In the late 1990's I managed Lynch's Irish Pub, located in the Monson Motor Lodge in St. Augustine , Florida; notorious for the "acid in the pool" incident that went down in civil rights history. The owner of the hotel (pictured) was still alive; and as it turned out had dated one of my great aunts. Therefore, he took a liking to me and confided that it was merely a bottle of bleach that he was holding, for the benefit of the newspaper photographers (as if that make it OK!). Perhaps the scariest part of this story is that I was so desperate to keep the pub from losing it's lease that I tolerated this disgusting man and his nauseating prejudices until he sold the property to someone else.
St. Augustine is the nation's oldest, continually occupied European city. It is full of spooky places and creepy ghost stories. I was oblivious to the hauntings in the pub until a group of employees shared their experiences in the women's bathroom. It turned out that one girl had been in the bathroom alone when the toilet paper dispenser in the other stall started spinning, loudly, she came running out of the bathroom in a panic and refused to enter it alone, afterwards. Another girl had entered the bathroom, before opening one morning, to see the paper towel dispenser revolving on it's own and depositing a pile of towels upon the floor. My first instinct was to dismiss these stories; until I recalled a particular morning, earlier that same week when I had entered the bathroom to discover a length of paper towels piled upon the floor. At the time, I took no notice; even though I had closed the night before, and no one else had access to the pub. One of the girls relayed a story about a couple who had been burned alive in a previous home, upon which the hotel had been built.
On another occasion I was sitting at the bar with the bartender and another employee (Kevin), while we drank our shift beers. The bartender had run out of cigarettes and was desperate to find one. He disappeared into the kitchen and came bursting from the office door (which was directly within our view) moments later. "Where'd she go? Where'd she go?!" he exclaimed in his thick Irish accent. Kevin and I looked at each other in complete confusion. The bartender went on to explain that when he entered the office through one door, he saw a woman leaving through the other. He described her in great detail saying that she wore a green period dress, with a huge train which made a whooshing sound as she brushed through the doorway. He was rattled as I had never seen him and spent the rest of the night glancing nervously towards the office door.
The job was supposed to be temporary, for me and therefore, I stayed in the adjacent hotel. One night I was lying in bed, watching TV when the bed suddenly sank; as though someone had sat down next to me. This was so shocking that I jumped up and turned the light on. This was a sensation that normally didn't affect me, as I had a very large cat who always slept with me. On this occasion, however, my cat was outside and I had left the door cracked waiting for him to return. Questioning my judgement I ran to the door and called my cat. Somehow I managed to convince myself that he must have jumped upon the bed and then run out the door. This hypothethis was quelled as I watched him come trotting home from the far side of the parking lot.
Message edited by author 2006-10-28 20:51:10. |
