I've always been fascinated with paranormal activity but I was always convinced it would happen to other people, that I'd never be 'lucky' enough to experience it. It wasn't until I was talking with an investigator that I realized there was a good chance that I'd had an experience and simply hadn't recognized it at the time. I wanted to share it, and this is the best place to do just that. I know I won't get pointed at or snickered about here.
All of my life, in my grandmother's house, there was a small little Victrola music box that played Lara's Theme from Doctor Zhivago. I would spend hours winding it just to hear the quiet plinkplinking of that song. Over and over again until it drove my grandmother batty! When she passed away that was one of the things left to me. Though her death had been sudden and unexpected she'd apparently tucked a small note into it quite some time ago saying that this item was to go to me.
Fast forward a few years and I had recently moved away from my family to another state for love (trust me, something nobody in their right mind should ever do!) and I was having a difficult time finding a job. Things were looking fairly down. I'd had a fight with my sister who lived up in Ontario, my parents lived down in Houston but had driven up to visit my sister for a while and my aunt, also, had decided attend (coming from Nova Scotia)... and I was stuck in New Jersey, just having fought with my best friend / sister and had no family around. Needless to say I was incredibly bummed out.
My boyfriend at the time decided, to help break the gloom, he was going to take me out to the clubs. Told me to get dressed and he'd pick me up. I lived in my own apartment and the only other living creature in the place was my cat Fran, who was in the bedroom with me.
I was changing when I heard noise coming from my kitchen. This weirded me out something fierce because I lived on the outskirts of Camden NJ, which is.. a less than desirable place for a young woman on her own to live, but it's what I could afford at the time

!
I went to explore and the noise turned out to be Lara's Theme, coming from the small Victrola music box in my cabinet. I picked it up and turned it over only to see the small metal winder not turning as it continued to play. I immediately got upset because obviously this meant my beloved music box was broken. Once it ran itself out I tested it again by winding it. This time, when it played, the winder turned! Satisfied that it wasn't broken I put it down and subsequently forgot about it. Feeling better because of the memories that simple song brought up I got dressed and carried on with the night.
It took a few months before I mentioned it, just offhand, to one of my friends (the investigator) when he came over and was looking at my bits and bobs. It all seemed to dawn on me at once. I really truly believe, now, that the music box my grandmother left me had never been broken. It was used, instead, as a way for her to let me know I wasn't alone at a time when I most felt it.
It still sits in a cabinet but has never once uttered a sound other than when wound physically by a person, a constant reminder (as sappy as this sounds) of my grandmother and love that stretched beyond the afterlife.