cemetery in the background.

• 13:37Speaker 06

  As I got out of the car,

• 13:41Speaker 06

  I came around to the passenger's side and my friend got out.

• 13:47Speaker 06

  We stood there, wondering what we were going to do.

• 13:54Speaker 06

  Is this safe?

• 13:57Speaker 06

  She kept reminding me that I've got a family, I've got a young son that's dependent on me. She tried to talk me out of it. She continued to remind me, in our Cherokee traditions, whenever we embark in a journey such as this, the consequences can be

• 14:21Speaker 06

  life or death.

• 14:27Speaker 06

  I knew I was going to do it.

• 14:30Speaker 06

  My heart and my mind were in a good place. They were in a place of learning, they were in a place of study. I just wanted to know if I could.

• 14:45Speaker 06

  She had decided that she wasn't going to do anything. She said, "I'm going to be sitting right here. I'll wait on you. I'll wait on you till I get scared and then I'm out of here." But she said, "I'll wait here as long as I can."

• 15:04Speaker 06

  I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know if this is going to be for real. I don't know if I'm going to take a step and fall down and bump my head. I pray for safety, I pray for an understanding because I want everything to be alright.

• 15:23Speaker 06

  I walked across the church yard to the old foundation that I'd played on many times. As I began to look around, I noticed the air was different. I could see it.

• 15:40Speaker 06

  I see it swirling around me. I see it almost in slow motion.

• 15:46Speaker 06

  It kinda had that, how they explain sound waves traveling, you know, how they have that warped look to them. That's the way the air looked.

• 15:58Speaker 06

  And in my mind, I see the church.

• 16:06Speaker 06

  The walls of the building, I can see the paint peeling and the cracked windows.

• 16:15Speaker 06

  The front step, the front door, the one that used the skeleton key.

• 16:23Speaker 06

  I see all of this in my mind's eye as I stood there in front of that foundation of that old church.

• 16:37Speaker 06

  I looked back and I waved to my friend. I smiled.

• 16:45Speaker 06

  And I turned to face the church.

• 16:52Speaker 06

  I raised my foot up.

• 16:56Speaker 06

  And I placed it where that first step would have been.

• 17:02Speaker 06

  And I stepped on a step.

• 17:09Speaker 06

  I know that I'm stepping on midair.

• 17:14Speaker 06

  My mind was racing. My heart was beating so hard I could feel it in my neck.

• 17:22Speaker 06

  The first step was done.

• 17:27Speaker 06

  I summed up the courage to lift my other foot and I stepped on another step.

• 17:37Speaker 06

  I was giggling nervously as I took another step. I knew I was standing on that landing.

• 17:48Speaker 06

  With confidence, I reached out and I grabbed the door handle.

• 18:00Speaker 06

  I could feel its firmness in my hand, that cold steel.

• 18:07Speaker 06

  Even though I know that when I grabbed that doorknob, I am grabbing midair.

• 18:14Speaker 06

  It gave me such an eerie feeling.

• 18:19Speaker 06

  I didn't know whether to giggle or cry.

• 18:25Speaker 06

  My heartbeat was now in my head, my throat, my arms and my legs. My entire body was a heartbeat.

• 18:37Speaker 06

  My mind racing, trying to tell my body to get out of there.

• 18:43Speaker 06

  But my stubbornness saying, "Go ahead, turn that doorknob." And so, I turned the doorknob.

• 18:56Speaker 06

  All these emotions run through my mind, through my body, and begin to mix up. I feel turmoil even.

• 19:09Speaker 06

  Am I doing the right thing?

• 19:12Speaker 06

  I remembered the old man telling me that as far as he could go was to grab that door handle.

• 19:20Speaker 06

  And then he jumped off.

• 19:24Speaker 06

  So I pushed that door just a little bit.

• 19:30Speaker 06

  And it moved. Oh my goodness, that door moved.

• 19:39Speaker 06

  I pushed just a little bit more and a bright light came flooding through that crack.

• 19:50Speaker 06

  It was a white, yellowish light. Beautiful. Yet very soft. And as I opened that door,

• 20:03Speaker 06

  I could hear somebody on the other side. Not just one, not just two, but many.

• 20:15Speaker 06

  The hairs on the back of my neck were standing up. The goosebumps all over my arms.

• 20:25Speaker 06

  But I wanted to hear and I wanted to see more. And so I pushed the door open just a little bit more.

