Tales From Duwamish Bay

THE ADVENTURES OF THE AMAZING BENANDANTI

2006-07-19T19:15:00.000-07:00

The Amazing Benandanti performs at the Chamber of Horrors Sideshow at a Marina in a town called Duwamish Bay.

The Sideshow has been in the same building for over 50 years and its star attraction has performed there since the first day the doors opened.

Over the years other performers have aged and died, moved on or disappeared.

All except for the Amazing Benandanti.

It was SUPPOSED to be sideshow secret along the Marina; the original Amazing Benandanti had a look- a-like daughter who in time took over the act. Of course, she's billed as an Immortal who learned her magic secrets from the Egyptians or Druids, or sometimes she was supposed to have been a student who studied Magic under Merlin himself.

The Amazing Benandanti is a Death Defying Escape Artist...tie her in chains, put her in a tank of water and watch as she escapes from a watery grave; she also performs a routine she calls " Chasing the Rabbit” which involves an Electric Chair once used in the most infamous now abandoned Prison in the state of Washington: Maplewood.

The Chair is her favorite part of her entire act because as she will tell you, there's no such thing as going over the top when you're suppose to be getting electrocuted. It appeals to her sense of theatrics, which are after all in the true spirit of the Sideshow.

Her eyes roll, her body convulses, blood trickles from her eyes and ears, wisps of smoke make their way from her slightly parted lips and then her blood red eyes change back to dark brown, she turns her wrists, the straps snap off and she stands and then takes a deep bow.

Among her other acts are the Escape from the Gallows and the Revenge of the Condemned.

Some nights as a treat for her self as much as for her audience The Amazing Benandanti summons ghosts, demons and other strange creatures that are part animal, part human. They are vaporous images but solid enough to touch.

That part of the act is always somewhat unpredictable and because of that The Amazing Benandanti doesn't like to perform it very often because one night a creature that was part horse and part crocodile nearly took her head off.

She will tell the crowd, as she prepares to open the doorway to not talk to the apparitions. They will ask you a question and if you answer...she won't be able to guarantee what happens next nor will she be able to guarantee your safety.

Sometimes because it's a simple pleasure and she enjoys it The Amazing Benandanti sits out front and performs little slight of hand tricks for people walking along the Boardwalk before her first show of the evening. She gives lessons and patiently explains how to make coins disappear and reappear again. There are magic scarves and dancing rope tricks that she can teach you to perform. She keeps all of these props in a well-worn, heavily snickered travel trunk.

Reach in, pull out a prop and the Amazing Benandanti will teach you magic too.

The Amazing Benandanti, like all good Sideshow performers does have her secrets. One is she's never in over 50 years surrendered her billing to anyone. Her ego would never allow that. There has only ever been one Amazing Benandanti, which is more then enough as anyone who knows her will be glad to tell you.

The second is The Amazing Benandanti isn't really a Magician.

Kincross Benandanti is a Werewolf, but like a lot of us she has her talents too. And one of those talents involves seeing into the next world.

That's how she came to see the riders camped on the railroad tracks. Not by, but on the tracks themselves. They were phantoms of course but that didn't mean they couldn't cause damage. The grass and shrubs along the tracks were starting to die and the air started to smell a bit stale and old.

Not that anyone noticed, these tracks ran below street level and were not exactly the type of place you paid attention too even when you did look down. The tracks were littered with trash and pigeons and crows roost wherever they can land. It wasn't pleasant to look at and the smell coming up to the sidewalk above was foul.

For nearly a week Kincross had been watching the three of them as they appeared at each sunset. Earlier in the evening they were almost transparent and as people above walked by they reached to the back of their necks or pulled their jackets a little closer to their bodies. Some of the people even stopped suddenly and turned around, like they expected to see someone following them.

By the time the moon raised the Riders were as real and solid looking as nightmare creatures made flesh can get.

One evening, as she stood on the bridge that looked down onto the tracks she watched the three riders come to life with more speed then they had on previous days and she wondered, what exactly were they?

She was puzzled and wondered how to satisfy her curiosity about these things. In the end she took her years of predatory experience, considered several options she learned in thousands of years of war experience, reached down, picked up a bottle and threw it at the head of the tallest figure.

It made contact with a thud that made Kincross wince and she said with genuine feeling “that has got to hurt”

Then the tall one looked up at her, directly into her eyes and hissed, it opened its mouth wide and thick yellow green mucus oozed out from the corners of its thin-scarred lips.

It was drooling.

That's when she ran.

Kincross was so distracted by what she had seen that earlier that evening she managed to make herself look like an amateur at her 10:00 show.

When her executioner pulled the lever on the trap door of the gallows and the very real hangman's noose tightened and yanked up just behind her ear, the language she used as she was snapped back up was not good. “

Hey,” she said to loudly " you’re suppose to nod before you do that so I can make myself ready…”

Her friend Clara the Alligator woman said, from under her executioner’s hood, “Mouth Danti!”

“Well, I'm sorry Clara “she croaked the rope is pulling my shirt up for Pete’s sake and something is tearing in my neck.”

“It’s supposed to be breaking your neck stupid!” Clara said starting to loose her temper “for Pete's sake shut your mouth and start choking!”

So before the act fell apart The Amazing Benandanti kicked, choked and struggled for air...she was giving a very good impersonation of not only a dieing woman, but a woman in agony, much to the delight of her audience.

She went rigid, and then limp and the rope creaked and sounded as loud as gunshots as she swayed back and forth from the end of the noose.

Then as if she were in slow motion on film, the dead woman twitched, kicked and seemed to slither up back up through the trap door. It looked like an invisible hand was pulling her; rope and all back up towards the scaffold's arm. Then while she seemed to be hanging in midair facing the audience her eyes snapped open.

And flamed red, red as coals in a fire.

“Ladies and Gentleman " cried Jesse the Cyclops from the side of the stage " the death defying Amazing Benandanti!”

Kincross lowered back onto the scaffold and worked the rope away from her neck and took her bow and when the curtains snapped shut on the stage Jesse gave her thumbs up.

“Good work ladies, I really liked the part when you vomited those entire four letter words when you're suppose to be dieing at the end of the rope Danti. Are you going to make that a permanent part of your death scene?' "

“Hey it's that touch of reality that makes the act”

“Sure, sure.” Jesse the real life Cyclops said, “Like this place has anything to do with reality.

That's the way it was at the Chamber of Horrors, which was part of a permanent Sideshow act down the street from the Guzman Curio Shoppe.

Reality was only a theory here on the Marina.

Jesse really was a Cyclops, all 7 feet and one eye in the center of his forehead of him. He was a friend of Kincross' from the very, very old days. He had been living in Olympic Peninsula in Washington State for several years when Kincross found him...and offered him work.

He wasn't sure exactly who set up the Sideshow, but it was a good place to be if you wanted to hide in the open. This was a relief from hiding in the shadows. Ask anyone who’s tried it. It’s enough to make you crazy.

So mixed among the fakes was Jesse, Wintra and Summer the Conjoined twins who's real talent was seeing into the past, but for the Sideshow they performed Victorian parlor music on violins and other stringed instruments, and Clara the Alligator Woman. There was nothing supernatural about Clara's skin condition, but at east she had a job and could walk around in the open.

Among the medical curiosities displayed in glass cases, the human oddities and artwork a woman with scaly skin was hardly noticeable. This is why she worked so many acts. She in her 45 years went from living in a mental institution to being a stage performer. Clara had always wanted to be an actress and as far as she was concerned, her mission had been well accomplished.

Now we come to The Amazing Benandanti.

Kincross was a faker of sorts; nothing she did was magic...exactly.

In fact she couldn't tell you if she was human or monster; she couldn't tell you how old she is. She came from the Mountains, but she's not sure which ones. None that are standing now, that she's sure of.

Then in one evening in less then 10 minutes her life changed...at last.

Kincross was watching the Sunset yet again and the sight of it going through the same old routine almost cost her sanity when she was captured and forced into a place where all she could do was sleep and dream.

It was a relief really.

After she was rescued from the Catacombs by the Franciscan Monks who discovered her sleeping beneath their Abbey where she had been imprisoned by a rogue witch and her vampire companion she promised herself more then a new life. She promised herself to become something else altogether.

That's why she ran away and joined the circus, that's why she almost ignored the Riders at the Railroad Tracks.

But old habits die-hard and that's why she threw the bottle...

Only these Riders, as she was about to learn were about to create some changes of their own.

When the Moon was full three days later on Halloween Kincross was going to find that out exactly what it was they were about to change.

The last week of October is a very big thing on the Marina.

The Guzman's Curio Shoppe displays its newest finds at Halloween, it's a tradition.

Their stock, things like shrunken heads, exotic plants and mummified remains of all sorts are spiffed up and their cases draped in orange and black crepe paper streamers. Akela, Ignancia’ s Guzman's sister, could not only be counted on to bring back treasures and curiosities like the Mummy of the Egyptian Priestess that made the entire Marina famous, she could tell the best stories and could entertain people for hours in the Soda Fountain in the front of the Curio Shoppe.

That included the performers from the Chamber of Horrors.

Wintra and Summer, Zymo the Missing link, and sometimes Jesse would sit among the tourists and locals and listen to Akela tell stories about a city made up of immortals who's souls died leaving their corpses to wander their city in a dream state for all eternity, a town called Leaning Birches where Death itself lives, an Insane Asylum haunted by a demon doctor and her husband, who as Akela tells the story was still haunt the Sixth floor of the abandoned Hospital that still stands in the town of Resolution just outside of Lawton. Akela also tells stories about Headhunters and witch doctors, curses and hexes.

Akela’ s stories are much more then simple scary stories and they are always more fact then fiction and she leaves no doubt about that as she spins one tale after another.

She also tells stories about Werewolves when she's sure Kincross isn't around because she can't get halfway through them before she hears a gravelly sounding voice go into hysterical fits of laughter and say, " Kade, you are SO funny! Come one, tell us a good one. You’re holding out on us, you know you are. “

A few doors down the restaurants; souvenir shops and art galleries display pumpkins, offer free candy and some host costume parties. The Arima's Amusement park, famous for its hand carved exotic carousel horses, mermaids and other fantasy animals are polished, the normal carousel music is replaced by recordings of funeral music and the electric lights are replaced by lanterns giving the friendly animals of the carousel a darker look.

Their eyes seem to follow you as you walk by and their wooden muscles seem to ripple under the half cast light.

The vendors selling treats along the Marina replace their usual fare with candy corn, orange cotton candy, as well black cat, bat and pumpkin shaped cookies and confections like black and orange popcorn balls. The soda pop is replaced by Devil's Blood, Nightmare Ambrosia and of course, Witch's Brew. There is an endless supply of caramel apples coated in not only in caramel but marshmallow, exotic chocolates and then all of this is rolled in nuts or candies in the shapes bats and ghosts.

But something was happening in those few days up to Halloween; there was an unfriendly bite to the night air, the fog that rolled up from the Duwamish Bay wasn't a fine mist, it was heavy and smothering and seemed to extinguish anything unfortunate enough to end up in its grasp.

On these evenings as you walk down the boardwalk or along the brick and cobblestone sidewalks and streets your footsteps seemed to echo too loud and for too long. No matter how fast you walked it seemed to take forever to get from one short block to the next.

One night, after the Sideshow had closed for the evening Clara and Kincross decided to walk down the boardwalk to the Curio Shoppe to visit with their friend Ignancia. Her sister Akela was in town and both women were anxious to hear some of Akela’ s new stories...before she took to relaxing with her wine and thin cigars that had been soaked in rum and began to change the stories to more fiction then fact.

This left the listeners with a pale imitation of what really happened.

Akela’ s stories were best told by candlelight and tea and before her mask of bravado hid whatever she may have been really feeling at the time her adventures were happening.

Halfway down the street it was Clara who asked Kincross, “Did you hear that?”

Of course Kincross had heard it.

Heavy footsteps in almost perfect timing with their own. "

No. “She lied.

Clara stopped and demanded, “You did too hear that!”

Kincross grabbed Clara's hand and started walking “of course I did and there’s more than one back there...so keep walking and shut up. I'm trying to think."

“What abo..." Clara felt something press against her chest and shove and she was pushed over a rail and into the black night waters of the Duwamish Bay

When Clara broke the surface of the icy waters she could hear the a terrible storm.

The winds howled, there was thunder and lightning and mixed in with that were the sounds of voices lost in the middle of the storm. Then she saw a terrible figure standing on the rail above her, it held out its arms and it howled against the night sky. Then it turned its misshapen head towards her and pushed away from the rail and then it was coming down towards her.

The force of the figure hitting the water pushed her back and then under the water. A heavy clawed hand grabbed her by the back of her jacket and lifted her dead weight straight out of the water and swung around like a rag doll.

After it had turned her around she was peering down into a pair of blood red eyes and jagged teeth so white they gleamed blue. The face was a shadowed by a heavy brow bone, and in the fog shrouded night down here in the water it was hard to tell if it was a human face or an animal’s face but you knew it didn't belong in this world.

“Danti!” Clara cried in relief “you’re alright!”

When they got to the Curio Shoppe Akela handed Clara a towel and a flask of something. When she put it to her lips to take a drink the alcohol seemed to disappear as it hit the space between her mouth and the flask's opening.

The fumes wafted up and burned Clara's eyes.

“What is this?” Clara asked raising the flask a second time but careful not to have her eyes open this time as she drank...or inhaled. "

Who knows, but it'll get you drunk fast. "

“Amen to that “Clara said and tossed the flask to Kincross.

Ignancia plucked the flask from Kincross' fingers and threw it back to her sister, “We need them sober, and we need to know what it was they saw.”

“Grave Robbers” Kincross said yanking the flask back and taking a long hard swig " three of them...nasty brutes too. I tried to finish one off. He must've just eaten. " She took another long swallow and snapped " this isn't working.”

Ignancia went to her cabinet and pushed at the latticework along the top. After she pushed in and pulled a drawer came of the center of the scrollwork. Without looking in she reached in and pulled out a small blue bottle and that smelled faintly of curry powder. “Here, sniff it.”

Kincross shrugged and did as she was told.

Then she ran out the door and the sounds of her getting sick into the Bay were brutal. When she came back in she said through clenched teeth and narrowed watering eyes “gee thanks."

“You have to kill those germs; you don't know what those things have been getting into.” Ignancia told her.

“I do, I could smell it and taste it I'm afraid. And we have a problem, a big one."

Akela laughed. “It looks like Ghouls have infested our Cemetery and are probably robbing them for food. And it can’t be good news for you or Jess because technically you count as the.... not of this world too, so you're on the menu and anybody else who has...how can I say it; were born of exotic heritage...like the Twins and I don't know, what could be a bigger problem then that? "

“It’s what they ate for their last meal.”

“Which was “Akela said through a line cloud of blue cigar smoke.

“Vampire”

So the night before Halloween Kincross, Akela, and Clara went out to Leaning Birch Cemetery to meet newest residents of Lawton Ridge.

Leaning Birch Cemetery is a well-known place on the entire West Coast; it's famous because of its size and somewhat notorious history. Leaning Birch had started out as a graveyard for suicides, the executed and the poor. Babies who only lived for a few hours or days are here as well as the deformed and defectives.

This is where the forgotten were laid to rest.

It's a maze of graves, marble and stone mausoleums and crypts dug directly into the hillside.

The Cemetery was built in the forest and in time it had become a city and more then once hikers and the curious had gone up there and been lost for days. Some where never found.

These three women were very familiar with this place and getting lost here wasn't something that concerned them.

“Why do we have to come out here at night, " Clara was whispering to herself, " why not during the day when there are people around and you can see where you're going if you have to run."

“Because last shows at our last show is at 10:00... You know that.” Kincross looked over at Akela and rolled her eyes heavenwards. Sometimes it was all too apparent to Kincross that Clara had been in an institution. At times when Clara started talking out of her head like this it was all to painfully clear that being locked up in that asylum had damaged her, poor thing.

They came to the first section of the Cemetery just as the Moon came up.

Akela waived the Lantern from one grave to the next, “what do you think?” she asked Kincross.

“This Graveyard is dead. “She grabbed the lantern from Akela. She walked briskly past new headstones, old weather worn headstones, past mausoleums then up the brick path to the Oak Tree Columbarium. And you could tell from the tilt of her head she was trying to catch sounds and was finding nothing.

“What do you mean its dead? “Clara asked, “It’s a graveyard.”

Kincross was over the top of the hill and Akela was running to catch up with her " Akela, what did she mean?” Clara had a horrible feeling in her middle and her head was starting to pound because Danti was scared and that was something in twenty years Clara had never seen her friend affected by.

Fear.

The graves near the Columbarium, where the cremains were housed was the oldest part of the Cemetery. Here in the center of the Cemetery were the oldest graves, the most ornate mausoleums and statues of angles, children, lambs, benches and hooded figures. All of them hand crafted and after all this time they had not cracked, or been worn away by the elements.

A barrier surrounded this part of the cemetery; you could feel it when you came here.

This place was the heart of the cemetery.

“There’s nothing here..." Kincross had dropped the lantern and it rolled down the brick path towards Akela. “There’s nothing here

Akela saw Kincross stop under a giant twisted tree. Only one side of it seemed to have grown and the other looked stunted. From a distance it looked as if it were reaching over to the ground beneath it.

Kincross called out, “come here, but not to close. You have to see this. "

Clara and Akela came up to the tree where Kincross was and on the ground was a dying Vampire. Its face was a twisted mass of cuts; its head was split open from the bridge of its nose to the back of its skull.

Kincross knew that unlike her self this creature could feel pain and she also knew that something intended for the Vampire to suffer.

“Here to finish me off Benandanti?” it asked through its ruined mouth “execution right? Will you break my neck and trap my putrid soul in my eyes forever? Or will you leave me here to suffer until the..."

“The expression is, until the cows come home.” Kincross shook her head “we didn't know you were here. We had no idea. "

“It would have stayed that way Benandanti, you may not believe that, but it's true. You can only stand Death for so long, understand?

“Kincross nodded, “I do.”

Akela shone the light into the vampires face. Under normal circumstances the Vampire is no oil painting. By nature their faces are ruddy and red and a little bloated. They're eyes are milky white and their hair dull and dry. It's their teeth that look good, they have sets of them, and like sharks and they're so sharp they can go through bone.

Those teeth shine so white they glow.

The Vampires don't spread their sickness or curse like you hear in the stories. They're regular people who die and for some reason that no one knows...they come back as this.

When they do the Benandanti come.

Akela was surprised to learn, after seeing more then one fight that these creatures knew each other by name. They understood each other’s language...knew each other’s histories. There was a balance between them and if Akela had to live to be 500 she intended to understand it one day.

“Who did this, which destroyed this place? "

“I forgot your family used to guard the Cemetery in Kincross...for centuries. I can see why you're fond of this place. It's quite beautiful. "

“Yes, yes, tell me who did this.”

“You saw the Ghouls, right?”

“Yes, by the tracks.”

“That’s where the gate is, that's why you saw them there. But they're not Ghouls anymore. They're not robbing the graves for food, like before. They're not hunting the living dead for sport or trophies even. They've been changed, something has happened to them. "

“What?”

“They’re turning human.

“Kincross motioned Akela and Clara back and leaned forward.” I can help you; maybe I can fix this...what's happened. I studied in the House of the Dead. I know what to do.

“The Vampire shook its head.” Just do what you do Benandanti, just...no execution. Do you swear? "

Kincross nodded. “I’ll...put you to rest, when we're done.”

Kincross drew her fist back and slammed it between the vampire's eyes. Because its face was so damaged already the skull almost split in two and from the center of the forehead where the soul lives a mist leak out, it crept from the corner of its eyes and felt its way to the ground and was gone.

“Shovel” Kincross said without looking up “get me a shovel.

“The sun was just starting to rise when they got home to the Marina. Clara put her hand on Kincross’s arm and Akela thumped her a few times on the back. “You did alright Kincross”

“What do you suppose he meant, the Ghouls are turning human?” Kincross demanded.

“I don't know but I bet it ain't for love. And the cemetery, are you sure it's dead? "

“All those ghosts, the things that live there...they've gone. Where could they go Akela? Do you know what happens to spirits that wander forever? They go nuts. No offense Clara. "

“None taken”

“Something scared the dead from their graves and drove them out of the only place on Earth they're safe. They're risking their sanity. They are willing to risk oblivion because of what? Ghouls who are turning human? What the hell happens when a ghoul becomes human? "

Akela was the one who noticed the trees that lined the hill above the Marina. The smile she always seemed to have on her face and the light from her deep brown eyes dimmed.

