“FREAK LOVE, GHOST LOVE, AND THE BLOODY STORY OF VALENTINE’S DAY” #WeirdDarkness

Listen to ““FREAK LOVE, GHOST LOVE, AND THE BLOODY STORY OF VALENTINE’S DAY” #WeirdDarkness” on Spreaker.

It’s the official day of romance (at least according to Hallmark Cards). Valentine’s Day bring up feelings of love and adoration, moments of affection, gifts to show one’s heartfelt emotions for another. But February 14th doesn’t always bring the warm and fuzzies. Sometimes the day brings tragedy, heartbreak, or just something of the bizarre and strange.

SOURCES AND REFERENCES FROM THE EPISODE…
“A Freak Love Story” by Rachel Souerbry for Ranker.com: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/4kr4ep45
“Ghost Love Stories” posted at NotebookOfGhosts.com: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/345vwf54, and BurroughsOfTheDead.com: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/4hcjbps8
“The Bloody Story Behind Valentine’s Day” by Avani Raj for ED Times: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/c759fnny

Weird Darkness theme by Alibi Music Library.

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“I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.” — John 12:46

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Originally aired: February 14, 2022

PARTIAL TRANSCRIPT:

Welcome, Weirdos – I’m Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness. Here you’ll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore, the strange and bizarre, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre, unsolved and unexplained.

Coming up in this episode… it’s the official day of romance (at least according to Hallmark Cards). Valentine’s Day bring up feelings of love and adoration, moments of affection, gifts to show one’s heartfelt emotions for another. But February 14^th doesn’t always bring the warm and fuzzies. Sometimes the day brings tragedy, heartbreak, or just something of the bizarre and strange.

If you’re new here, welcome to the show! While you’re listening, be sure to check out WeirdDarkness.com for merchandise, my newsletter, enter contests, to connect with me on social media, plus, you can visit the Hope in the Darkness page if you’re struggling with depression or dark thoughts. You can find all of that and more at WeirdDarkness.com.

Now.. bolt your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights, and come with me into the Weird Darkness!

STORY: A FREAK LOVE STORY=====

Emmitt and Percilla Bejano were legends in the carnival world, particularly in the “freak show” industry where they performed as the World’s Strangest Couple. Before they were married, they performed separately: Percilla was known as “The Monkey Girl,” and Emmitt was known as “The Alligator-Skinned Man.”

They were human attractions, putting themselves on display for the entertainment of others. Both were born with incurable skin conditions: Percilla’s hypertrichosis caused her to grow thick black hair all over her face and body (including a full beard), and Emmitt’s ichthyosis gave him dry, hard skin that appeared scaly, like a fish or reptile.

While the exploitation devices used by circus leaders have been heavily criticized, Emmitt and Percilla Bejano did not outwardly act victimized – like many of their fellow performers, they embraced the way they were made and used it to make a respectable living. They figured if people were going to stare anyway, why not make some money?

Emmitt and Percilla truly embodied the spirit of the sideshow and inspired many people with their unusual love story. But when you look past appearances (like they did), they weren’t so unusual at all – they led the normal life of a married couple and were devoted to each other until the very end.

The unique pair met while performing with the Johnny J. Jones Exposition in the late 1930s. Percilla Lauther was described as having a beautiful singing voice and was an accomplished dancer by the time she met Emmitt Bejano, the Alligator-Skinned Man. Emmitt himself was described as kind and gentle; their love quickly bloomed, and they eloped in 1938.

They were just two people with rare skin disorders who truly understood each other and were on the same path in life.

It was obvious to those who knew Emmitt and Percilla that they were not just in love – they were perfect for each other. They began making plans for the future, but surprisingly, Percilla’s parents voiced their dissent.

Carl and Frances Lauther had been her adoptive parents since Percilla was just a toddler, and they had become very protective of her. They were also concerned that as the star of their show, Percilla shouldn’t be too exposed to outside influences, such as a husband who might convince her to leave. In the end, the couple put their love for each other first and eloped in 1938.

