Perusal of the March 2008 archives
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 31
» Please Provide Your Valued Opinion
Behold! The egg.
The lady Loryienne has asked a pointed and valuable question, and this appears an appropriate time to address it. When first discovering the Elven house my first step is the same as any anthropologist, scientist, or morphologist, it is documentation. Sketches in pencil or polychrome are valuable and necessary, but I have also whole-heartedly embraced the modern techniques of photography. There have been great leaps forward in this science and art in the last few decades and I use the contemporary and readily available albumen photographic printing method. This common process involves printing onto paper (available commercially) with an albumen prepared negative. The albumin (egg white) is combined with chlorine and bromine or iodine salts before being immersed entirety in silver nitrate. It is this combination of materials, combined with shutter speeds, that allows for the photographing of fairies and other mystical creatures.Chickens have long been known to be creatures that dwell on the edge of the human and the magical realm; dragons, unicorns, toads and chickens. Sadly, the long gestation period of the dragon (some 1,200 years), combined with the irrational exuberance for their hunting during the dark ages, has concluded in near extinction. As for the unicorn, it is documented that the creatures only dwell in virgin forests, leaving them only for short periods to seek mates. Man’s insatiable desire for tables, cabinetry, and high end toothpicks has meant the destruction of all but a few stands of inaccessible and well hidden virgin forests throughout the world, and in turn an ever dwindling numbers of unicorns. Chickens, on the other hand, have proven important to the human race; indeed they have made themselves valuable to us. “Ah the poor hens, almost everything finds the chicken tasty”; so said my late wife when finding one of our hens stolen from its nighttime perch. As the darkness of night creeps on the chicken enters a trance like state– a time when the bird fluctuates between the magical world and our own, a time in which the fowl is liberated from its round and flight-clumsy body and perform mad balletic dances in cerebral worlds with night-time magical companions. During these dark hours they are most vulnerable to mortal predator, until the morning crow of the rooster calls the hens to rejoin this world and warns all night dwellers to retreat to the shadows for another day.
The chicken provides what is perhaps the most palpable and valuable gift from the magic world; the egg. Our ancient ancestors dealt with the Others routinely and revered the chicken as an “oracle” between our world and the other. They asked questions of the fairy queens by speaking directly to entranced chickens under the light of the full moon. The light of day found the elders of the druid communities waiting anxiously around the now wakeful hen. When at last the egg came forth they would crack the egg and “read” the yolk and albumen. Nearly every culture regards the egg as a symbol of magic – it was adopted from the ancient druids by the Christians and dressed up as a sign of spring and Easter. Old German peasants give us stories of golden eggs and beanstalks – originally not involving the Grimm brothers’ fancified goose, but the common chicken.
And so, it is through the fascinating modern invention of Abel Niépce de Saint-Victor’s that we now coat photographs with albumen and through coincidence that the process involves silver nitrate – silver being one of only three metals many magical creatures can abide. Mystical albumen and silver nitrate combined with the slow shutter speeds of the modern camera, allow even the casual photographer to capture the images of the magical world. But still, one would have to be in the right place at the right time, or know where to look, to capture the image of one of the Others. Accidentally photographing a fairy in your home snap-shot of Aunt Edaline would be paramount to photographing uncle Albert in Peoria and capturing the image of a random elephant passing behind him, it simply doesn’t happen very often. But, as the modern use of egg white in photography expands in years to come there will surely be more and more incidents of accidental Other imagery -- Yet unless finding a creature at rest or one who would agree to “sit” for you, the being may end up appearing as only a blur to the casual eye: calked up as an error in the development process.
So, on the edge of the old stand of maples I shoved the sharp ends of my tripod into the frozen ground and set up my camera with its own patented shutter optic lens loaded the flash-powder and proceeded to document the sight for my files.