Every green thing up on the hill was dead or dieing. There wasn't a bird in the sky, and the air smelled stale and old even though there was a constant breeze coming off the Bay. It was like walking into a long closed room in an abandoned house.

The Sun was shining bright; it was going to be a beautiful autumn morning.

Only to the three women standing on the Pier, it felt like the darkest hours after Midnight.

THE CONTINUING ADVENTURES OF THE AMAZING BENANDANTI

Kincross and Clara The Alligator Woman were out on the Pier last Saturday before their 7:00pm show at the Chamber of Horrors performing slight of hand tricks.

Kincross was dressed in a simple black dress and over her shoulders she wore her black cape with the purple lining and on top of her head at a slight angle was her top hat and she was also wearing her favorite rainbow colored sunglasses.

Clara was wearing her favorite yellow dress and her Alligator markings seemed to shimmer and glow light green under the light gauze fabric.

“Did you hear about the Malloy Sisters?” Clara whispered, “Do you know what they're doing now?”

Kincross shrugged, “Eating their young?”

“I’m serious..."

“Well, so am I “Kincross said.

Kincross’ hand gracefully swept up into the air and from her fingertips a dove appeared and perched on two of her fingers." Those Malloy’s are one seriously ill family." Kincross held her hand open, palm up and the dove was gone.

She twirled her hand in a circle, opened it and the dove was back.

“If you can't get this thing to stop pecking my hand I'm turning this thing into a chicken nugget.” Kincross whispered so that the little girl watching them couldn't hear.

When the girl walked away Clara said quickly “they’ve been taking people up to the Bridge Islands.” Then she ducked her head and winced.

Kincross snapped her head forward and the novelty glasses slid down her nose. “They are NOT.”

Clara nodded and with a snap of her wrist covered the dove with a red scarf and then Kincross threw it up into the air and the dove was gone. “I think we should tell Sarah.”

Kincross pocketed the scarf and hissed ‘ouch’ between her teeth. “Sheriff was very clear to us; we have to take care of our own." It looked as if she were flicking dust from her left shoulder but when Clara saw that small gesture Kincross almost looked ashamed.

Almost.

“But."

“No buts about it Clara, if Sarah has to bring the law we could all wind up in psycho wards or in jars somewhere in a medical lab. You want that? "

Clara shook her head, " Danti, the people the Sisters are taking aren't, you know from here. They're...they're people Danti. "

“I’ll go talk to them.”

“Danti..."

Kincross crossed her heart and held her hand up, “talk, just talk I promise on my Mother's grave..."

“Very Funny,”

“Okay, I promise all I'll do is talk. You can come and keep me honest"

The Alligator Woman shook her head, “I won't go near those creatures, but I'll tell you where you'll find them..."

The Malloy Sisters were exactly where Clara said they would be. They were having Tea like respectable ladies at the Glass Gardens Tea House on Weller Street. They were sitting very dignified and refined towards the back of the room by a salt-water fish tank filled with Seahorses.

When Kincross saw them she grimaced. The Malloy Sisters didn't smell like the Sea, they smelled like the grave.

“Ah” said one with red hair, “the Amazing Benandanti, Magician Extraordinaire and Werewolf Less Ordinary. Tell us, dog to master do you ever have the urge to chase cars or buses? “She asked daintily.

“No, but I do still have, on occasion, the urge to roast Sea Witches over an open pit and feed their lying carcasses to the gulls.” Kincross replied in the same mocking tone.

“We don't lie, Benandanti. It's just like the sign at the Pier says we simply provide a service, Sunset Boat Rides to the Islands. We own boats now, we sail them; that’s what we do for a living…”

“For a living. Now that’s funny.” Kincross chuckled.

“We’ve...become modern.” the bald headed sister with tattoos ringing her head said through clenched teeth. “We don't practice the old ways anymore.”

" Well, see to it that you don't become unmodern otherwise I'll have no choice but to bury you so deep the maggots will never find your bones.”

“Don’t threaten us Benandanti, it's not good for your health to threaten us. “Said the Red Headed Sister.

Kincross leaned across the table and opened her hand. In her outstretched palm was a book of matches with a dragon on the cover. “Don’t mess with me ladies, I've cooked your kind faster then you can say, what's that smell...I'm warning you whether you like it or not. I don't like the idea YOU are going up to the Islands and I don't like the idea YOU aren't taking money for your ahem, good deeds. And I have every intention of finding out why you've become such civic minded ladies...all of the sudden. "

“Just reuniting loved ones and doing good works...” the Tattooed Sister laughed.

“Yes Benandanti, more then anyone you should believe in redemption. You know it's possible; you strive for it every minute of your pathetic wasted life.” The youngest sister with long white hair said just above a whisper.

Kincross sat back and spread a napkin across her lap; she poured herself some tea and then raised the cup to her lips and drank. Then she helped herself to an almond cookie and popped it into her mouth.

“You know, I don't like you being anywhere near the Bridges and I don't trust you being so close to the dearly departed. So if I find out you're going onto those Islands yourselves, if I hear about " accidents " involving tourists being lost at Sea if I see one Shade...just one down here in Duwamish with your names on their lips I will find you ladies and after mere second in my hands I will have you wishing you'd never made it out of Croatan. Got it? "

“We’re never going back there,” hissed the Youngest Malloy Sister “nothing can make us go back there.”

“Oh ladies, I will personally take you back to Croatan myself...you know I can.”

“They’re just sunset trips to the Bridges Benandanti; we sail at Dusk and bring you back by Moonlight. That's all we do" the Red Headed Sister said slowly and she stared hard into Kincross’ face as each word sunk in.

Kincross chose another cookie tossed it back into her mouth and then raised the teacup to her lips again and bit a chunk from the side of the small cup. Steaming hot tea ran down her arm and pooled at her elbow onto the tabletop.

She chewed and ground the heavy glass with her mouth open and the Malloy Sisters saw her teeth, her long sharp teeth pulverizing the cookie and glass to dust and then she spat it all out on the floor at the Sea Witches feet.

“You’re liars ladies, that's what you do. I guess it can't be helped it's in your nature. As for me? I'll grind your bones to make my bread...hell I want to because that’s what is in my nature. That can't be helped either. Remember that next time you go on a Moonlight Cruise up to the Bridges and you start feeling nostalgia for the old days. Keep it clean ladies...I'm warning you. "

The Sisters flat dark eyes stayed flat and expressionless, which was good because that was the Malloy Sisters version of keeping their mouths shut.

They were listening to every single word.

Kincross wiped the corners of her mouth with her napkin and when she looked up her blood red eyes were glowing in the semi-darkness of the tea room." Ladies, I wish you smooth sailing. "

The Malloy Sisters watched Kincross leave the Tea Room; they also ignored the nasty gesture she made at them through the windows as she walked by.

One sister reached out and pulled her hands back across the heavy oak table as she stood up. When she lifted her hands there were deep gashes in the wood.

Then together they left the Tea Room and seemed to drift like shadows in the gathering fog to the Pier.

© anita moscoso

Circling/Arriving In Duwamish

2006-07-19T05:04:00.000-07:00

To arrive and to bring,
the first blossom of spring,
when the southern hemisphere is
just through mid winter,

is astonishing.
To arrive and find the lodgings
so welcoming,
to pay respect to the
forgotten ones.
Pieces found along the way,
collected to form
one again, are laid gently
on the quiet earth.

I LONG TO RETURN TO DUWAMISH BAY

2006-07-18T01:20:00.000-07:00

I like Anita Marie long to return
to that place where I feel at home
It is many months since I last visited!
I have this longing today ..why today ?
Perhaps it is that I am seeking
solace,answers,nourishment
Where will it come from I ask myself ?

Will it be from those I meet
those who travel the Soul Food way
Or perhaps my ancestor spirits
who wander in the streets at night
I feel sad that some of those
who cross my path are not of my liking
They are rude,critical,call me a dreamer

Have I seen the last of those I would call
social in their beliefs?
I hope not for if this is so
then I will be bereft.
I want those of my Father and Mothers time
Those who would hold out their hand
invite you in for a meal
Not ask for payment or praise

I will rug up well against the cold
at night when I arrive at Duwamish Bay
I know where to find that steed I travlled on
perhaps even the young handsome man who asked me to sit
behind him on the saddle so long ago
as we galloped up the hill toward the town
coming to a halt outside the inn
There I can meet those who crossed my path before
and again share a meal of hot hearty stew

I will feel refreshed if I can be as one with those
who are of " My Kind"
Those who share a feeling of the world as I do
Those who would want it to be as it was
Or am I being just a dreamer as some have said?
No I will not listen to them
I know that I can learn more from my ancestors
my friends my chosen travelling companions
It is by feeling that I go by
Soul feelings,good feelings

I am on my way
I am just waiting for the right moment
IT IS HERE ! I AM OUT THE FRONT DOOR
Bag packed this morning ,just ready for a quick departure
See you soon Ania Marie and old friends one and all.

Lois (Muse of the Sea) 18.7.06

Invitation

2006-07-16T11:17:00.000-07:00

Have you ever been to a place called Duwamish Bay? I've come by Ship and Ferry, on foot and horseback. I go back over and over again because of these words. I hope they inspire you as they have inspired me

From Chief Seattle’s Speech:

The young men, the mothers, and girls, the little children who once lived and were happy here, still love these lonely places. And at evening the forests are dark with the presence of the dead. When the last red man has vanished from this earth, and his memory is only a story among the whites, these shores will still swarm with the invisible dead of my people. And when you children's children think they are alone in the fields, the forests, the shops, the highways, or the quiet of the woods, they will not be alone. There is no place in this country where a man can be alone. At night when the streets of your towns and cities are quiet, and you think they are empty, they will throng with the returning spirits that once thronged them, and that still love these places.

The white man will never be alone.

So let him be just and deal kindly with my people.

The dead have power too.

Duwamish Bay Calls to me now...will you join me? It maybe the journey of a life time...

I liked the shark

2006-03-02T22:44:00.000-08:00

“Jaws”

A few nights ago I was wading through my own unending mountain of E-mails, spread over 5 screen names on AOL, Yahoo, and MSN; for ‘background noise’ I had the telly on, with an old film that is a perennial favourite. We went to see “Jaws” when it was a new release, the whole famn damily. Not only Mum, and my two brothers, we also took Grandma DuBay (my great-grandmother) to see it as well.

Grandma DuBay had what Mum refers to as a ‘dime-store’ personality. If she was taken to one of the best restaurants in town, and be taken to see the film that sweeps the Oscars and she would complain mightily for the entire ordeal. However, if you took her to the Coney Island Hot Dog drive-through greasy spoon and thence to the Drve-In to see the triple-feature Horror Film Fest, she would talk about that for weeks!!

So, we knew that Grandma DuBay would enjoy “Jaws: immensely. We stood in line for nearly two hours, until the next showing, because the one we went there for was sold out. All of the other people in line kept glaring at us, thinking that we were monsters for bringing such a sweet little granny to “Jaws”.

Now, Granmda was only 4’11, and weighed maybe 90 pounds while wearing dripping wet clothes; she was wearing one of those 2-piece polyester pant sets that can be mail ordered (and if you order now we’ll give you our patented ‘Battery-Operated Sweater Shaver ABSOLUTELY FREE) from those little pamphlet-esque catalogues one looks at, rolls their eyes and promptly heave them into the nearest dustbin.

At, last!! We got out of the sun and into the cool dimness of the theatre, and charged to the snack bar. Mum bought everyone giant cold sodas and two family sized buckets of popcorn with extra butter.

The four of us shared the one bucket of popcorn and Grandma tucked into the other bucket. Of course, all five of us were glued to the screen; “Jaws” was, after all, a groundbreaking film in its day. People stopped glaring at us as the watched Grandma thoroughly enjoy herself, with the popcorn, root beer, and the shark.

Anyone who has seen “Jaws” probably remembers the theme for the next shark attack, that iconic, “Dah-dumm… dah-dumm… dah-dumm…”

Every time that music would start to play Grandmas eyes would light up and she would double the pace of her popcorn nibbling. It was as much fun watching Grandma as it was seeing the film for the first time.

Anywhoo… we decided later that Grandma was the only one there rooting for the shark.

That memory lies in a clean, well-lit corner of my mind, and no matter how many times we relive it; it still has the power to transport back to the innocence of early adolescence, between the ‘Cold War’ and “Terror Alert”.

By the by… the next day we went to Sherwood Forest Lake. Unbeknownst to us they had stocked the lake with game fish earlier that year. I sat on the dock, which sort of crouched over the water, with a span of probably 6 feet between it and the shoreline. As I waggled my feet in the water, the game fish came to see what was happening.

One intrepid fish proved braver than the rest and attempted to nibble my great to… I screamed, shot straight into the air and hit the dock running, I think I broke all previous running broad jump records getting to the shore. I didn’t stop running until I was across the road and clinging to the Rental Horses’ corral across the street from the lake.

Once we discovered that it was game fish that were used to being fed by hand, my brothers and I fed them nearly a whole bag of potato crisp crumbles. We were lying on our bellies on the dock, with our heads leaning over the side as we tossed the bits of potato crisps on the surface and watched the fish suck them from the top with a crisp sucking sound.

We are our Mother’s children, that was when we had 2 dogs, 12 cats, two tanks of tropical fish, a baby pheasant with a broken wing and a snake named Harry because he hadn’t any….

Benediction

2006-03-02T22:05:00.000-08:00

Benediction
01-03-2006
©Gwen M. Myers

This life will leave you weary
Spattered in filth and alone.
Trying hard to hold on to
Something to call your own.

Wondering what is your failure
Something you’d left unfinished.
Questioning every little action
Given up on what you wished.

And into this internal darkness
Shines a soft and steady light.
That by its simple presence
Begins to set things arght.

A voice you may never hear
Yet you understand every word.
A low, sweet song of reason
That still awakens you hard.

You relearn long-forgotten trust
And open your shuttered heart.
Discovering that trust isn’t misplaced
Believing you can make a new start.

You begin to search for the source
From whence comes your voice.
What source the gentle wisdom
That helps you change your choice.

Stopping by a mirror you glimpse
The source and receiver of this gift.
‘Twas your own soul speaking
Now you will never be adrift.

Then the voice commands you
To seek those whose spirits speak.
And you find you are drawn to them
And with lovely words they speak.

Within the embrace of spirits
Lies our immortal bliss.
That sweet benediction
Never again will you miss.

What name do we call this
The sweet communion?
What label can we give it,
When through it we begin again?

It is called simply, a friend.

I AM OF THE SEA

2006-02-22T19:57:00.000-08:00

In reply to Shiloh's photograph
In reply to Gwen's Poem "Neptune's Steeds"
I offer my feelings and thoughts
*********************
For those who gaze out to sea
and wish again for spawning and swimming
And then think of whence we came
Of course it calls us who believe
those with restless spirit

The longing to be where we belong
That part of us which craves a home
A home not of material belongings
But...one where we can rest and feel free
Perhaps it is our need to be sustained
We must be heard ,for no other place
makes us feel as free

The moon that shines upon the sea
Is the moon that shines for me and thee
As Gwen waits for it to rise
I see it here in my homeland
And will think of her
With feet in the soft sand
about to climb on board
that steed to carry herto those
she feels akin to be

Hurry hurry Gwen to your dream underwater
For those places unchartered are disappearing
As those of greed will make them dark
and deprive them of the creatures we have
known of long ago and whence we came
Mother of Pearl,rare fish,Minki whales
the list is long
The greed longer and ongoing at a fast pace.

One day as Winnie Cross once said
"When we are there we will rest
And be free
It is home ,it is home
Where we long to be"...............

Lois (Muse of the Sea) 23/2/06

2006-02-22T19:26:00.000-08:00

Shiloh shared her pic below with me and a poem began to percolate.

At last!!! Inspiration to write! So here is the picture and what it inspired.

Neptune’s Steeds

My life will never be the same.
‘Twas my own fault as well
For I gazed of my free will
Upon the full moon rising
With a restless tide.

It was there that I was caught.
Mesmerised and claimed
By the Moon and Stars
Glistening so close to
The sea-strand and me.

Waves foamed their way ashore.
Coming with every inch closer
To my feet as they sunk
Into the darkened sands
Packed by salt water.

At first I was unbelieving of them.
They were creatures of myth
Legends that had nearly been lost.
Could such a thing remain unseen,
Unknown through all explorations?

It was on one such wave they came.
Their voices rang like conch-shells,
Manes fading, swirling into the foam,
They pranced within the waves
For now free of harness and chariot.

Every scale on their tail-halves a-glisten.
Their eyes the shade of wave-troughs,
And horns that were of mother of pearl.
They seemed to me to be inviting me,
“Come, come closer, ride us, if you dare.”

A deep breath and still frisson-rack’d,
I clambered onto a smooth, cool back.
My awed, whispered thought was this,
“I could lose myself in these eyes.”
As we were away to the depths.

I was escorted to the Halls of Neptune.
There was I gifted with this curse.
Every Full Moon I must return here
And keep a date with destiny
Learning Magics long-forgotten.

Apprenticed to Neptune am I.
To know the ways of wave and tide.
Ride the wild water steeds,
Visit the ocean’s darkest places,
Places that have never been charted.

Betweens the Days of Calling
I am forever torn in two.
The human me still remaining
Cries for the safety of the sand,
While her heart longs for the sea.

© 2006 Gwen M. Myers

Eventide In Duwamish Bay

2006-01-23T11:58:00.000-08:00

This was one of the first stories I wrote for the Soul Food Cafe and I'm partial to this tale for several reasons: but like The Amazing Benandanti and Gone To Croatan you'll see the beginning shades of Duwamish Bay.

Well, good evening to you and welcome! Come in, come in. Yes, that fog did come in fast tonight didn't it? Sometimes it just creeps up the bluff from the beach below and other times it moves as fast as a freight train, doesn't it?

As you can see I've added some things here at the Cafe, officially I'm a Curio Shop now and I'll be open each night at Eventide. That's twilight to you I guess.

So what shall it be tonight? A ghost story? Maybe a twisted tale of revenge or longing or greed? What? My story. Why not? It's a good one, if I don't say so myself.

Have a seat...I have to talk to the Management about those doors... they won't stay open and they're forever slamming themselves closed. Anyway, this is my story and why I'm here today...

When I was a girl, my grandfather owned a Curio Shop down at the Duwamish Bay Marina. You've probably heard of it. He had a genuine Egyptian Mummy, an electric chair and an old time embalming machine that's over six feet tall.

My favorite things were the shrunken heads he billed as genuine fake shrunken heads. He didn't feel like explaining where his sister in law got them. I'd sure be glad to tell you. She got them from her bush pilot days.

I always thought it was cool that I had the only grandmother on the block whose sister flew airplanes and could land them anywhere the ground was level. But it wasn't so cool when I found out exactly what she was flying. Mostly booze, some drugs, guns. Stuff you couldn't very well send through the mail.

One day she started flying around these little Islands in the Pacific. She never sent post cards from these trips. But she always brought back the coolest presents and once she brought back this little chest full of shrunken heads. Some were obviously very old and the hair on those little heads where jet-black. She had just come back from the Central Asia as well as the Pacific, so that wasn't surprising.

Then I saw some with red, blonde and light brown hair. Some even had traces of beards and mustaches. The looked almost brand new and smelled sort of funny. Like Lemons.

She saw me lift one and hold it up to the light and she said somewhat darkly, " See what happens when someone warns you to keep your head or else? "

I dangled the little head around, "or else " I whispered back.

My Grandfather, Cypriano, came into the room then and looked over our shoulders to see what Auntie had brought back. He was starting to expand his curio shop to what it is now and Auntie could be counted on to bring back some very interesting treasures. He looked down into the chest and pulled out about eight of the heads. Then he gently plucked the one from my fingers and dropped it into the chest. "

Bury it you fool, " he told her and then he left the room muttering to himself about being glad stupidity wasn't catchy, or hereditary.