Emmitt and Percilla left her adopted father Carl Lauther’s show in 1945 and joined up with Ripley’s Believe it or Not’s traveling exhibition, performing as “The Strangest Married Couple in the World.” They continued to work through the ’50s and ’60s as the Bejano Family. The pair had positive attitudes about their line of work, and even took some pride in it.

In a 1978 interview, Percilla said, “We have fun in our work… When they start making fun at me, I say, ‘I can see you for nothing right here, but you had to pay to see me.'”

Emmitt added, “[Sideshow work] keeps me off the relief line. It’s an honest effort, and I feel more or less proud of the fact that I can earn my own living and can do anything anybody else can. Nature does funny things sometimes, but I’ve lived a normal life.”

Both Emmitt and Percilla eventually worked with the “King of the Sideshows,” Ward Hall, who had a lot of praise for Percilla in particular. He was quoted at a fairground in 2006 as saying: “She had an orange-green complexion and long, silky, beautiful hair all over her face and body. She was a very intelligent, educated lady and she loved to dance… Oh, I spent many hours dancing with Priscilla. She was a great Latin dancer and I loved Latin dances.”

Percilla and Emmitt were like many other married couples and wanted children. Sadly, their first experience with parenthood ended in tragedy. They had a daughter, Francine, who passed from pneumonia about four months after she was born.

Heartbroken but unwilling to give up, they decided to adopt a baby boy in 1960. His name was Tony, and they called their little piece of land in the town of Gibsonton, FL, P.E.T. Ranch. The nickname stood for Percilla, Emmitt, and Tony. He grew up working the carnival circuit with his parents, operating rides and selling concessions.

Emmitt and Percilla were very successful on the sideshow circuit, and even branched out into film later in their careers. The couple starred in Carny in 1980 with Gary Busey and Jodie Foster, and they also made appearances in several documentaries. They gave interviews in the ’80s and ’90s as some of the last veterans of the “freak show” culture; many of their contemporaries had quit or been phased out long ago due to the now-taboo nature of sideshows. Many of the shows had been shut down by activist groups.

They eventually retired and pulled away from life in the public eye in the early ’90s.

Emmitt passed on April 17, 1995; he and Percilla had been married almost 60 years. It was at that point that Percilla started shaving her beard, and she continued to do so for the next six years. She made a few more television and documentary appearances, including the Jerry Springer Show, talking about her long life as a sideshow attraction and her beloved husband.

She passed in her sleep on February 5, 2001, at the age of 90.

Percilla’s biological father’s logic was that if there was no cure for his daughter’s condition, the family might as well use her unique appearance to make some money in the United States. Her parents had six other children back in Puerto Rico and could use the extra income. Percilla was 3 years old the first time she went on display for the public.

Percilla’s father was originally from Spain and spoke mostly Spanish, so he needed a little help with promoting Percilla as a carnival attraction. He turned to professional showman Carl Lauther, who had years of experience running sideshows. Lauther immediately took an interest in Percilla, and he was helping to care for her when her father was shot and killed in Gainesville, FL.

Percilla’s father’s last wish was for Carl Lauther and his wife to adopt Percilla; Lauther had been her sideshow promoter for a brief period of time before her father was slain. He and his wife adopted Percilla as their own, and they continued to promote her as an attraction.

The Lauthers reportedly treated Percilla very well. Percilla was very smart and fluent in English and Spanish. They hired a tutor to make sure she finished her schooling, and when she told them she was lonely, they gave her a pet chimpanzee.

It was very common for sideshow promoters to adopt their “human oddities” in the early 20th century, since their parents often couldn’t handle them or knew that performing could give them a better life. Emmitt was also adopted by his promoter, Johnny Bejano.

Carl Lauther was conflicted about Percilla’s presentation as “The Monkey Girl.” He wasn’t a fan of the name and openly defended her when people heckled her or called her a “freak,” but he gave in when he realized the “Monkey Girl” name was what drew the crowds.

