Through the Secret Keyhole

A Curious Day by the Stream...

It was a strange and odd day by the stream, if I recall the tale correctly...

    

You might have to jog my memory with the exact details of the events that transpired that warm summer day...
 

You see, there were once 4 characters who were great friends.  2 gentlemen and two ladies.  They grew up playing in the same tree house, living down the same heavily tree lined streets...

        

They adored each other, taking care of each other as if they were family.  They never quite fit in with the other kids at school, so that made their bond stronger.  When it was time to go off to college, each one sadly said good-bye to the other.  And off they went into the real world, not to see each other again for many many years...

By the time they were in their late thirties neither one of the friends had married.  They had met potential matches along the way, but nothing quite clicked. 

It happened on year that all four of them decided it was fine time to reunite and see each other, since it had been nearly 15 (or more) years since they had not seen one another...

They decided to meet at the train station in their charming home town.  As each one arrived, it was as if they had never been apart from each other.  They realized then, how much they missed and adored one another...

And so  it would only make sense that,  couples would form, and love would blossom amongst these long time friends.

It didn't matter that one of the gals was 5 years older than one of the boys.  Once they were all in their thirties, age was meaningless...

They decided to buy a grand cottage together, all four of them.  And live in their home town.  Neither couple was able to have children, so they stayed quite like children themselves.

They played by the stream several times a week.  Cards, and guessing games and feasts were part of their everyday...

   

As you can imagine, this is how that curious day by the stream that would change their lives forever, came to be...

You see, on a warm day by said stream, a baby basket filled with what looked like flowers came rushing down to the spot where the friends rested.  It seemed to have floated all the way down from the grand river a few miles up-stream...

But it wasn't an empty basket at all, for inside there was a beautiful smiling, cooing, chubby cheeked baby girl.  It was at first a grand shock indeed.  Oh the women went mad in love over the babe, and so they went to the sheriff and to the orphanages and hospitals, trying to solve the mystery about the baby.

Over time, it became clear that no one would come forth to claim the baby, and so, with no need for thought, both couples adopted the baby.   She became the daughter of 4 loving and adoring parents.

It was quite a site, to see Emmaline Rose, Barrington Mackenzie, Cordelia Bloom and Thadeus McGuillicuddy with their bouncing baby.  And, a happy baby she was!

        

One tragic thing is that, I can't recall what they named the baby, can you?  Oh, you know this story so much better than I do ;)   - You should really be the one telling it...

Anyhow, the wee lass was growing to be quite a doll indeed...

        

Beloved from county to county for her amazing singing and dancing skills, which were surely traits inherited from her birth mother...

As she grew older, the girl showed vast signs of wanting to run off, and become a performer.  Oh she made Emmaline and Cordelia ever so worried, for they adored her so.

Now, this is where my mind becomes a blur.  Was it true that she actually was the daughter of a great circus performer who had sailed her off down a river in a basket all those years ago? 

Did she go off to find her own way as a performer herself?

        

What was the actual story, I wonder...  ?

Or did she stay to live in the big house with her two mothers and fathers, and have a family of her own? 

   

Pray tell, won't you kindly share how the tale unraveled?  
 
 

♥,V

 

Haunted.

Have you been wondering where I have been?  If you have, why haven't you tried to find me somewhere through the secret keyhole?  I needed your help.  This blog has not been abandoned, it's been haunted. 

No really, I am not joking  ;) ;)

You see, I am locked up in an attic in a haunted house...

 

It all started with a tiny book I was told not to read before bed because it could suck you into another place in time.  Right into a dark fairytale...

 

For years, I listened, and made sure not to read the fables when the sky turned to night.  Until one evening, when I decided to test what I thought was pure urban legend...

   

But, it was true.  I woke up in a haunted old Victorian house, stuck in an attic, tied to a tiny door.  Part of a fairytale (of the dark variety) in my book...

 

A few ghosts inhabiting the house tied me up.  And, they won't let me go until you agree to play a few games with them...

 

While you do that, maybe I can wiggle my way out? 

 

You see, these ghosts seem to have forgotten who they were when they walked on the earth.  They are wondering if anyone out there might know?

   

These two sisters are driving me a tad nutty.  Do you have any clue as to what their story is??  Perhaps you have had them for tea and can fill me in?

   

Also, there is a man who delivers my warm milk and toast night after night, and I could have sworn I saw him somewhere before...