" Auntie, " I asked " do you know how to make shrunken heads now? "

" You bet honey bunny. "

" Is it hard? " "

Nah, once you can stop the body from running around its super easy. "

******************************

So the Curio Shop grew, mostly the patrons in those early days were the people who lived around China Town. Then with the new Marina families started coming in from the suburbs on the weekends for a taste of life by shore. With that my Grandfather's shop grew from a dark old boathouse to a bigger darkened boat house with lots and lots of weird treasures lining the walls, dangling from the ceiling and set out on tables.

Then my Grandather expanded the ice cream shop out front. That use to be my favorite place because it was your traditional 1950's malt shop with a juke box and wonder of wonders, we owned it. He loved rock and roll and those funny songs from the 20's. So it was a nice place to eat and talk and make plans. Then you could walk through this little doorway (the frame itself as well as the door was once used in a court house where an infamous serial killer was held and he was suppose to have been shot trying to escape through this very door, you could still see the bullet holes) and there was the Curio Shop wrapped in shadows and filleted sunlight waiting to be explored.

It was exciting at the Marina in those early days because there were all sorts of fun places opening almost every day. There was even an amusement park owned by the Arima family that had a famous carousel with horses and mermaids and other fanciful creatures to ride. Each one was unique, each was original and Mrs. Arima and her brothers handcrafted them all. That's where I spent my childhood, and then the Mummy of the Priestess came to us.

That's really when things changed for everyone at the Marina.

*********************************

Auntie Akela drove up late one night, it was almost Midnight and she smelled very pleasant. Sort of a mix of Lavender and those thin Cuban cigars that she used to like to smoke. Plus, she smelled of gin.

"You've got to see what I've got Pualani, " she slurred as my Mother opened the door " it'll put hair on your chest."

I guess it's because my Mother had no desire to see hair on her chest that she called over her shoulder " Papa, it's for you. " She invited my Auntie in and discreetly guided her to a chair in the hall. " Where have you been Auntie? Everyone's been looking for you. "

"Oh? " she looked startled and a bit scared. " Look in the truck bed Cypriano."

"It's okay, it's the good every bodies, you know? " my Mother said before my Auntie could make for the back door.

Then my Grandfather came through the door with a body; at least I could see the outline of a body under a thin red shroud edged with gold embroidery.

Auntie Akela got up and pushed her thick black hair back behind her ears. She straightened her shirt and tucked it into blue jeans. Then she went to my grandfather and motioned for him to put the figure in his arms down on the couch. She pulled the shroud back from the face and motioned me forward.

"This is a Priestess and she was buried in the Temple of Bast. You can see where she was stabbed...it's a horrible wound in her back. Then they sewed her mouth so she couldn't talk in the next world shut and they tried to take her heart. They did these things to her when she was alive. See the cuts on her hands? She tried to fight them off. But the city she lived in is gone, the people are gone and all that is left of them is she. But look at her Sarah. She's still the most beautiful woman in the world. They couldn't take that from her."

It was very clear the Priestess had respect from my Auntie that she hardly, if ever gave to the living.

"How did you get her?" I asked in a whisper.

" Won her in a card game," Auntie Akela slurred in my ear" she told me too."

"That's how the Priestess of Bast came to Duwamish Bay and found her place at the Marina.

**********************************

The Priestess soon replaced the Soda Fountain as my favorite part of the shop.

She had a very nice place in a glass case made of teak from a tree my grandfather cut down himself in the Philippines. He told me that a horrible demon had taken refuge in the tree and in order to get rid of it he cut the tree down to force the demon out. That's how he got the bite marks on his hand and back and that's how my Grandmother lost her eye.

The teak had remained in his garage until the Priestess came to us. It was a symbol of bravery to my Grandfather and he wanted to give at least that much to the Priestess.

My Grandfather even put a guest book by the Priestess where you could read signatures and messages from people who came from among the States and Canada, the Orient, Europe, Transylvania (my favorite) and just about every exotic place you could imagine. The guest book was back there so the Priestess would know that people were paying her respect thousands of years after her death. My family gave her that because after she came to us the Shop wasn't just successful; it had become a major tourist stop. The only one owned by a Filipino family, the only one that always seemed to be opened. No matter what time of the year or time of the day.

****************************

This part of my story about the Curiosity Shop is always the hardest part to tell. It is hard because it is the part where I have to explain how my family lost the Shop. It is about the day many of our friends and the people who had come to the Marina, with nothing more on their minds then looking forward to riding the Arima's Carousel or a trip to the Guzman's Ice Cream Shop to see the Mummy, never went home again.

The Fire at the Marina was supposed to have been started by a cigarette in a trashcan. That's how the legend went anyway. It burned down everything on the Marina that day.

It was just me and my Mom at the Shop the evening the fire broke out. I was stationed by the Priestess explaining the pros and cons of various candy bars, telling her the newest stories circulating about Auntie Akela (something about an angry wife with an ax) when all of the sudden the window behind us flooded with bright orange light. Then I heard my Mom scream my name from the parking lot at the side of the building. There was a terrible crash and the front of the building caved in and was replaced by a wall of flames.

The heat from the firewall in front of me singed my eyelashes and bangs right away. And I think my skin was beginning to blister when I heard the Priestess's glass case crack behind me. In fact, glass all over the shop was cracking and exploding. My little two headed calf disappeared behind running yellow flames that were racing along shelves and the rafters and the dangling shrunken heads burst into flames and looked exactly like little stars glowing along the ceiling.

Then the Priestess's case exploded behind me and before I was buried under a burning rafter, which had crashed at that point someone grabbed me by the hair on top of my head and snatched me back. It was a foreign voice I heard, it said my name and gentle, cool hands pulled me back and held me fast as the building burned and crashed around us. The voice was chanting something, part song, part incantation that I think was a prayer as the ceiling collapsed and the floor caved in and we both fell into the black water below the boathouse.

My Auntie Akela found the Princess and me across the street where the memorial plaque to the 800 people that died on the Marina that day is now. It's a pretty little park with chestnut trees and flowers and benches. There's even a little fishpond stocked with koi.

She found me, minus most of my hair sleeping under a tree. The Princess was leaning against the tree and somehow her ancient arms had unfolded and where now bent upwards, as if she had been carrying something. Her head was bowed and Auntie Akela saw that the dignity and even pride the ancient woman took to her tomb had been replaced with something else.

My Auntie found she couldn't face the Priestess, it seemed wrong to look her in the face at what was such a private moment.

*******************************

I woke up a week later and when I did my Grandmother asked me where I had been and I solemnly replied, " I was with the Priestess " and she nodded and left it at that. No one asked me about my Journey and it's not a story I'm ready to tell. Of all the stories here, the Priestess story haunts me the most.

My Grandfather rebuilt the Shop and my Auntie Akela once again took to the sky and went to the darkened jungles and secret alleyways that every town, no matter how normal and respectable it may look on the outside has. She brought back new treasures and new secrets and stories and in our new Shop we dutifully told each and displayed each and every one.

When my Grandfather died my Mother took over the Shop and you can go there to this day and buy your own shrunken heads, you can see pictures of a female pilot named Akela Guzman who was said to have fought a demon in hand to hand combat in the jungles of the Philippines and you can see her trophy from that adventure in a glass jar...a head of a man with horns and eyes like a snake. Some people swear you can see his eyes follow you as you cross the store.

But as a courtesy I can tell you the true story.

Auntie did take that head with her own two hands.

She got the head after my Grandmother somehow knew to be in an alley a few blocks away from the Marina one evening after the fire. Somehow she found the person responsible for all those deaths would be there, and that that no matter how loud he yelled no one would hear him.

The head was once attached to the body of a man named Lars Cranfield and he was a stranger. When they found his headless, un-robbed body with his ID still in his wallet no one came forward to claim him.

They ran his picture from the license and his last known address at the hotel for over a year in the papers and then his story faded away.

He's the man who never existed and you can hear stories about him around Terrace to this day. Apparently the money in his wallet, even the change in his pocket was minted with the same date. His ID was new and his wallet and clothes on his back and hanging in the closet of his hotel room were brand new. Most of the stuff still had sales tags on them.

"It's like he never existed until the day he was found in the Alley " the story goes.

My Grandmother, she was avenging the death of her friends and all of those people, when her sister took the head...it changed to what you can see now. She keeps it, she says, as a warning. It's near the main door on a pedestal, and you'd think it would be in a place where people couldn't touch it or tap on the glass. Only nobody does.

Ever.

And my Priestess, she's back in her case at the rear of the store. Educated people from all over the world visit her and have tried to learn her secrets. She is still quite beautiful and I like the way her head tilts down a little as if she's acknowledging you. Her hair, courtesy of my Grandmother and Mother is still bright and shinning because they put coconut oil in it at least once a month. They carefully dust her and keep the ornaments my Mother and Auntie Akela brought back from one of their rare trips together into Egypt where they discovered together the true identity of the Priestess polished and carefully arranged on her chest and arms.

When they came back they even put in a little indoor pond right near the Priestess and filled it with water lilies and other exotic water plants from places Auntie Akela traveled too. Some of those plants drive the botanist up the wall because they can't figure out where they came from. Or what they are.

Forensics experts who have studied the Princess, even x-rayed and done ultrasound's on her mummified remains can't explain why she's so well preserved. Being that she's held by human hands on a constant basis and is exposed to sea air 24 hours a day.

I still visit the Shop of course, but like my Aunt Akela I followed many strange and dark paths.

I've been to the Carpathian Mountains and I've seen the ruins of Pompeii and have heard the cries and whispers and pleas that some people mistake for the sounds of wind or echoes from the voices of tourists who visit this necropolis. I've seen the Pyramids and caves in South America where there is almost no air to breath, but there are the ruins of cities down there and I've learned those stories too. I've been stuck on roads in Africa and had to wait for a pride of lions to cross the road, I have seen dark places and light places and they all are here with me now.

And now I have my own little Shop here at the Cafe. I have my exotic books written in forgotten languages and the pictures in those books never look the same when you come back to them later. I have treasures that tell them stories. This is my own little Curio Shop and I'm glad you could visit.

Come back anytime and I'll be glad to tell you a story.

But it will have to be at Eventide.
© anita moscoso 2005

HappyBelated New Year

2006-01-19T01:27:00.000-08:00

My dears,
Please forgive me for my abscence. This time I have a frighteningly good reason.

On 6 January I got a tummy ache, just *boom* there it was. I was cursed with all the attendant misery of unhappy innards. I felt so bad I asked Mum to take me to the Emergency Room.

We arrived to discover that the ER was overflowing!!! After a 20-hour wait, I was finally seen, by which point the appendicitis (which had been silent at first) had degenerated to a ruptured appendix. I was wheeled off to emergency surgery, and had my insides joggled and cleaned and snipped at the same time.

For the next five days I was in an opiate fog, there was a morphine pump in place and I was regularly being scolded for not using it enough. I clearly remember the anaesthesiologist coming to check on me and saying, "You owe Dr. Anderson a very big thank you, he saved your life in there!"

If that wasn't quite enough to bring me up short, the fact that now, 12 days later I still am inpain and struggling to get around.

Through all of this I have been pondering, and what I ended up with is a deep and abiding sense of joy in everyday and simple things.

I am alive, well, and healing slowly. As I can sit for longer periods of time I wil get back in saddle and be an active part of Soul Food again.
Love, hugs and kisses,
Gwen

" REMEMBER US"

2005-12-14T19:32:00.000-08:00

Sister of Ours...For GWEN...

It has been written in the story "Sisters"
When you are older you will need your sisters
No matter how much you love your lover,
your children,
Do things with your sisters as well
We need more than a couple and children world
and when you look back you will have learned
Time passes
Life happens
Distance separates
Children grow up
Love waxes and wanes
Hearts break
careers end
Jobs come and go
Parents die
Colleagues forget favours....BUT...

Sisters are there, no matter how many miles are between you
A sister is never farther away than needing her can reach
When you walk that lonesome road,and you
have to walk it by yourself ,your sisters will be
on the road's rim cheering you on,pulling for you
intervening on your behalf and waiting
for you with open arms at the end.
Sometimes they will break the rules and
walk beside you,or come and carry you out.
When we began this adventure called "Womanhood"
we had no idea of the incredible joys and sorrows that lay ahead.
Nor did we know how much we would need each other.
Every day ,we need each other still.

Gwen I wish I had written of sisters wisdom
But I am sure you know that we are here and you can express in your wonderful writing a story familiar to a lot of your travelling companions....Lois (Muse of the Sea) 15/12/05.

Back from Beyond the Gates

2005-12-13T22:18:00.000-08:00

I filled my lungs with the scent-rich air of the bay. The smell of the sea, and the conversations between seals on the waves and sea lions steaming on the docks. The sails of crafts, large and small, drew my eyes to the eternhal sea.

I am still in an unplanned Journey Within my Soul, forced by lack of means of communication with the outside world.

I am now poised on the edge of a step I must take alone. No friend can walk with me on the Road I Travel, Familly cannot hold my hand for this. I must stand alone, yet surrounded by the understanding I have gleaned in this lifetime.

Too many disagree with the existence of magic. Myself, I have seen such glorious things, and heard tiny miracles occur. I am sure that magic is everywhere, if you just look.

I have seen people live thier lives in joyous service to their chosen Deity, and others rise beyond their weaknesses to grow as people. I have seen others sacrifice everything for 'love', and come away immeasurably wealthy. I have stood in my Solitary's Circle and watched the Bonds Between the Stars glimmer into focus as the Full Mother-Moon caressed me in silver. I have seen bald eagles, more than a dozen, gather in one clearing, harkening for one to tarry in Rivendell a little longer.

I have heard new-born babies, human and animal take their first breath, then cry out, "I am here!! I live!!!" I have been soothed to my centre by the sound of a cat's purr, or simply the sound of the wind, getting caught in the evergreens and hardwoods. On the side of the road, waiting for the day, I have begged the night never end as I listened to wolves sing their wild songs.

I have worked, studied, and sacrificed so much to reach this point in my Sprit's growth. Now is the moment, glowing with the future's promises; pregnant with the wisdom of the past, and empowered by my sorrows. I stand before The Gods, to take up my Aegis and Honour.

I wrote the following poem to mark the time of acceptance:

Shamanne-In-Waiting

13-12-2005

There, at wide-flung gates;
The Portal to her sweet soul
Her recent emptiness
Is heaviest, unbearable
The growing clamours'
Voice is both strident
And demanding.

The pain always remains,
A torturously constant wraith;
Clawing at her needed calm.
The aching strident voice
Of her coming mortality.
The farewell to her flesh
And a sweet, brief life.

There is an eyeblink for her
Epiphany of burning lucidity;
Knowing oh so much,
Yet too much still unknown.
A fondly remembered rhythm
That has no sound is sensed.

Her familiar hastens home
No more a Guardian,
Become her Shewitt-partner.
A rightly trusted advisor,
And dearest of friends.
Her beloved dragon returns,
Crooning sweet reunion.

Impatient to be filled
And know fulfillment.
Ready at last, to be able
To give proud claim to
Her Birthright and rôle.
She will be Shamanne.

Now, she waits again,
For the coming of Balance.
Her Hoped-for Shaman;
The Bringer of Male Powers.
Glorious in His wisdom,
And generous passions.
He seems almost Mythic to Her.

She knows of Partnering,
The bond between two spirits,
Union evoking such power
And creating their lucid light.
This be what she seeks,
Promises meant to be
Offered and fulfilled.

And so she always dances
Spirit Calling out to Him,
In the only honest style
No other way is possible
For Women of Her Station.
He is stubbornly never Named
Always kept carefully Faceless.

She knows she may not call
Him by a given name.
That is not how she may
Make this Magyck be done.
He is called only by the words
‘My One True Soulmate’
This is her driving need.

Still she seeks Him out,
With all her heart-courage,
Her bright spirit’s power,
And a hard-won wisdom.
Her passion calling out
And hoping for an answer
But ever hearing queries.
Soon naught remains but disunion.

No more does she consciously seek.
Her Dreams of Tomorrow are lying,
Beaten, wearily sad, and dying.
She does not wish to fight.
Is this to be her grim reality?
Ever knowing apartness and
This aloneness of her Spirit.

She knows now, there are
None who would seek
Her favours in her bower.
Claim her as His spirit’s own.
So she turns herself inward
Where the silence reigns.

Now she remains here,
Millennia seem to pass by,
Time remaining unaware.
A lonely fly, trapped
In stifling amber.
She is not truly alive,
Nor yet is she dead.

A bright golden bubble,
Lit by promises of hope.
The sleeping air stirs
And now is scented
Sweetly rich and fecund;
Evoking the Sweet Mother;
Callèd The Close Goddess.

Floating but earthbound,
She is somewhere far above
Crushed between awareness
Of the constant enemy-pain,
And grinding sense of Lostness.
The silent old melancholy returns
And brings a sense of emptiness.

Everything she thought she was,
Burned away by the crucible.
She is like the piñata, a husk,
Ready to be filled with goodies.
Looking like a treasured lamp,
That is polished clean, then lit,
And so is she now alight.

Forced into impatient waiting.

I know know who I am meant to stand for. I have always known it, without grasping it at all.

I am The Spirit of Man, Thoth-Crowley's Queen of Wands: the one who has known sorrow, pain, and loneliness, she has learned from her suffering. The unnecessary has been burned away

In love, and tenderness I choose to reach to those spirits I am meant to touch; do what I can to open their eyes and spirits.
God and Goddess bless,and Namaste,
H. R. H. Gwen Guin

Shamanne and Healer to The Amazon Queene

Old Photos Found

2005-11-08T16:04:00.000-08:00

A trunk filled with old photos of the Duwamish Marina, and its regular side shows, have emerged. These two photographs are a part of a collection that will be shown in Duwamish in the near future.
Collection by Heather Blakey

The Black Monk of Fallen

2005-11-05T19:07:00.000-08:00

Here's a little story from me to you...its about this little town up the road from where I live here in Duwamish Bay...and it's all about the Black Monk of Fallen

Fallen was this little town on the verge of dieing when the State put the Prison there.

It took its first breath, I think, the day they opened it.

You see, right after the first Prisoner walked through the gates the town started to come to life, new houses went up almost everyday and a school and a main street with all sorts of stores and it even had a cemetery.

After the first execution you'd have thought they struck gold up in those hills and in a way I guess they did. Fallen went from being a corpse drying out in the hot desert sun to not being a corpse drying out in the desert sun in a matter of weeks.

It turned into this living thing where the greens were too green and the trees were to tall and no matter how cold it got the leaves and plants and flowers never died...not even during the winter.

They didn't even die in that fire that broke out about two months after Fallen Penitentiary opened.

How did it happen? Was it magic? When you look back on it, it was simple.

All it took really was for someone to fall through that trapdoor in Section " D " of Fallen Penitentiary.

After the people in the nearby town Duwamish Bay saw what was happening in Fallen they stayed away and refused to do business or talk to anyone who was from that cadaver of a town suddenly returned from the Dead.

Fallen in time became one of those little towns you only saw when you were lost off the Main Highway and you were so busy screaming at the person with the map in their hand that you don't really notice anything outside of your car.

So while it was, alive...if you can call it that no one from Duwamish Bay would set foot in it.

After it died again they would outright deny that monstrosity of stone and brick and metal was back in those hills.

The residents of Duwamish would look at the curious traveler like they were a simpletons...much loved simpletons and say very sweetly and kindly, " Fallen Penitentiary? You drove all the way out here to see that place? It doesn't exist you know, it never has. Here, why don't you go on down to the Marina, there's a Sideshow there that's world famous you know..."

What the Residents in Duwamish said to the outside world was one thing, what they knew for a fact was another and besides they weren't really lying when they said Fallen never existed...but that's just mincing words.

The truth is they were afraid of Fallen and they wanted whatever that place was to stay up there in the High Desert and rot.

Then on Halloween in 1920 the people in Duwamish Bay got their wish granted.

That was the year Fallen died.

Again.

That's what people think because Laramie Underwood had been up there on October 30th to drop off a prisoner and he went back on November 1st to bring down the body of an executed woman named Elizabeth Everett.

Elizabeth Everett wasn't in the pine box in the one room little brick house where they stored the executed. In fact not only was Elizabeth Everett not there neither were the 200 living inmates or the Prison Staff.

Gone, they were all gone.

Laramie Underwood said the building was empty and dusty and the bars were rusted and the mortar between the bricks was crumbling and there was puddles of stagnant water all over the place.

