New England Gothic

    Apple orchards that spring up over night. Nobody knows where they came from but they’ve always been there and the old man at the farm stand knows your name and your mother’s name and your grandmother’s name and your great-grandmother’s name and when he smiles his teeth are just a little too sharp.

    (You ask him for directions. “Well,” the old man says, “you can’t get there from here.” You can’t get anywhere from here. The dirt road keeps winding but you could have sworn you passed that tree before.)

    The Old Man in the Mountain who gazed across the valleys, a silent guardian, then one morning he went away and no one knows where he’s gone and nobody’s quite sure what will happen, now, without the protection of his watchful eye.

    Mt Monadnock is the most climbed mountain in the world, they say. 125,000 people climb it every year, they say. They never say how many of those people make it back down again.

    Some of the coldest temperatures in the world have been recorded on top of Mt Washington. When you drive your car back down from the summit, there are icicles on the undercarriage. It’s mid-August, but you can’t stop shivering.

    This contra dance has been going on for over 200 years. Continuously. The dancers keep changing but you never see anyone leave. You’re not sure how long you’ve been dancing. You’re not sure how old you are. You don’t recognize your face when you see it reflected in the window as you whirl past.

    You hope that’s a fox you hear screaming in the woods at night. You always hope it’s a fox when you hear it screaming in the woods every night.

    and it keeps on snowing and it keeps on snowing and it keeps on snowing and it keeps on snowing and it keeps on snowing and it keeps on snowing and it keeps on snowing and it keeps on snowing and it keeps on snowing and it...

    Driving home in a blizzard, you see shapes moving through the curtain of white, and you try to convince yourself that they’re just other cars, but they’re too big and have too many limbs and the lights they emit are the wrong color...

    Victims of long-ago witch trials wandering the streets of the North Shore with gaping mouths and necks still crooked with the memory of a noose.

    This is where the Revolution began. This is where the revolution will always begin. You try not to focus on the hoofbeats but they’re always there, at the edge of hearing.

    A hiker on the Greenway pauses at the foot of your driveway, just like he does every day. You offer him a glass of lemonade, just like you do every day. You’re nervous about what might happen if he ever refuses.

    When the nights are cold and the days are warm, the maple sap begins to flow. You tap the trees, according to old tradition. The sap gathering in the buckets is a strange color this year (it’s usually not nearly so reddish) and tastes strangely metallic. When the wind blows and the branches rub together, it sounds like moaning.

    Block Island is visible from the beach in Westerly. Block Island is visible from the beach in Newport. Block Island is visible from the beach in Warwick. Block Island is visible from the beach in Pawtucket. Pawtucket has no beaches. Block Island is following you.

    It’s called the Northeast Kingdom for a reason. No one ever questions who the king might be because if they do, he just might come to pay them a visit….

    They cancelled the Pumpkin Festival this year but late October rolls around and the jack-o-lanterns start appearing. Nobody is putting them there. None of them have candles, but they light up at night. You could have sworn one of them just winked at you.

My special thanks to Maggie Blueberry for this. Check out her Instagram site: https://www.instagram.com/maggie.blueberry/

Image Credit: https://www.pinterest.com/fuuharu/spire/