Author Jeff Belanger has been fascinated with the supernatural since age ten, and over the years, he's interviewed hundreds of people about their experiences. In the first half, he recounted frightening legends from New England folklore, including tales about plagues and vampires, and how people dealt with them. COVID-19 isn't the first plague Americans faced, he noted-- one of the worst was tuberculosis or "consumption," which took the lives of many in the 18th and 19th centuries. Accounts of vampires ("walking corpses that would suck the vitality out of living people") have historically arisen in times of plague, he added. In an 1892 case from Exeter, Rhode Island, George Brown exhumed his daughter Mercy's corpse because he believed she was a vampire that was causing his other children to die.

Because Mercy's corpse had not decomposed, the father took this as confirmation she was indeed a vampire. "Her heart was burned on a nearby rock," Belanger recalled. "The ashes were mixed into an elixir and fed to her brother Edwin, who was in the last stages of life." He detailed other bizarre exhumations, as well as cases of taphaphobia-- a not entirely uncommon fear for that era of being buried alive (one man had a glass-topped coffin made). Belanger shared lore of a ghostly cemetery in the Berkshire Mountains and a New Hampshire body of water with the actual name of Haunted Lake. He also touched on his work studying nightmares and their connection with the paranormal.

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Energy healer and grief coach Pamela Aloia discussed the importance of energetic protection and her method of using a "cloak," a kind of spiritual shield one can carry with them daily, particularly when they go out into the world. She described the cloak as a bubble of light that one visualizes around oneself. The bubble can be clear or any color, and is intended to protect us from energy that is not ours, she explained. This can include radiation and electromagnetic waves, as well as emotions and thoughts of other people. When we're bombarded with these external energies, sometimes the body absorbs them, and this can create negative or sluggish effects, she suggested.

The power of the cloak or bubble, she explained, is fueled by heart energy and a higher source, and can help alleviate anxiety, fear, and anger. Aloia talked about her work clearing negative energies from homes and the use of angels, prayer, music, and animal totems. These, she said, are different forms of energy work that people can experiment with to see what is most effective for them in specific situations. Animal totems bring us a better connection to the earth, she cited, and can be visualized to put us in balance, such as contemplating the way a turtle lives when we need to slow down.

News segment guests: Christian Wilde, Capt. Kelly Sweeney, John M. Curtis