      

I might be wrong, but I am quite sure he was part of a circus company I saw perform in the early 1900's?

   

So you see.  This blog is haunted.  The Haunted Blog...

 

Jump in with me, pull me out of the storybook Victorian haunted house.  Maybe if you tell the ghosts who they are, they will set me free ;)

Unless of course, you think you want to join me and we should stay for a while?  If say, the real world gets a tad boring?

♥,V

(Haunted house photos: borrowed from http://ditmaspark.blogspot.com/2007/10/haunted-victorians.html who borrowed them from nymag.com.  Circus photo from: Wisconsin Historical Society)

A Mad Tea Party, of the Wonderland Variety....

I was having a chat with my Mom about Alice in Wonderland.  She shared some Alice secrets and thoughts with me from when she was a girl...

She also told me that  she once had a copy of the book, with gold leaf edges, tattered and crisp.

(Arthur Rackham Illustration)

      

She said, the original story was rather dark and scary, and had to be lightened up a bit for children...

In fact, she shared that most of the fairy tales my grandmother told her (I agreed because I heard the same ones) were very dark and heart thumping...

Isn't that interesting?  I love to hear such stories... 

As you might know, Saturday is the Second Annual Mad Tea Party at A Fanciful Twist.  So, in honor of said festivities, how about a 1903 film?

This is the first movie version (1903) of Lewis Caroll's novel "Alice in Wonderland", directed by Cecil Hepworth.

See you through the gates of A Fanciful Twist, for a little Wonderland Magic....

      

♥ , V

Life, in a Ghost Town?

Growing up around mines and ghost towns can be a curious thing.  When your home base is in the southern most part of Arizona, in a tiny town, then 30 miles into the hills from that town (in the middle of nowhere) there are things you begin to see and feel...

Things you begin to see and feel in that vast emptiness, of people who have been there before you.  Traces they have left behind...

      

(Life in a Ghost Town Image:  Richard Rizzo) 

We lived in California in summers.  We traveled during the summer too.  But Arizona/Northern Mexico is where we made our daily life...

When I was a young girl, before I had siblings, my father bought land in a place called Vista Del Cielo (in Southern Az).  It was a long drive to get there from our small border town.  Made seemingly longer by an endless dirt road (which was paved 12 years ago). 

We built our home on a hill, in this hidden dirt filled desert, that suited its name perfectly.  Views like no other place.  3 houses were out there (5 total, scattered).  But, before our home was built, my Dad would take me on long hikes, from town, to our land in the heavens (or as far as a 6 year old could go).  Then my Mom would pick us up.  While waiting for her, we would rest on giant boulders, and look up at the clouds...

This is one side of what I saw (and see when I visit our home) when I went out to play, outside of our enclosed back yard...

      

So began my adventure as me, and what I find intriguing.  I was 8 years old when I started roaming the land.  I would pack snacks and head out to "explore."  Rocks, dirt, cacti, mines...  Ghosts?

Of course I didn't go into the mines, they were unstable and very deep.  This one below, sits down and across the canyon from the photo above, and has an old rickety ladder going into it...

I was never afraid of bob cats, mountain lions or snakes.  I just accepted that someday, I might be attacked or bitten by one.  Luckily, I never was.  I think I was much braver then, than I am now.

 

There are over six mines surrounding our family house.  My brother, uncle and his exploring team even went into one.  However, I will delve into that in later posts.

The point is, I think this is where my fascination began with old abandoned buildings, cars and mining/ghost towns... 

Most of which could be found, in my own backyard, literally.

I could never understand how this car made it up the dry, giant boulder laden stream, through the hidden canyon and into the valley behind our house.  But to see it, still there, is very comforting to me.  I used to play in it as a kid. 

  

Of course, over the years, believe it or not, this deserted place in the hills, that my Dad pegged as wonderful, has become one of the hottest places to build a home in that area (which I find annoying, but that is neither here nor there).  You even see a famous face jogging out there every now and then.  And sadly, this car, that I thought was mine and mine alone those 23 years ago, has since been a bit pillaged...

If you walked east, past the car and down the dry stream about 3 miles, you would come upon a deteriorated miner's house, chock-full of miner's equipment and a gold panning area.  I was there 3 years ago.  It is still there, although, nothing like it was when I was a kid...  Back then it was preserved in time.  Now it has become a resting point for illegal immigrants hiding in our back hills.  Dangerous even...