" Its like no one had set foot in that place for 100 years. But let me tell you, that wasn't the part that scared me. What scared me was when I heard this door to one of the offices open and close and I heard these footsteps and I could hear keys being jangled around and I heard whistling and what scared me was that voice and those footsteps were moving along like it was just your normal everyday thing to do. How could a normal person act like that? I mean, that place was dead...dead you know? "

Laramie he lived in this little town called Resolution and he shot himself about two weeks after discovering that Fallen was dead.

Some of the people from Duwamish went up to Fallen after Laramie's funeral because they wanted to make sure whatever had come after Laramie wasn't going to go after anyone else.

So they brought a grave marker of sorts up to the front gates of Fallen and hoped that it would be enough to keep whatever was walking those halls inside of that evil place.

The Marker was carved from white marble and it was an effigy of a hooded man and his arms are at his sides and his head is tilted slightly to the right, like he's listening for something.

They faced him away from the Prison and the the six or so people that made the trip that day said some prayers for the dead and as they walked away they could hear sounds back there.

Not one of them turned around.

Not one of them looked back.

They knew...the " Monk" brought from the Plague Chapel had turned black and it was now facing the Prison, not away from it.

And then as time went by people did forget about the Prison and became less afraid of it and in the end it became another neglected cemetery...the hills around Duwamish are littered with those.

So that brings us to twenty years ago and a game that local teenagers had been playing for years...it was called " Clinking " and it involved bottles and the Black Monk.

It was a simple game; you'd dare someone to go up to Fallen and drink to the Monk and you'd toss your empty bottle towards where he stands and you'd hear this ' clink ' because the bottles have carpeted the ground there.

Clinking... get it?

Of course what some people tried to do was actually hit the statue but that wasn't easy to do because it was black and there were no lights up there.

So one year this girl takes the dare and goes up to Fallen and she can see things in the windows...misshapen hands grasping at the bars and she thought she even saw people walking through the gates.

Then she takes her drink and tosses her bottle and ... there is no clink.

Then suddenly the bottle comes flying back at her and catches her right between the eyes and she's knocked off her feet and her face splits open and there's blood everywhere and this isn't Hollywood you know. The bottle doesn't shatter; it smacks the ground with a ' clink '.

" Doesn't feel so good, does it? " says a man's voice.

So...that's my story, and in a way its straight from Duwamish Bay and if you think the Black Monk of Fallen or Clinking sounds like an urban legend I'd say to you, lean a little closer and take a good look at me.

This isn't a beauty mark running down the center of my face.

I wish it were.

I really do.

© text only anita marie moscoso 2005

The Strange Tale of The Malloy Sisters

2005-11-05T18:36:00.000-08:00

Meet Three of Duwamish Bays More Colorful Residents in
The Strange Tale of The Malloy Sisters

There once were three Sisters that lived on Lake Undercroft and if the stories are true, and please believe they are, they were three of the most vicious prolific serial killers the entire State has ever seen.

They were also Witches.

The Malloy’s weren't the “ lets get naked and celebrate womanhood witches”...no, they were more like the “let me cut your head off and eat your brains and lets celebrate the Dark Lord” type witches.

The Malloy Sisters have always been busy but most recently they were responsible for these dead bodies that littered Fire Road Highway (38 eight and everytime it rains they seem to find more) and a local guy who worked in a bank and liked to upload nasty pictures on the company computer was accused, tried and executed for the crimes.

Of course he didn't do it, and of course the Malloy Sisters did and of course they got away with it, after all they were Witches.

What about the Mountlake Nine?

Have you heard of them?

There were nine little kids that disappeared from this Elementary School in the town of Resolution...and by that I mean they disappeared as they walked into the school, from the schools library, from the lunchroom, gym and the playground.

No one ever figured out what happened to them until a nature photographer found their little skulls hanging from a tree near Undercroft Lake.

The skulls were attached to the tree branches by a chain and they clonked and bonked against each other every time the wind blew.

The skulls still had their eyes and I think that was the last thing the Nature Photographer ever saw with his mind still intact.

After he found the Mountlake Nine he became what you'd call a burden to society and drank himself to death.

Human remains littered the trees and grounds around their boathouse and the bodies paved the highway that led to their front door and no one could or would touch those three women.

The Malloy Sisters did everything short of showing up at the County Court House with a written confession in one hand, the murders recorded on videotape in the other hand and the victims crying out from the Great Beyond, " The Malloy Sisters Did It! "

So why didn't the people in Resolution do something you ask?

They eventually did, they sent the Witches down the River straight to the Heart of Duwamish.

The Sheriff in Duwamish Bay is a very capable woman named Sarah Blitzer.

Sarah's Mother owns a Curiosity Shop on the Marina (complete with an Egyptian Mummy in a glass case) and Sarah's best friends are Conjoined Twins that work a permanent Sideshow down on the Lost Road.

In the big large grand scheme of things Sarah is a practical creature who inhabits a very impractical town.

Mr. Cavanaugh that lives behind the Sheriffs Office? He never comes out at daylight. The Sideshows star performer? A former Resident of the Carpathian Mountains and the edge of Duwamish Bay…the place the locals call “ Ghost Town.”

It really is a ghost town.

The night the Malloy Sisters arrived in Duwamish Bay Sarah was waiting for them at the end of the Pier with a smile, full can of gasoline, three nooses and a very angry group of people from the Merchants Society and between the twelve of them they welcomed the Sisters to their new home.

It was the Merchants who strung the Sisters up and it was Sarah who kicked the chairs from under their feet and it was Sarah, still acting as the Law that hit the match and tossed it into the kindling at the Witches feet.

Sheriff Blitzer sat on one of those green and yellow stripped lawn chairs all night and watched the Witches burn and then she watched the sun come up.

The next morning the Malloy Sisters were still hanging from the tree.

Their hair had been burned away and their clothes hung in tatters and one of the Sisters no longer had flesh on one side of her face so she seemed to be grinning down at Sarah as she said, “ was there a point to this Sheriff…exactly how many times do you plan on going through with this little charade of yours?”

Sarah replied as she stretched her long legs and yawned , “We have all eternity to understand each other Ladies and Welcome to Duwamish Bay.”

© anita moscoso text 2005

Playing Tonight at Duwamish Cemetary...

2005-10-31T00:15:00.000-08:00

THE SKIVING DEAD

FEATURING

New lead Singer

BEAN SIDHE

You're in for a screaming good time!

Starts at Midnight

From All Souls....

2005-10-30T19:54:00.000-08:00

From All The Souls Here at Duwamish Bay...

Within The Inn

2005-10-16T20:06:00.000-07:00

I finally reached Duwamish Bay Inn, and claimed a gorgeous room in the Bayside Tower. I was able to open gleaming French doors so my dragon could join us in the room.

Annelinna laughed, sounding like the song of snowbells. "Hay-yooo-munn,we don' have de days to res'. We gots go to Iffika!"

"I know sweetie, we'll be going on in the morning. Not only will I be sleeping tonight, I'll be 'Zenning' with Pye and Skye. That will do as much, if not more, than sleeping will."

"Whut is diss 'Zimming'?" Annelinna's tiny, mobile face frowned briefly.

"You'll see dear, and you are most welcome to join us." I settled on top of the covers to the huge bed. The cats and dragon joined me and curled up , all four of us fitting together into a large yin and yang in the centre of the bed.

Annelinna gingerly found a place to curl up with us, and the five of us 'Zenned Out'; not really sleeping, nor yet awake. Somewhere above and in between wakefulness and sleep we floated. The cats purred joyously and my dragon hummed softly in her throat as ourbreathing changed, becoming deep and slow; I could feel my brain waves slowing into Alpha state and my muscles relaxed fully.

I was curled around, in, and with cats, dragon, and doll in my meditative state with a faint smile holding fast to the corners of my mouth. Here in this place my worries are shed and I touch divinity with my spirit.

It was at suppertime, announced by a soft knock and gentle voice calling through the door. "Ma'am? Supper is being put on the table."

"Mmmmm-kay." I mumbled as I slid back down and into consciousness. The cats and dragon stretched luxuriantly with me while Annelinna beamed at everyone impartially.

"So! Diss 'zimming' is medidation." Her voice was sweet delicate, and chiming. "all usses zimm togedder an'it worksezz beddah."

"Yes dear. Now, I believe supper is ready, I already requested food for the cats and dragon." I opened the door and, yes, there were small dishes for my cats, and a large bucket for the dragon.

"Will you join me for supper Annelinna?"

"Yes. I vant fooods in my bowlly!!"

She rode sidesaddle on my shoulder to the dining hall, it was lit by crystal chandelier and many candles on the tables. The place settings glowed mellowly in the golden light as chattering people sat at the tables and began to pass platters and bowls of food around.

"I don' eatzz dee dead animallas!!" Annelinna stared at the platters of beef, ham, and poultry in utter horror.

"That's all right hon, I see several kinds of vegetables and breads coming our way."

"Good!!!" She eyed the platter of salad with delight, before claiming a cherry tomato, a bit of onion, a slice of cucumber, and a shred of lettuce. The next plate was piled with hot rolls, glossy with melting butter on top. We took one and she sliced off a largush crumb for herself. "Dass 'nuff forrr me!"

"I'll bet!! It would be amazing if you ate all of that without sinking into a 'food coma'!!" I winked and added some cooked cabbage, already buttery with celery seeds clinging to the shreds of cabbage.

We were well and truly 'portly'ed' when the trays of desserts began to make the rounds. I grinned and eyed lemon meringue pie and chocolate creme pie.

"Hooo noooo!!! De sweeetzz!!! I nebber sezz nooo to de sweeetzz!!" Annelinna groaned and I smiled in understanding, my round self spoke for my own inability to refuse sweets.

"What looks good to you 'Linna?"

"Ssschockoooladd!!!!" I laughed and claimed a slice of chocolate creme pie, she tucked in before I had passed the platter on to the next person and their doll.

After we had polished off the pie and washed it down with milk so cold it had little shards of ice in it it was time to stagger to bed.

The cats and dragon were waiting sleepily in our room. After I had changed into a flowing pale green silk nightie and climbed into satiny smooth sheets that held the scent of sunshine and soft breezes from the Bay, the critters claimed thier parts of the bed and Annelinna sunk into the second hugely fluffy feather pillow. It was barely two blinks and we were falling into a deep and restful sleep.

passing the time in Duwamish

2005-09-25T08:24:00.000-07:00

passing the time in Duwamish

Hermitage Publications Opens - Seeking Submissions

2005-09-24T05:42:00.000-07:00

Invitations soon to be sent out, or email if you would like guidelines....golden opportunity to have your original ideas recognised.....Imogen Crest, Hermitage Publications, Hermitage Regions.

Famous undead rock band to play Duwamish

2005-09-23T15:35:00.000-07:00

(Noted in the Raven Courier)

Entertainment organisers of the All Hallows Eve/Day of the Dead festivities at Duwamish have announced that rock band the Skiving Dead will top the bill at a free concert in Duwamish Cemetary on October 31 at midnight.
Skiving Dead frontman Slasher Poe said the band was looking forward to the gig.
``The crowds at Duwamish really go off," he said. ``Especially if you leave `em out too long."
Poe was silent on rumours that the Skiving Dead would unveil its new lead singer at the gig. But word is that the new vocalist has a voice that would wake the dead. Extra seating will be supplied at the cemetary just in case.

The Winged One

2005-09-23T11:13:00.000-07:00

Pegasus came to me like in a dream. He loved me as a child and I loved him. I would ride on his back over oceans and deserts in the moonlight. All summer we had a platonic love affair. Every night he would appear at my window and off we would go. My parents never knew I was gone. And then one day I realized the world had their hold on me and I could not go. And he was so disappointed he never came to me again.

And now would he even remember me? Would he know in my heart, I so regret having to grow up. It was not a choice, it just happened. I only wish I had one more moonlit night with him. He shared with me wonder, mysteries and to not ever to be afraid of the dark. He was my protector, my champion. And I was only a little girl with dreams of slaying demons and nightmares. I still want to slay the nightmares but I do that with my pen. And they bow down defeated and bleed black India ink.

And now my beloved Pegasus, I remember you in the bright moonlight where you gave me courage and showed me magic. I can only thank you with limp words that cannot show you how much you have meant to me. I’ll keep my window open for you.

Dance Upon The Shore

2005-09-22T22:38:00.000-07:00

The lights of Duwamish are an enticing glow as I stand here, beside my little driftwood fire. The shifting colours in the flames mirror the Aurora singing overhead. Within my Circle, not so tiny under this full moon, I stand naked and fearlees. Tonight I will dance as my spirit does. Here, where Sun, sky, sea and sand are one.

The donkeys have nodded approval to all my preparations, as have Skye and Pye. Skye's silky white tail is in wild spikes from the salt water, as is Pye's impossibly fluffy brush in all the colours of the sand. My own hair is in salty curls and waves, the crystals shimmer on my skin like the light of faery fires in the oldest of old woods.

Without music I am dancing, easily, freely. The thunder of the surf mimics the sound of my feet on the sand. The music plays in my spirit and my body must follow.

So many things I dance for; for my own slow salvation, coming to me on a little breath here and there. For peace and understanding to come into my heart; so that I may once again see the spiderweb of silvery bonds between the stars, whether I seek them or not. I dance for that moment beneath a desert moon, when everything was right and I was still within myself.

I dance for the love I cannnot gainsay, no matter if it will be consummated or not. I seek some poor comfort in the knowledge that I can still love, deeply, passionately and fearlessly. That must be what I carry in the face of my all-too human heart.

On the nights I would beg the Gods bring this man to me, I must instead plead for his happiness with her. I cry that I should not be bitter or jealous, although I could scream with the raging against unfairness.

I dance for a future that will be at once so rich and full, yet achingly empty at the same time.

I dance in supplication, "Let not my brother have that ugliness in his flesh, let the tumor be benign. I would not have him eaten alive from within. Nor would I see his daughter suffer through seeing him with the Cancer, I could not bear her lose her father to a mass of freaked-out cells.

I dance also for my mother, that her worries be lessened; that her twilight years be easy, and she know happiness that goes through her soul and shines out of her eyes.

I pray that my baby brother regain his feet and stop hiding away from life. I ask the Gods to show him wellness and strength of spirit.

I dance for all of the friends that have shown me the better life I sought years ago. I wish them to know love and happiness, that their gifts be returned a thousandfold.

I dance even for my father, that he will know healing, and not hatred in his last years on this earth.

And lastly, I dance for myself, that my gifts will always be used in the service of the light. That I will grow and move closer to the Perfect Self every day of my life.

And, yes, I dance also for Him, that I may know him one day, all of him... the man as well as the friend I cannot live without. That wish which is kept sturdily locked away from the light of day.

Tears are caught in the corners of my smile as I dance until everything blurs into a whirl of colours and the sound becomes a long subsonic "OHM" that reverberates through me.

At last I can dance no more and I collapse in front of the dying fire, laughing and crying at once. Skye moves closer to comfort me, and soothe my heart.

Skye, with her sweet trill and trusting adoration. She is my comfort and my spirit's companion, I thank the Gods every day for bringing this sweet lady to my life. She blesses me with a silken head-butt.

Not worrying about my nudity I curl up by the fire with cats and donkeys huddling close, as if to protect me as my magicking wings wherever it is needed.

In the silence comes the voice of every mother, "Namaste, my daughter, be at peace." I answer, "Blessed be, Mother of Man." as I drift into sleep, snuggling a cat on either side, and the donkeys next to them.

Journey to Duwamish

2005-09-22T14:25:00.000-07:00

I was sitting in the garden at Baba Yaga’s when a raven brought me the invitation to spend a couple of days in Duwamish. My last visit there had been so short, hardly a visit at all as I was in a hurry to catch up with the rest of my group. In factI had had no chance to visit the Isle of Ancestors or even have a look round. I had also heard that there was a wonderful bookshop there and an art gallery.

It didn’t take me long to pack up my things and as they weren’t heavy and I knew that Duwamish wasn’t too far away I decided I would walk. I needed the exercise after sitting over my spinning and weaving for many hours at a time. There was an autumnal feel to the air as I set off. Fire tipped the leaves of the trees and cobwebs strung between the trees were hung with crystals, sparkling in the early morning sunlight, from the heavy dew. I saluted the spiders in their webs as I passed, now conscious of the invaluable work they do.

Eventually I came to the stream that I knew would lead me down into Duwamish Bay. The water chuckled and gurgled as it splashed down the rocky bed causing rainbows to dance in the spray. Altogether it felt good to be alive. Even the birds in the thickets along my way were singing their hearts out.

At length I reached the village and looked curiously around me, for it was the first time I would have had the chance to look around. Immediately ahead of me was a sign announcing the presence of 'Ye Olde Tea Shoppe' with the most enticing smells wafting out from it. I went in and chose a corner table near the window, from where I could view the comings and goings of people. After sitting down and ordering a pot of Earl Grey tea. I picked up several of the leaflets that had been left on the table. The first was a guide to the more interesting shops in Duwamish. The North Star Studios immediately caught my eye as did Madame Livia's Bookshop of Chaos. There was also something called the Enchanter's Wunderkabinett. I would certainly try to visit all three of these. The second leaflet bore a picture of a mangnificent snowy owl and advertised private boat trips to White Owl Island, by special arrangement with the Enchantress. The third one advertised boat trips to the Isle of Ancestors. Duwamish was obviously a fascinating place and I wasn't sure I would be able to fit everything in. The White Owl Island trips only started in the early evening so I would have plenty of time to explore to my heart's content.

Visit to North Star Studios
I decided to visit the North Star Studios first. The blurb said that it was governed by Providence and that you had to make a wish. I was so busy wondering what I could wish that I bumped into the rickety garden gate knocking it right of its hinges. I immediately knew what my wish would be - I had the perfect gate at home sitting unused in a corner of the garden. I could wish its immediate transfer here, only after checking with the gallery owner of course, that such a gift would be welcomed.

I walked up the path through a truly exuberant garden and stopped to look in the window which was filled with mouth watering treasures - some raku sculptures, a magnificent ceramic torso and a Japanese doll. I couldn't wait to get inside.

The magic was upon me already. I stepped in to find a veritable Aladdin's cave of goodies ranging from wooden sculptures through glassware to jewellery, each piece more beautiful than the last. In a corner I found a silver horse prancing on a bed of uncut amethyst crystals. I just had to have that and duly asked the gallery owner if she would be kind enough to keep it for my return. It was only with difficulty that I tore myself away but I did want to visit the bookshop and the Wunderkabinett (the Old Curiosity Shop).

Madame Livia's Bookshop of Chaos was only a couple of blocks away. The doorway was very small and it was quite a squeeze to get in. Was the owner trying to discourage visitors from entering or leaving? Inside there were books everywhere, not just on the shelves but in tottering piles on the floors, a small table was completely hidden under a mountain of books and magazines and revues appeared to be in imminent danger of sliding off the chair on which they had been temporarily piled.

Madame Livia's appearance was as chaotic as her name. There was more than a hint of gypsy in her I thought. Her hair flowed around her in wild abandon and she was wearing the most exotic collection of jewellry - huge earrings, a veritable cascade of necklaces and bangles on both arms. In fact, she was wearing so much that the various bits of jewellry clinked against each other and tinkled like a myriad of bells whenever she moved. She wore layer upon layer of tiered skirts in a bewildering patchwork of colours and textures. I felt sure she must be related to Madame Eclectica in some way.

She scanned me shrewdly as I carefully made my way into the shop. "Greetings Traveller. Welcome to my little world of literary chaos". How was it that everyone in this land seemed to know my name? "Hello" I said and "thank you. Please tell me, how do you know my name?" "I can read it in your face" was her slightly unnerving reply. "You have been travelling for quite a while now and your adventures are leaving indelible traces on your face but only the aware can read them". I was beginning to think she must be related to Madame Rosa, the fortune teller, as well as Baba Yaga and all the rest and to suspect some sort of conspiracy. Were they all one and the same person but appearing in different manifestations in the different places we went to? I think I might have to have a quiet word with the Enchantress when I can finally nail her down. She seems to be so elusive these days.

I explained about the jigsaw puzzle map and asked her if she had any books on cartography. She told me to go and look under a dusty aspidistra plant in the back of the shop. "Would you like a cup of herbal nonsense while you are looking around?" she enquired. I replied that I would be delighted to taste a cup of herbal nonsense. She disappeared out to the back of the shop. When she returned a little later, Madame Livia was carrying a tray with two cups of herbal nonsense on it and a plate of fairy cakes. When I went to take one, the fairy sitting on the top of the cake flew off leaving a trail of fairy dust in the form of multi-coloured hundreds and thousands sprinkled on the top of the cake.