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 31
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 30
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On Edge
A lamp lit our way as we followed in Molly’s shadow, turning a right angle up the wallowed stairs into the sloping shoulders of the old house. She showed us our room, a long narrow space with a single dormered window looking out across the pasture toward the woods. The little guest room was wallpapered in twisting tendrils of ivy and rosettes, that proved quite becoming during the day, but in the cool light of the growing moon resembled snakes twisting their way up the walls, chasing mice to swallow. There was a thick cannonball rope bed and a trundle pulled out below for the girls. It was here we settled down for an uncomfortable night.I awoke suddenly to the sound a door latch in the otherwise silent room, not knowing how much time had passed since falling asleep. The moon had wound its way along the floorboards and now cast eighteen wavy rectangles of cool light, icicles throwing pointy-toothed shadows on the girls. I looked out from the depression my restless body had created in the feather bed, the door was opened just an inch or so, I sat up and peered into the tar-black darkness of the hall beyond. The light of the moon stroked the girls cheeks as they slept curled up in one another’s arms, Lucia clinging closely to the stuffed toy marmoset her mother had stitched for her. I fluffed the pillows and resettled myself in the bed, but the loose ropes and rising edges of the old mattress gave me the uncomfortable feeling of looking up from the bottom of a grave. I tucked in the bed sheets as a battlement against the persistent New England drafts and closed my eyes. Nervousness immediately overtook me, and my eyelids sprung open to see a dark figure moving about at the foot of the bed. I lept up to grab my walking stick, but tripped on the trundle bed and landed squarely on the girls who awakened with startled screams. I responded with a yelp of my own and jumped to my feet. Ready to defend my family, I held aloft the stuffed marmoset and scanned the space around me finding that whatever I thought I had seen was now gone. Leaving me standing in the sparely furnished room with a quickened heart rate, two frightened girls and a lot of explaining to do. I pushed the door closed until the latch clicked, then we all crawled into the big bed, the girls hanging a bit off the edges, our exaggerated heartbeats began to temper one another, and slowed until our chests rose and fell into a legato harmony, and we drifted off to sleep despite ourselves.
The morning came as welcome relief. The dormer faced the southeast and showed the mist of the proceeding evening was gone, March morning sun ended my dreams with a reddish glow. We dressed and followed the radiating warmth and smell of coffee and back-bacon to the kitchen, stepping down from the stairway just as Arthur made his way in from the morning chores. The old woman still remained in her dark corner, covered in a pile of quilts and blankets. It appeared that she had slept there the entire night, as she was still in the same bed dress and bonnet. The girls made a wide arc around her as they carried there plates to the counter, a route similar to that I had seen them take at home when checking the hen house for eggs and avoiding the possessive rooster. I would have thought the old woman stuffed, as there was no sign of breathing or movement, but her eyes, light blue and milky white with cataracts followed our movements from one side of the kitchen to the other.
I had taken pains to respect Mr. McCrunkstales’ wishes, and traveled discreetly, using a tuba case to carry our technical equipment. This worked well on the train, as I appeared to be a traveling musician, but it would be harder to explain to the old woman and the farmhands why I was carrying a tuba case into the maple grove, so I covered the case in an old blanket. The girls and I dressed for the cold and followed Arthur outside.
The sun had started warming the crisp air the retreating darkness had left behind and the sleigh wagon slipped and scraped as the melting snow gave way to ragged patches of grass and stone. The branches of the reaching arms of the maples had not leafed out, so the sun struck through to the forest floor, encouraging the wildflowers before the old maple trees and grey birches could grab all the sunlight for themselves. We passed many buckets hanging from the trees but carried on straight to our destination. After a quarter hour the wagon stopped on the edge of a secluded back pasture and Archibald gave us a nod that indicated to us that this was where we were to get out. It was immediately obvious which trees were the ones in question, there was the same twisting and turning tubing indicated in the photo –the brass and copper still untouched by the morning sun, decorated with a thin lace of frost.
“I’ll leave you here for a while, must be getting on with the gathering, I’ll be passing back and forth from the farm. Can I bring you out anything?” asked our host.
