Music:The Be Good Tanyas, "Keep It Light Enough to Travel."
A question about hitch-hiking ghosts.
Almost everybody's heard the basic hitch-hiking ghost story—dude (usually) gives a girl a ride home, and later finds out that she was actually dead way before she got into the car—but there are some really fascinating regional variants. So here is my question for you:
How does the story go? Is she a victim, a predator, or just a confused kid trying to go home? Is seeing a hitcher like seeing the Bean Nighe—you're just doomed to die now? How does it go?
To be clear, I'm not asking you to make something up; I want to know how, in your part of the country or the world, the story goes. Or, if this is the first time you've encountered the idea (outside Disney's Haunted Mansion), I'd like to know that, too.
I realize you probably don't need more of these, but I read through and didn't see the version I grew up with (Alaska) and thought I'd share:
The guy leaves prom early because he's a) had a bad time b) been ditched by his date or c) all his friends are drunk and up to no good. He's the nice type, quiet, polite, very "boy scout," and he's heading towards a bad path in life, on the wall about college. And then he sees a girl walking down the side of the road. Being the good kid he is, he stops. She gives him a sob story about a drunk date, and how she just wants to go home.
He gives her a ride, but before they get there she disappears. Poof. Gone. He becomes obsessed, and starts looking for her in yearbooks, newspapers, birth announcements, so on. He ditches the evil people he was hanging out with before, and avoids a dangerous drug-and-party-centric lifestyle that would have consumed him. Finally, desperately, after coming back from college, becoming a successful insert nice doctor-teacher-psychologist-professor type profession here. He's lamenting about the girl that might have been to a patient/student's parent. She asks about the girl, he tells her, lo and behold, her dead daughter/sister. He's told she died, and to deliver a message if he ever sees her again. Armed with knowledge, the next year, he waits for her to show and tells her that her mom/sister is still waiting for him/sent him. There she is, like clockwork, night of the prom, same girl, same dress, yadda yadda yadda. This time, they make it to the door, he gives her a kiss on the cheek, and says goodnight. She's never seen again and he goes on to marry the sister/be a great doctor/teacher and/or name his child after her.
...I'm going to guess it was an attempt at cautioning us about the evil of peer pressure, underage drinking, partying, and falling in with a bad crowd? But then, there's also a reward element.
curious
April 27 2009, 21:06:13 UTC 8 years ago
The guy leaves prom early because he's a) had a bad time b) been ditched by his date or c) all his friends are drunk and up to no good. He's the nice type, quiet, polite, very "boy scout," and he's heading towards a bad path in life, on the wall about college. And then he sees a girl walking down the side of the road. Being the good kid he is, he stops. She gives him a sob story about a drunk date, and how she just wants to go home.
He gives her a ride, but before they get there she disappears. Poof. Gone. He becomes obsessed, and starts looking for her in yearbooks, newspapers, birth announcements, so on. He ditches the evil people he was hanging out with before, and avoids a dangerous drug-and-party-centric lifestyle that would have consumed him. Finally, desperately, after coming back from college, becoming a successful insert nice doctor-teacher-psychologist-professor type profession here. He's lamenting about the girl that might have been to a patient/student's parent. She asks about the girl, he tells her, lo and behold, her dead daughter/sister. He's told she died, and to deliver a message if he ever sees her again. Armed with knowledge, the next year, he waits for her to show and tells her that her mom/sister is still waiting for him/sent him. There she is, like clockwork, night of the prom, same girl, same dress, yadda yadda yadda. This time, they make it to the door, he gives her a kiss on the cheek, and says goodnight. She's never seen again and he goes on to marry the sister/be a great doctor/teacher and/or name his child after her.
...I'm going to guess it was an attempt at cautioning us about the evil of peer pressure, underage drinking, partying, and falling in with a bad crowd? But then, there's also a reward element.
April 28 2009, 00:50:32 UTC 8 years ago