The cake and the drink were delicious. "Do you know anything about White Owl island?" I enquired casually as I drained my cup of herbal nonsense. "Indeed I do. Why, would you be interested in visiting it?" I told her what my research had turned up and explained that I was fascinated by these old rituals and would very much like to meet the Magiratha if that could be arranged. She told me she would see what she could do.

I continued browsing through the shelves which contained many interesting volumes. I picked up a book of beautiful floral illustrations and hastily put it back again when a picture of nettles stung me where I had been foolish enough to touch the page. I was lost in contemplation of some of the illustrations in another book when she came bustling back into the shop. "It's all arranged" she beamed, "you can go to White Owl Island this afternoon. Alec will pick you up at the quay at 4 o'clock." I thanked her and headed off to the Duwamish Inn as I still hadn't checked in, which I thought I ought to do if I was likely to be out all night. The Innkeeper recognised me from my very brief previous visit and showed me to my room on the first floor in the turret from where I had a wonderful view over the harbour.

Shortly before 4 I picked up my swansdown cape and my little pouch and set off for the quay.

Where to Go Next?

2005-09-22T04:47:00.000-07:00

Decision decisions! Where to go next? Pegasus is helping out a confused traveller.

To view an enlarged view of one cartographers perspective of the Soul Food Silk Way click here.

Gone To Croatan by Anita Marie Moscoso

2005-09-21T14:51:00.000-07:00

At the beginning of this year I came up with an idea about a town inhabited by Werewolves, Ghosts, Witches, Demons and Ghouls and other wonderful Characters...Including some named for members of my own family and put them in a little place we now visit here at the Soul Food Cafe.

I called it Duwamish and with Heather's encouragement it's grown to the extent that I'm now writing my first novel based on this short story.

I've been amazed and awed by the visions Duwamish has inspired in all of you...So I thought I'd re-post this for you to read.

Enjoy your stay and the rest of your journey...
Anita Marie

GONE TO CROATAN
TEXT BY ANITA MOSCOSO
ILLUSTRATIONS BY HEATHER BLAKEY

Years ago, before they walked into oblivion someone turned back and left this message carved on a tree, " gone to Croatan ".

Now it's my turn, tonight I'm going to Croatan; I'm going to Croatan to avenge my own murder.

My name Is Livia Cotard and once I owned a little bookshop at the Marina on the Duwamish Bay.

In the front of my shop you would find books sought after by collectors from all over the world. Rare first editions, bound sets, atlases, maps, and a variety of other books that were prized by collectors for their illustrations.

The front of my store is separated from the back by a large imposing oak door. Its hinges are leather and its locks and tumblers are made of wood.

The Imposing Oak Door by Heather Blakey

This is where my real store is; this is where I conduct my real trade.

The room behind this door is a very comfortable library. The walls lined ceiling to floor bookcases. One case has a glass door, the second had an iron gate and others were left open.

Each case held over 100 volumes.

The books were crafted by an unusual group of Authors and had been written for a very exotic group of clients. These were famous one of a kind horror stories among this group of readers and they would spare no expense in collecting them.

The Authors by Heather Blakey

This is how these little treasures were created.

If the Authors were to arrive at a home for a story they always came hours before a funeral and they were never turned away. After a small ceremony involving salt and scented oils they were left alone with the Dead and their work would begin. The Authors would take blank sheets of parchment; sometimes strips of linen or thin sheets of copper, gold and in later years paper and place them over the chest of a dead person. Then the Author would place their hand over the corpse's stilled heart and the story would be recorded.

Authors at Work by Heather Blakey

It was said you could hear the scratching sounds of what was assumed to be pen to parchment and that no matter how much you were tempted that you should never try to catch one of these Authors at work. Not unless you wanted to end up bound in one of those books too.

When they were finished what was recorded on these pages were all the sins and evil that the dead person ever committed. Page after page would hold horrible dark stories and horrific illustrations. Brought forward by the Author's skilled hand, images and words and flashes of smell and sound would be captured then interpreted by the Author and burned onto the pages.

The Authors always left a gift for the stories. Sometimes they left gold or jewels, potions in bottles and sometimes money.

The Croatan Treasury by Heather Blakey

After they left these homes the Authors would take these pages and bind them, and place them in libraries in homes not fit for human habitation.

These books were not written to be read by human eyes.

Eyes accustomed to the dark and held by hands that pushed open caskets from the inside read them. They were cherished and prized by families whose bodies and very nature could be altered by the full Moon, by men and women whose bloodlines and family histories had been altered by curses and magic.

Owning these books and selling them wasn't where my trouble started, as you might assume. My family has been dealing in this trade since the Authors first turned up centuries ago. My problems started with a woman named Cynthia Kern.

I let her into my back room the day of my Murder, even though she was very much of this world because the book she held was already in her possession.

Cynthia was from the East Side and owned a large very traditional over priced antique shop. Her clients were as unique and demanding as my own and a few of them were well known art collectors. One of them, she told me had somehow gotten a hold of this most unusual book written about a woman who killed her own children and blamed the crime on a neighbor.

The neighbor was executed and the true murderess lived to a ripe old age and died childless because one tragedy after another struck at her new family. Her babies (five of them) who were born years after the death of her first family all met sad ends...unexplained illnesses, fires and another was drowned.

Instead of living under a dark cloud she was wrapped in the warmth of sympathy and kindness of her entire community.

There was of course no way to actually read this book because it was written in the language of a family named Benandanti. So, it was the artwork, the pictures that made these books famous and prized by the non-reader. Each illustration was a memory, which had been burned onto the pages

The stronger the memory the more vibrant and active the picture. It was like watching a movie.

The murdering woman in this story lovingly relived her crimes almost every moment of her day. Each memory had been captured on those pages with stunning detail and clarity. It was quite a find. I still don't know how this Kern woman came across the book but she brought it to me and asked if I could find more of them.

I told her this was an extremely rare series of books, created by request of the Benandanti family. Now days you'd call them true crime fans. At the time, I think the idea of infanticide intrigued a family who's children, poor little things, usually didn't live past the age of six.

Children were extremely important to them and the thought of killing one was, to the Benandanti, a true horror.

I didn't have any books from the Benandanti Collection.

The Venda Family I knew were avid collectors of the Benandanti book collections. If there had been any of these left to be found, the Vendas had no doubt acquired them ages ago.

Cynthia went through some of the other books on the shelves...and then she came to the Naemoor Collection, As she reached out and rested her hand against the glass case she asked me, would it be alright for her to look at these?

I saw no reason to say no. They weren't for sale though; they were part of my private collection. " They're blank " she said, confused as she turned the pages.

" They were for one of the Naemoor to use, when she became an Author, but she left the family and disappeared. Kids you know, they have minds of their own. "

" Why weren't they passed on? "

"It doesn't work that way, " I said taking the book and gently replacing it on the shelf and closing the door. " These pages were specially created for the Author, they won't...work right for anyone else."

Cynthia placed her hand with their long bony fingers, which had been over decorated with frosty dark pink nail polish, and many diamond rings against the glass. I recognized that look on her face. That volume was calling to her very soul...asking to be placed upon her heart. Begging to be allowed to capture her darkest secrets on its pages.

Strange to do that to a living person. Her heart I knew must be black and her soul darker yet. I must say I was intrigued by the way the book called to her.

No, not intrigued...mystified.

She tried again to persuade me to sell her the blank book bound in soft red leather and decorated with silver threads that are as delicate as a spider's web and I refused.

She tried to smile, make small talk and then she handed me her card. When her fingertips brushed the side of my hand my lip curled and I tried to not look repulsed. This woman was a husk; she was as decayed and foul as a corpse rotting in the hot sun.

It's not often you meet such a corrupted soul and her story would be valuable to any Author.

But that's not my trade, my trade is bookseller and for all these years I've been content to do that.

Until my Shop was robbed...and I was murdered.

It was my friend Ignancia Guzman who owns the Curio Shop six doors down from me who discovered my store had been broken into. She came down to my houseboat and got me, reassuring me that whatever happened, she would help me.

The shelf with the blank Naemoor Volumes had been struck at the side with an axe and one of the blank volumes... a black book decorated with gold leaf and edged with small blue stones, had been nearly hacked in half. The books don't like to be separated and the hack job was needed to get to the Red Volume out of the case and away from the other books.

Ignancia pulled the broken axe out of the shelf and threw it across the room. She carefully examined each book and found that it had bee the black one that had not been as damaged as the others and she asked me for a towel and some salt.

" It's gonna be alright, here sit down. " Then she carefully set the book down, and shook the towel open and held it up to the light. She laid the towel flat and sprinkled the salt on it and set the book in the middle. Then as careful as a surgeon she started to fold the towel around the book.

" It's the best I can do " Ignancia voice was angry but her eyes were bright...she wasn't the type of woman who cried or showed her feelings easily and I was moved, honored to know I mattered so much to her.

" I know, and I appreciate everything you've done. " I assured her.

She nodded and looked away and pushed the bound book into my hands. " Go, go ' she told me very crisp and businesslike.

I reached for the book and it crashed to the floor, I hadn't dropped it. It had passed through my fingers. I tried to concentrate harder and this time I was able to grasp the book and lift it.

I didn't look into Ignancia' s face. She was as I've said, a dignified person and I wanted to spare her the embarrassment of my seeing the pain on her face that I knew was there and she couldn't help but to feel.

I don't know what possessed me to leave the message on my door that I wrote on the back of my closed sign. It was very important for me to leave something behind, something personal and all I could think to say was " Gone to Croatan "

Croatan is home of the lost, safe harbor to ships that sail in permanent twilight and the place where people like me return to in the end.

The train that left the station just outside of Leaning Birch Cemetery was a special train. It only ran once a day and it didn't cost anything to ride. The Conductor was a tall thin cadaverous looking gentleman and when he saw me waiting at the stop he looked very surprised.

" I almost didn't see you there Mrs. Cotard, " he said.

" I'm glad to say it's not your eyes Mr. Inverness, I'm afraid it's me. I've...I've had a misfortune. I haven't much time. I was wondering if you could help me. "

" Certainly Mrs. Cotard. What can I do for you? "

" I can't travel in my, well, condition. I need a ride and I thought that perhaps your train would work for me. "

He looked at my poor fading hands and smiled, then he stepped aside.

As I boarded I handed him a very old gold coin. It was Roman and the design would mean something to Mr. Inverness who had spent a lot of time in that part of the world. It was a gift not a token and he accepted it.

The train turned out to be more animal then machine and the engine sounded more like a heart beat then anything mechanical. It felt as if it were breathing. I took a window seat as the train lurched and moved forward. Nothing I saw through the windows looked familiar, the landscape at times was foreign the seasons changed in seconds and the sun and moon sailed across the sky.

The train reared back and stopped and we were in front of a house in the suburbs. The house was Tudor in design with bright yellow roses lining the drive up to the house.

Mr. Inverness smiled as I stepped down, " Take your time Mrs. Cotard, we'll hold the train. "

" That's not necessary " I replied

Then he said almost under his breath " Just saving myself the trip Mrs. Cotard. "

I enjoyed my walk up to the door, I enjoyed turning my plan over and over in my head, walking around it and admiring it from different angles in my mind's eye.

It was going to be a work of art.

When I arrived I didn't knock at the door, it wasn't there for me anymore. Entire parts of my world seemed to be disappearing. I saw the floor in the hall but not the walls on one side of the room, I saw paintings but within the paintings little images were gone, I saw people walk by with no faces, missing limbs, some looked as if they had been neatly split down the middle.

What I saw looked like an incomplete puzzle...almost there but missing pieces in odd shapes and sizes. Making things more difficult for me to find my way was my failing vision. I felt as if I were looking down a long tunnel with fog banks creeping towards me...or perhaps from me.

Regardless, somehow I found Cynthia's room and my Red Book.

My last surviving book held all that was left of my soul. It was desperately calling out to what was left of me and it's sister, my poor damaged book. Which I had been holding close to my heart since my journey began.

It was now almost full.

That book I placed under her bed and I heard it thump as it opened itself. A dark fog crept cautiously from under the bed and then my anger and grief swarmed out like angry bees from the book and clung to my fading image before they flew from the room and burrowed into every dark soul they could find...and in this house there were many of those.

My nightmares would become their reality and soon they wouldn't be able to tell the difference between the two.

I crept to Cynthia's bedside and watched her sleeping, my red book on her nightstand in agony because what it wanted most was just out of reach.

I had lied to Cynthia about the red book because it was my own and I had authored it myself years ago. It wasn't a blank book; it was full, bursting with dark terrible tales. The only person who could have actually seen the printed pages was a Naemoor, our language was the language of Authors and you don't learn our language you are born to it.

Those pages were full of words and images that only my family could decipher.

This was my proudest possession because I had turned the world upside down for this story and what I did to get it would be, how would you term it, be considered justifiable homicide.

That's what I told myself and my family after the deed was done.

We Authors only took stories from the dead...except for myself. Which was why I ended up selling books instead of writing them. My family was horrified I would take a story from a living soul because by taking a story from a living person you trapped them in paper and ink for all eternity.

You see in my younger days certain topics fascinated me, and one in particular fascinated me most of all. Cannibals...I collected story after story about Cannibals...and 200 of those dark tales paled in comparison to my Gentleman.

He was a butcher and a fiend and he called himself Jack.

I placed the red book on Cynthia's chest and held it down over her heart and because it was full I knew what it wanted was to speak to Cynthia...it was romantic in a morbid way. This dark book caged in a hidden room had called out to this woman's dark heart and she had answered.

So I gave them to each other and they became one for a moment. Then she was no more and someone else opened her eyes and blinked and squinted and sat up.

She was so hungry she couldn't stand it.

Then from down the hall came voices, relaxed unassuming voices and Cynthia rose delicately from her bed and went down to the kitchen to see about breakfast.
© text anita moscoso 2005
© ILLUSTRATIONS BY HEATHER BLAKEY

Lemurian Archipelago

2005-09-21T04:26:00.000-07:00

Just down from Duwamish lies the Lemurian Archipelago. The ocean here is a living place where everything is governed by the laws of magic. The coastline here is dotted with archipelagos and deserted islands. Everyone who comes to Lemuria has their own personal island or archipelego which they must maintain through the use of magic.

A trip is being arranged for guests to visit the Archipelago with Pegasus and choose an island

Visited the Duwamish Curiosity Shop

2005-09-20T05:58:00.000-07:00

With a bit of time on my hands I decided to wander down to the Duwamish Cemetery and find Anita Marie's Curiosity Shop. I ended up spending an hour browsing and then sat in the sun sketching her new abode. Too cool!

Ballast Island

2005-09-19T22:03:00.000-07:00

This is the first in a series of stories about the strange history of Duwamish Bay Village. Legend says that the Village still exists just beyond Lost Harbor. This story was given to me by a woman who's Great Grandfather may have seen the ending of the Village...or perhaps it was it's beginning.
AMM

Is Ballast Island Haunted? We use to ask our Great Grandparents, are there ghosts out there?

My Great Grandfather who was a Magician and could spin tales as easily as he could make a coin disappear and then reappear would only look sad and say, " It's full of Ghosts. "

Located in the Lost Harbor, Ballast Island is where ships would dump their ballasts. " It was a garbage dump, it was a disgrace to us all when they sent those poor people out to live on that thing. "

Of course nobody lives there now, in fact most of the Island is gone but on some days you can see what's left of it when the tide is low.

" It was a disgrace to us all" he said slowly " and then the Halloween Storm came. "

I'd been brought up on the stories about the Halloween Storm.

The Halloween storm was freak windstorm that came to our coast just before 6:00pm on October 31of 1896 with no warning.

The winds came up off the Harbor and raged and raged until November 2nd.

When it was over everything had been wiped off of Ballast Island.

Wiped off the island and straight into the Harbor.

My Great Grandfather told us that the next year on the 31st to the hour the storm hit the people working on the new Marina saw them coming from the mists.

Canoes.

They were coming towards the shore, and the people in them were looking over their shoulders at something...something large and dark and alive and just before they reached the new Pier they disappeared.

Lots of people saw them then, they still see them now.

My Grandfather was a young man back when he first saw them and he said he saw the sky pull apart and the world around him flooded with Shadows and then the winds screamed off the harbor and he was swept up in a storm that wasn't there.

He couldn't breath because the wind was pulling the air from his lungs and he could barely keep his eyes opened against the force of it.

Then in the shadows and the boiling waters he saw a woman fighting the wind and the waves in a canoe and he saw three little children desperately hanging onto the sides of the canoe to keep from being pulled over its sides.

" I'll never forget it Tiger, " he told me, " it was like the Wind you know was pulling at them trying to pull them out of that canoe. Then she saw me, I looked into her eyes and she didn't want to die she wanted to fight. The Ghost Woman saw me and then she dropped the oar into the harbor and she reached for me. "

I dove off the dock and straight into the Harbor because the tide because, well, I could feel it. It wasn't the harbor that wanted them. It was that damn Wind...so I swam out to her and then I put my hand out and she was gone. But I won't forget that look. Never, I will never forget look. "

" Well, don't you think I was the only person to see the Ghost People in those Canoes. Lots of people have. When I was down at the Pier just a few years ago they came back like they always do at this time of the year and this time Tiger I could hear them calling to the shore for help. Pleading and calling for help. "

" Do you know Mrs. Linden from the Hill? She was down there with her little kids and the winds came and the canoes came from the mists and we could hear them Tiger and the sound of it would've broken your heart. Well, Mrs. Linden starts shrieking like a lunatic, " Look at the pretty lights at the Marina ... look at the pretty lights. "

" And I'll be damned but everyone did, they all looked back up the shoreline and away from those poor Ghost People. "

My Great Grandfather told me that story every Halloween as we stood on the Pier and watched the Ghost People try to make it to shore.

It was the very least we could do.

Now I have Grandchildren of my own and when they ask me if Ballast Island is full of ghosts I tell them no.

I tell them the Ghost People are all around us...and they always will be.

That's what I tell my Grandchildren.
© anita marie moscoso 2005-text

Waiting for the Silver

2005-09-18T13:33:00.000-07:00

Even though I was delightfully tired and eager to check into the Duwamish Inn, it was such a lovely night and I loathed to go inside. I decided on the spur of the moment to walk down to the water's edge. It was misting lightly by the time I got there and the fishing boats were tied up in a row, rocking gently, and creaking on their ropes.

Waiting for the Silver

Rocking gently at their moorings,
water lapping at their hulls.
Holds empty now,
fishers resting,
waiting…
Dreaming of the
shimmering harvest yet to come.

Salty spray adorning masts,
scales like stars upon the decks.
Clanking chains,
rusty anchors,
stinking bait.
Voices raised
as nets and ropes bloody hands.
Crews, wet and cold,
harvesting the sea.

Rocking gently at their moorings,
water lapping at their hulls.
Holds empty now,
fishers resting,
waiting,
dreaming of tomorrow's catch.

Vi
©September 17, 2005

Raindrop Madness

2005-09-17T10:33:00.000-07:00

After leaving the raft I decided to hike to Duwamish. A gentle rain was falling and the light was fading fast. When I arrived in town there were lights shining from windows and through open doors. To add to the magic there was a smell of wood smoke in the air. I headed toward the inn from whence I could hear music. Although I was eager for company and conversation, I was in no hurry Because there was magic in the air.

Have you ever noticed
the raindrops on your glasses
when you walk about at night?
Squint a little, and you will see
street lights transformed
into silvery fish
swimming in star studded seas.
Bats flying on jeweled wings,
dancing with the stars
until they disappear
into the soft, warm darkness of the night.

The bats return,
to skim the waves of glistening oceans,
their eyes sparkling with
an awareness of their own.

Am I mad,
or just caught up in the dance?
If this be madness,
then keep your sanity
while I revel in a world of prancing lights,
silver bats,
and sparkling butterflies.

I go forth with joy into rain at night,
where sparkling lights will guide me,
and lead me into a fantasy
that is mine alone.

Have you ever noticed
the magic of raindrops on your glasses?
Of course, you have to look into
rather than through your lenses.

And those of you who don't wear glasses,
well, you're just plain out of luck.

