Haunted Hawthorne Hotel

I live in Salem MA, known to many as "Witch City". It is famous for the witch trials that took place way back in the 1600s. The whole city is filled to the brim with museums, shops, tours, novelty stores, etc; all cashing in on this ancient history. We even have a statue of Elizabeth Montgomery (from Bewitched) in our central square. So before I moved here, this place was always on my radar as I love to revel in the "woo" here and there. But besides all of that, there is also an excellent art museum called The Peabody Essex, loads of beautiful architecture, maritime history and historical sites, and cute shops with neat little trinkets just about everywhere.

Before moving here about two years ago, my boyfriend's mother suggested that we spend the night at the Hawthorne Hotel for mother's day; followed by a leisurely trip to the museum the next day. I was all in, as I had never stayed at the Hawthorne before and I loved Salem for all of the reasons mentioned.

When we arrived at the hotel I noticed right away that it had a very authentic feel, as though the building belonged chiefly to the past. The original elevator was still working and intact from the hotel's construction in the 1920s. As we ascended to our room on the third floor, a couple who were in it with us mentioned to each other that the third floor was said to be haunted. I didn't think anything of it. Of course, it's haunted I thought...all of Salem is supposedly haunted. That's the whole shtick. I figured it was just a tourist's fantasy and brushed it right off.

That night Nikki and I went out and had a nice dinner at which I drank no more than two glasses of wine. Then we strolled back to the hotel and got to bed by 11 p.m. Nikki is a morning person so I was hoping to get right to sleep since I knew she would be waking me up at some ungodly hour. I settled in and shut the lights.

At around 1 a.m I was just falling asleep when I heard some strange sounds coming from Nikki's direction. I realized suddenly that she was talking in her sleep. As strange as that was- I thought, "ok, that's o.k, people do that. It's normal". Then the talking got spooky as she started to sound distressed like she was having a nightmare, so I woke her up. She looked at me and said "oh, Kate, were you just lying down here in the bed next to me? I said, "no, I have been here in my bed all night, you were talking in your sleep." Nikki said that she felt like someone was with her on the bed and she was trying to wake herself up. I thought then that it was just a classic case of sleep paralysis. She said that she felt like someone was touching her with their hands on her arm. I did not touch her to wake her, I spoke loudly to her saying her name until she woke up, so at no point did I put my hands on her.

Nikki quickly fell back asleep, but I was still a little weirded out and turned the light off but then turned the t.v. on to help me relax. The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air was on, and I was comforted by the very not spooky Will Smith and his fluorescent colored wardrobe. I finally started to doze off at about 3am. Just as I was in between the state of waking and sleeping I heard the loudest banging sound, just above my head over the bed. It was so loud that I shot straight up in the bed! I looked around, feeling confused, and then said out loud to myself "no way!". I got up and went to the door. I opened it to see if anyone was in the hallways. No one was there. I tried to replicate the noise with objects in the room, but there was nothing that could have made that noise. I sat up wide awake the rest of the night, annoyed...by the first haunting experience I'd ever had.

Normally I would have loved this kind of thing and been oh so interested in what was happening. This particular occasion however was not prime ghost hunting time. I was just supposed to be having a quiet evening with Nikki spending quality girl time; shopping and seeing art. I wanted to sleep and be a person for her the next day, but I stayed wide, wide awake.

When the sun FINALLY came up, and Nikki got up all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, we got ready for the day and then headed downstairs for breakfast in the beautiful dining room at the Hawthorne. I sat across from Nikki, looking disheveled and she asked me how I slept. I said I hadn't and then started asking her more about the sleep talking incident. She said that she doesn't normally talk in her sleep but had the strangest dream and felt like someone was touching her. I told her what happened to me with the banging noise and she and I kind of laughed about our little haunting.

I was not done sleuthing the situation however so I scrolled through some of the reviews of the Hawthorne online. Multiple accounts from the customers described hauntings on the third floor, and in the elevator. Most of these accounts involved two things. The first was "phantom hands" the feeling of someone touching you when no one is there. The second was loud knocking or banging sounds late in the night. The hotel responds to all of these posts very professionally trying to debunk the claims, saying that it is a very old hotel so noises, of course, happen, etc., etc.

We experienced two of the most common haunting scenarios that night.

It would have been less convincing to me that we had indeed had been haunted if I did not see that these two things were so common. After all, in between waking and sleeping, both of us could have been simply dreaming. I know that we were not though. I know it from both the experience and my intuition that this was what it was.

The Hawthorne Hotel...is haunted!

The Lonely Doll

The right book always seems to find me at the right time. It was during my third quarter life crisis that I found this gem; A Lonely Doll: The Dare Wright Story. 

Dare Wright was a fabulous, quirky, talented, and interesting woman. She was an artist and a writer; creating books for children. Her most well known series of books "The Lonely Doll" can be recognized by their pink gingham boarder, and the unique photographic illustrations of a doll and her bears. 

 

All of the original photographs were taken by the author. Both the stories and the photos were peppered with both adventure, and an undercurrent of sadness. Children were mesmerized by these pages all throughout the 50's and 60's. 

Some were even seen as a bit too naughty for children's books.

The Lonely Doll was famous, and the books are still now collected by art lovers and the original nostalgic fans alike.

