Listening to ghost stories on the radio this morning made me wish I had a ghost story to tell. Then I realized have do have one – maybe even two.
But the one I’m really thinking about today has to do with some strange happenings on the VGH Burn Unit in the early 1980s. I started working there in 1987, and while I was never witness to any of the occurrences, several people I worked with told me about their experiences.
In the early 80s the burn unit was still in the old Fairview building on 12th and Heather. It had beautiful old double-hung windows with clear views of the North Shore Mountains. The floors were paved with black and white hexagonal tile, and the counter-tops were covered with sterile-looking stainless steel. The elevator had a shiny brass accordion door that shimmied open and shut at each floor. The burn unit was stuck on the top floor of the building, many said to keep the screams of the burn patients farthest away from the rest of the patients – though from their dorm next door, the student nurses heard the cries clearly. (These days, thanks to a better understanding of pain control and because of better pain medication, the screaming has almost ceased.)
So, some time in the early 80s a young man was severely burned and admitted to the burn unit. He was much loved by the staff and they were dismayed at their inability to save him. One nurse I worked with said that she was in the room with him when he died. She said she witnessed a white light leave him and pass out the window – no kidding, she did tell me that. (This was a very normal competent nurse, not at all a flake – as far as I could tell.) Soon after the young man died, odd things started to happen. The elevator started going up and down on it’s own. Strange unexplained noises occurred in the middle of the night. But most unsettling of all was that patients started reporting unusual dreams. They said in their dreams a young man came to comfort them, telling them not to worry, everything was going to be all right.
The old Fairview building no longer exists. In its place is a stand of gleaming condos. I wonder what kind of dreams the people living there are having.
