Across the street from 857 Taylor Street was a ramshackle wooden cabin I called The Witch’s House. It certainly doesn’t look that way now, as the old home was razed and this prefab place was erected.

Sad thing, as the wooden cabin was a magickal and mysterious place for me, I wish I could show it to you. I describe it in a scene in my upcoming memoir, Food Memories called “Sourgrass.” I describe the way the collections of multi-colored glass bottles lined the windows, how they glistened in the sun like jewels. I describe the many cats slinking through the overgrown and wild property, and how there never was really anyone there.

As mentioned in previous posts, I was a pretty fantasy/magic leaning child, and this place held such wonder. Especially since there was never anyone there. I seemed to have some sort of relationship with this place, gathering my friends at times to help fix and paint its crumbling picket fence, and trying to take care of the cats that seemed to somehow get mysteriously fed. One day, I actually went into the house, it was unlocked, and cats were on the counters, licking old bowls. Again, someone there, but not there. I was fascinated by it all.

Across from this lot was another lot where the neighborhood forest was. Again forgive me for the quality of these pictures, and for not being able to show you the amazingness of what it all used to look like.

If I were an artist I’d definitely render a long ago version for you! This is the entrance to the corner of the woods, and back then there were no sidewalks or condominiums. It is quite possible the pine tree in the foreground is a survivor from those times…and the grassy earth, well its the same grassy earth. As also described in detail in the “Sourgrass” chapter, I’d go rambling over this bump of land, down the hill and take a right onto a thin trail deeper into the trees. In this scene, I described running through this forest to see if my secret fort had been intruded on. Smells and tastes were so powerful back then, as was my first meeting with the sourgrass plant (Oxalis pes-caprae). I loved this plant so much as a child, equal to my love for the forest and the witch’s house. I also described how I used the wild onion (Allium Triquetrum) growing nearby to smear a protective layer around my fortress door. This was a plant I respected but didn’t love so much :}

Pairing these two things together, the forest and the Witch’s House, I see how I was exploring the witch both inside and outside of me, already drawn to plant teachers and the familiars of cave-like fortresses and wild untamed cats. There was no Netflix then, no internet, and kids like me just ran around these different places until it got dark, or as my mom said, “come home before you can’t see the color in the trees.” My mom, in her own way, was a witchy gal, despite her struggles with alcoholism, depression and Anorexia, and in these stories I’ve spent the last few years recalling, I see that more and more. Yet she was never as accessible or pure as the energy of nature, or the fantasies of my mind where unseen witches lived. These are the places and memories I’m so very glad to have experienced and learned from.

I do wish I would’ve had an actual Aughra to go hang out with though, rather than dreaming of the imaginary Mother witch from The Dark Crystal to be waiting for me behind the Witch’s House doors :}