How The Haunted Past of the Salem Witch Trials Inspires Art

It was my first “me” day out since before COVID. I’d been looking forward to visiting Salem again for a while. The smell of incense permeating the air with its soothing resonance; the shops full of crystals, tarot cards, and other artifacts of modern-day witchcraft; the people dressed in outlandish outfits distinguishing themselves from the tourists; the rainbow sidewalks and flags that make members of the LGBTQ+ community like me feel welcome and safe – these prospects all left me eager to head out of Marblehead into her sister city.

The purpose of my trip: to view “The Salem Witch Trials: Reckoning and Reclaiming,” an exhibit that was on display at the Peabody Essex Museum. Upon arriving, the wonderful staff at the ticket counter suggested I head up to the The Great Animal Orchestra on the third floor to put my name on the waitlist for the special sound exhibit. But, receiving the text while having a snack and a coffee in the cafe, I gave up my spot to finish my breakfast, and decided to slowly enjoy the exhibit that prompted this visit, without having to feel rushed by the prospect of losing my spot in an exhibit I would surely have time to revisit later. 

Seeing the first-hand documents of the Salem Witch Trials, most of them nearly illegible and requiring assistance from printed transcripts, hit me harder than I expected. As someone who identifies as a witch, it hurt to think that people who didn’t even give themselves the same label were legally murdered because of false accusations from jealous neighbors trying to weasel their way into getting the victims’ land or destroy the social standings they coveted.

Even today, people don’t understand what a “witch” really is, using the term as an insult and basing their knowledge on pop culture and outdated stereotypes. The careful cursive signatures of the few admirable people who petitioned the courts in favor of the accused weren’t enough to save the lives of the 19 people who were executed and the 200 or so other people who were falsely accused and had their possessions and reputations stolen away from them in the hysteria. 

After stepping back in time and viewing these documents and other artifacts owned by the accusers, victims, and judges who participated in the trials, I moved to the two sub-exhibits featuring photographs and fashion designs inspired by the haunted pasts of the artists. Both photographer Frances F. Denny and fashion designer Lee Alexander McQueen had relatives who were players in the Salem Witch Trials, and they were inspired by the ghosts of their ancestors to create the artwork hanging on the walls or propped in display cases in the museum. 

I connected more strongly to Denny’s photographic collection, titled “Major Arcana” after the central cards in a tarot deck. Staring into the faces of other modern-day witches reminded me I’m not alone, and it was interesting to see the various forms witchcraft can take in different locations in America. I was so inspired I ended up buying the book! This collection, coupled with McQueen’s display of fashion designs and documents from his accused relative, made me feel that perhaps there is a way to help the victims of the trials, by keeping their memories and good names alive and living true to ourselves as modern day witches. But with so many of the accused still left not exonerated, I can’t help but wonder if it’s enough to make up for what we humans did in the past. Have we changed enough to have learned from our dreadful history?

A Funny PoGo Story

It was a cool day, warm enough to not need a jacket while walking, yet cool enough to wear two long-sleeved layers covering my slightly sunburnt skin.

The purpose of the walk: to catch as many Sustainability Week Pokémon as I could before the event ended, while also walking enough kilometers to finally encounter a shiny mew (the pixelated product of a $12 ticket I purchased more than a month ago), battling grunts along the way to earn Mysterious Components for the Rocket Radars necessary to battle the 50 Rocket Leaders I needed to defeat in order to reach Level 45.

My walk took me around a small part of the Town of Stoneham, where I often play Pokémon Go on weekends such as this fine Sunday, or in the hour or so between the time I clock out of work, mostly remotely due to the ongoing pandemic, and when my boyfriend and I usually pick up dinner on weekdays.

As I was leaving the Pomeworth Playground area, where I had spent a few minutes collecting gifts from Pokemon stops and catching all the poison-types I could find, I noticed the circle on the map indicating my GO-Tcha was not lit up, which meant, as usual, it had lost its connection. After I crossed the street to start heading back towards the apartment, I pulled up my sleeve to tap the device and reconnect it only to find that the small black oval-shaped piece of tech had fallen out of my bracelet!

Retracing my steps seemed to be the best way to handle the situation, so I slowly crossed back to the other side of the street, carefully scouring the dirt-covered crosswalk, every broken bit of rock resembling my missing gadget. For the next half hour, maybe even an hour or more, I absentmindedly chucked pokeballs at the Trubbish and Grimer appearing on my screen as I scanned every bit of ground along the path I had walked, worried about the looks I may have been receiving but too concerned about finding my GO-Tcha to simply give up.

Finally, unsure what else to do, I texted my boyfriend, who usually has the best answers when I am feeling overwhelmed. I retraced my steps further back than I had already done, in case I had lost it sooner than I had realized, and he walked over to where I continued my search in vain, spending a few more minutes following me back to the playground as I explained what ground I had covered when I knew I had my GO-Tcha on my person and where I was when I found it had gone missing.

