HAUNTING THE CHAPEL, PART 1.

Posted on September 26, 2025     14 Comments

For the 2025 Halloween season, Uncle T is HAUNTING THE CHAPEL.

Say what? Did someone drop an acid tab into his apple cider because what the hell does that mean?

Allow me to explain. Sometimes the first blast of what I like to call “Autumn power” hits you at the most unexpected moments. It could be in the middle of harvesting crops and swinging your scythe on a late September day and a chilly breeze fills the air. Suddenly it hits you. Or while browsing the drug store with your bratty kid sister on a back-to-school errand, you catch a glimpse of that beautiful, mouth-watering box of Cadbury Screme Eggs on display. Or it could be as simple as going for a walk! These small but powerful moments are the table setters. The sneak preview before the feature presentation and grand finale. Summer days might be care free, but Autumn is when we feel most alive.

It began when I hit the road this week to visit my ol’ Grandpappy who lives up north. I was driving his ’76 Ford Country Squire to drop it off because he was fixing my motorbike, which I planned to ride home after dropping off the station wagon and having a smoke with ol’ Grandpappy on his front porch. He likes to sit on his rocking chair all day, smoking his corn cob pipe and yelling at 18-wheelers that drive by.

For these types of excursions, I take to the back roads which are far more interesting than the interstate. Passing through villages and rolling valleys is like driving through a countryside portrait. Stone walls, pumpkin patches, colonial homes, rotting cornfields, a murder of crows, ancient cemeteries, apple orchards, old barns and every so often, that farmer standing in the middle of a field, wearing dirty overalls and giving me that “look”.

I drove through a mountain town called Sugar Hill and came to a bend in the road. When looking to my right, I laid eyes on the most stunning, little old chapel that made me drop my lit Winston onto my lap, almost driving Grandpappy’s rusty wagon into a large maple tree. I stopped dead in my tracks at this breathtaking but slightly ominous, forbidding structure that stood before me like a painting. It was as though I had arrived at something I had been searching for even though I wasn’t searching for anything.

I got out of the car and walked around the property, the sound of my boots crunching over the first fallen leaves on the ground. Not a single person was in sight and the town itself felt completely empty. I gazed in awe at the immaculate-looking chapel as the late afternoon sun mixed with a chill in the air. Goosebumps raised on my arm. The harvest moon hovered faintly over the chapel as dusk approached. I could smell smoke from a wood burning stove nearby, probably some old timer in a house down the road. This was my Autumn moment of power.

Unfortunately the chapel was closed at the time because I really felt like exploring inside its primitive walls. Searching for sacred objects. Forbidden passages. Secrets kept concealed for centuries. I would be instantly transformed into Father Malone from The Fog as I made my way around the church, looking for journals that reveal haunted tales of the past.

This Halloween season I plan on Haunting the Chapel which means locating and visiting the oldest houses of the holy (or unholy) that I can find. Cathedrals, churches, crypts, mausoleums, crematoriums, temples, tombs, catacombs, sacrificial pits and more! This quest will hopefully result in feeling what I felt when stumbling on this shrouded chapel in the mountains of New Hampshire.

Especially when bathed in the light and darkness of Fall colors, these medieval-like structures are something to behold. If by the end of the month we end up conjuring the dead or conducting an exorcism or two, so be it!

Truth be told, ‘Autumn power’ can come from something as simple as going for a walk. It’s another reason to love Halloween because often times the smallest, mundane activities become enhanced during the season. Whether it be the trees putting on a show of color or finding spooky cereals at the market.

Now go find yours. Or let it find YOU.