Vi
©September 17, 2005

To the Island...

2005-09-17T01:27:00.000-07:00

Waking early on a windy morning I left my quarters at the inn and made my way on foot to the jetty where the ferrywomen waited. I thought I saw a man there, too, but it must have been my imagination. The wind blew at my hair and clothes, and I pulled my cloak tighter around my shoulders.

On the ferry the ride was rough, but the women were unperturbed, as I expected them to be. I didn't see the man again, and knew it was a trick of the light. The light grew brighter in the distance, as I saw in my mind the territory of the White Owl. The women invited no conversation, only expertly negotiated the wild waters, singing in minor keys to the wind.

The Yellow Hills of Italy

2005-09-17T00:17:00.000-07:00

Burning the midnight oil in Dwamish. Painting by candle light and reliving memories of Italy.

Return from White Owl Island

2005-09-16T05:08:00.000-07:00

I returned from the White Owl humbled. She did not offer me advice when I asked for guidance as I lead so many travellers through a foreign realm. Instead she gave me this pastoral crook as a symbol of divine creative power. She assured me that with this crook on my staff I could guide others on the spiral journey of regeneration.

Now I am not sure what I will do with my free time here in Duwamish. I might wander down to the Gypsy encampment by the bridge or I might return to the bath-house where the Ferry Women and Priestesses bathe. My room in the Inn is very comfortable and from my window I can see the light house on White Owl Island and mentally plot the path I walked to meet White Owl.

Reaching Duwamish Bay by Signs

2005-09-16T03:18:00.000-07:00

Leaving the enchanted forest I had some of the answers I was looking for, and felt less like a trespasser. The mossy green woods were full of life I had forgotten about. As I went on my way out and on the path to the Bay, which I could see in the future, I rode on in wonder at the signs along the way.

I was headed in the right place, chattered the Parrot, in its own particular language that I could understand now, after being in the enchanted forest. I followed its directions and then thought I was lost.

Fortunately, a beautiful Bird of Paradise flower was pointing me in the right direction with its orange plume of flowers. Again, it had a strange language that I could now understand. Here, here, it said, pointing along the path.

I followed the direction until nightfall and I could see the lights, weary but expectant, of the Bay and the bridge I needed to cross. I followed the lights in the darkness, and felt the strength of the bridge as I rode on my trusty horse across it to the other side....

In Duwamish

2005-09-15T18:17:00.000-07:00

I have been in Duwamish for a few days now, waiting for folk to arrive from various parts of the realm. Some travellers have been at the House of Serpents while others were in servitude at the House of Baba Yaga. Mercifully Baba agreed that the spindles could lay idle for a few days and decided that evenn she would take a break and join the gathering in Duwamish. By all accounts the Gypsies are now camped just outside the town.

The Inn at Duwamish is filling and later there will be a potlash dinner supplied by the innkeeper to traditionally mark the arrival of the salmon. Visitors will no doubt be keen to explore the Marina, visit Livia's bookshop and take a bath at the bath-house frequented by the Ferry Women who have wonderful stories to tell.

Two excursions are planned while we are here. One will be a visit to White Owl Island which Fran discovered during her wanderings and another will be to the Isle of Ancestors for those who have not been there yet. If you go to White Owl Island you will find (later today) a special activity and the Isle of Ancestors is still open for visitors.

After a day or two we will be moving out and heading to the Lemurian Abbey where the Gorgons, Baba Yaga, the Amazon Queen and Abbess will be in audience to watch a special performance in the Great Banquet Hall. You may want to dip into Pandora's Box of Costumes for ideas. Everyone is welcome to go on stage and be in the spotlight during this wonderful festival.

We will stay at the Abbey for a few nights and then find our way to Baba Yaga's House.

Raft to Duwamish

2005-09-15T13:09:00.000-07:00

My journey so far has been an education in methods of travel. First, I have enjoyed the company of Moonbeam, a very special donkey who bore me and my luggage safely through some of the wildest terrain, and who, with her flying ability, out of reach of the masked bandits who tried to waylay us along the trail. Then there was Black, as steady a mount as could be found anywhere in Horsedom. He reminded me of another Black who, with his partner Captain, hauled the coal wagon of my childhood.

And now, on my way to Duwamish, I board a walk-on ferry which is nothing more than a raft pulled by a cable from one river bank to the other. I was the only passenger but wished there were others. I'd been alone for a while now and could use a chat.

The Ferry Mistress is quite a character, dressed as she is in overalls and Wellington boots with dirty gray hair bundled into an untidy bun on top of her head. The pipe she smokes is so much part of her weathered features that I can't imagine her being without it. "Hurry it up, now, woman," she says in a voice that is more screech than speech. "We can't wait all day fer the likes o' you."

I drop some coppers into her hand and notice the weather worn veins and leathery skin. I wish I had time to listen to her story, if she would be willing to share it with the likes of me. I doubted she would, so I walk to the front of the raft and drop my rucksack and bundle onto the deck, such as it is. Then I sit, my back propped against the rickety rail.

"Mind it don't give way on you," the ferry woman screeches. "I can't stop in mid stream to pull you outa the water."

"Understood," I say with a smile as I hump my butt away from the edge.

The Ferry Mistress released the rope that had anchored the primitive ferry to the bank, keeping it stable and unmoving in the water. Once cut loose, the raft was propelled downstream by the swift current. Slowly, by cranking on the cable winch, my non-communicative ferry mistress, brought the raft back in line with the opposite bank. It was a slow process with the raft fighting the cable all the way. Where, I wondered, will we end up if the cable breaks?

Finally, we reached the other side. I shouldered my rucksack and picked up my bundle.
"Thank you," I say to the ferry woman; captain of her ship, admiral of her fleet of one antique vessel.

"Begone with you," she screeches. "You think you be my only passenger?"

I look toward the opposite bank. There is no one there waiting for this ferry of note.

"G'bye then," I say, and turn to face in the shimmering distance, Duwamish.

Vi
©September 15, 2005

Ferry to Isle of Ancestors and Owl Island

2005-09-14T05:10:00.000-07:00

2005-09-13T21:07:00.000-07:00

Coming Soon To A Blog Near You...

The Celestial Night

2005-09-13T17:30:00.000-07:00

The anticipation mounts
Laughter, applause
But I must escape this merriment
I am too shy for this stage
I hide in the shadow of a great Willow.

I hear a hushed swish of a skirt
And there in all her radiance,
The Amazon Queen.
I bow my head,
“My lady…”
“Do not the festivities amuse you?” she inquires.
“Oh yes, but I cannot perform…
not even for you.” I shamefully admit.
“Then I will have to amuse you, myself,” she grins.
And pulls me into the night.

Away from the lights,
My eyes adjust to the forest floor.
I am careful to follow in her path,
Avoiding large fallen branches.

I hear a waterfall.
She has lead me to a spring.
And there,
sipping from its source
Is a crouching cloaked figure.

Feminine hands touch the water.
Hands brilliant like bone.
She turns to face us.
Her hood slips down.
Light spills from within.
And there…
a radiant being stands.

The Amazon Queen bows,
And I follow.
This gentle lady’s cloak,
Falls to the ground.
Suddenly,
the night
Flares like a full moon just landed.
Her skin shimmers
Her blazing gown is gossamer thin
with the palest tiny pearls.

“Luna, I would like to introduce you
to your namesake,
Lady Luna, Diana,
The Moon Goddess.”
I stare, speechless.

Of all the surprises and worries
I had never expected the Amazon Queen
To bestow such a gift
To me.

The Goddess inclines her head
And gracefully enters the spring.
It dazzles
with what is not an underwater light.
There she bathes and tells us
how her sisters each manage a star.
But being the youngest
she wanted to stay nearest home,
And care for Gaia’s own little sister.

The Amazon Queen stirs.
“We don’t want to be missed.”
We stand ready to leave.
Lady Luna, holds out her hands to me,
with a gift.

Sisterly affection I have never had.
I would like a sister like her.
She dons her midnight cloak
The night goes dark
Only her voice tells me
I am still here.

I open the pouch
An oval piece of moonstone
Falls into my palm.
Its bluish surface brightens
Like a cool candle.
“If you ever feel lonely,
just listen to the stone.
It is connected to me.
It will be comforting, I think.”

I am so moved…
by this lovely Goddess…sister.
That my eyes mist
I am amazed…

The Amazon Queen quietly speaks
The Moon Goddess nods.
I hoarsely whisper thank you.

The Queen smiles satisfied.
I follow her back into the forest.
I have an urge to turn around.
But I hold tightly to the moonstone.
Filled with gratitude
And some giddiness.
Who would have thought
Such delights wait to be found!

Tea in the trees

2005-09-13T17:26:00.001-07:00

Walking a well tread path
A crisp fall breeze catches me
By surprise.
It’s good to know Autumn is coming
After so much sun in Arizona and Italy.

I breathe in deeply.
A movement catches my eye.
Midnight with the star on her forehead
Greets me.
I sense a message from her:
Go to Duwamish Bay.

The Good Abbess has sent me a ride.
Thank you gentle Enchantress
Where ever you are.

We ride the trail and meet no bandits,
To my relieve.
Coming over the ridge
The awe inspiring surprise
Of that wonderful blue ocean.
The Isle of Ancestors nestles serenely
On the horizon.

I set up camp in a tree house.
It’s hardly rustic.
Opulent with velvet pillows,
Oriental rugs and tea for me.
On a plate of chocolates a card reads:

Welcome Luna,
Relax and prepare for your performance.

After a delicious cup of Earl Grey tea
in a Russian tea cup,
I write nonsense.
I reluctantly throw something awful together
and fall asleep.

Horns jubilantly announce
The beginning of the activities
I gather my things
As the half moon rises.

Road to Duwamish

2005-09-11T22:05:00.000-07:00

On the road to Duwamish I happened upon a farm and the farmer and his family have made me welcome for a few days rest. Some home style cooking and tender loving care is bound to do me good. While I was here I noticed a party of the Gypsies pull in. Maybe they will set up in the barn tonight and I will get to dance. On the other hand I might just enjoy a quiet night, soaking in the clear air.

To See If I Am Right About A Few Things

2005-09-10T23:59:00.000-07:00

I took a detour this morning to a mossy wood I had only dreamed about as a girl. I had lived in it, yet not known its significance, until it was gone. Deep thoughts about what was gone, and whether I deserved to have it back worried my mind. The green moss of the wood was like velvet and and yet it troubled me; I felt like I was trespassing....

Thinking back to the lake at the Hermitage I let the pictures form in my mind. Surely this place was as beautiful, but in a different way. Possibly I was more familiar with the Hermitage, not feeling like an interloper there. Was the world of nature different according to places and location? Did I have a right to the wild beauty of nature and its mysteries? To stop the fear and ignorance of the modern world creeping in, I thought of the Hermitage regions. I ride on to see if I am right about a few things....

Rivers

2005-09-10T08:06:00.000-07:00

I knew better then to go off the path, I knew to keep the River to Duwamish at my shoulder no matter where it led me.

The Route to Duwamish always changes you know.

Once it took me passed a ruined mining town, through a cemetery and above a town inhabited by ghosts. On another Journey to Duwamish it led me through a city I use to live in as a girl, below a monastery and into the Catacombs there. Once I went to a great party at a Marina that took place in the 1920's... and that was in 2003 and I wasn't born until 1964 but who cares?

It was a great time.

This time the River was going towards the Mountains.

I thought we were going in the wrong direction- I’m not sure why other then it felt odd.

I went along because the River knows what it knows.

Then I saw this Creek, and along side of it was a washed out road and leaning against a tree at the beginning of the road where I was standing was a rope and a pick and my Aunt's leather bomber jacket she wore as a young woman back in the 1940's when she started flying.

I took it as a sign and grabbed the jacket, put it on and took the rest of the tools with me.

I looked back and the River was still and then as I walked away it bubbled and roared.

I didn't look back. I was afraid to; I was afraid of what I would see.

I went up a gravel trail that slowly turned to what I thought was solid stone and it got colder and colder and now I'm at the edge of a new river.

It’s made of ice and its very dark and cold here.

Very Dark.

© text anita marie moscoso 2005

Finally On the Road to Duwamish Bay

2005-09-10T01:58:00.000-07:00

Making slow progress, many travellers, wondering

what lies ahead.....

Roads to Duwamish Congested

2005-09-09T16:05:00.000-07:00

All Roads Lead To Duwamish

2005-09-09T01:13:00.000-07:00

The roads leading to Duwamish are busy. Raven is heading on foot through the Mountains of Myrr towards the bay and is planning to stay at the Inn. She has been at the source of the Duwmamish and says that the waters are gushing down from the source, emptying into the bay.

Clue?

2005-09-08T18:25:00.000-07:00

Demolition of Infamous Boathouse
Halted

The Lawton Boathouse, the scene of several unsolved murders over the years was sceduled to be demolished today at Sunrise.

However, local authorities halted the demolition because it has yet again been linked to a crime scene in Duwamish Bay.

" I think you can burn that place to the ground and it won't matter. " said local fisherman Koji Barker " It's going to come back no matter what we do to it. "

Murder most foul

2005-09-08T17:01:00.000-07:00

Someone, mercifully not from our party, has come to grief at the Duwamish Inn. I expect that there will be more details in the Raven Courier.

On the road to Duwamish

2005-09-08T16:38:00.000-07:00

Word is travelling around the realm that there is to be a gathering of all travellers at the Duwamish Inn. Riders are coming to bring people from wherever they are located to stay for a few days in Duwamish - before heading to the Lemurian Abbey for a grand festival.

Some travellers have been here before and but I know that tehy will be keen to revisit Duwamish and catch up with old friends like the Inn Keeper and the Ferry Women. Everyone will need to bring a special outfit, a wig, a mask, an act to perform before the Abbess, The Gorgons and the Amazon Queen who are said to be staying at the Abbey at the moment. I suggest that travellers rummage in Pandora's Wardrobe to find the perfect apparel.

The Abbess is organising a banquet to celebrate your visit and she has asked me if everyone could perhaps do a poetry reading, a story telling session, a tarot reading, tell a fairy story or an old wives tale (wash her mouth out now)... oh I don't know, some presentation of some sort that uses your distinct voice. It is a stage you see and I agreed because I figured everyone is here because they are looking for a stage door, eager to walk out into the spotlight and be heard - as often as possible.

But first everyone must reach Duwamish by horse, donkey, raven or whatever transport is available.

Wandering Luck

2005-09-07T12:30:00.000-07:00

I have been out wandering the local area for the past few days. I am sorry to be holding up all of my companion travels. I just kept finding winding trails that called my name. I must say I took quite a few photos of the local flora while I was out an about. The wilderness is very lovely here. This wise, old tree was my favorite thoughtful spot on the journey. I spent hours leaning against it's sturdy trunk and letting any thought or idea or whisp of wisdom passing by on the breeze soak into me.

I'm not sure what the locals call this particular vision, but I found it very confusing and very calming at the same time. I would try to leave and wasn't sure which direction I should go. Sometimes I felt like I was standing on my head. I would call this the Land of Disorientation. It has it's good points. Being disoriented for a long period of time helps you look at things from angles you'd never considered before.

Before heading back to the House of Serpents, I decided to wander into Duwamish Bay. Any excuse to be near my beloved, the ocean, once more. I wandered the beach, collected magical rocks and shells, and let the ocean air wrap me in her cozy embrace. I don't know why, but I feel more at home when I am at the ocean than when I am anywhere else in the world.

As I have come to expect on this journey, I was called to Duwamish Bay for more important reasons than to visit the ocean. In my wanderings I came upon a quaint little shop. I was first attracted to it's open gate that lead to a fountain in a courtyard. Ivy climbed walls and trees adorning the entire area in rich splendor. When I tried to enter the shop, I found the door locked. Disappointed I wouldn't be able to see the treasures within, which I was certain would be even more glorious than the treasures outside, I turned to walk away. A glittery sprite caught my attention as she fluttered by and landed on a window sill just below a sign that read "For Rent." The sprite continued to flutter, even though she was sitting quite still. I decided to take a closer look. When I got closer, I noticed that the sprite was pointing in the window. I decided to peek inside to see what she was so excited about. At first I couldn't tell what sorts of treasures this shop may have sold in the past. The inside looked like any other shop with display tables and shelves, all bare. I perused the scene with my eyes a bit longer until my heart skipped a beat when my gaze fell onto a potter's wheel. "Could it be?!" I gasped. "Could this have been an art gallery?"

I couldn't leave without knowing, so I followed the instructions on the "For Rent" sign which said, "Interested parties may enter, only if you are judged to be a worthy pervayor by the Sprite Muse. She will unlock the door and allow you to browse the shop. Details of ownership are on the table by the door. Follow their instructions if you think you have what it takes to be the next owner of Duwamish Bay's only art gallery."

The Sprite Muse flew to the door and the door sprung open with a slight creak. I walked to the pace of my heart I could hear beating in my ears. My breath quickened. "This is a dream come true," I thought. "What could be better than owning an art gallery that looks out over the ocean -- a marriage of my two greatest loves in all the world!" Visions of items that would soon fill the shop flashed through my mind. I started getting a sinking feeling when I thought about cost, but the Sprite Muse fluttered by and my spirit soared again. She landed on the table next to a few sheets of paper. "That must be the details of ownership," I thought.

After muling over the ownership requirements (not for very long since I was constantly distracted by the Sprite Muse), I realized that it was this gallery, and the sprite, who had chosen me to be the next owner. It was not me choosing to own the gallery. I signed on the dotted line, filed the papers in my traveling bag, and danced my way back to the House of the Serpent to catch up with my traveling companions to share my good fortune.

Along the rest of the journey I will collect pieces of art to show in the gallery. I will dream new dreams of this gallery by the sea. I know I have what it takes to make this gallery the best anyone in Duwamish has ever seen. I'll have to...I have been chosen.

Artists Wanted In Duwamish

2005-09-04T19:14:00.000-07:00

Space for Rent:
146 Anacortes Street
Duwamish Bay, Washington

This Charmer sits above the Duwamish Marina in the lovely Glass Gardens District.

The Glass Gardens Art Gallery and all of it's contents are currently for rent.

It's the hope of the Marina Merchants Association that the Lease Signer will agree to maintain the sight as an Art Gallery as it is the only one in Duwamish.

Please Direct all Inquires to Mark Arima of the Marina Merchants Association.

Or contact gargoyle642001@yahoo.com
for an invitation to Duwamish Bay....

Spotted at Duwamish

2005-09-04T17:02:00.000-07:00

Singing for the Frog Goddess

2005-08-09T19:58:00.000-07:00

Myth hath it that if we sing for the Frog Goddess her waters will break and the Duwmaish will flow again.

While everyone else is a the Hermitage I am exploring the upper reaches of the Duwamish to find the Frog Goddess and sing her my song.

A weird night at the Duwamish Motel

2005-08-08T22:13:00.000-07:00

I scared a ghost.
It hovered over me, the pearlescent, misty form of a woman, then it screamed – it looked at me and screamed in horror, flicking back like smoke in a puff of wind.
Then it vanished.
Shaking, I slithered out bed and fell to the floor. My first thought was to run, but the ghost had completely vanished, and my legs wouldn’t work anyway. My second thought was that I should have listened to the locals that told me not to come near the Duwamish Motel. Strange happenings there, they said, and the owner, Mr Brede, was supposed to have murdered his wife. He was seen burying something in a nearby field. But it was both Mr Brede and his wife who greeted me at the reception desk, so I dismissed that as scurrilous gossip.
My third thought was to get back into bed and pull the covers over my head. I went with that one.
And she came back.
This time she pressed down on me, not like a weight, but with some force I couldn’t see.
``What are you DOING here?” she demanded. ``Who the hell are you? This is MY bed.”
``Not anymore,” I shouted back at her. ``I hired the room two hours ago – and nobody told me someone died here.”
``I am not dead!” the ghost snapped. ``I’m astral traveling.”
I sat up straight in bed. ``Where’s your silver cord?” I said. Everyone knows that a silver cord connects you to your corporeal body while you’re astral traveling, so you don’t get lost.
She looked blank. ``What silver cord?”
``You didn’t know about the silver cord? No wonder- ” I said. ``Was this your first time?”
``Yes – I got the instructions out of a book, How to Have an Out Of Body Experience In 30 Days or Your Money Back. It looked cool – I had to try it.”
``Did you read all of it?”
``No, I just skipped to the meditation bit.” She hung her ghostly head. ``Thirty days seemed such a long time to wait.”
Suddenly she flickered, growing dim, as if some of the ectoplasm, or whatever you call it, had drained away.
``Oh no,” she said. ``I couldn’t have.”
``Died?” I suggested. ``That’s possible. Maybe you really are a ghost.”
``But I only checked into the motel yesterday. The book said I needed a place where I could be completely alone. And I just went for a short trip.”
``Without your silver cord,” I reminded her.
There was a sharp rap on the door. ``You having trouble in there?”
``Must be Mrs Brede,” I said to my astral visitor. ``I’d better let her in.”
I opened the door. ``I heard you yelling,” Mrs Brede said. ``Is everything OK?”
Suddenly there was something very familiar about her. I looked at her, and I looked at my `ghost’.
``Oops,” I said.
``What are you doing in my body!” The astral traveler screamed. The woman backed away and raced off into the night, with the astral traveler in hot pursuit.
I guess Mrs Brede just couldn’t resist the opportunity to hop into an uninhabited body after her untimely death. As I raced out to my car I passed Mr Brede, swinging limply from a tree branch with a rope around his neck.
I jumped in my car and didn’t look back.

