rissy stories

Thursday, 5/5/16, Day 4: Colorado 🙂

Hello again! Today I will be going over Day 4 of my trip to Utah! However, this entry will be shorter and mostly notes & pictures more than anything else because we were in the van most of this day, but also because Colorado was freaking beautiful and I loved it so much.

Everyone woke up around 6-7ish, feeling very refreshed. We ate some breakfast – oatmeal and cereal, and then Casey and I went on a little walk to admire and take pictures of the lake and the mountains at the campsite:

After breakfast, we were all able to take showers because we hadn’t taken any since Day 2, then we stopped at a gas station and hit the road again.

One of the first places we stopped was The Great Sand Dunes (these notes came from my journal, but were taken almost directly from the research that Gene did for the presentation):

-The Great Sand Dunes are trapped between 2 mountain ranges: the San Juan Mountains and the Sangre de Christo Mountains, deposited around 1.5 billion years ago by wind and water.

-Nomadic tribes with mammoth and bison started visiting this spot in Mosaco, Colorado around 11,000 years ago, but it gained National Park status in 1932.

-The 89% sand here was derived from the erosion from the volcanic rocks that made up the central and southwestern parts of the San Juan Mountains – Tertiary (first period in the Cenozoic era) in age, and we know this because the composition of this sand (non-magnetic and heavy minerals) proves that it came from those mountains.

-The sand contains 52% volcanic rock fragments: hypersthene (a green mineral that contains magnesium iron silicate) and basaltic hornblende (basalt is dark-colored, fine-grained igneous rock and hornblende is dark-colored amphibole minerals found in igneous & metamorphic rocks).

-The sand is also about 28% quartz (a hard white/colorless mineral full of silicon dioxide found in all three main rock groups).

-However, 11% sand also comes from the Sangre de Cristo Mountains – Proterozoic (eon in the later part of the Precambrian) in age, and it’s also found near the Medano Pass area.

-The grains traveled eastward across the valley floor and it started with melt water from Pleistocene (the first epoch of the Quaternary period) glaciers.

Afterwards, we stopped at a gift shop called Oasis. We got a couple of really cool souvenirs: Casey and I got rings, and I also got a phone cord charger because my old one broke. Then we ate lunch and Gene gave us a lecture on the notes that I just typed up. And after this lunch break we spent almost the rest of the day in the van – driving through the Rockies and over the continental divide to get to Gunnison, CO.

I barely slept in the van on this day because everything was so pretty and I was taking pictures left and right. However, we made it to the campsite around 6:30 then set up camp. We were really high up in the mountains, so the air was thin, there were deer and other wildlife EVERYWHERE, it was freezing, and my lips were extremely chapped by the end of the night.

I ended up sharing a tent with Casey again, and the guys made grilled cheese, tomato soup, and ramen. While and after we ate, we just sat around and told stories for the rest of the night. Jesse and I shared baseball/softball stories for a while and then Gene stepped in to talk about skiing with Jesse. After that, I talked to Casey and Jesse about the urban legend of “The Black Eyed Children” because the wide-open, pretty empty, forest-type area reminded me of a specific story that I read about on the internet a few weeks before I went on the trip.

So, excuse me once again while I deviate into a “review” mode:

xxx

I first heard about the topic through a Shane Dawson (famous Youtuber who I occasionally watch) urban legend video that I watched towards the end of the school year, but I actually thought it was interesting as well as a good source for creative writing content. So, I made the worst mistake anyone could make: I researched it a little bit further to gather more information in order to create a short story, but it scared me to death for about a week and I stopped completely. I still have yet to make that story (coming soon), but naturally, I wanted to talk about it and scare the s*** out of other people…like I’m about to do now *cue evil smile*.

Now, I personally believe that it’s all nonsense because you obviously can’t believe everything you read on the Internet and it sounds a little too bizarre to be real. This became an Internet thing in 1998, so that kind of tipped me off to the fact that if it just became a fad in the 90s, then it’s probably made up. However, there are also a few stories about black-eyed children that date back before the Internet, so who knows. To me, it sounds too much like a horror book/movie – like something out of a Stephen King novel. Mostly everyone I’ve talked to about it (close friends and family) had never even heard of it, so I also figure that it’s pretty uncommon to have a personal experience – despite what the Internet told me.

