Paranormal Activity - The Ouija Board

If you haven't seen "Paranormal Activity" yet, beware -- SPOILERS AHEAD.

In the film, the psychic tells Micah emphatically not to get a ouija board and try to talk to the demon tormenting his girlfriend Katie. Nevertheless, Katie comes down to their living room one day to find what she describes as something like the most beautiful ouija board she's ever seen. "I did not buy a ouija board," Micah says pathetically in his defense, "I borrowed a ouija board."

Most of us know ouija boards from our younger days. There's an innocent age when we're not sure what is entertainment and what is true -- dragons, princesses, witches, ghosts, magic, ouija boards; all of it falls into this strange, partly-fairytale partly-true reality, and because of that, it's all up for grabs. We'd play with the ouija board at sleepovers, freak out friends with stories of conversations with ghosts and pass along hearsay that people heard screaming when they burned their boards. Some of us believed the ouija boards were really a way to talk to ghosts, and some of us didn't, but the possibility that they could be a gateway to another dimension had us all fascinated, as well as good and scared.

I still don't know, of course, whether the ouija board is a subtle mind trick (ideomotor action) or moved by outside forces, but I know I don't care to touch one, with all the grown-up scary stories I've heard. I also remember a few times as a kid when things seemed a little too real ... no thank you. Still, I am attracted by their mystique, their arcane symbolism. There's a little goth kid inside me who thought that ouija board Micah brought home was pretty darn beautiful, too.

In the interest of that, let's have a look at some of the more fabulous ouija boards out there. There are excellent antique boards on display at The Museum of Talking Boards and Witchboards.net, you can buy gorgeous boards or have one custom made at DragonOak.com, and I found some pretty enchanting ones available for sale on eBay; see the gallery. Halloween's just around the corner if you're feeling spiritually curious (and brave). I've yet to see the release of the official "Paranormal Activity" board, but it can't be far off. Would you buy it?