But, I see, I have veered from the entire point of my original story.  Which was to share that, due to the mining/ghost town intrigue that was planted in me as a kid, I find myself endlessly drawn to such places. 

I remember my first visit into an old abandoned home in a ghost town.  Everything was still in its place.  Clothes, food, old furniture... 

The only thing missing were the people.

Why do people abandon their towns?  Why do they seemingly vanish?  There are many reasons of course.  I will share some of my personal treks into local ghost towns in other posts, but today I want to share a place we are headed to late this summer...

A place I have been itching to visit for years...

Bodie, California.

      

A town"Frozen in Time..."

I get goose bumps just thinking about visiting here.  How wonderful, that is has been preserved as a historic state park.

        

(Photo:  Brett Fleissner)

A once booming little town, in 1880 getting close to it's midlife, there were 10,000 people in Bodie.  But in 1881, dropped to 3,000 and continued declining... 

      

        

(photos above:  Bodie.Com)

I love preserved ghost towns.  Just look at these interior shots...

      

        

(photos above:  David Tavares)

Absolutely Fascinating...

       

(above photo: Birgit)

It is astounding to me, to see the list of organizations this tiny town was home to in its day...  From E Clampus Vitus, A fraternal organization dedicated to the study and preservation of Western Heritage, especially the history of the Mother Lode and gold mining regions of the area(wikepedia).    To over a dozen others... 

      

I would love to have a home and gallery in an old building like the old I.O.O.F. Building below - Independent Order of Odd Fellows (left) and the Dechambeau Hotel...  There was even a building for the Rebekahs.

      

More I.O.O.F. info and their wonderful motto here...

(photo: Frank Faby)

I can't wait to visit Bodie for myself.  Have you been there?

      

      

(photos above: Greg Wagner)

Who knows who you might run into in Bodie.  Maybe even You too, will be there ;)

      

(photo of U2, Bodie.Com) 

Many more Ghost Town adventures to come.  And, I will make sure to take a ton of photos in Bodie late this summer...

      

(photo:  Greg Wagner)

♥,V

Little Blue House in the Woods...

Have you ever been somewhere in a dream that you have never been to in real life?  Perhaps inside of a house, where you see details like furniture and trinkets, or even stairs.  Yet you know there is no way your mind has a memory of such a place, besides being in your dream?

      

And, has it every happened, that you forget about said dream?  Until one day, perhaps even years later, you are driving (on a road trip etc.) and you spot the house that you dreamt of?  You sit in disbelief, stunned at what you see?

How can it really exist? 

I experienced just this type of event 10 years ago, with the little blue house, in the woods... 

      

In a forest, 9 hours from my house, sat the eery little place.  Exactly as I dreamt it, inside and out.  

I had never been there before in my life.

An older woman, dressed in a simple calico dress that was stained and old (covered by a thick man' sweater) came to the door and beckoned us in.  She was deaf, and so she ushered us along.  Pointing us up some stairs.

Is her house on some sort of tour I wondered?  Is she selling something??  It surely wasn't a tour?  There were no signs outside.  We were just walking in the woods and came upon this place...

I looked at Mister Lovee and asked, why are we doing this?  Isn't this strange to you?

Still, up the stairs we went.  It was so cold, and so odd.  This woman, having us roam around this place...

      

Part of my thought was that it was a trap, and we'd never escape...

We went into a room upstairs.  I told Mister Lovee we should leave...

      

He tells me to be calm.  All is fine.  I whisper outloud "ya sure, this is what people do in scary movies, they keep forging on, and then..."

We continue poking along, until we get to little attic stairs.  I look at Mister, he says go on...  And I say, "okay, just a peek.  I mean, we are snooping in this ladie's house..."

Right there in the attic, was the kitchen.  How unusual is that?

      

I decided I really wanted to leave.  I march down the stairs, quickly yet quietly.  I come around the corner and bump into the woman.  Her skin is dark olive, with a grey glow to it.

I smile big.  Wonderful house I say, as I nod.  She smiles.  I don't know if she understands what I am saying.  All of a sudden, a loud bell starts ringing.  I mean loud.  I see a bell attached to the wall to ceiling seam in the living room, with a string attached to it that wraps around the corner and obviously goes far away into the part of the house were were not in.  Almost to a basement...

The string is moving, like someone is pulling it.  But she doesn't budge, she can't hear it of course.

So, I point to my ears, and then to the bell.  She looks up at the bell, and the string going mad, and she does nothing.