So, the gist of the urban legend is that there are these pale children, roughly from age 6 to 16, who have completely black eyes, but they don’t necessarily let you see them at first. They show up at houses and cars – then they knock on the door (or car window), and ask to be let inside. They apparently say something to the effect of: “It’s really cold/hot out here and my parents are late in picking me up, can I stay inside your house/car?” Or, “Can I use your telephone? I need to call my parents.” Or, “I really need to use your bathroom, can I come inside?” Or, “Can you please drive me home?” Or, “It’s really late and I’m lost, can I please stay in your house for the night?” Or simply, “Please let me in.”

They are either alone or in pairs, and I’ve heard/read stories about them looking down or away from you so you can’t see their eyes or they are wearing sunglasses, but I’ve also heard/read stories where they look directly at you from the start. They look/sound like normal children otherwise, but you apparently get this automatic sense that something just isn’t right about the situation. I’ve heard/read stories about how as soon as you open your front door or look out your window that you’re hit with this horrible feeling of utter terror and you don’t really know why.

They can show up at any time of day or at night, but they are apparently more likely to in rural or open areas where houses are really far apart from each other or in empty parking lots. However, I equate the situation to that of vampires because it doesn’t seem like they can actually enter a home or a car without the owner’s permission, which is strange.

But they do have this hypnotic power of some sort to make you let them in – especially after you actually make eye contact. I’ve heard/read stories about how once you make eye contact, you’re f***ed. I’ve also heard that even if you make eye contact, you may unknowingly open the door more than you were aware of, but you can still catch yourself and slam it in their face before its too late.

The majority of the stories that I’ve heard/read are of people who catch themselves at the last minute. They may be fixated and hypnotized at first, but then they say “Nope, not today,” and shut the door, even though the kids end up pounding on it, demanding to be let inside. The majority of these homeowners will hide until the kids go away and the car owners will just drive away. I’ve heard/read that they vanish, walk away, or move onto the next house.

Honestly, I’ve only heard/read of 2 scenarios where the kids are let inside the home/car. The car story I heard on a Youtube video and the home story I read in a blog, but based on these two stories: the kids don’t actually do anything once they are let inside. They do whatever and then vanish or they make an excuse to leave. However, it’s what happens afterwards that’s the major problem.

They apparently put some sort of curse on the house as well as the people in it. The victims will become mysteriously sick for long periods of time without any type of diagnosis or treatments that help. In the car story, one of the victims got into a car accident. However, all of the victims lived in both stories, but they remain scarred for the rest of their lives by these experiences.

From what I hear/read, even the people who don’t let them in are scarred. It apparently changes lives. Some of these people refused to open doors for trick-or-treaters on Halloween, and they can’t go outside by themselves after the sun goes down anymore. Some are also terrified to talk about the experience because they’re afraid that it’s going to happen again, or happen to the person they told.

However, I’ve also heard one story about how these kids tried to enter one house, but failed. The homeowners watched them walk to the next house and they succeeded, but then they never saw the kids come back out. Apparently the next-door neighbors completely vanished after that. There were no signs of a struggle, everything was left looking completely normal, but the people who once lived there were gone forever.

So honestly… I don’t really know what to believe or not believe about it. Some people think that they are demons, some think they are ghosts, but you can never really be sure. Again, I think it’s mostly bull, but that’s also because I’ve never encountered an actual paranormal experience before. I’ve never used an Ouija board, I’ve never lived in/visited a haunted house at night – but I have seen Ghost Hunters, Youtube, and read countless stories about them. I figure that if there’s sufficient evidence that this actually happened then some of it must be real.

There have also been recorded sightings of “black-eyed children” (or what people think they are) – mostly in the Cannock Chase forest in England. You can easily look them up on Youtube or Google, but I believe that they honestly could be anything – it isn’t necessarily a black-eyed child because you can’t really see its eyes in one of the videos. There’s also one that’s spotted in a cornfield and you can see its black eyes, but that’s about the only realistic one I’ve seen yet.

I guess I’ll let you decide for yourself.

You’re welcome.

xxx

So, after we talked about “The Black Eyed Children” legend, I laughed because poor Casey and Jesse looked horrified. Casey said “Make sure we zip the tent all the way closed tonight,” and Jesse replied with, “And my child will be taught to never make any friends or open the door for anyone.”

So, anyways, that’s all I have for you today! I’ll post Day 5 over the next few days or next week, so until then, I’ll catch you later!