“Yes,” I answered back as the girls and I wandered around the trees. “We have brought most everything required, but now that we are here it seems we may be in need a few supplementary items. We’ll need a four-meter length of white twine, a wooden chicken carrier, a silver ice pick, a bit of copper wire, and a small bag of blueberries.” Lucia pulled at my sleeve and I leaned into her whisper, “ah yes,” I added, “a key wound kitchen clock with a second hand and a brass #5 double headed flex bolt.” She yanked again. “And a square of milk chocolate.”
“No trouble,” granted the farmer “but we haven’t any fresh blueberries this time of year – will canned preserves do?”
“They will have to,” I replied.
Archibald started off, and I opened my case and started sorting my items. As Lucia inspected the arrangement and connections of the tubing Lenore wandered off to a tree standing lonely on the edge of the woods, and she stood staring silently. I picked up a small case and walked out to see what was holding her interest. “Look,” she said, “a little house.” The trunk of the old tree had a hole near the bottom exposing the hollow interior. Lenore went on to inspect the rest of the tree, scraping lichen into glass vials and digging to find brown winged maple seeds in the soft snow while I fastened on the patented spectacles. I wound the thick copper key at the back sending gears and flaps whirring, tempering my rate of vision and making it clear that Lenore’s instincts were right. We had found an elf house.
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 28
Elves' House
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 26
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 22
Sphinx Moth
The Village of Winterbottom had a distinctly grey appearance, encouraged by the season’s murky slush that inhabited the ruts in the road outside the station, slush that was fast freezing in the gathering darkness. My great Uncle Endurance Galubrious had been killed by slush. I shuddered at the sight of the stuff, and looked away, I turned my gaze to the one other passenger who stepped with us out onto the platform of the weather-beaten Victorian station, a young boy of about nine clad in a woolen jacket and breeches. He carried what I thought to be a French horn case, but on closer inspection, appeared to be built in the shape of a ground sloth. As I looked at the bag from afar a grunt and thump sounded from it. The young man looked at me with no small amount of consternation, turned, and fled into the darkness. The train too, abandoned us – heaving off in a great rush of steam, its heavy engine growing silent as it twisted its way along the valley floor. A final whistle echoed through the moist air and signaled its passage into Canada, leaving us alone with the dreaded slush.I had sent a telegraph to McCrunkstale at the time of our departure, but no one appeared to be waiting for us. The ticket office was closed so we sat ourselves on a bench near the door and the girls passed the time by dodging drips of icy water falling from the eaves. There was very little noise from the village – the only sign of life was smoke rising from the ashen houses into a leaden sky. A low lying fog developed on the melting snow, gathering and falling in an orchestrated dance of vapors, until it dissipated entirely, revealing a figure standing at the end of the platform.
“Dr. Galubrious?” A gravely voice called out, pleasant, but a bit brittle, as if tired from lack of use.
“At your service, Sir” I replied, with as much enthusiasm as I could muster.
“Well, what beautiful young ladies we have here.” The man said placing his hands on his hips and stepping closer. He could be no more than five feet away from us now, yet his neutral tweed jacket and pants, his sooty beard and his winter wrinkled face created an illusion of camouflage. Like the mimicry of the Common Sphinx Moth, his figure blended into the trunks of the silvered trees behind him, leaving his dark eyes the only prominent feature.
“I’m sorry I’m late, it’s a busy time of the year what with the sugaring and the calving, and the roads are terrible, all this freezing and thawing. I’m Archibald, glad to meet you.” His speech was riddled with tight O’s that betrayed our proximity to the border. “Well, let’s get you somewhere warm, the Mrs. has something waiting on the stove. Let me help you with your bags.” We followed the man to his mud-splattered carriage, two large grey geldings harnessed to the front. The horses seemed somewhat uncomfortable, nickering and snorting, as if they would have been far more at ease pulling a hay-wagon than this black and gold-stenciled surrey. We pulled an old quilt over our laps and we were off.