• 20:37Speaker 06

  My eyes are open with amazement. I could see the pews. All those old homemade pews. Made with sawmill lumber. One by fours. And I see the backs of people's heads.

• 21:01Speaker 06

  I see an older man sitting there, dressed in his overalls. His white, pressed dress shirt. And I see the ladies with their calico dresses on. Kirchens on their head. The smells of grandmas and grandpas. Of spearmint gum and candy.

• 21:28Speaker 06

  They never acknowledged me. As far as I know, no one knew I opened the door.

• 21:38Speaker 06

  Then I hear the voices.

• 21:43Speaker 06

  Oh my goodness. Voices that I had not heard in a long time.

• 21:52Speaker 06

  I heard my family singing. I heard the voices of my aunties and uncles past. My Uncle Bill, my Aunt Hanaway. Many that had already gone on. The ones that I grew up with, the ones that I knew.

• 22:13Speaker 06

  I could hear their distinct voices lead our Cherokee hymns. I hear my grandpa. Oh, how strong his voice was.

• 22:26Speaker 06

  I could hear the song.

• 22:30Speaker 06

  I knew that song.

• 22:40Glynn Washington?

  This episode is sponsored by Vinted. Imagine opening my closet, looking for a shirt, and I see that jacket. That jacket, that jacket I got for that party I never went to three years ago. That jacket, it's still there, it's still mocking me. Well, it was still there. Because then I stopped and I reached for my phone because Vinted is a secondhand marketplace app where you can sell clothes that you no longer wear. Listing on Vinted is quick and simple. Once an item sells, Vinted creates the prepaid shipping label for you. And Vinted has no seller fees. I mean, you keep every dollar you earn.

• 23:23Glynn Washington?

  And I could get a little more room in my closet. You know, for that next jacket. Give your clothes a second life with Vinted. Download the Vinted app for free and start listing. No seller fees. So you keep everything you earn.

• 23:40Speaker 04

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• 24:41Speaker 06

  Oh, how beautiful that sounded.

• 24:45Speaker 06

  I knew that they weren't living yet. Here I was, I was hearing them. I wanted to be there with them. I wanted to sit in the pews with them and sing like I did when I was a child. And true, I do miss them. But I was caught in a dilemma.

• 25:09Speaker 06

  You see, the old man, he told me, you can step through to the other side, he said, but I don't know if you can come back.

• 25:19Speaker 06

  As I opened that door just a little bit more.

• 25:24Speaker 06

  What was I going to do?

• 25:28Speaker 06

  What would you do?

• 25:31Speaker 06

  Was I seeing the light? Because they say that once you go to the light, you can't come back.

• 25:38Speaker 06

  Was this relevant to death? Or was this just visiting a place and being able to come back home?

• 25:50Speaker 06

  I wanted so bad to be there on the other side with them.

• 25:56Speaker 06

  But what if I couldn't go back to my son?

• 26:02Speaker 06

  All of a sudden, the courage that I had summed up vanished.

• 26:09Speaker 06

  I slammed that door and I jumped off of that landing. I landed on the ground and I rolled.

• 26:21Speaker 06

  I never looked back.

• 26:24Speaker 06

  I never looked to see even if the church building was there or if the light was still shining.

• 26:36Speaker 06

  When I jumped up off the ground, I ran towards the car and my friend had already ran around to the driver's side.

• 26:47Speaker 06

  I jumped into the car while the car was rolling. I almost got left there. We drove like we had stole something. We're just kinda driving, silence.

• 27:04Speaker 06

  Did that really just happen?

• 27:09Speaker 06

  We got to the creek. We pulled over, still shaking from the experience.

• 27:19Speaker 06

  Then composed ourself, got out of the car and walked around.

• 27:26Speaker 06

  I walked down to the creek.

• 27:31Speaker 06

  Slashed my face with that cold water to wake up.

• 27:39Speaker 06

  She asked me, "Where did you go?"

• 27:44Speaker 06

  I said, "What do you mean?" She said, "You disappeared."

• 27:50Speaker 06

  I said, "I disappeared?" She said, "Yeah."

• 27:57Speaker 06

  When I saw you raise up your foot, that was the last time that I saw you. You smiled and you waved. And when you put that foot down, you disappeared.

• 28:12Speaker 06

  She said, "Do you realize that you've been gone almost four hours?"