Percilla performed with a trained chimpanzee named Josephine, and the pair had a bit of a balancing act in terms of personalities: Percilla was polite and graciously invited guests to her exhibit, while Josephine would smoke cigarettes and occasionally spit at guests.

Percilla’s biological mother and father had a hard time coming to terms with their daughter’s condition. She didn’t just surprise them – she surprised the entire medical community and general public of Puerto Rico.

Her parents brought her to the United States for testing repeatedly, but in the end, Percilla’s mother gave up her rights to her daughter. She stayed in Puerto Rico with the family’s other six children while Percilla’s father put her on display in America. She did, however, occasionally come to America to visit her daughter throughout Percilla’s long career as a performer.

Percilla Roman was born on April 26, 1911, in the town of Bayamon, Puerto Rico. Back then, people were a bit shaken by babies born with conditions such as hers, hypertrichosis. She was born with a full head of hair, two full rows of teeth, and hair all over her body.

Hypertrichosis is a congenital skin disease linked to the X chromosome, but can also develop later in life. Symptoms vary from person to person, but can include excessive hair growth, mild abnormalities in the face and teeth, and deafness.

Ichthyosis is defined as “a family of genetic skin disorders characterized by dry, scaling skin that may be thickened or very thin.” Ichthy is a Greek root word for fish; it was this scaly, reptilian appearance that led to Emmitt’s stage name, “The Alligator-Skinned Boy.” The disease is fairly rare, with 16,000 babies born every year with some form of the condition and 300 born with moderate to severe ichthyosis.

There is no cure for ichthyosis, but doctors are developing treatments to ease the symptoms a person would suffer from throughout their life. Due to his condition, Emmitt was unable to sweat properly, so he would spend time between performances sitting in vats of ice water.

BREAK=====

Coming up, we look into the spectral side of love and Valentine’s Day – those ghosts who still linger thanks to a broken heart. That’s up next on Weird Darkness.

STORY: GHOST LOVE STORIES=====

They say tragic events can leave spirits on earth, and passionate love so often ends in tragedy. They also say unfinished business can leave souls wandering the earth. How often have we felt a romance end without closure? Today, on the most romantic of holidays, it seems appropriate to explore these stories of love. Love so passionate it leaves a heartbroken, supernatural stain on earth.

In Stowe, Vermont lies a covered bridge they call “Emily’s Bridge.” There are several versions of Emily’s sad tale. Some versions say that Emily and her boyfriend were meeting at the bridge to elope, since her parents did not approve. He never came, and she hung herself from a rafter. Another version says Emily was left at the wedding alter. She hopped on a carriage to find her love. When she reached the bridge, one of the horses was startled and she died in an accident. Some versions say she was killed by runaway horses on the way to her wedding. Whatever way you put it: Emily reached a tragic fate. Visitors to the bridge have reported scratch marks on their cars and bodies, and strange noises (footsteps, ropes tightening, girl screaming). If you park your car on the bridge you might hear banging on the car or her body’s feet dragging on the car’s roof.

The Castillo de San Marcos in St. Augustine, Florida is the oldest masonry fort in the United States. The site itself is dripping with paranormal activity, but today we focus on an affair that led to murder. In 1784, Colonel Garcia Marti brought his young wife, Dolores to the fort. He wasn’t the most devoted husband and often ignored his wife, thus she found other ways to spend her time. She began an affair with her husband’s assistant, Captain Manuel Abela. Dolores wore a very unique perfume, which Garcia smelled on Manuel one day. Shortly after, Dolores and Manuel went missing. Garcia told everyone that Dolores had returned to Spain and that Manuel had a special assignment in Cuba. About 50 years or so later, a hidden room was found in a dungeon behind a brick wall. The remains of a woman and man were found (some versions say chained to the wall, some say in a pile of ashes). Sightings of a woman with a white dress have been reported on the site. Could it be Delores?