Just stands blankly looking at me and smiles.

I go to open the front door.  She comes from behind me and closes it.  

OMG!!!!!!

She points to a room where you would normally think to find the kitchen and it is full of doors.  Hundreds of old victorian doors. 

Ohhhhh, maybe she sells these?  Yes, that must be it, I say outloud.

While she is showing me the doors in her odd way, Mister goes to the front door, opens it and loudly says, in a very stern voice, DOVE, we're outta here....

That tone & that phrase means somethings up.

So, I turn around, chills all over me (leaving the woman standing amongst the doors), and bolt out. 

"What did you see, what happened?" I ask.  He doesn't answer. 

As both of us are standing outside, she stands about 1 foot inside the front doorway, and points to a shed/house.

Of course, what do we do?  We go peek.  It is full of treasures.

      

But we decide it truly is time to get out of there.

I am scared and shakey and wobbly in the knees.  We rush through the woods to our car.

It starts.  We are safe. 

So, we stop at a little cafe about 2 miles down the road, in the middle of nowhere.  Everyone turns to look at us as we walk in.

We sit, order coffee and pie.  I tell the waitress we were just up at the little blue house in the woods.  Her eyebrows raise...

I tell her we went inside, and she puts the coffee put down on our table.  Almost stunned.

I tell her we met a nice lady who lives there and she gave us a "tour."

She looks at me blankly.  Picks up her coffee pot, and goes and whispers something to another waitresses. 

They both stare at us.

We don't feel like eating our pie.  We sip some coffee, pay and leave.

We sit silent in the car, until we are sure to be out of those woods and that village.

      

We never really know what happened.  But we know it was all too strange.

We never spoke about it again.

This was a true story.  This was not a dream...

Miss Hall-Borchert, if you please...

Deep in the tunnels of her heart, lived vast secrets.  Lives, times and places that left a palpable emptiness inside of her...

 

She had journeyed with an intriguing woman many many years ago from New York to Paris, and then later, back to New York again.   They were companions of sorts.  Until she went to live with another lovely woman, who took her on great life adventures as well.  Beautiful frocks a plenty!

She was perfect in every way, especially in the way garments enveloped her frame. 

      

How she loved to dress up, and share her gowns with the glamorous women she shared a life with...

Alas time, time fluttered by, and the faces she recognized changed, eventually disappearing altogether.  They slowly drifted off into eternity, while she stood tall, trying not to show her own age...

 

She was attempting to fit into this strange and changing world.  She longed for times past...

      

As she stood tall, she was thankful for her strong feet that held her up, especially when she felt sad, missing the ladies from those early 1900 years... 

 

She found herself in the year of 2006, standing in a building that was full of frames and furniture.  Wooden geese, fake fruit, chandeliers...  This was a scary place for everyone who was there.  It was the worst fate a decorative creature could find him or herself in...

Doomed to the antique store storage room.  Not even in the store, but in the store's storage room.  She felt downright, awful.  Even her bones were feeling tattered...

      

She pondered during that time, how it was that people came and went, but she lived on.  Held stories, even fibers of times long ago...  

She started to lose all hope one sweltering summer day back in 2006.  That is when she spotted the face of a girl, a girl who asked if she could take a better look...

"How much is she?" asked the girl...

$495 said the shop owner.

The girl gasped a bit and turned her face away from the garment gal.  The girl collected all sorts of other treasures, and before she left asked how much Miss Hall-Borchert was again?

The shop keeper spoke a new price,  a price that was about half that of the first price.

All of a sudden Miss Hall-Borchert knew she had to plead with the girl, she didn't want to be left behind. 

She mustered up all the strength she could and whispered, please save me, take me out of this place, please.  I will fill your life with stories, I will keep your dreams for you by night...

The girl said,  I don't know why, but I just can't leave her here...

And so, Miss Hall-Borchert took up residence at A Fanciful Twist Wee Country Manor.  Where she diligently keeps dreams, and all her stories from almost 100 years ago, live on...

      

A fate not so bad, after-all....

♥, V 

ps:  I am going to give a go at responding to comments, in the comment section, at this bloglette.   I think that will be good fun ~ xoxo

The Hidden Attic

It is safe to say that much of my intrigue started in my Grandma (Nana's) attic.  Up a dozen or more narrow stairs, to a tiny door.  A door that opened into a room, that lead you down to another even tinier door that was sealed shut...