Twenty minutes into out trip the sweet smell of maple syrup reached out to us as ribbons of scent wove their way through the old maple trees. We rounded a bend in the road and saw the old farmstead across wind swept ridges of a plowed cornfield crouching on the crest of a small rise. Typical of the region, the small cape style house faced the road, behind it was attached a summer kitchen, connected to that a woodshed, this, in turn attached to a chicken house, stable, pig shed, dairy barn, hay barn, corn-crib, tool shed, smithy, smoke house, taxidermiary, well house, potato shed and, finally, the outhouse. The entire group of buildings snaked across the knoll, rising and falling with the swells of the winter landscape. The collection of buildings looked like a crouching cat, ready to jump onto the dejected sugarhouse, framed in rough lumber it stood warily, ready to retreat into the massive sugarbush that crept up the mountain behind it. Steam poured out of the little shack and veiled the house in aromatic smog.
Snow had blown and gathered so deeply near the edges of the house, that when Archibald opened the door we had to step a considerable distance down, and into the darkness, giving me the feeling of stepping into a rabbits warren. Mrs. McCrunkstale added to the effect, as she rushed about in the firelight, flitting here and there, checking on her stove and ushering us in through the low door with dark eyes and a wide smile. What Archibald lacked in conversational skills his wife more than made up for, she started a breathless twelve-minute ramble of chatter that began with local milk prices and ended with recent archeological discoveries in Egypt. Chipped ironware bowls were scattered about the thick table in front of the fire, and sitting down I found the bottom curves of the bowls were decorated with flow-blue transfers from Spode’s “stages of a womanhood series.” I was delighted to find my setting was the “the rested and contented young mother.” Looking around the table I found that Lenore was gazing wistfully at the “Innocent and enchanting young maiden” at the bottom of her bowl. Lucia on the other hand stared up at me icily, as she had been seated at the “one step away from death and cranky” plate, her demeanor did not improve as a pool of beef broth with great chunks of overcooked beef and undercooked root vegetables was splashed over the old crone’s craggy face.
As we began to eat, Mrs. McCrunkstale explained to us that her real name was Molting White Cranes of the Slow Waters McCrunkstale, but that most everyone just called Molly, everyone but her mother-in-law. Molly nodded in the direction of a darkened corner, and I was aware for the first time of an old woman sitting in the shadows there. She could have easily been the model for Lucia’s bowl – and it was clear from her steely glance that she did not care for her daughter-in-law, her son’s marriage, or our presence in the house. It also became apparent that our dinner conversation was not going to center around the creatures in the woods. I was introduced to Old Mother McCrunkstale as “Second Cousin Arthur”; the smiling Molly was using the old woman’s feeble mind against her. I brought her brittle hand to my chin and kissed it’s wrinkled back, and so began our little game.
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 22
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 18
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Composed by Dr. G on Mar 17
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We Journey North
The College employees Union contract negotiations had ended poorly last spring, leaving the professors with an increase of just .012 percent to our base wages and an extra round of hard cheese annually. Put simply, my wallet was bare. But, the Galubrious family had a few more prizes left, in the corner of my study I swept off a blizzard of un-graded research papers and opened the lid of a heavy trunk emblazoned with a gilded GG and rummaged through the contents. I pulled out an early Baroque sardine fork and turned it over in my hand, its worn handle was sculpted in the shape of two golden cranes their necks intertwined holding high in their beaks a magnificent carbuncle squid. The workmanship was magnificent – it was crafted by Julliet Faberge, the one armed goldsmith who lived in the shadows of her more famous cousins. The many tentacles of the squid have, since the dark ages, symbolized the eight levels of devotion. This particular sardine fork had been a gift to Napoleon by his secret Russian love. It was said that he would never enter battle without the treasure tucked close to his heart – when time and circumstance would stir him to thoughts of his beloved, he would slip his hand under his lapel and stroke the long necks of the cranes.As the carriage neared the station I directed the driver down a thin alley, it was here in the opaque shadows that I traded the small, storied treasure for a roll of drab bills. The transaction yielded more than enough to fund our travels north and keep us fed and housed for many months to come.
Grey mill towns gave way to white hills and scattered villages with church spires piercing the horizon as the train pushed its way North. Finally fields in turn gave way to deep forests. Dawn broke through the trees and emblazoned a red haze as the buds at the tips of the maples were beginning to swell in the morning sun of March.
