I was raised in a family where extended gatherings frequently involved "readings." These occurrences were carried out at the kitchen table by my eldest aunt or my mother and involved the person being read (usually other family members or close family friends) handing over a ring or necklace that was held in the hand of the reader and inspired their prophecies. My experience of the paranormal didn't end there. Until grade three, my immediate family rented a small older house that I still think of as my real home, as we moved every 3-5 years or so. When my father was out late, which was often, my mother would drive dinner knives through the mouldings around the door to the basement to keep whatever was down there,  down there. Various family members saw or felt things that were inexplicable but suggested a connection to another realm, something beyond the ordinary and everyday. And I learned in adulthood that old aunts of my grandfather had offered to buy him, and his new bride, a home if they would only change their names and name their children according to their numerological beliefs. They declined the offer.

As a result, I have an open mind about the paranormal and the occult. It's not that I believe; I just don't disbelieve. I enjoy the tension produced by stories and events that straddle the familiar and the strange. In short, I choose to exist in a perpetual state of suspended disbelief.