Minnie Quay was the 15-year-old daughter of James and Maryann Quay. They lived in Forester, Michigan, so they often saw boats coming and out of town. Minnie fell in love with a sailor (not much is known about him) and her parents disapproved of this crush. One day, word came to town that his boat sank. Minnie was quite distraught, especially since her parents had forbidden her to say good-bye when he last left. Some time after, she was babysitting her infant brother for her parents. She left her house and walked towards the waterfront. People near the town inn, The Tanner House, waved as she walked by. Suddenly, their friendly faces turned to faces of horror as she walked into Lake Huron. Legend says she still walks the beach, waiting for her sailor to return. More frightening versions say she lures young girls towards the water, and towards their deaths.

Jesse Strang deserted his wife and children and began a new life in Albany, New York. He lived under a new name, Joseph Orton, and began working at the Van Rensselaers’ residence at Cherry Hill. He caught the eye of the affluent Elsie Van Rensselaer, a married woman. Jesse and Elsie decided their love could really flourish without Elsie’s husband, John Whipple, around. In May of 1827, after a failed attempt of arsenic poisoning, Jesse Strang shot John Whipple. Jesse and Elsie tried to hide their murder plot, but they didn’t cover their tracks very well. Murder by Gaslight (a new favorite blog) describes the sensational trial that followed: “In June Jesse Strang confessed to the murder and told prosecutors where to find the rifle. He believed that if Elsie was convicted as well, her powerful family connections would get them both pardoned and he tried to lay the blame on her. But when his lawyer and the prosecutor told him that nothing he said against Elsie would lighten his punishment he withdrew his confession. Members of the household testified that they had heard Strang spread the stories of prowlers out to kill Whipple. The merchants who sold him the rifle and the arsenic testified as did hotel keepers who had seen Strang and Elsie together. But it was Strang’s confessions, admitted over the objection of the defense, which sealed his fate. The jury deliberated for fifteen minutes before returning a verdict of guilty. Elsie’s trial followed the same course as Strang’s except the prosecution tried to call Strang as a witness. There was much debate over his eligibility to testify because he had been convicted but not yet sentenced. In the end the judge would not allow his testimony. The prosecution rested, and the jury, without leaving their seats, acquitted Elsie Whipple. The Albany Establishment had closed ranks to save one of their own from a public hanging.” Jesse Strang was found guilty of first degree murder and Elise Whipple was found not guilty. According to an Albany tourist site, all members of this love triangle roam the halls of Cherry Hill. People have witnessed a ghost on the bottom floor of Cherry Hill and believe it is Mr. Whipple. He is not hostile, but gives off a feeling of anger. Jesse Strang’s ghost is seen where the gallows once stood wearing the same clothes he wore the day of his execution. Imagine repeatedly running into both your exes in the afterlife. That’s pretty tragic.

As we can see, tragic love often ends with lingering ghosts. There is even a type of ghost, the White Lady, that is often attached to a story of betrayal by a lover. The White Lady appears in folklore all over the world (to name a few: the United States, Czech Republic, Germany, Brazil). Even if you don’t believe in ghosts, you can acknowledge the universal power of tragic love in storytelling, and what better metaphor for heartbreak than a ghost.

When you think about it, most ghost stories also have elements of romance in them, don’t they? Common ghost origin-stories tend to run one of three ways — a murder or misdeed has been committed, an unjust, sudden or premature death occurred, or the old standby: they died of a broken heart. Since New York City abounds with ghost stories, it makes sense that we’d have a lot of love stories there, too. Here are but a few.

Many people are familiar with Gertrude Tredwell, the famous spinster ghost of the Merchant’s House Museum. Born in 1840 to a wealthy merchant family on East 4th Street, Gertrude grew up and fell in love with a very dreamy doctor named Luis Walton. Walton, though, was a Catholic and Gertrude’s strict Episcopalian daddy forbade the marriage. She never loved again. Gertrude pined away on East 4th Street until she died 1933. She still wistfully haunts her old home, which is now a museum.

