May 4: I had been in Verdun where hundreds of thousands of soldiers were killed due to war.  I had spent two intensive days searching for the unknown soldiers and found myself acknowledging the impact of war’s devastation and death. I had walked where life had been extinguished over and over again. I had drifted into the underworld. If there were ghosts, or souls doomed to walk through battlegrounds because their bodies lacked a proper burial, or unsettled spirits caught between realms of life and death, my guess was that they would be here in Verdun. 

I awoke at 5 o’clock to the creaking of hardwood floors. It was a consistent creak and sounded like someone was standing on my floor, watching me. I opened my eyes and saw nothing but darkness. I listened intently to the creak. It was coming from the floor, or near the chair, by the windows in my hotel room. It was unsettling because I knew the noise wasn’t coming from the room above. On Saturday night, I heard the sound of people walking on that floor. This was a different creak. It was coming from my room and sounded like someone was shifting weight from one foot to the other foot. There was a presence in my room that wasn’t me.