My car beeped as I backed out of my boyfriend’s driveway near T Street in San Clemente.
The warning sounded like someone was behind me.
I stopped hard and looked through the back window.
Nobody.
I checked the backup camera.
A dark, shadowy figure was still moving across the screen.
Before we go any further, you should know something about me:
I am not a ghost girl.
I don’t watch paranormal shows. I’m not looking for signs from the other side. I don’t walk into old houses wondering who might still be hanging around.
That is simply not my lane.
Which is probably why this unsettled me as much as it did.
The figure looked like a man, though not clearly enough to make out any details. Just a person-shaped shadow walking behind my car.
I turned around again.
Nothing.
Not someone farther down the driveway. Not someone on the sidewalk or across the street. No dude with a surfboard. Nobody.
I looked back at the screen.
The figure was still there… and still moving.
Slowly crossing the camera like someone casually passing behind the car.
My brain scrambled for an explanation. A blind spot? A reflection? Was it a camera glitch?
I turned around one more time.
Nada.
Then I looked back at the screen and watched the figure continue walking until it disappeared off the camera.
I just sat there, completely still. I wasn’t exactly scared. That’s the strange part.
My heart was racing, and the whole thing was deeply unsettling, but I didn’t feel afraid. Mostly, I felt confused.
Because I knew what I saw on the screen. And I also knew there was no physical person behind my car.
Later, I told a couple of friends about it. They immediately mentioned videos of cars detecting people who weren’t actually there and shadowy figures appearing on vehicle displays, sometimes in places like cemeteries.
Which was not particularly helpful when I was already creeped out.
Thanks, guys.
Of course, technology glitches and cameras misinterpret shadows. Sensors can pick up objects strangely. Software does weird things.
There may be a completely reasonable explanation. There probably is.
But it’s bizarre to watch what looks exactly like a person walk behind your car, look away to confirm it, see no one, and then watch the figure keep moving on the screen.
That part is difficult to explain away when you’re sitting there experiencing it.
And spiritually?
I’m not someone who wants to make every unexplained thing supernatural. My faith actually keeps me from doing that.
I know who I belong to. I know Jesus. I don’t need to become fascinated with things I don’t understand, and I don’t believe fear should get the final word.
But I also think it’s okay to admit when something is just…
freaking weird.
Unsettling.
Unexplainable, at least for the moment.
Maybe my backup camera had a very convincing glitch. It’s possible a shadow hit it at exactly the right angle or there’s a technology explanation I haven’t discovered yet.
I honestly don’t know.
What I do know is that for about thirty seconds in a driveway near T Street, my car was convinced someone was walking behind me.
My eyes told me otherwise.
And for once, I have no tidy conclusion.
So a few days later, I’m sitting here Googling it.
It looks like I’m not the only person whose car has seen someone who wasn’t there. Tesla drivers have posted videos of their cars detecting human figures in otherwise empty cemeteries, and I even found an account from another driver who said a face appeared in their backup camera… only to turn around and find nobody there. Yikes!
Okay friends, I am confident there are perfectly reasonable explanations. But somehow knowing other people have experienced something similar makes the whole thing both more explainable, and also dare I say, significantly spookier.
So now I’m curious.
Has anything like this ever happened to you?
Have you ever seen something on a car camera or sensor that wasn’t actually there?
Or had one of those random little moments where you knew what you saw, but had absolutely no idea what you saw?
Because apparently, I’ve joined that club.
And I’m still not a ghost girl.
-Sam