Harry Houdini and his wife Bess also fall into the category of romantic ghosts. Before Harry died, the two of them agreed on a secret phrase that one of them would transmit to the other after death through a medium, thus proving that spirit contact between loved ones was indeed possible. Sweet, no? We recommend you try it with all your best friends and loved ones. The only tricky part is that you can’t write it down or share it with anyone else, so you’ll probably forget it or get it mixed up with your Dropbox password. But give it a shot, and let us know if you make contact with any dearly departed spouses to prove definitively that life exists after death.

Another high profile NYC ghost is John Lennon, who has been said to visit his wife Yoko in the Dakota Apartment on at least one occasion. Most famously, his spirit appeared to her sitting at his white piano; he turned to her and said, “Don’t be afraid. I am still with you.”

All these star-crossed lovers and adoring spouses are well and good, but if you like a little scandal with your romance, you can’t do better than Aaron Burr. Burr’s notoriety began with the trial of Levi Weeks in 1799, and if he’d been anyone else, would have climaxed around 1804 when he shot Alexander Hamilton. But because he was Aaron Burr, he kept on digging himself deeper into trouble. He attempted to start his own country in Louisiana and was tried for treason. Then he was exiled to France. Finally he finished it all up by marrying and then divorcing scandalous heiress Eliza Jumel. Burr is a fairly active ghost around town, having been variously spotted on the Battery, waiting for his daughter Theodosia’s ship to come in (in the Burr family tradition of excellent luck, she was lost at sea) and at One If By Land, Two If By Sea restaurant in Greenwich Village (incidentally, voted the city’s most romantic restaurant) and in various NYU buildings around West Third Street. Burr was an apparently pretty randy fellow in life, and he still seems to like the ladies in the afterlife: reports of him goosing co-eds and female diners have abounded for years. He seems to stay away from the Morris Jumel Mansion though, probably because his ex-wife Eliza haunts there.

Moving into the even more lurid end of the spectrum, we have the notorious ghost of Broadway impresario David Belasco, who never met an actress he didn’t want to… cast. Belasco still haunts his namesake theatre, sometime dressed in the kinky priest’s cassock that earned him the nickname “Monk” in life. According to Playbill, he’s as amorous as ever, once startling a female star in he dressing room shower.

For sheer numbers of women, though, you can’t beat the Sheik! Rudolph Valentino had a youthful career as a taxi dancer, two wives, and loads of ladies throwing themselves at him while he was alive; after he died, tens of thousands of fainting, shrieking women mourned in the street in front of Frank Campbell’s Funeral Chapel on the Upper West Side. The phrase “Latin Lover” was basically invented for this man, for goodness’ sake, so he’s synonymous with romance.

He also has a connection with Astoria, Queens. Valentino used to dine at the Astor Room when it was adjacent to Paramount Studios (now Kaufman Astoria Studios) back in the Roaring 20s; some say his specter still flits among the tables. Of course, his ghost has also been spotted in Los Angeles, so you never know.

But what about ghosts in the other boroughs? We’ve got Queens represented here, and Manhattan amply covered, but are there any romantic ghosts in Brooklyn, Staten Island, or the Bronx? Of course there are.

Our definition of romance is going to get even more twisted here.

In Colonial times, a British colonel and loyalist named William Axtell bought a mansion called Melrose Hall located in what is now the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, and moved in there with his fiancee. His fiancee was educated, graceful and beautiful, but she was not the one Axtell loved — alas, he was in love with her sister, Alva. He simply couldn’t bear to be without her, and so he did what any man would do: built a secret chamber in his house and hid her away in there.

