The Vanishing House

Lately I've been entertaining myself with David Paulides Missing 411 stories. I've been sucked into the mystery rabbit hole, and it has brought my own strange experience back to memory. A memory that I never forgot, just didn't really give much thought to beyond the occasional "oh yeah, that happened".

I always say my life is not very interesting. But maybe I'm just looking at it through the wrong lens. 

Every summer growing up, my family and I would take a long road trip to Pocatello, Idaho to visit my grandparents.

One year we drove my dad's big, gas guzzling, Ford F150 the entire 14 hours. It was an uncomfortable, hot drive. The air conditioner wasn't the best in that car. My skin was sticking to the leather seats. I entertained myself by picking at the black, rubber sealant that was melting off from around the windows.

We never took that truck anywhere; it was just always used to haul things around home- so it was weird that we were driving it all the way out to Idaho.

As a five-year-old I didn't know anything about gas prices, but I did know that we never drove that truck. We only used it to haul wood and stuff, so the fact that we were taking it on a huge trip was noticeable point of reference for me later on.

My grandparents' neighborhood was built between the 1930's-1940's.

They were small homes with chain link fences dividing the back yards, no privacy- and the gap between each house was very small. Each house had an alleyway between them that was only about 3 ft. wide, if that.

The houses were close, the backyard fences were see-through and the neighbors knew each other and saw each other all the time. Everything was very visible, and everything was very close together. It left very little room for getting lost. 

My grandparents had next door neighbors with two kids, a boy who was my age, and a girl who was a few years younger than us. For as long as they lived there, I would play with the two of them every summer when I would visit.

I remember a lot of details of this experience. On this particular trip to Idaho, I was next door playing with the kids. I had been there for about 45 minutes. We played upstairs, and the old Disney "Jungle Book" movie was playing in the background. At this point in my life I had never seen that movie. It wasn't one that my family owned. So I was sort of half-watching it while we played. 

Our play date wrapped up. Their parents wanted to go somewhere, so they asked me if I was able to walk the 4 foot walk next door to my grandmas or if I needed them go with me. 

I thought about it for a second, acknowledging to myself that yes, I was quite little. I've always been cautious and practical, even as a little kid. So I did think about it critically for a second. But I'm not blind and I have working legs, and a 4ft walk to the house next to me shouldn't be a problem, so I politely thanked them and turned them down. I remember they asked me if I was sure. But I reassured them that it should be fine. 

We even all walked outside together and they watched me as I crossed over their lawn to my grandparents’ front lawn.

Even though they didn't accompany me straight to the front door and deliver me in directly into the protective grasp of my grandpa/dad/brother (who were the ones at home at the time), they were there with me as I walked to the front of the house. They saw with their own eyes as I stood just a few feet away from the front door and waved goodbye to them as they drove off.

 After the car had left my sight I turned to go into the house- which was only a few feet away.

So--- this is where it gets weird.

I turned around.

And there was no house there.

I looked at where my grandparents’ house should be. And it was just an empty patch of dirt and grass and gravel.

I looked at the neighbor’s house. It was there. I looked at my grandparents' house. It was not there.

 

I looked back at my friends' house. Then back at the patch of grass and gravel.

It was weird, because I never remembered there being a patch of gravel on that street before. It was a very well established street with houses lining up and down. And big old trees. The houses were built years ago and there was nothing in development.

There was dirt and gravel in the alleyways that ran behind the houses, because in this neighborhood, the driveways where behind the houses and to get to them you had to pull into these gravel alleyways. But I wasn't in the backyard. I was clearly in the front yard. I was literally staring at everyone else's front yards. 

But, I thought, I was only five. I was clearly messing this up somehow. There's no way a whole house full of people could just disappear.

I looked back at the street. My dad's truck was still parked ON THE MAIN STREET IN THE FRONT OF THE HOUSES where it should be. The park that was diagonal from my grandparents' house was still there. My friend’s house was still directly next to me.

I didn't want to cross the street, because I wasn't old enough to do so without a parent. But after standing there frozen in confusion for about 5 minutes or so I decided that maybe I needed a better vantage point. I couldn't figure out why this was so confusing and maybe I was looking at the property wrong.