Warning from Duwamish Bay

2005-08-07T10:26:00.000-07:00

Before I leave for my Ride tonight I wanted to share this bit of real life Lore to remind you that Heather's interview with the Gorgon isn't JUST an interview and that the Gorgon's story isn't JUST a story.

There is a tribal Elder from The Makahs (http://www.makah.com/home.htm) who attended a meeting back in June to discuss earthquakes and tsunamis with FEMA (federal emergency and management agency) officials.

The Tribal Elder's name is Helma Ward.

Her story is a warning for us all living here in the Pacific Northwest: " The stories say this has happened before and will happen again" Helma is quoted as saying.

She’s talking about catastrophic earthquakes.

Because her warning come in the form of ‘ storytelling ‘ no one was listening. A very dire warning and a detailed account of a truly devasting event were disounted as ' fairy tales '.

Now scientists are paying attention because science is finding evidence her story actually did happen:

One winter the Makahs were starving and held at bay (they were fishermen) by harsh weather.

The Thunderbird (who was of monstrous size and caused lightning when it opened and closed it's eyes ) decided to help them and rose up out of the Olympic Glacial Field and attacked the whale in a battle that tore apart the land, caused the volcanoes to erupt and when it was done the Thunderbird delivered the whale into the river in a large wave.

This isn't just a story about a mythical battle, its a very detailed description of an earthquake (the Thunderbird) and the resulting tsunami (the large waves...remember what happened in India? When the tide went out and all the fish and sea life that was left behind and the kids ran after them? ).

According to Helma's Grandfather there really WAS a whale in the river and no one knew how it got there. According to other accounts other tribes found numerous sea life and whales on dry land after this 'battle'.

( From The Makah Reservation )

Scientist have only recently discovered that in 1700 a huge earthquake whose impact was felt in Japan hit our Pacific Northwest. One of the areas that would have been horribly impacted by this quake was the area where Helma’ s tribe lived.

Helma’ s Tribe has this story and in their tradition of storytelling have known about this event all along... which is why Helma doesn't allow her Grandchildren to catch their school bus in this place where ' the ground was made bad "

Legends aren't just stories...remember that tonight when you ride out.

Anita Marie

From the Duwamish Inn Brochure

2005-08-04T19:02:00.000-07:00

For hundreds of years the Duwamish River has supported the people who have lived on her shores. Idyllic, with an abundance of fish, game, fowl and trees the region was once a vast trading network.

The Duwamish Inn, here at Duwamish Bay, boasts that it maintains traditional gatherings and customs that have strengthened a sense of community and belonging. Just one of our quirky rituals is to provide regular celebratory potlatches or gift-giving ceremonies for our guests. However, we have taken the liberty of providing a fresh approach to these time honoured events.

The potlatch was a gift-giving feast. It was sort of like Christmas, or a birthday party, but, instead of taking gifts to the party, guests who came to a potlatch received gifts from the host. Tribal chiefs of people, such as the Duwamish, gave potlatches to celebrate important events such as naming a child, a son's coming of age, or a successful hunt. Also, a marriage or completion of a new long house might be another reason. Potlatches were usually given in a large house built only for potlatches. Entire tribes were invited. They danced, sang and listened to speeches, held athletic contests to see who could run the fastest, climb the highest or jump the farthest. Tribes wrestled with each other and raced in canoes. They tested their strength to see who could keep going the longest and sometimes held contests to see who could eat the most. Big potlatches lasted three to five days. The big day was the last when gifts were given out.

Potlatches were important because a chief could show his wealth by the gifts he gave. To make his guests think he was of high social rank, he gave away the best of everything he owned. Gifts included canoes, blankets, furs, skins and food. A chief became especially important in the eyes of his guests if he gave strings of rare shells called "dentallium." These narrow shells were hard to find and were found only in the deep, cold waters off the west coast of Vancouver Island. Dentallium were valuable because of their scarcity. Sometimes they were used as money to buy things from other tribes.

Families in the villages on the Duwamish River worked closely with each other to help with the potlatch. They often gave their most valuable articles to the chief to make him appear wealthy to his guests. They did this in order to bring honor to their tribe. Even though a chief gave away everything they owned, they knew they would be repaid because there was a trick to the gift-giving! No guest at a potlatch could refuse the gifts offered him. An important guest had to give a potlatch in return to show how wealthy he was! To save "face," his potlatch had to be bigger and better that the one he attended. It was the goal of each chief to "out-do" the other.

Here at Duwamish Inn we have a contemporary version of the traditional potlatch. We cannot offer you a canoe, blankets or furs and we certainly don't encourage people to out-do one another but we regularly provide evenings where people bring along fine food in baskets to share with other guests.

We bar-b-que the Salmon in a traditional way and everyone brings something really delicious to share. Apart from bringing food guests bring ‘treasures’ to swap. During the evening people dance, sing, provide readings and share stories. We have a large basket that sits on the central table and participants are asked to select a song, story or dance to present to the group. A lot of the material comes from Livia Cotard’s bookshop on the Marina, a bookshop that attracts visitors from far and wide, but visitors can add stories of their own.

What will you swap? What stories will you have to offer?

2005-08-01T17:29:00.000-07:00

Darlings: Wish you were here. Having a wonderful time despite the troll infestation problem. Bit of a bad hair day, what with the snakes and all, but the mojitos are divine!

Love and Kisses, Karen

2005-07-30T18:00:00.000-07:00

Empty Travel Journal

Welcome To Duwamish Gateway to Croatan

2005-07-30T15:12:00.000-07:00

Where did the Idea for our Duwamish come from? Here it is, mystery solved the following quote flavors and color each word I write about Duwamish and Croatan.

One day I hope the rest of you will share the place your ideas come from.

Here it' is: it's a quote attributed to Chief Seattle....
So on behalf of me, Anita Marie, Welcome to Duwamish the Gateway to Croatan....

" And when the last red man shall have perished, and the memory of my tribe shall become a myth among the white men, these shores will swarm with the invisible dead of my tribe; and when our children’s children think themselves alone in the field, the store, the shop, upon the highway, or in the pathless woods, they will not be alone."

Chief Seattle

Will The Real Duwamish Please Stand Up?

2005-07-29T17:34:00.000-07:00

Hi All,

As some of you may know a lot of us have been having fun in a town called Duwamish.

The Duwamish we write about isn't real city, as some of you may know...however the Duwamish People are very real. I've enclosed a link so that you can meet them as well as their Chief, who's namesake is the city of Seattle.

In a way, he inspired my creation of a Werewolf named Kincross Benandanti, if you read to the bottom of this post you'll see that someone who grew up hearing about the Young Cheif Seattle was bound to be inspired by his bravery and daring.

SO PLEASE if you've enjoyed bringing our Duwamish to life, please please take the time to meet the Real Duwamish people and I hope that they will inspire you as they have inspired me.

Anita Marie

http://www.duwamishtribe.org

The Story of the Duwamish
Told by the Tribal Logo

The Killer Whale This represents the Duwamish people as they were sea oriented people

The Eagle (Dorsal Fin) The Eagle represents the high respect the Duwamish people had for it as the ruler of the sky, and the fact, that the main base for the Duwamish Tribe was in Renton. The Eagle represents the ruler of the sky

The Raven (Pectoral Fin) Clever and cunning, the Raven represents the knowledge and teachings of the Duwamish people

Tail Ovoid Represents the white man when he first came to the Puget Sound

Whale Eye Ovoid Represents the Duwamish Indian

Raven Eye Ovoid Represents the Duwamish and how they helped the white man from starving to death and how they took care of them for the first two years here in the Puget Sound. They taught the white man how to live and become self-sufficient.

Si'ahl’s leadership ( Seattle )

It is said that Si'ahl grew up speaking both the Dkhw’Duw’Absh and Dkhw’Suqw'Absh dialects of Lushootseed. Because Native descent was derived from both parent’s lineage, Si'ahl inherited his position as chief of the Dkhw’Duw’Absh Tribe from his maternal uncle. He built a strong alliance between the two Nations of his parents.

As a young warrior, Si'ahl was known for his courage, daring, and leadership in battle. In the 1820s, thirty years before European-American immigrants landed on the shores of Elliott Bay, local tribes waited uneasily for a threatened invasion. Rumors had reached Si'ahl that a large force of warriors from the White River tribes was on its way downriver to make a night attack on the Dkhw’Duw’Absh.

Si'ahl set up a night ambush at a strategic bend in the Black River, defeating over 100 warriors in 5 large war canoes. When word of the victory reached Old Man House, the important Suquamish longhouse on Agate Pass, a council of six tribes chose Si'ahl as the leader of a 6-tribe confederation in central Puget Sound. As leader of six local tribes of central Puget Sound, Chief Si'ahl continued the friendly relations with European-American immigrants that his father began in 1792.

Protector and Benefactor

By 1851, Chief Si'ahl was a venerable leader respected for his peaceful ways, not his prowess at war. Chief Si'ahl and other members of the Dkhw’Duw’Absh Nation greeted the first European-American immigrants when they arrived at Alki Point, near Duwamish Head in what is now West Seattle.

Graveyard Shift

2005-07-29T02:17:00.000-07:00

The Duwamish graveyard is an interesting place...

GRAVEYARD SHIFT

``Have you ever seen a ghost?” I asked my boss Stan when I first started working at the cemetery – so long ago, I’ve forgotten when.
He glanced at me sideways, and chuckled.
``Ask me again in a while,” he said.
We were filling in one of the graves. It had recently rained, washing away some of the soil, and the top of a blackened skull was showing through the dirt.
I didn’t have to ask him again, but I guess he knew that.
The first time I saw one I was waiting for the last mourner to leave. There was a steady drizzle, seeping down the back of my neck, under my raincoat.
The mourner, in his plain dark suit, his head bowed so I couldn’t see his face, didn’t seem to notice the rain. After a while, I saw that he wasn’t even getting wet.
I slid down the hill. The man didn’t look up, he just kept staring down at the grave as if he was really pissed off about something.
Stan came walking toward us, making shooing gestures with his hands. ``Come on now,” he said. ``Move along, you shouldn’t be here.”
I thought he was talking to me at first and I started backing away. But he was talking to the man by the graveside.
The man looked up. I couldn’t see anything wispy or ghostly about him. He looked quite solid, but something didn’t quite seem right - his features were out of sync somehow and his hairline kept moving, as if it wasn’t sure where it was supposed to be.
``Run along now,” Stan said, in a kindly way. ``They’ll be waiting for you.” He pointed off in the direction of the trees and the man’s head slowly followed, as he were one of those computer drawn figures in a game.
I felt a soft breeze as he moved past me, then he just disappeared.
``Forgotten already,” Stan said cheerfully. ``Once they forget, they don’t come back.”
``Forget what?” I asked.
``Who they were, what they looked like,” Stan said. ``You see, it all depends how long they can remember. Some of them have been here since the place opened. But once they forget, they’re gone.”
Then I saw Louisa. I was eating a tuna sandwich in my lunch break, and she stood near me. I was about to direct her to Stan’s office, thinking she was looking for a grave, when I realized she looked odd.
Ghosts look odd because they have to keep remembering. Try it - try remembering what you look like, where your legs are, how your arms move. It’s pretty hard.
Some of the ghosts are really good at it. They remember everything perfectly and you almost can’t tell them from the not dead. They hang around the funerals and the visitors and chat to them and you’d never guess unless you knew they were buried there. Mostly they like to remember themselves at their best, as you would.
Louisa’s memory wandered all over the place. Sometimes she was a little girl, sometimes an old woman. The ghosts say it helps if they are still remembered by other people. It’s a kind of collective thing, and it gets harder as the people die off and the memories fade.
Poor old Louisa had no one to remember, or too many people to remember - she slipped about, morphing like a dream. One moment she had rosy cheeks, the next sere and withered cheeks.
``Run along,” I said, ``they’re waiting for you.” But she was still there when I went back to work, cleaning up the graves.
It’s funny what people leave on graves. Little bottles of liquor - Stan takes those - birthday cards, little gifts, perfumed soaps, photographs. The church collects most of it. I guess they pass on anything useful.
The dead are mostly harmless. They usually don’t remember emotions, they are too busy trying to remember the physical things, where the ears should be, which way a nose points. They like to remember the good things, so we never saw any headless ghosts or dripping bloody wounds. Stan says ghosts who hang around graveyards just want to remember what it was like to be alive.
Every time I saw Louisa, I would say, ``Run along now, they’re waiting for you.” The last time I saw her, she actually listened. She was an old, old woman, bent and shriveled. In the end, that was all she could remember. I saw her arm raise, as if someone had gently taken hold of it, then she walked away without looking back. Maybe she had forgotten how.
Stan died quite a while back now – heart attack, under Louisa’s tree. He said goodbye after his funeral. ``Gotta get a move on ,” he said, ``they’re waiting for me.” He was very insubstantial, forgetting as quickly as he could. So I took over from him, and stayed among the dead.
Everyone here is dead except me.

And sometimes I wonder about me.

End

In The Bath-House: The Ferry Woman's Tale

2005-07-26T18:08:00.000-07:00

Luxuriating in the steamy waters of the bath-house, relaxing with my companions from the grotto, I sipped on Oolong tea and started thinking about the Ferry Women. I wondered who they were and where they came from, and what stories they must have to tell. Thoughts have an unsettling habit of manifesting themselves in Duwamis, so I was not surprised to see my own Ferry Woman sitting on the tiles at the edge of the bath, dangling her feet in the water.

She fixed me with a shrewd look. ``You seemed cheerful on the way back. Did you meet someone you know?”
``No,” I said. ``It was an ancestor I never knew, but maybe suspected – a strolling player, a minstrel. I know little of my family more than a couple of generations back. We were travellers, you see, we didn’t keep records.”

She nodded. ``Like us.” She said succinctly.

She was a strong, muscular woman, as I would expect in her profession. She had pale blue eyes in a deeply tanned and wrinkled face and her hands were broad and calloused
``You’re Irish, aren’t you?” She said.
``What gave it away?”
``Oh, the red hair, the green eyes.” She chuckled. ``And maybe a fellow feeling – my name is Maeve.” Her voice was deep and rich, with the lilt of the west in it.
``How did you come to be a Ferry Woman?” I asked, ``and how did you come to Duwamis?”
``I came here because I answered a call,” she said, ``and as for my life on the sea – that was a call I answered too.

I was walking on the shore one day, watching the waves beating ceaselessly on the sand. The frothy white caps billowed up, curved over and leapt onto the shore - `white horses’, we called them when I young.

I felt the sting of salt spray, and as I watched, the graceful form of a leaping white stallion rose from the foam and galloped onto the shore.

It was Manannan Mac Lir, God of the Ocean. Sometimes he takes human form, sometimes he takes the form of a great salmon, but when he is a horse, and leaps ashore in a welter of foam – oh, that is a sight to see!

All morning I had been feeling a storm in the air. The wind was whipping my robes, and the sand shifting beneath my feet but I could not leave. I heard my mother calling for me – she hated the sea, where my father had been lost. But I could not stay away from it – it was as if it called me, ceaselessly, day and night.

The great stallion paused at the crest of the dune and his head turned my way – my heart was almost stilled in me as I looked into his eyes – human eyes on the head of a horse. Great dark eyes that looked deep into my soul.

That night there was a terrible storm – we heard the crack of a hip breaking on the rocks, and we all ran down with torches to see if we could help. My mother wanted me to stay behind, but I refused.
It was a terrible sight. The great ship was sinking and the water was full of souls desperately trying to reach the shore. The fishermen put out their boats and rowed out to pick up all they could, while others formed a chain to walk out and grab those washing up on the shore.

I heard crying on the wind and ran down the beach – I saw a child clinging to a rock, surrounded by buffeting waves. A great head reared up from the water and I saw Macannan Mac Lir swimming toward her. The child slipped onto his back and he came ashore, to where I was standing. I helped the child down, and he bowed his great head over her and blew softly on her face, drying her tears. I understood that this was a sacrifice he did not want, and I understood that though he is great and terrible, the God of the Sea is also just. In that moment I pledged my allegiance to the sea, to the endless white waves.
In the morning, with the wreckage strewn across the shore and bodies tangled in the weeds, I told my mother I was going to sea, and there was nothing she could do to stop me. And in time I got the call to come here, to Duwamis, to be a Ferry Woman, and I joined my sisters who came before me.”
I thought how wonderful it must be to know yourself – who you are, what you believe, to be so strong in your life’s purpose.

Maeve got to her feet. ``I must go – I must take another journey to the island of the Ancestors tonight.”
``Have you ever been there yourself?”
``Yes,” she said simply. ``I saw my mother – she has forgiven me.” And with a slight bow of her head, Maeve walked away.

In the baths...

2005-07-26T12:34:00.000-07:00

After a wonderful massage by a large and silent creature of undeterminate gender, who had ten digits on each hand and enormous strength, my muscles were liquid. I walked slowly to the bath house in a cozy robe and slippers, and entered the hall of waters. The smell of lavender and other essential oils hung in the air, mingling with billowy clouds of steam rising from the blue depths of the pools. I saw familiar faces, leaning contentedly against the side of the pools, fellow travelers all. I slipped off the robe and slid quickly into the deep end of the first pool, one surrounded by rocks, plants and flora in a naturalistic setting that brought to mind a waterfall and pool in the rain forest. I sighed with relief and release as the hot water contacted my skin. I felt small creatures flicking around my calves and knees, and looked within the water to find tiny fish, a vivid blue, nipping at my skin. The sensation tickled but was not unpleasant. I leaned my head back and relaxed.

After some time, I felt others slip into the water, and opened my eyes. I felt a bit nervous about being with quasi-strangers, naked. Instinctively, I folded my arms across my chest. Some of the others were a bit inhibited, as well, but a few lay back in the water, arms open to the heat and bliss, uncaring that they were exposed. There was a bit of idle talk, some comments and praise all around regarding the performances the other night, but mostly quiet. The steam mingled with our breath, and rose from the pool like gossamer. I began to feel the need for a breath of fresh air, but felt uncomfortable getting out of the pool. The other travelers would see my body—the scars around my breasts, my slightly sagging belly, the bulges in my thighs. I waited, hoping for courage to descend. Instead, as we were quietly talking, a large woman entered the room, completely naked, no towel or robe or anything. She was at least 375 pounds, massively tall, and glistened with oil. Her great breasts lay atop her generous belly, her thighs rubbed together when she walked, and her buttocks quivered with each step. She had hairy legs, stretch marks, and a slight mustache, if I were to be truthful. She strutted in and announced to the entire room,

“That was the greatest single massage I have ever experienced. I feel as if I may melt.” She walked over to our pool, and actually leapt in, performing sort of a modified cannonball. Waves broke over all of us in the pool, wetting our faces and leaving us gasping and red.She settled herself in the corner of the pool, chuckling.

“Sorry, gals, can’t be helped. The best way to enter any situation is to jump right in, with both feet. She lifted first one giant breast, then the other, allowing the water to wash beneath them as they gently bobbed near the surface. “Ah, the old girls feel good, swimming free,” she said. She raised both her arms and stretched luxuriously. I looked away, politely.