What was hiding behind this fantasy world however, was an incredibly tragic, beauty, a lonely doll herself; Dare Wright.



Her story is one of intrigue, as she was a truly tortured artist. Edith was the name of her muse, the main character of the Lonely Doll...and was also a sort of alter ego.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4258856

Diet Coke Extremists Threaten Boston

Last night I slept very poorly, thinking too much about the recent incident in Charlottesville and the upcoming "Freedom of speech" rally in Boston. It took me 3 days to finally read a whole article on it, and watch the infamous Vice news video. It was so disturbing and I knew it would be this thing that I then would have to deconstruct and work through, so yesterday I had some time and I did just that.
When my friends and I participated in the Women's March, we knew we were part of something big. It was so big and so energetically charged that we felt a slight sense of danger in it all, and as a precaution- we each wrote our emergency contact information on our arms in permanent marker (just in case).  Luckily that amazing day ended without any kind of violence and turned out to be one of the best days of my entire life. The whole world showed up to stand in solidarity to say that we were opposed to inequality, misogyny, racism, and homophobia. Those who would seek to destroy progress in feminism and human rights. Those who would elect that awful man and all that he stands for. We knew it was only the first step, but we definitely made a statement, one that needed to be made. One that we knew we would be making again and again for the next four years. The rally today will be one of many scheduled around the country. According to "the organizers" they are calling it the "Freedom of Speech Rally". It comes to us just one week after the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville which ended in 3 deaths and many left injured. All I knew at first was that a similar demonstration was scheduled for Boston and that everyone was freaking the eff out about it. After reading a few news articles and watching the news clips I was left with so many questions... such as "who is actually behind the rally, like what are they called?" and "why do they keep saying they are not the 'same' as the Charlottesville group? What makes them different?" and "who is even speaking at this rally?". If you are going to one of the counter protests you should probably know who you're dealing with. I don't understand how this stuff was not addressed in all of the news coverage for this thing. One of the first things I did was pick a random person from their FB flier speaker list and google'd him. I came up with a black man from Dorchester who recently ran for city council. His name is Donnie Parsons. I was surprised because "Unite the Right" was from what I understood; a white nationalist rally. So, okay this is not that...but that doesn't mean that those assholes won't ride in on the coattails of their fellow Right wing-nuts just to start some shit. After some time scouring more stuff online I found some answers. According to a blog post by the Anti Defamation League: "The alt lite, sometimes referred to as the New Right, is a loosely-connected movement whose adherents generally shun white supremacist thinking, but who are in step wth the alt right in their hatred of feminists and immigrants, among others. Many within the alt lite sphere are virulently anti-Muslim; the group abhors everyone on “the left” and traffics in conspiracy theories." So today we are dealing with a diet cola version of extremism. They draw the line at white nationalism. Aren't they swell? I am worried about my friends today.   https://www.adl.org/blog/free-speech-rally-planned-for-boston Here are two other articles you should read if you want to be well informed that don't have to do with the rally but are more about how these people get to this point and beyond. https://www.vox.com/identities/2016/11/15/13595508/racism-trump-research-study https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/8/18/16151924/radicalization-white-supremacists-nazis Understanding stuff makes me feel more in control and less anxious. Even if that control is not really anything more than a firm mental handle on what the fuck is going on. One of the worst things about all this is that we read the headlines and think "HOW THE FUCK IS THIS A THING" and that makes us anxious and depressed.
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For Tarot Reading First Timers

I have recently started reading cards for people outside of my close friend group, and have come across many people who are interested but have never had a reading before. Here are a few key pieces of information in regard to readings and how they work.

In a reading there is the reader, and the querent. The reader lays out the cards and tells the story that unfolds to the querent using a mixture of knowledge of the cards and intuition. The querent can tell you as much or as little as they would like to about themselves, though sometimes it helps the reader to see more clearly when a story is confirmed or expanded upon. I always disclose before hand that I am not psychic, and so the more you tell me about your situation, the better I will be able to decipher the meanings to you.

Some people fear that the cards will tell them something that they don't want to know or that if they get a certain card then they will be cursed by it, or not be able to change the outcome. This is mainly due to the common idea that the cards are only used by witches, and psychics like you see in the movies.The future however is not static, and so they cannot tell you what the future holds, but rather can help you identify patterns in your life that will guide you in your decisions moving forward. So to those that feel afraid of getting their cards read; it should be noted that the readings will never tell you information about you that you don't already innately know or show you something awful that you don't have the power to change. You control your life. The cards are just ink on paper.

The way in which it really works starts with you. The thing is- that we are usually so busy being caught up in our lives that we don't take the time to check in with ourselves. When you have your cards read, you are seeing your story laid out before you and your subconscious opens up, and spills the beans on things that you've stuck back there for however long; and often these are things that have been influencing your choices without your conscious awareness of them. So initially, that can really be a shocker! 

Once you get past the initial surprise of having a stranger tell you about your life by using cards with weird pictures on them, you will start to see the story, the cycle, and the patterns that come through in the reading. That's what it's all about. Identifying these things and considering your current path, you'll be given new choices in regard to moving forward. That's what it's all about. As the famous Carl Jung said:

"Until you make the unconscious- conscious; it will rule your life, and you will call it fate".