I walked across the street and turned around. My friend’s house was there. The trashy old house on the other side of my grandparents’ house was there. My dad's truck was there. My grandparents' house was NOT there.

 At this point an old man was walking down the street. He stopped me and asked me if I was lost. I told him that yes, I was trying to find my grandma’s house, and I had been playing at my friend’s house but now I was having trouble finding my way back.

We walked around the block together and he kept asking me if any houses looked familiar, and asked me if I remembered what our car looked like, and I said "YES- we took my dad's truck this time, and we never take it, and it's a very light brown (I didn't know the word for beige), and it has melting plastic around the windows"

I remember he kind of shrugged off the part about the windows.

After about 15 minutes of walking around the blocks around my grandparents’ house, I noticed my big brother across the street. He had climbed onto the top of a dumpster looking into it, calling my name.

At that point the nice old man dropped me off with my brother, who chided me for disappearing and together we went home to my grandparents’ house.

I remember at this point my mom and grandma were home. My parents and grandparents asked me what happened and I explained that "the house just disappeared". And they said to each other "she must've gotten disoriented"

The old man was my grandparent's neighbor, and he told my grandpa that after walking around the neighborhood for a little bit, we just ended up back in the same place we started.

So who knows what happened? Even as a little kid, I did everything I could think of the try to see that house reappear before leaving the area. After waiting in one spot, looking from different perspectives, looking away, looking back, looking around, checking landmarks- the park, the truck, the run down house next door- and it not showing up I decided that I must have somehow moved away from the house and with the help of an adult that I needed to go look for it. I KNEW that I hadn't moved away from the house, but I had no other fathomable idea of what had happened.  However, I also acknowledge that little kids can get turned around.

Was I almost a victim of some X-files style phenomenon? I personally don't think it's as impressive as that. Even though I had this experience, I'm still skeptical. Even as a five year old, as it was happening, I thought "see? this is why you don't leave five year olds alone! No wonder the neighbors kept asking if they should walk me to the front door!" 

I want to give five-year-old me all the credit and say "YES! I WAS RIGHT- THE HOUSE VANISHED INTO THIN AIR". But even five-year-old me tended to agree with the adults and I think that I just was disoriented. I do remember every detail of what happened because it was such a weird experience, but still, I was only five. Weird stuff happens when you're five. Your brain plays tricks on you all the time when you're five. Shadows in the mirror at night look like monsters when you're five. You make up really intricate stories with your Barbies when you're five. Your grandma's house disappears right in front of you when you're five.

Even as a five-year-old I was convinced that somehow *I* had gotten myself lost. I didn't believe too hard that it was supernatural.  BUT, if you like a good story and you like to get spooky- here are some things to consider:

 • Pocatello is inhabited by the Shoshone and Bannock Nations. The Fort Hall Reservation and Pocatello overlap. There are many very spiritual and haunted native areas that are off limits to non-natives in and around Pocatello.

 •   Shoshone lore- the only Shonshone/Bannock entities that I know of that kidnap kids are Water Babies, and my grandparent's house was nowhere near any water. However, I wouldn't say that I'm super up on Native lore- so maybe there's more that I don't know about! 

• There's also the Nimerigar- little people in Shoshone legend. As far as I know they're tricksters. Maybe I was a victim of a fairy prank.

• Lots of minerals in the soil- Ghost Adventures went to Lava Hot Springs (in the area) and went on and on about the richness of the minerals in the soil and how supernatural beings love that sort of thing

• Lots of UFO sightings in Idaho (ranked No.1 per capita in USA!) - my family even claimed to have seen one once through the window of their back yard back in the 60's (from that very house!). My mom even remembers, they wouldn't let her near the window to see because she was a kid and they didn't want her involved in any of the weirdness happening outside.

• I'm of German descent- my grandparents on my other side are from Germany. Urban legend says that Germans fall victim to the missing 411 phenomenon more often.

Was it a glitch in the matrix? Was I being shifted into some other dimension? Or was I just being a five year old? It could be either. In the words of Terry Pratchett- it's a funny old world.

And it's full of mystery.