Only one other person knew about Alva: the slave woman who took care of her and brought her food. Alva would wait all day until the Colonel could slip away, and then he’d visit her upstairs in their secret sex chamber. One day, when the Colonel was away on an extended business trip, the slave woman died. There was no one to bring Alva food or drink, and so she starved to death. Let that be a lesson to you if you’ve secreted an illicit love away in a clandestine sex chamber: have some kind of food distribution buddy system in place. You know, like how you don’t go swimming alone.

Does Alva haunt the site? She did at one point. The house was later purchased by Anna Carla Mowatt, an actress, who learned of the story of Alva, and wrote about it in her memoir, The Autobiography of an Actress. She affirmed that “a young girl had starved to death in that chamber and that her ghost wandered at night around the house.” No word on whether the Colonel ever visited her, though.

The next story actually strains the definition of “ghost” a little bit, too, since there’s no evidence of a spirit at unrest — but it was such a good story, and really had a Valentine’s Day twist to it, so it was just impossible to resist.

According to The New York Grimpendium by J.W. Ocker, in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx you’ll find the “Grave of a Boy Killed By Kisses.” George Spencer Millet celebrated his fifteenth birthday the day after Valentine’s Day, on February 15th, 1909. He was working as an office boy at the Metropolitan Life Building at the time, and according to Ocker, he was so popular with the ladies at the office that they chased him around on his birthday trying to “shower him with kisses”:

“In the ensuing playful scuffle…George fell and then shouted out, ‘I am stabbed!’ He then went unconscious, bleeding profusely from the chest and dying soon afterward in an ambulance. Turns out, George had an ink eraser in his pocket, which in those days meant a pointed blade for scraping ink off paper. Somehow in all the well-meaning shenanigans, he had fallen on it and it had pierced his heart.”

If you visit his grave in Woodlawn, you’ll see the whole narrative spelled out on the tombstone, which reads “Lost life by stab in falling on ink eraser, evading six young women trying to give him birthday kisses in office Metropolitan Life Building.”

We return to tradition with our final tale. On Staten Island today you can find a building known as the Old Bermuda Inn. Its website bills it as a place where “people dine, dance, and fall in love.” They’re not far off. It’s the former Mersereau Mansion, a sumptuous, white pillared 19th century mansion built as a wedding gift for Martha Mersereau and her husband. In 1861, the Civil War would come along and sweep away Martha’s beloved Mr. Mersereau. Martha fretted and paced and waited for her dear husband to come home, to no avail: he died in battle. She joined him not long afterward of the classic broken heart (told you this was a traditional story). Naturally she still roams the mansion’s capacious hallways, waiting forlornly for her long-lost love who is never to return.

Drawing on the Inn’s website again, we find the following account of her ghost:

“People have reported seeing Martha’s silhouette in the window, as well as a figure walking around in the front part of the inn. Workers at the restaurant have reported strange noises and locked doors opening on their own.”

An oil painting of Martha mysteriously caught fire during a recent renovation, which many have interpreted as her specter expressing its displeasure at the intrusion into her home. Like most true lovers, she would rather be left alone to await her one and only.”

BREAK=====

Death, tragedy, broken hearts… it all makes for a morbid Valentine’s Day. But nothing I’ve told you up to now even remotely compares to the bloody story behind how Valentine’s Day got started to begin with. I’ll have that for you up next on Weird Darkness.

STORY: THE BLOODY STORY BEHIND VALENTINE’S DAY=====

Valentine’s day is a secular celebration despite being connected to the western Christian church. Celebrated all over the world, among all age groups, this day is regarded as an appreciation for love and romance.

14th of February, a day we all exchange gifts, greetings, and affection with our beloved(s) is not all that it looks like. Hopeful singles, preparations beginning a month prior, market brimming with lovey-dovey goodies, and rose-tinted glasses become the norm this time around every year.

But the reason for celebrating this day has been lost somewhere along the line similar to various other celebrated days. Although the origin of this day has failed to make its point among the Gen-Z, its darker, and sinister counterpart has not been lost.