• 28:24Speaker 06

  Unbelievable. To me, it only seemed like a blink of an eye. Like a few minutes had passed, maybe ten minutes. I said, "Why did you wait four hours?" She said, "Because I couldn't bear the thought that I was leaving that grounds without you." You had a son, you had family. What was I going to tell them if I came home without you? She said, "I was so frightened. The next time I saw you was when you came jumping out of midair.

• 29:05Speaker 06

  When I ran around the car to get into the driver's side, I wasn't even worried about you. I was worried about getting out of there because whatever had grabbed you, I didn't want it to grab me either." We laughed about it nervously, and I told her about the experience that I had just had. She was in disbelief because she just didn't understand. We get back in the car and drive home in silence.

• 29:51Speaker 06

  We don't ever speak of it. I'd be lying to you if I told you I hadn't tried it again. I've tried to go back several times, but I was never able to step on that step again.

• 30:16Speaker 06

  Maybe it's because I was there for a different purpose.

• 30:23Speaker 06

  My heart wasn't right, my mind wasn't right.

• 30:29Speaker 06

  Maybe one of these days, I'll hear somebody that actually stepped through and came back.

• 30:41Speaker 06

  And if I were to ever get the chance again,

• 30:47Speaker 06

  I often wonder, what would I do different?

• 30:52Speaker 06

  I've lived a wonderful life, got a wonderful family.

• 30:58Speaker 06

  But I believe that if given the chance,

• 31:03Speaker 06

  when I push that door open,

• 31:06Speaker 06

  I would step through and find my place there among the elders and sit down and sing.

• 31:17Speaker 06

  (Singing) Ne lainei iu weiti Jousaid nai kuwi yu lo se Ji ali sky toti naiski Wul lo saichwei a ti lo se Aya tothli wigan nai nai

• 32:00Speaker 06

  U na ran ti wu ni lo se U ne lainei i tu woklai Nai kuwi se we ti gati

• 32:53Glynn Washington?

  Thanks so much to Cherokee National Treasure Chugi Kingfisher for sharing your story. That original piece was scored by Yari Bundy was produced by Chris Hamburg.

• 33:16Glynn Washington?

  Now I'm often asked, "What are you afraid of?" I'm gonna throw that same question back at you, dear listeners. What are you afraid of? I know that some of you are hiding something. I know this because you've told me this. That you would change houses, or you would throw your grandmother's jewelry box away, or that you would burn a certain picture in the hallway. You would do this, but you fear the consequences. You know of ramifications far beyond the apparent, and if you are scared of a thing, or a place, or a person, and you don't know how to proceed, please tell me about it.

• 34:01Glynn Washington?

  Maybe together, perhaps, perhaps, we can get to the bottom of the mystery. Because there's nothing better than a spook story from a spook listener. And if you don't know how to identify people walking this dark path, look around you. They might just be wearing a spook t-shirt right now as a sign. It's sexy. Get your own while you still can. SnapJudgment.org. If you like your storytelling under the bright light of day, get the amazing Stupendous Sister podcast, Snap Judgment. It is storytelling with a beat.

• 34:46Glynn Washington?

  Spook is brought to you by the team that knows all too well not to disturb creatures sleeping in the dark. Except for Mark Ristich, who always carries a sharp stick so he can disturb the creatures that are sleeping in the dark. There's Davy Kim, Chris Hambrick, Leon Morimoto, Taylor Decot, Marissa Dodge, Zoe Frigno, Anne Ford, Eric Yanez, Cody Hardjo, Lola Abraha, Miles Lassie, Yari Bundy, and Doug Stewart. The Spook theme song is by Pat "Macy" Miller, Anderson Washington. And everyone wants to be powerful.

• 35:26Glynn Washington?

  Power is respect, power is admiration, and it's wealth, and it's desire, and secrets are the means by which we hoard power. Secret knowledge, secret signs, secret doors, secret caches, secrets, which is all well and good. But none of us live forever. Even those that twist secret understandings in order to do just that, they too will fail. And when the secret holders pass on, they take their secrets with them. So much knowledge lost, so many opportunities squandered, leaving us to piece back this

• 36:08Glynn Washington?

  puzzle in the dark, simply because some would hoard their understanding, but no more. The stakes are too great, we've fallen backward for too long. No more secrets, no more lies. Instead of hiding wisdom under a shadow, take a vow with me. From now on, promise those that you care about, and promise yourself that you will never, ever, never, ever, never, ever, never, never, never, never, never, ever, ever, turn out the lads.