We sat in the Café Cart, and I order eggs, bacon, toasts with rhubarb jam and a slice of apple pie with Vermont cheddar cheese, and somewhat wistfully, a side of sardines. The girls had griddlecakes, sausages and melon balls, which Lucia immediately began assembling into a molecular model of nitrous oxide. The train jostled as it made its way around the curves of the green mountains, collapsing the structure and sending a great pool of maple syrup over the rim of Lucia’s plate. The sticky wave landed squarely in the lap of Lenore who sat staring out the window, a melon ball frozen half way to her mouth, snapping her out of her daydream.
I too, had been lost in thought, wondering what lay before us in the quiet town of Winterbottom, whether this was a fool’s errand. The porter walked sleepy-eyed through the corridors, punching tickets and thrusting them back. When he got to our seats I took the opportunity to ask him how long it would be before our stop. He pried a ticket from Lenore’s sticky hands pulling a taffy-like syrupy thread across the table. He looked down his nose through trifocals at our tickets, “You can’t go any further north without entering the Queen’s Dominion, Winterbottom is the last stop before Canada, they’ll make an announcement in about an hour. Hope you’ve brought your heavy coats.”
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 16
Mr. McCrunkstale's Inquiry
Doctor Galubrious,Warm salutations to you and your daughters, I hope this letter finds you well. It is sugaring season here in New Hampshire and my family has been producing maple syrup in these northern woods for five generations. Last week, as the days grew warm, we set the taps and hung the buckets in the sugar bush. Tuesday, when we went gathering, I was alarmed to find that despite the nicely fluctuating temperatures, two of the sap buckets were entirely empty. Closer inspection revealed a maze of small, scavenged tubing leading from a hole drilled in the bottom of the buckets, and tracing a path back into an opening in the tree.
Ever since my neighbor’s youngest son Phillmore was rammed in the head by a Mama hog a good year ago he’s been known to do some mighty odd things (his mother is still getting over finding Marigold, one of the good milking jerseys, wearing her Sunday dress last Fall). So naturally my suspicions fell to the boy, and I over-looked the hooliganism. I replaced the bucket and disassembled the piping before heading back to the farm to tin up the holes as the first heavy flakes of an approaching storm began to fall. The weather kept me from checking the buckets until late the next day; it was then that I found the hole and piping reassembled, and no footprints anywhere to be found amongst the trees.
We are good, god-fearing folk and a not prone to fits of fancy, but I have always prided myself on an open mind and my wife has a head full of stories handed down by her French-Canadian/Iroquois mother. She tells stories of very small human-like creatures inhabiting this region long before our family began clearing these forests. I told her about the strange activity in the sugar bush and later that evening, as we sat by the fire she passed me over the “Farm and Cosmo” and quietly pointed to your advertisement.
Doctor, this is a small town, your arrival will be noticed without question. I request your highest discretion, as knowledge of your profession would make us the talk of church turkey dinners for years to come. If you were willing to come, we would be grateful for your expertise and will provide what compensation we can, your room and board, and all the pancakes you and your daughters can eat.
Please find enclosed a photograph taken in the sugar bush just two days ago.
With sincerity –
Mr. Archibald McCrunkstale
Winterbottom, New Hampshire
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 15
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 15
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 15
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Do not despair
Fair reader, gracious thanks to you for your comments, inquiries and encouragement. Let me assure you that our adventure in search of mystic and magical creatures has only just begun. It would appear that the advertisement placed in the “New England Farmyard and Cosmopolitan” has yielded some response. By post today I received a compelling letter from a Mr. Archibald McCrunkstale, a resident of the tiny hamlet of Winterbottom in the great northern woods of Coos County, New Hampshire. It seems Mr. McCrunkstale has a most unique and interesting problem. As I write, my girls are stuffing carpet bags and trunks with our gear. I am forced to make heart-wrenching choices between scientific instruments, which reference books and how many smoking jackets to take with us. We are only allowed a small quantity of luggage. Our carriage arrives in the early hours and we board the Maine and Winnipesaukee Railroad at 4:30am.
