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A Letter from Caitlyn Paxson
Dear Reader,
October has long been my favorite month, and I try to savor it – but I will admit, this one passed in a flurry of travel and work, and I never quite achieved that feeling of autumnal bliss that I always seem to be chasing. Does anyone else long for some crackle-leafed idyllic Halloween of yore, always seemingly slightly out of reach? We had no leaves on the Island at all this year – Hurricane Fiona blew them to oblivion back in September. But we did have some lovely mist.
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Image Description: The sun rising over a misty field.
We also have lots of orange cats.
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Image Description: Orange tabbies snoozing on a blue blanket.
I can hardly believe how fast these honey drops are growing. The Contessa continues to live up to her name – slightly aloof but flirtatious and inclined to instigate slight mischief. Bruce is a dear little dude who likes to sit down and think things over and to make friends with anyone who will have him, including inanimate objects. He’s taken a particular shining to the broom. And Monty obligingly cleans their ears and generally behaves like a put-upon stepdad.
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Image Description: Bruce and Monty looking out the window.
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Image Description: Two books with a white pumpkin.
I tried to use my reading selections this month to get into the right October mood, and I have a couple of books in that vein to tell you about.
I was introduced to Shirley Jackson the same way most of us probably were – reading The Lottery in school. I can’t say that it inspired me to seek out her other work (I just remember being vaguely disgusted by the irony of discussing it in a high school English class where I felt like everyone around me would be more than happy to throw a few stones), but since then I have enjoyed adaptations of her other work, so I felt like it was time to give her a real try. I went with her last novel, We Have Always Lived in the Castle. I think the less you know about the story going in, the better – so I will just say that it is about two sisters who are trying to survive in the wake of a family tragedy. It’s not a happy story. What I really liked about it is the writing itself, and the cleverness of the narrative voice that Jackson uses. We often talk about unreliable narrators, but I’ve seldom seen the technique employed as subtly as it’s used here. The narrator says things that, in less competent hands, would feel like mistakes in the writing itself, but instead they point an arrow at the truth that she can’t speak aloud.
My other Halloween mood reading selection was Holly Black’s Book of Night. I’ve been a fan of her Young Adult novels for decades, and was very excited to give her first adult fantasy novel a try. If you’re familiar with her work, The Book of Night reminds me a lot of a grittier, grown-up version of her Curse Workers trilogy. It’s about a woman who has given up being a con artist and thief but gets tangled up in a series of crimes being committed by people who can use their shadows to do magic. If you like paranormal fantasy, you’ll enjoy this – it has the perfect mix of morally grubby but lovable characters, intriguing magic shenanigans, and a romance with a tragic twist.
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Interpreting
October is a busy month when you’re a fake spirit medium! I spent a lot of time at Beaconsfield House in Charlottetown in the weeks leading up to Halloween, playing Madame Evangeline Grey, Spirit Medium and Conduit for the Otherworldy. In her guise, I demonstrate the tricks and fakery employed by Victorian spirit mediums to entertain (swindle?) their audiences.
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Beaconsfield House in all her yellow glory. Cameron MacDonald (the actor/storyteller who plays James Peake, owner of Beaconsfield) and me, ready to summon some spirits. A view of the drawing room from the medium’s perspective.
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The show itself is very fun to do (I had to learn a bunch of magic tricks that I pull off enthusiastically if not very adeptly), but my favorite part is the talk-back afterwards, where I tell everyone about the history behind the show. If you’re interested, I highly recommend the book A Magician Among the Spirits by Harry Houdini – in it, he calls out all the fake spirit mediums of his day and breaks down how they do their magic.
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Image Description: Me as Madame Evangeline Grey.
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Crafting
Sometimes the reality of a project doesn’t quite match the vision you had in your head, and that was definitely the case for October’s crown. I decided I wanted to try to make a witch hat out of foraged fibers, and I had all sorts of ideas about grasses and weaving with them. I figured my trusty willow weaving method would make a good base, so that’s where I started.
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Image Description: Walking through the willows. A nest among the branches. The willow witch hat base.
Making the base went fine. But then when I attempted to weave in the grasses to fill it out… it just didn’t work. I’m sure that, given enough time and research, one could figure it out. But I had spirits to pretend to talk to and kittens to wrangle and it just didn’t happen! So the base became the final product, and while I’m not entirely satisfied, it did look very dramatic by the light of our Samhain fire.
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Image Description: Me in the firelight, willow witch hat outlined against the darkening sky.
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Growing
We have had unseasonably warm weather for October, and the garden is still giving as a result, far past when I would have expected to put her to bed for the winter.
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Image Description: The vegetable garden, close-up of calendula and chard, a basket of late autumn harvest, a flower collage.
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October even had a few bouquets – this was the last one.
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Image Description: A hand-held bouquet.
I’ve already started pouring over seed catalogues for next year – though I will admit, I’m ready for a break. I think the seasonal nature of gardening is part of what makes it such a beautiful endeavor. When you need rest, nature slows things down.
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Witching
Is it even Halloween if I don’t dress up like a witch and dance around in a field? This year, I had company! Our friend Becky was visiting and joined me for my yearly witchy field frolic. Becky is an artist (and happens to have a lot of Halloween-appropriate designs), so check out her shop!
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Image Description: Just two witches frolicking around a field with brooms.
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Musing
Early in the month, we went down to western New England for a wedding. It was beautiful to visit with friends, some of whom we had not seen since before the pandemic. But it was an odd trip for me, because I went to college in the same area as the wedding venue almost twenty years ago and I haven’t been back since. As we approached, the landscape suddenly shifted into something familiar to my very bones, and a strange feeling came over me - a melancholy sort of remembrance. After the wedding, we drove up to my old school. The buildings are still there, but the college itself is gone now. It felt like a dream, wandering the empty campus, seeing ghosts everywhere. I wrote a poem, and I think poetry captures the particular feeling better than prose.
Tree Rings
There are few trees, where I live now.
I have pulled up roots and been
Transplanted so many times
I forget what I was growing into.
If you cut a tree and read her rings,
You can see the seasons
That shaped her written in the circles:
The droughts, the plenty, the lightning.
Now, under these gold trees,
With the mountain wind quaking us,
I remember suddenly who I was
In that sapling time, so long ago.
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Image Description: Marlboro College, October 2022.
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The irony of confronting my own old ghosts in a month where I was pretending to talk to other people’s does not escape me. October’s vibes come for us all.
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Image Description: Ghostly lady, haunting Beaconsfield House.
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I hope you all had the most atmospheric of hauntings this month, and that the changing seasons will be gentle, wherever you are. Until next month, wishing you the best books and the most berry-full brambles,
Caitlyn
I write this from the traditional unceded territory known as Mi’kma’ki. Two books by Indigenous authors that I really enjoyed recently are The Summer of Bitter and Sweet by Jen Ferguson and Mi’kmaq Campfire Stories of Prince Edward Island by Julie Pellissier-Lush.
(All opinions expressed in this newsletter are my own and do not represent my employer.)
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