Unable to find the finicky device, we halted our search and started walking back to the apartment to grab the car and pick up dinner, placing an order via the Panera app on the way.

Returning to the apartment with the acquired dinner, I started taking off my jeans to change into much more comfortable PJ pants, and what should fall to the floor but my missing GO-Tcha! Somehow it had managed to stay on my pants, perhaps stuck on the edge of the pocket, while I walked back and forth looking for it and went with my boyfriend to pick up dinner!

I retrieved the small accessory from the ground and returned it to the safety of the gaping hole in my bracelet where it belonged, vowing to keep a better eye on it during future use.

NaNoWriMo 2020

Every November for the past three or so years I’ve taken an unused notebook and labeled it “NaNoWriMo” with that year, fully intending on sitting down to write every day during National Novel Writing Month. And every year I don’t make it past the first week due to poor planning, lack of motivation, real life, and other excuses I throw into the void.

This year has been a little different. No, I haven’t been good about writing every day. I didn’t even write most days so far this month. But this is the first year I continued to work on my story. Instead of writing for the first few days and then laying the story to rest, I’ve had spurts of a couple or so days over the whole month. What’s different this year, you may ask? Besides being stuck at home due to the pandemic, I’m writing a story I already know: Rapunzel.

Why rewrite a fairy tale that’s already been rewritten? Well, in all the versions of Rapunzel I’ve read, none of them really delve deep into the physical relationship the witch has with the girl. I also wanted to explore the reason the witch would decide to force the baker to exchange his firstborn child for the rampion he stole from her garden to please his infertile wife. Besides being a lonely witch, perhaps she had feelings for the baker and since she couldn’t have him, some part of him would have to do.

I’d like to say one of my New Year’s Resolutions would be to write every day, but like my determination to write every day in November, making resolutions always seems pointless since I never fall through with half of them. But as I’ve been writing throughout this month, I’ve felt the creative spark I thought had long been extinguished. Though I wrote only a page or so each of the handful of days I’ve written in the “NaNoWriMo 2020” notebook, seeing all those pages develop into the beginning of a story I care so much about is an amazing feeling! And though my work is a long way away from being viewable to the public eye, getting the story out is what is important right now. The good writing will come in the subsequent drafts, after I know how the story is going to go.

Photo from Pixabay by Dimitris Vetsikas

For those out there who have ambitions of being a writer, I wish you luck and motivation. It is a lot of work to write something worth reading, but after all the hard parts it will be amazing to see your story grow into something others can enjoy. Happy writing!

Header photo from Pixabay by Christoph Zimmermann.

Literary Hangover

It’s hours after the last webinar ended for the 11th annual Salem Lit Fest. Mentions of dragons, magic, suspense, mystery, and writing processes are still buzzing around my head. If there was one thing I could take away from this weekend, it’s the number one rule of writing: there is no rule.

 

Everyone’s writing path is different. Some people are pantsers – they sit at a keyboard and just start typing, or if they’re old school (or authentic, I guess you could say) and don’t mind killing trees, they could handwrite their muse-inspired words in a journal as their ideas pour out and then type them up later, all without any advanced planning. And then there are plotters. They need to know where their story is going, sometimes with a detailed outline of specific events. Scrivener was a highly recommended writing tool mentioned in at least one of the Salem Lit Fest webinars. You can write your text in any order and rearrange it later – useful for both pantsers and plotters.

 

And after writing the story, what about publishing? Some of the authors mentioned finding a literary agent to help them publish their first novel, some spending years finding the right agent. Other writers don’t wait or feel their story is finalized enough to self-publish it. In this day and age, there are so many options, it can be overwhelming.

 

Image by RobinHiggins taken from Pixabay

The most important thing to realize about the writing and publishing process is to not take to heart how other writers got to where they are today – you need to do what is right for you, whether that’s getting an MFA in writing beforehand or publishing a book at 15. If you have a story that needs telling, you shouldn’t wait if it wants to come out early. But you need to be willing to put in the time, energy, and effort into it – books don’t write themselves, after all. Just grab any book from your bookshelf or from a library or bookstore and take a look at the Acknowledgements section – some of the best books have the longest list of thank yous. It doesn’t take just one person to publish a book, after all. Think of the author as the parent, and the editors, publishers, publicists, and everyone else are teachers, mentors, and other people who influence the book-child to live up to its fullest potential.

 

When I was younger, I remember pondering fairy tales and thinking I want to find the right version of this fairy tale. None of what I read satisfied me, although I enjoyed each version immensely. Many of the authors from this weekend mentioned what they were told, about how if you don’t see what you want to read, write it. I may do just that, if the stories decided to come out of my mind at any point.

 

Screenshot from the “Conversation—Fairytale Retellings” session of the 2020 Salem Lit Fest

Speaking of retelling stories, that seemed to be a common fear among many of the panelists. Many of the authors declared they don’t read books similar to what they are currently writing, so that their story is not too influenced by the other authors’ works. The “Conversation—Fairytale Retellings” session was the only exception since, naturally, you would need to be familiar with the tales you are retelling.