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 13
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 12
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 11
Olive Branch
We saw that familiar small key-chain bob and float of its own accord across the basement’s dirt floor, then it swung about, and disappeared around the corner. Another quiet cackle echoed back to us. We all stood, a bit dumbfounded, Lenore with headgear still fastened tight, the tin moon flipping past her left eye.“It took it, it took the keys!!” exclaimed Lenore.
“Where did it go?” asked Lucia.
“I don’t know – I didn’t see it. “
Both Lucia and I turned our heads to face her in disbelief.
Lucia asked “What do you mean you didn’t see it, you always see “it”
“I didn’t see it.” Lenore responded sadly
“You didn’t see it!” Lucia jumped up and down – “don’t you see, the headgear works, it works with just the wind up shutter, we don’t need the electricity! Now we just need to reverse the process!"
So, this is how my youngest child, incorporating existing frames, Swiss clockworks, High quality German polished lenses, red-straining filters, high impact copper alloy rods, quadratic graph manipulation and a cut smoked herring tin, developed her “Spring-wound Shutter Optic Spectacles” (Ukranian patent # 21,145). It is these glasses, along with this experience, that has made all the difference. It is the reason we embarked upon our family trade, it is how we came to seek out the distant branches of our family tree, it is how we came to mend fences with the small creature that lives in our home and call him by name: Thistletin Bogswallow XLII. These weathered grey walls and this overgrown garden, with it’s rusted iron gates and looming oak branches have become a refuge for the fast vanishing magical creatures, as they seek sanctuary from the creeping coal smog and cold concrete of industrialization. Perhaps most importantly, it is how people the world over have come to know the name Galubrious for more than the fine tooled leather and inlaid mother of pearl buttons of fine instruments of the free reed aerophone family.
For the time being we had found peace, be it for a short while. It became clear to me that our house boggart had been appeased when I awoke the next morning to an odiferous, musky bouquet. Looking at my distinctly middle-aged, but dare I say pulchritudinous form in the bedroom mirror, I found my shaved mustache kindly replaced with a neatly trimmed chunk of woodchuck fur glued firmly to my upper lip. Though some may have taken this as an offense – I took it as an aromatic olive branch.
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 11
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 08
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The Contraption
While I poured over my books in seclusion, Lucia had some how persuaded her older sister to submit to a barrage of testing, to ascertain precisely what Lenore could see and why. When the light in my office had begun to fade, I looked up from my reading. I found the silence of the house un-nerving and so climbed the stairs and entered the girl’s room to find Lenore’s cranium crowned by an enormous ring of instruments, gages and lenses, her sister dashed about with a small screwdriver, making adjustment and directing lenses and shutters across her sister’s pupils by way of a series of tiny gears running at a variety of angles and speeds. She penciled down the readings on the gauges in her red velvet and flower encrusted daybook before winding up another apparatus, and setting more gears and dodgers whirly-gigging away. Her sister stared blankly – but not unhappily - forward at the flowered wall paper, her head topped with a nest of wires, the copper ends of some plastered firmly to her scalp, the yellow hound yawned disinterested at her feet. It took a few moments before they noticed me standing in the doorway. Lucia only stopped for long enough to wave a hello, before splicing two copper wires together a few inches away from her sister’s right ear.“It appears” began Lucia, “that Lenore’s flicker fusion frequency is far beyond that of most other people. She can perceive as many as 150 hertz per CRT, nearly double what the rest of us can take in, allowing her visual physiology to track the path of an object moving at high speeds.” Lenore picked up the electrical plug off the floor and proceeded to the socket on the opposite side of the room. “And, I have also discovered a secondary heartbeat – nearly undetectable, like a murmur - floating underneath the primary one. I believe these abnormalities allow her vision to slow down the perception of objects moving at a very high rate of speed – each individual flutter of a hummingbirds wing, for example. or the fast arch of a badminton serve, or auntie Eileen’s bobble tree loop stitch when knitting. Using this device to halve the rate of sight, her visions may disappear.”
“Well” I answered back thoughtfully – “wouldn’t that prove an impediment to her birding, badminton and knitting skills?”
Lucia rolled her eyes at my little joke, and continued on as if I had said nothing. “If we reverse the process, and increased the rate of our own perception, we would increase our own persistence of vision – we could see what she sees.”
Lucia thrust the plug into the socket and the contraption on Lenore’s head whirred to life, she continued to stare straight ahead. Then there was a great jump of sparks, a smell of burnt ozone and hair, and the room went suddenly dark. Embers fizzled on the floor and the room filled with the dog’s barking and yelps from Lucia as she tripped across the floor. Lenore struggled to remove the device from the top of her head, her dark silhouette danced like a Javanese shadow puppet before the parrish blue square of the bedroom window. I rushed forward and tried to pry the device from her head – but it was impossible to find the fastening latches in the dark – and she simply dangled, feet kicking, as I tried to shake her out of it, a good foot and a half above the bedroom floor.
“Stop” she yelled – “I’m fine!, I just got a little scared is all.”
I lowered her apprehensively to the ground, ran to find a lamp and re-entered the room. everything was cast into a warm glow with long shadows– and there was a palpable silence, with the exception of a whirring and clicking as the wind-up portion of the head gear continued to wind down. A bent half-moon blinder cut from a smoked herring tin continued to orbit her head, a little off kilter.
The girls were in no mood to be left upstairs alone in the dark, so they followed me – by the light of the kerosene lamp – as we made out way downstairs and into the basement to find the fuse box. By the lantern’s glow it was hard to discern which of the glass fuses had blown to black as we peered forward at the circuit box in the dim light. As I reached out for the box there was a sudden click and a flash from the root cellar, and a blinding light bounced around the basement imprinting the outline of spider webs and the circuit breakers on my eyes. I made a random grab for one of the fuses, popped it out and shoved a penny from my pocket into the empty socket. Success! Current surged through the line and the single bulb dangling from the center of the basement ceiling sprung to life, bathing the cellar room in light. A faint, self-contented chuckle of laughter bounced off the cold walls, and we spun around to find it's source.
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 08
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 04
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Window from the eastern portico of the Chapel of the Bloodied Cedar – constructed at Castle Malwood in 1107 and dedicated to William Rufus the Red.
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 04
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Rufus the Red
Instead of sitting at the top of the stairs, waiting for the click of the shutter in the darkness, I sequestered myself in my phrontistery, where I carried out my studies. pouring through volumes of research, I studied the characteristics of those people who had the special ability to see the others; known by many as the “sight” or the “whim”. Children were most likely to see mystical creatures, also the aged, but this was often attributed to the sporadic cartwheels of developing or deteriorating minds. It was reported that many Anglo-Saxons sporting red hair commonly had the ability, but my research revealed that those red heads claiming to have the sight shared more than physical features, they had a common twisted root in the family tree: King Rufus the Red.Not only did the king have red hair, he was said to have a fiery disposition and a wild streak of insanity; having some 27 gilded and stone encrusted cages built to house his pet yams. Tucked behind a vintage jar of pear and lemming chutney in the musty archives of the library annex and larder at Windsor, I found an old diary. It included an account of the Queen’s bodice lacer’s foot maid who claimed that Rufus’s birth was not the result of a royal marriage, but instead the offspring of a rare chance encounter of his mother with a lusty wood sprite. The result was a king with split allegiances, and a disturbed mind, he taxed his people heavily to purchase great tracts of dark and enchanted forests on both sides of the Channel. He took no queen, but records show his presence at the baptism of a red-haired male child of a Bristol barmaid at Canterbury Cathedral. It is said that the refusal of baptismal rights by Anselm, abbot of Bec, led to the cleric’s persecution, and the deepening of the King’s distaste for organized religion. The day before he was to sever his ties with the church and take the young barmaid as his queen, the king took his brother hunting the last pair of great bustards in the New Forest. It was there, at Brokenhurst, that an errant arrow skewered his left eye and another accidentally pierced his heart as he passed a group of hooded monks. Though they employed the great medical advances of the time: the thumping of the head with cedar bows, the king soon expired.