Suddenly, she moved to my side. Her arm slid around my neck. She clasped me to her bosom.

“Sister!” she said, “It is so good to see you.”

I was shocked and somewhat panicky, skin to skin with this expansive woman, this woman I didn’t even know.

“Um, excuse me, but I don’t think we’ve met,” I said, attempting to free myself from her wet oily clutches.

“Oh, I’m sure we have,” she said. “Somewhere.” She loosed me then and went swimming about the pool, as graceful as a dolphin, splashing about and kicking her legs in the air. “La-de-da, la-de-da,” she sang.

“Really, madam,” I said sternly. “You are splashing all of us while we are trying to relax. Control yourself.”

She looked at me, winked, and threw a handful of water in my face. I sputtered and hiccupped. I wrenched myself up onto the edge of the pool, and reached for my robe, preparing to leave. But I was too slow. The impossible fat woman had grabbed it and plunged it into the water. It was soaking wet. I ducked back under the water.

“Oh, tut-tut, darling. You won’t want to get out of the pool now. I mean really, do you want everyone to see that tiny little stomach of yours? Why it’s hardly large enough to give birth to the world. And those thighs, darling…they are more like sticks than sturdy tree trunks. And your breasts don’t flop around at all; they aren’t really very festive, are they, darling?”

I was incredulous. This woman, this enormous creature, felt herself beautiful, gorgeous, voluptuous, and to her, I was nothing but a six foot, two hundred pound....stick woman. I sat hunched in the pool, feeling bitter and embarrassed.

“Oh, now, mustn’t pout, sweetie. We all can’t be…well, spectacular. You are lovely in your own way…”

“And what way is that?” I asked coldly.

“Well, darling, in the way that is somewhat…well, confined, I guess. Correct me if I am wrong, but you have worked very hard to stay as small as you are, and you still feel you are too large. Am I right?” I nodded, slightly. “And I watched you walk in from the massage hut, darling, furtively, as if wolves were after you. Meanwhile, I was doing a dance for all of the massage creatures and other guests. I figure that once I am relaxed and oiled up, everyone should view the magnificence that is me. I can tell you, I got quite a round of applause, and even a few coppers, though I lack a pocket at the present to keep them in.” She lurched onto the side of the pool and stood, water streaming off of her great curves. “This is who I am, darling, and I am luscious. Now, who are you?”

“I am…just…a woman.” I said, rather at a loss.

“Exactly, my dear. A woman. A woman is all lovely curves, generous spaces, hidden clefts, nourishing hills, succulent valleys, hidden meadows, and flowing rivers.” As she recited this litany, she moved. Her hips wound round in circles, her arms moved about in the air, her hands stroked her great curves, her dark hair slapped wetly against her back and breasts. “We must flow, like lava, like water, like air. We cannot be confined. In order to be the real women, the true women, that we are, WE MUST FLOW!” She reached down and took my hands, pulling me out of the pool. I struggled against her, but she brought me onto the surface. “Now, darling, look at me.” I glanced at my fellow travelers, but they were all watching the large woman. I looked at her. “Now, dance.”

She began to move, and holding my hands in her own, I was forced to move as well. I began to sway my hips, move my shoulders, and shuffle my feet. The air cooled my skin.

“Look at me, darling, look at me!” she said.

As I gazed into her eyes, I saw a vision. She was seated on a throne, dressed only in a belt of gold, and adorned with many jewels. Man and women were bowing down to worship her. Her bounteous flesh overflowed her throne, and her subjects reached out to touch it, afterward kissing their own hands and looking at their fingers with rapture.

“Hmmm? What do you say, Darling?” She smiled merrily at me, still dancing round and round.

Suddenly her vision shifted, and I saw myself, naked in a room full of men and women. I was in the corner, and no one noticed me. But soon, I began to change, shifting and growing. My body became rounder, fuller, and more voluptuous. I could feel the sag of my flesh, the drop of my belly, the weight of my breasts lying on my stomach. I became voluminous. Suddenly, all of the people in the room were watching me, and I became aware of a sound. The people were all chanting, in a strange language, but one that I knew somehow. It was my name they were chanting, only they called me Gaia:

Gaia, who created us
Gaia, who comforts us
Gaia, who protects us
Gaia, who contains us
Gaia, who birthed the universe
Gaia, who nourishes the world
Gaia, bless us.

Suddenly I slipped inside my own skin, the skin that I had worn uncomfortably for forty years, and as I did, the woman embraced me, her tears falling on my skin, mingling with my own as they streamed down my face. We stood, flesh to flesh, skin to skin, woman to woman, and felt our strength, the strength of the mother of the world, the strength of the body, the strength of birth, death, and everything between it. A moment later, we stepped apart, and she cupped my chin in her hand for a moment, and said, “Now we both know who you are. Goodbye, darling.”

I looked at all of my travel companions, seated there in the pool, and I raised my arms overhead and began to dance, a wild dance of joy and abandon, followed by a leap into the pool that splashed everyone, even the ones in the next pool over. My fellow travelers just smiled and wiped the water from their eyes. I looked at the ceiling and whispered, “Thanks be to Gaia.”

A Ride on the Carousel

2005-07-25T18:04:00.000-07:00

On my first visit to Duwamish, I spent most of my time at the bookshop and the curio shop. I am an inveterate fossicker and collector, and the curio shop was fascinating. I saw things there I could not identify and had never seen in my life. But I had vowed to travel light, so I sternly limited myself to one purchase in each shop. At the bookshop, the choice was really hard, as it seemed every book I had ever wanted was there – in the end, I settled for a beautiful old illuminated retelling of the legend of Dierdre andNaoise, and at the curio shop I bought a small handcarved box. I had found some lovely shells and pieces of seaworn glass on the shore, so I stowed them in the box. I love places like this, with the seaat the door. The coast reminded me of Scotland, where I spent some of my happiest years.

After the banquet, on my return, I heard a calliope echoing down the Marina, and resolved to find the source. I followed it to the Arima's Amusement Park. Inside it was just like all the sideshow midways I have ever known, but somehow even more colourful and enticing. For me, it was like coming home. I was born into the travelling life, my parents were performers, and so this place drew me like a magnet. As I wandered past the sideshows and knock'em joints, I found the source of the calliope – a magnificent carousel with gilded hand carved creatures.

The carousel stopped as I approached, and stepped up on the platform. In front of me was a magnificent shimmering jade green seahorse, fitted with a golden bridle and saddle. I climbed onto its back and the carousel started up again. I hung on to the pole that twisted in my hands like a stick of golden barley sugar, rising and falling with the music as the carousel turned.

It was a strange, dreamlike ride – the lights around the carousel blurred, and my sea horse seemed to sway on the pole – I felt the air ripple past me in soft, caressing waves, and tasted the tang of the ocean on my lips.Then the carousel slowed and everything came back into focus – the other riders on their fantastic steeds, the arch of the Big Wheel over sideshow alley, the blaring noise of the carnival barkers and the sweet smell of spun sugar.

One of the carnival roustabouts laughed at me as I climbed down from the ride, still slightly dazed and disoriented.

You're lucky it isn't Halloween," he said.

How Henry Became a Muse--of Sorts--A Tale for Duwamish

2005-07-23T13:42:00.000-07:00

He had lived in the abandoned theater along with a variety of other street people for what had seemed like years. Then again it might have been forever, it was frequently difficult for Henry to remember. He'd been to a nearby clinic once or twice where a doctor had given him pills and told him to come back when they were finished but he'd forgotten what the pills were for, so he'd never returned.

Henry was a slight, small man with thinning gray hair who tended to stammer when he felt intimidated, which was most of the time. On the day that turned his life around, he was sweeping the barroom floor behind the curtain when he heard a noise out front. He peeked through one of the holes actors use to count the house and saw a woman sitting alone in the second row. She had a notebook on her lap and was scribbling furiously. Henry nearly passed out.

Where'd she come from! Street people stayed in the building all the time, Henry invited most of them, knew them well and the reasons they'd come but, not only was this woman not from the streets, she was bare foot and wearing pajamas, as if she were in her own bedroom!

Henry had lived in the theater so long, it was in fact, or at least in his mind home and, despite his natural timidity, he intended to find out what she was doing in there.

"You there, behind the curtain, come out and show yourself," a shrill voice demanded, breaking Henry's resolve and nearly tumbling him backwards. He grabbed at the curtain to keep from falling and she asked again, "Who are you, and why are you hiding back there?"

Struck mute, Henry felt the floor buckling beneath him, but then the woman spoke again, and in her voice he heard uncertainty and the beginning of fear. "I don't do plays," she admitted and I don't understand why I'm here. Will you please tell me who you are and what you want of me?"

He cleared his throat and prayed he wouldn't stammer. "Henry," was all he could manage.

"Henry, please come out so I can meet you."

Henry peeked out and realized the woman was on the verge of tears. He parted the curtain a few inches and watched as she self-consciously lifted the notebook in front of her breasts. He squared his shoulders, drawing himself up to his full five foot seven inch height and strode out with as much confidence as he could muster.

"My name is Barbara," she told him, "Are you an actor?"

"Oh, no, no, not an actor!" Henry said vehemently, struggling not to dive back under the curtain .

"Please don't go. I mean you no harm. I'm a writer, but all I can write lately is blah, blah, blah, and then suddenly I saw the curtain move--and I thought someone had come to inspire me--to be my muse."

Henry blinked, struggling to keep up. He remembered the empty pill container in his pocket. He really should go back and get it refilled. He'd missed something--the woman was babbling on--what was she saying?

". . . . . . but if you wanted the job, I'm sure we could work something out."

"Job?"

"Anything you could do, I'd be grateful." She wiped away a tear. It's very hard. I come up with plots, I'm quite good at that, but I have problems finding the right characters."

And that was how it began. Henry told her to come back in the evening and when he opened the curtain at last, he introduced her to Phil, the bartender, who pointed out the lovers seated at a table for two, and the kid down the end with his uncle who'd just bought him his first drink. Henry brought over Mrs. Flynn, who knew all the local gossip and would gladly get back to her after she tracked down Mr. Flynn, and a frazzled blond with purple eye shadow came over and said she'd love to play the girl-next-door or a prostitute with a heart of gold, whichever was needed and, finally, a middle-aged English teacher, who painted houses to make ends meet over the summer, told them all he'd once been a drama major and would be thrilled to appear in one of her stories.

The bartender apologized that the place wasn't as crowded as usual and warned the writer not to approach the solitary figure drinking alone in the shadows.

Henry took a deep breath after musing it over, and added that if she was working on a crime novel, for a few dollars more, he'd consider asking the man about his friends.

Experience of reaching Duwamish

2005-07-23T06:03:00.000-07:00

I have tidied up my beautiful cave...I like the word Grotto which means a small picturesque cave...and that's just what is was so warm,inviting,magical and mysterious..when one thinks they can at last meet someone who they have thought about many many times,my Grandmother Sophie.

Time to leave ,alone I walked down the mountain to the road where the little old man with the horse and cart had dropped me the day before...but how far was it to Duwarnish Bay ...only one way to find out, get going Lois.

I walked for about an hour or so it seemed and it was mostly uphill...bushwalking is not one of my strong points......I had just sat under a tree in the shade for a rest ,and at the moment around the corner coming in the opposite direction was a young man on a black horse,cantering along with the main and tail blowing in the wind...He pulled the horse up slowly and alighted ,walking over to me holding the reins he said "Good Morning to you"

"Good morning to you too I replied" "It is unusual to see someone walking up the mountain unless they are a trader or a beggar..."I am neither I said I am on my way to Duwarnish Bay and then on to The Lemurian Abbey".

"You have a long walk ahead of you mostly up hill" said the young man...Oh well as today is Sunday I have the time to give you a much needed ride to your destination"..He beckoned me to the left side of the black horse ,putting my foot into the stirrup ,instructing me to throw my right leg high in the air ,and through the I sailed....Having only been on a horse as a young teenager I must have some idea left in my head because he commented that I looked like a professional rider.....

Oh how men kid us women along knowing just the right thing to say at the right time....Enough nonsense Lois ....

The young man was up on the horse before I had a chance to say what do I owe you for this kindness,and off we set up the Mountain of Umbria.

I wrapped my arms around his waist and was transported back to when I was a girl of 18, walzing around the dance floor at the St Kilda town hall so many many years ago....Then I had a tiny 18 inch waist.

We spoke very little, he did most of the talking describing the countryside and the stories of the myths of the mountain....We rode into town with many a person in the street quite surprised to see the young man with me..Who was she they were thinking........We stopped outside a small inn ,the horse stopping as if it knew where we were.....This was a creature of habit ....I eased myself down very gently from this wonderful black horse.

We had not exchanged names the young man and I but it did not seem necessary,he accepted me as just someone he had helped find their way to Duwarnish Bay ...He beckoned me into the inn ,where we were greeted by a tall man with a rather long black beard ..."That was a quick journey my son " he said...It was then I knew he was the inn keepers son.

After explaining the what's and why's and how's I was shown to a small room where I was to spend the night ...and after a meal that was brought to my room I was ready for sleep......Its not every day you half climb a mountain and ride on a horse for miles on a country road with a handsome young man (did I mention he was handsome) ........So this was the stop off point on the way to the Lemurian Abbey I would ask my landlord in the morning when I set off once again on another part of my journey.

........

I slept well that Sunday evening ,it must be the country air ,I know I could not smell the sea and this worried me a bit....I like being close to the breeze that smells of the salt and brine from the ocean or bay.

I washed,combed my hair put on my black track-suit pants and top then my heavy boots,I wasn't sure how far I had to walk and also there may not be a young handsome man on a black horse this time.

Throwing my small cotton backpack over my right shoulder I descended the old timber staircase ,and into the front area of the Duwarnish Inn.

I could hear chattering and laughing over to my left and as I opened the door to one of the large front rooms there seated either side of a long table were I think 9 women and me made 10.

They beckoned me (I like that word beckoned) to come join them for breakfast...I was hungry ,this mountain air is not for those on a diet.

We chatted as old friends ,names shared experiences told ,all very different on how we had come to the Duwarnish Inn ....All spoke of a cave/grotto where they had been greeted by a stranger who took their hand and settled them down for the night ...some told of caves that had beautiful lace/satin curtains and big mirrors on the walls,hand woven mats on the floor and night clothing laid out on the bed ready for a restfull nights sleep.

But...........We women had one story to tell that was common to us .....not about how we got to the cave,not about what we had in our backpacks ,not about who we met at the cave entrance ..But ..The chocolates that awaited us ,4 beautiful dark chocolates ,chocolates not seen before so rich and tasty....I then reached into my pocket ,Oh damm I have left my chocolates on the bedside table ,I excused myself ,rushed up the old stairway and into my room to retrieve the 2 chocolates I had left there on Sunday night..........

They were gone and in their place was a small flute ,only about 5 inches long made from the most delicate timber and on it a small card that said......This is for you to sing yourself to happiness".

Well over the years I have done much to give myself happiness ,and have learnt that it comes from within not without .

o now I have this special gift from whom I know not, but something tells me it is very very special,as I wrap it on my small handkerchief and put it at the bottom of my backpack I know that I will play it one day soon......I now join the girls in the front parlour of the Duwarnish.

.........

As I sat around the table with my female friends I listened intently to what they would be wearing for the performance at Lemuria in the Great Banquet Hall.

In the corner of the large front parlour at the inn were boxes filled with bright coloured robes,scarves,hats,ribbons,wigs etc etc ....I was told to help myself to what I need ...Now I am not fond of clothes at the best of times and only get dressed up when pressed to do so......but dressing up for a performance brought back memories of my days when working in Aged care ,no money supplied by the nursing home owners,so we staff improvised ..

I remember over the years being....a Hula dancer, Cinderella, Sweet Sixteen and never been kissed,one of the 3 little girls in BlueLand, a maid,a child going to the football with her Mother.....No rehearsels,we went on cold but it was a joy and such fun for the staff and residents as well.

So as I rumaged through the box I found a long brightly coloured cotton skirt and an off the shoulder white cotton blouse....how this would go with walking boots I hated to think.

Now as I belong to a choir where we sing a lot of folk songs from other countries also lullabys and protest songs etc etc I was thinking I might like to sing something from Portugal .......The CD it comes from is called CRISTINA BRANCO corpo iluminado.....This music is guitar predominately ,but I think a few notes on my small flute might go well..What do you think ?is there anyone in my group that could give me a few quick lessons on the flute.?
Any offers most welcome ,but I am a slow learner.

Now this is the song I have chosen to sing
ll Faudra que Tu m 'Arrives
In English it is
YOU MUST HAPPEN TO ME
************************************8
Because life happens to me
I myself am forced to happen,
as the day that fades away
turns unhurriedly into night

What magic draws a curve
Inside this deep circle
Who draws a wave on the ocean
how many in the world did he draw

And whoever knows love
as I percieve it in you
Because life happens to me
you must happen to me too.

**********************************
I will think of the young handsome man on the black horse, as sing this beautiful song,and I will think of a man I loved way back in 1956...I was young and unromantic I think,but now I would be much more romantic ,age does bring wisdom,I am feeling sentimental ,but not sad, just thinking about the song.

I am off to practice my beautiful song and later join the others hoping to find that elusive flute teacher.

Whirling ,spinning, floating ,my skirt is the finest of cotton and settles easily around my feet ,it feels cool against the sunbunt skin on my legs from my horseriding experience ...Oh to be young, to be young again,we should be able to come back to earth again with all our learned knowledge.

Exploring Duwamish

2005-07-23T04:45:00.000-07:00

Relaxed after my travels and my performance at the Abbey under control I decided to take the opportunity to explore Duwamish. The Inn was crowded with people rehearsing, captivating the audience of locals. The Enchantress is bustling about, overseeing rehearsals and getting all in order for the banquet at the Abbey.

Armed with my backpack, journal pen and camera (I am learning to travel light!)
I was off, but not before collecting the Duwamish brochure at the front desk. My first stop was the shops along the Marina and a chance to perhaps collect some treasures.

I stopped in at the Art Gallery; it was rather an eclectic mix of artists and works. I made a most pleasurable acquisition. The gallery had a selection of sketches -rendered by our friend Heather – of the Duwamish Bay. I could not leave without this purchase.

My next stop was the Curio Shoppe. Full of the weird and wonderful. I browsed the store, not looking for anything in particular. I knew that if there was something here for me then it would point itself out. And there it was, amongst a collection of apothecary jars, bottles and tools. A slender glass bottle within which a single raven’s feather was suspended, as if held there by magic.

A brief stop at the Sweet Shoppe, I now know where the Soul Food Café get their chocolates. I was quite literally was the kid in the candy store. A small selection of sweets and chocolates were purchased and I was on my way again.

Livia Cotard’s bookshop was the next stop on my Duwamish expedition. That could have been the end of my adventure; I could spend hours in such a delight as this bookshop. I had been browsing in the bookshop of exquisite books when Livia herself came to me. She said “I do apologise, but I must ask you to leave, I must go to collect a story. Please accept my apologies and please do return before you leave Duwamish.” As she said this she pressed a small leather bound book into my hands. I told her I could not accept such a gift. “Nonsense” she said “it is yours.” I thanked her, promising to return before our party departed Duwamish.

Then it was time for the most important destination in my exploration, but first I had to find some flowers. I walked towards the end of the marina and purchased some flowers from a woman with a cart laden with flowers. Then I started toward the Leaning Birch Cemetery – where the forgotten were laid to rest. I met no one on the way. At the cemetery it seemed that no one came here at all.

The graves were overgrown; some of the headstones had fallen over and lay where they fell. I had to search for what I had come for checking headstones and clearing vines. It was then that I found it. A small headstone with the inscription:
The Forgotten – in memory of the stillborn babes
I cleared around the grave as best I could and lay my flowers down. This was how it was so long ago. There were no records, no names or numbers, but this is the site of many a stillborn babe.

I sat down by the headstone and took out of my backpack the book that Livia had given me. I opened the book to the title page; it read – The Forgotten – the story of lost souls.

Duwamish Players

2005-07-23T04:14:00.000-07:00

A group of us have been staying in Duwamish on our way to the Lemurian Abbey. After successful dress rehearsals with the Duwamish Players, our group of travelling players will ride with the Enchantress of the Cave of the Sibyl to the present 'From the Cave of the Enchantress' to Abbey Residents.

Before departing we have some free time and I have been out with my sketchbook.