Romans have always been big on blood and slaughter. People in ancient Rome were the firsts to avail this holiday. Considered a matter of great pride, February 13-15 was celebrated as the feast of Lupercalia, and sacrifices were made.

Lupercalia was their festival in which sacrifices of goats and dogs were followed by whipping women with the hides of the just-slain animals to avert evil spirits and purify the entire city. Of course, men could never have been involved in the impurity, so only women had to be ‘treated’.

This entire ‘festival’ was believed to bring fertility and good health. Women too, after years of sufferings, had come to believe that this was all done in good faith and that their fertility had everything to do with the beatings and sacrifices and nothing with the actual biology.

Hence, love and romance had only one definition in ancient Rome – violence. Toxicity was the norm and so was the vulnerability of the roman women. Like in 21st-century fairs, the roman had names of women put in jars, and ‘lucky draws’ were taken out for the ‘lucky’ women who would be beaten to a pulp and granted fertility.

Matchmaking was adopted as an answer to the unsettling ratio of men to women so that every woman could have a ‘fair chance’ of being blessed after the feast. And so, it’s not difficult to understand where our modern-day toxic, intolerable, and patriarchal love comes from.

The western Christian church announced the 14th of February as St. Valentine’s Day in honour of two early Christian martyrs, both named Valentine, who were executed on the same day in different years in the 3rd century A.D.

But a pope of significant intelligence, combined both St. Valentine’s day and the festival of Lupercalia later on, resulting in the half-informed, muddled version of the origin that is known to the general public.

The rituals were expected to have stopped and they did, or so the church thought. With love in the air and literature, thanks to Shakespeare and other poets suffering from lovesickness, the attention got diverted from the barbaric festival of Lupercalia.

With the evolution and prolonged knowledge of right and wrong, came an end to the sacrifices and violence attached to the day but the toxic mindset and the sadistic pride continues to this day. The Valentine’s day celebration will go on with gusto and rightfully so, we are not Romans and our thought process is not like theirs.

But should love not be celebrated all day, every day? Should we only be grateful and appreciative of our loved ones once a year?

Also, since the day has been modified several times already, why not a bit more? Why not celebrate love in all its glory – both platonic and romantic?

Modern love has been granted most of the salient features of the ‘roman love’ where the toxicity is on top, but let’s keep that conversation for another time and end this on a positive note. Congratulations, you’ve not become a part of this ‘fake love’, at least not in this lifetime.

SHOW CLOSE=====

Thanks for listening. If you like the show, please share it with someone you know who loves the paranormal or strange stories, true crime, monsters, or unsolved mysteries like you do! And please leave a rating and review of the show in the podcast app you listen from – doing so helps the show to get noticed! You can also email me anytime with your questions or comments through the website at WeirdDarkness.com. That’s also where you can find all of my social media, listen to free audiobooks, shop the Weird Darkness store, sign up for the newsletter to win monthly prizes, find my other podcast “Church of the Undead”, and find the Hope in the Darkness page if you or someone you know is struggling with depression or dark thoughts. Plus if you have a true paranormal or creepy tale to tell, you can click on TELL YOUR STORY.

All stories in Weird Darkness are purported to be true (unless stated otherwise) and you can find source links or links to the authors in the show notes.

“A Freak Love Story” by Rachel Souerbry for Ranker.com

“Ghost Love Stories” posted at NotebookOfGhosts.com and BurroughsOfTheDead.com

“The Bloody Story Behind Valentine’s Day” by Avani Raj for ED Times

Again, you can find link to all of these stories in the show notes.

WeirdDarkness™ – is a production and trademark of Marlar House Productions. Copyright, Weird Darkness.

Now that we’re coming out of the dark, I’ll leave you with a little light… “And this is love: that we walk in obedience to his commands. As you have heard from the beginning, his command is that you walk in love.” – 2 John 1:6

And a final thought… “Love doesn’t make the world go round. Love is what makes the ride worthwhile.” — Franklin P. Jones

I’m Darren Marlar. Thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness.

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