According to my research a considerable number of those blessed with the “”whim” could trace their ancestry back to that same Bristol barmaid, and many sport great shocks of red hair. Accounts are unreliable, and many children are hushed up by parents who rightfully worry of being branded as witches, but the ancestry includes the great Yorkshire families of Wright and Griffith, as well as my own great great grandfather; Ichabod Galubrious.
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 04
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 02
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 01
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Peace offering
A sharp call from my daughters brought me down the wooden stairs and into the basement. We crouched together in the dim light and investigated the wall. Out of the small opening wafted a cool draft sprinkled with the scent of dog’s feet and Roquefort cheese. I knew we were treading on thin ice here. We had obviously found the boggart’s new home and did not want to risk infuriating him further. But the wild, impetuous academian side of me took over, and I bounded up the stairs and dusted off my cardioelectrochronometer, a device I invented during my research days to detect the smallest rhythmic presence of a heartbeat, and with it in hand dashed once more down into the darkness.When I returned I found Lenore staring intently into the hole.
“I see Him” she whispered, "he's sleeping."
“You haven’t touched him have you?” I inquired nervously
as Lucia and I bent forward and held up the lamp. We saw nothing but what appeared to be a nest of mismatched socks, handkerchiefs, flower sacks and silk ties. Lucia and I glanced at each other and said nothing. This was not an unusual occurrence. Many times Lenore had been brought to tears when those around her failed to see the magical world she, herself, found easy to intuit. We both remembered Lenore’s exclamations of delight in front of the Zambian ambassador as she witnessed Fairies riding field mice in Lady Pigpickling’s sunken garden at Grey Gables. There was also the time when we took our family’s summer vacation in the Virginia’s Great Dismal Swamp and found her wandering in the light of the full moon, dressed only in her nightgown. Her enormous hazel eyes wide open, staring into the darkness of the oak branches and hanging moss as we extricated her from the waist deep muck. Rubbing her legs down with salt and pulling of shriveled leeches from between her toes did not dampen her enthusiasm as she recounted following the “glowing orb and enchanting song of the willow-the-wisp” as we listened, blurry eyed in the grey of the early dawn. It had become apparent long ago that she was operating at a different wavelength than the rest of us.
Since I had last used the cardioelectronchronometer my youngest, Lucia had made improvements, ratcheting up the sensory membrane by installing a secondary drum magnifier, and stabilizing the lower bed using a milled alchemy of brass, aluminum and high tensile pine sap. The results were impressive. Turning on the knob and passing the wand over the opening set the dials jumping. Despite what the rest of us could, or could not see, there was life behind the wall. And this was the place for us to present our peace offering.
I ushered the girls to the workshop and asked them to start constructing a decorative platform for the offering while I slipped back down stairs to scrape soil and take air samples. After I had labeled and stored away my glass vials, I exited my study to the ringing sound of hammers and coping saws. Despite her youthful age of six, Lucia had a fine set of woodworking skills, and had amassed an impressive collection of carpentry tools. In the half hour I had been taking samples, the girls had managed to make an impressive little altar out of rose-wood, tiger maple, and a cigar box, It was expertly dovetailed and incorporated a number of found objects – including the tip of the lightning rod that had until recently graced the top of our house. I decided not to ask how they had retrieved it and instead admired the fine craftsmanship. At the very center sat a small niche - where the keys dangled seductively. To finish it all off we hand rubbed the wood with a block of Stilton cheese, a detail we were sure the boggart would appreciate, and hung the contraption on the wall opposite the opening in the dimly lit root cellar.
But the researcher in me could not be tempered, and after putting the altar into place I tied a small thread onto the loop in the key ring, passed it through a horseshoe nail, around the doorknob, over a small lead pulley, and onto the shutter switch of a Kodak Exactashot 1522 press camera – the most sensitive, and quickest camera available in the American market that now incorporated a few improvements Lucia had made to the shutter mechanism. I felt confident we would soon have photographic evidence of our little friend.
Composed by Dr. G on Mar 01