 

Write what you know. This is another great piece of writing advice that resounded through computer speakers over the past few days. It’s especially easy for the memoirists, but a little bit more difficult for the fantasy writers who are building their own worlds, or trying with effort to write about places that are real, trying to get all the details right for the readers who are familiar with the settings in question. The things fiction writers can write about that they know for sure would be the universal truths of love, friendship, hatred, joy, sadness, pain, loss, and all the other human experiences that many of us have felt at one point or another in our lives.

What I love the most about literary events such as this Salem Lit Fest is the sense of community. The authors didn’t just suggest you read their own books – more often they recommended and praised the books of other panelists, especially the ones from their own panel, which had commonalities to their stories. Many of the books from the various panels had similar themes, which might be why the authors are intrigued by their comrades. After this event, I am more inspired to not only read the books that were discussed, but to write my own stories. Now I just have to decide if I should reserve the books mentioned in this weekend’s videos from my local library, or if I should just succumb to my book-hoarding desires and visit the bookstore’s very convenient Salem Lit Fest page…

The Darkness In You

I’m officially a published writer! My short story got accepted in Boned!

Boned

by Cassandra Sprague

Photo by Sebastiaan Stam on Pexels.com

You turn off the lights and get into bed, anxiously tucking the blankets all the way up to your chin, the darkness settling over you like a cloud of guilt. Does it feel like you’re not alone, like someone, or something, is watching you? It’s not the dark you’re scared of. It’s me.

Have you ever thought you saw something out of the corner of your eye, but when you turned your head, there was nothing there?

I am the darkness in your soul, for once you take a life, you can’t take your innocence back. I am Death, I am Vengeance, I am Justice. I’m the monster that was under your bed when you were a kid. Now I’m the skeletons in your closet.

You replay the scene in your mind, how it could have gone differently.

You might ask…

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Enjoying the Sunset

Instead of being lazy and taking the bus home, I decided to enjoy the last few moments of today’s daylight and walk the half-hour trek home, heading towards the ever-elusive sunset before me.

 

As my legs automatically conveyed my body towards my apartment, I admired the sunset, thinking descriptive words in my mind to attempt to describe this magnificent natural event. Before I realized it, I had the start of a poem. Here it is, unedited:

 

The golden sky, dappled with pink-lined clouds

stretches before me, interrupted by dark silhouettes

of leafless trees, branches standing up

against the winter breeze.

The sun sinks lower towards slumber

until all that is left is a sea of gray.

 

New Year, New Me

While I usually make New Year’s Resolutions annually and never stick with them, I have a new motivation and determination this year. I have become tired of living just to get through the day, pushing my dreams and passions to the side like junk mail. I go to work waiting to leave so I can read my book or write a poem, plan a short story or make a craft. But by the time I get home, I am unmotivated to do anything more than going online and wasting time checking social media or browsing on Etsy.

 

I started following Amazon bestselling author Kristen Martin at some point last year despite not having read any of her books. I recently purchased and finally started reading  Be Your Own #Goals, and a few weeks ago I watched her video from a few weeks ago of her daily winter morning routine with a day-in-the-life added in. During the video, she held up a colorful life planner stuffed full with loose papers in front of the camera, mentioning it was the last month that she would be writing her goals in it’s bulging depths. I know all the scribbled To Do lists in my purse-sized journal and on scraps of paper weren’t doing the trick, so I looked online until I found a planner that I loved on the inside and out and ordered it.

 

A few days ago, I was waiting in the Stop&Shop checkout line with my boyfriend and saw a magazine with an attractive cover that had the word “Breathe” in big white letters on a dark blue background. When I saw it, I knew it would help inspire me to accomplish some of the resolutions I jotted down at the end of my 2018 pocket-sized planner, a feeling that was confirmed when I examined the table of contents to find most, if not all, of the things I wanted to work on in the New Year.

 

Armed with a life planner to set daily, weekly, and monthly goals, as well as the well-being special issue of Breathe Magazine and any other motivational posts, movies, books, and so on, I hope to accomplish what I am setting out to do this year, which includes:

• writing and getting my work published
• organizing and downsizing my apartment
• eating healthier
• excersizing regularly
• trying or improving on different art forms, especially clay-sculpting

 

So far I have done the opposite of some of my goals, namely “eating healthier,” which was broken first thing today by wolfing down a pumpkin pancake drizzled with a heaping of cheesecake filling when I was celebrating the New Year with my boyfriend and some of our friends. But I will not let one transgression stop me from fulfilling the promises I’ve made to myself to get my life on track.

 

I almost made up for it by having salad tonight but I had a craving for sushi, which is still pretty healthy if you ask me. With it came a bundle of fortune cookies, and inside the first was this message, a spark of hope for the future that lies ahead of me: