16 | October | 2012 | Adventures and Musings of an Arch Druidess

All I ever wanted to be for Halloween from the time I knew what it was, was a witch or a pirate. The first two years my mom was still cherishing the illusion that she could make me a girlie girl and I had to go out in a monstrosity. A gosh-awful pink, yellow and blue satin costume of Bo Peep complete with crook and headpiece, it was beyond ugly into grotesquery.

In first grade for Christmas mom made me a lifesize doll that looked like me and had the same clothes. Mom was really proud of it and then really hurt when the first thing I said was, ”I didn’t ask for a doll, where is my microscope?” (Mom held a grudge about that the rest of her life. You would have thought she went into labour for the damn thing.) Thankfully, I also received the Lionel microscope or there would have been hell to pay. The only other thing I asked for was a live rattlesnake, see? Not a girlie, girl at all. That year for Halloween I was forced to dress like that goddess damned doll and carry it with me. That doll creeped me out but all teachers at school and the parents on the trick or treat route loved it. Did I mention I hated dolls as a child?

It took to the next year to finally get at least one of my wishes, Pirate. Since I was having nightmares about pirates under the bed they seem to think that might cure it. It didn’t but at least it wasn’t something femmie and terrible or creepy. The pirate under the bed nightmares continued even after we moved to Glendale when I inherited one of my great aunt’s beds and it was over a foot off the floor and a good three feet high with 4 posts. One night the cat was under the bed and grabbed my ankle with both paws which launched me to the ceiling screaming but somehow also cured the pirate under the bed problem which was good because my dad was tired of launching me from the doorway onto the bed lest I step on the floor and the pirate get me.

Anyway I was 8 before I got to be a witch, I think my dad got tired of hearing about it. That or my grandmother stepped in. I’d started spending several weeks in the summer with her and was starting to learn the things she would teach me, I think we started with talking to trees and that is still the one that sticks in my head along with talking to birds and animals.

Anyway I knew even then I wanted to be a witch and when a tree finally talked back to me when mom and dad sent me at age 9 to church camp the deal was sealed.