As you first entered the attic, you turned on a string light bulb lamp, which illuminated all sorts of things (and still does, as my grandparents still live in their house).

      

Pictures on walls, faded but beautiful...

Items, all sorts of them, lined up in the attic,  on shelves and rafters.  I took these photos in my early twenties...

      

I remember my little mind, absolutely curious, to the point of bursting.  What was all this?  That attic,  paired with fairy, witch and ghost stories from my Mom & Grandma, left my mind wide open. 

As far as I was concerned, anything was possible, and nothing could be questioned...  There are more details about my Grandparents house right here...

Needless to say, I have been beckoned by attics and stories and secret spaces my whole life.  But that attic up those stairs, how it made me feel all sorts of emotions...

Mainly because I was certain, that after I closed the door, there were faces of little children, peeking back at me...

      

Stories sealed away that I had yet to uncover.  Perhaps, part of the fun is not uncovering them, but letting mystery live.  Letting the imagination have it's way with the mind....

Have you ever had an attic experience?  Or recall a place that started your fascination with tales and curiosities beyond your wildest imagination?

What is this place all about?

I decided to create this space in April of 2008.  So, just a banner lived here for months and months, almost a year.  

It was to be a tiny bit of an extension of A Fanciful Twist, but perhaps more like a voyage  through one of the many doors that house a secret keyhole to another time...

 

It wasn't until October of 2008, after many months of ideas swirling,  that I could wrap my brain around bringing forth what the true purpose of this blog was...  I knew bits of it, which is why I started it in the first place.  But bringing it all together would be a tad more complicated...

I think when a person is young and searching for freedom of self and expression, a person also is open to all things new and fascinating.  And perhaps, simply based on the nature of youth, a person does not stop, as he or she is running into the future, and look back and take particular note of the characters, places and stories in ones life until much later... 

        

Of course we notice them and appreciate them on some level.  But their true value is not embraced until a bit of maturity hands us the key, to unlock the stories of the people and places that surround us...

 

I think really, what happens when we are very young, is that curiosity is pulling us in every direction.  And of course,  our youthful intrigue helps us veer more towards the unknown and creating our own little path in life.  Wanting to break free from the paths of our ancestors...

 

At an early age, I was lucky to look back, before I fluttered too far into the future and into another life of my own.  I was able to look back and embrace the exquisite characters and places that made up the little world I was born into.

Perhaps it is the curious bevy of women and stories flying across the table that always held me captive in a world of incandescent imaginations.  Witches and ghost stories were not even questioned.  They were merely part of the discussion. 

 

I can't begin to describe all that I would like to share in this blog.  But I can tell you a little of what I have in mind.

I want to have a place to share the stories my grandmother has told us since childhood.  I want to share all the interesting wonderment that I have discovered in the state in which I live.  No, not the state of madness, I mean literally, in the state of Arizona ;)

Explorations I made, alone most of the time, into ghost towns and mines... 

Old pieces of this and that, that I have dragged home and can't let go of...

Old photographs & letters I have collected along the way, many inherited from my grandmother, some people I don't even know, but have attached my own personal story to...

 

    

I'd like to share bits and pieces of places that have taken my breath away.  Untouched, unvisited - forgotten.  Other worldy places I visited as an adult.  The door to some of these places opened by Mr. Lovee, who is also an explorer by heart...

Both him and I, have taken to collecting treasures on the side of abandoned roads.  Skipping about at the sight of rusted findings...

          

Nevertheless,  I'd like to go in this direction, of times past and stories told.  Including photogrpahs I took as a teenager, and developed and processed myself.  I found a passion two stories below ground, in a quiet dark room.  Photos unfolding.  Memories held in place by one snap shot...

 

Many of the negatives of photos I took were stolen by someone I knew.  Many beloved photographs of places and of myself at 18.  But, even though the negatives are gone, I have a smidgen of contact sheets that I can extract some of these images from...  Many of these photographs were taken on lone explorations in the desert.  Abandonded churches and abandoned homes, ghost towns...

          

Perhaps, you will be compelled to share some of your stories with me.  Of places that have captured your heart.  Taken your breath away.  Or, of people who have whispered stories in your ear, helping shape the wings of your curiosity...

Let's explore...

(More info regarding "Through the Secret Keyhole" at my ABOUT page)

~This post was originally started on October 16, 2008, and finally was ready to be shared today~