If I ever meet Stephen King, I am going to ask him to give me back all the sleepless nights as a child that I spent worrying about pets returning from beyond the grave and creepy twins stalking me down long hallways muttering “redrum.” Which means you couldn’t pay me eleventy bajillion dollars to be anywhere nearby when the Colorado hotel that inspired his book The Shining digs up the pet cemetery it has on the grounds.

“Oh, let’s dig up a pet cemetery linked to The Shining, great idea!” is just like saying, “Let’s have some scary stuff go down here, eh?” It’s a perfect storm of paranormal possibility, a blatant invitation for all the ghosts and ghoulies to descend on one location and terrify the noodles out of anyone around.

According to USA Today, the hotel (which looks very lovely, actually) is planning to move the 12 or so marked graves dating back to the 1960s in order to make way for a wedding and corporate retreat pavilion.

King’s Pet Sematary is based on a spot in Maine, but he’s admitted in the past that The Shining was partly inspired by a dream he had while staying at the hotel, which in turn made the rest of us dream of haunted hotels, so thanks for that, Stephen.

Anyway, residents nearby say they’re worried about the noise and the loss of the historic burial ground. And while no one else will say it out loud, a local psychic has confirmed that yes, paranormal stuff will totally go down.

“Stirring up the bones of the dead” could get the spirit world in a tizzy, she says. Construction accidents, unexpected delays and other shenanigans could occur if spirits stuck “between this world and the other world” are disturbed. And not just animal ghosts.

“They’ll pull the owners to them if the owners passed over and are unhappy,” she explained.

Oh, GREAT. Again, I am grateful for the thousands of miles between myself and that hotspot of horrifying possibilities. My advice: leave out lots of extra pet food, promise belly rubs to any animal ghosts that might show up and don’t tell their spirit owners that it’s their turn to walk the dog. And do not invite Jack Nicholson to the groundbreaking.

Hotel linked to Stephen King to dig up pet cemetery [USA Today]

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