Tag Archives: fog

Just bitchin', paranormal

On Little Cat Feet…

 

blogfog1A strange thing happened.

Various explanations have been advanced. They reflect the philosophical bent of the speaker rather than provide definitive answers.

‘There are ley lines beneath your house…’ ‘Magnetic fields…’ ‘A nexus of sea, land and air…’

‘You are haunted…’

At three in the morning I was awakened by the long, slow, sonorous sound of a fog horn. I lay still, waiting for its call to repeat, wondering why, in six years at this locale, I haven’t heard it before. A glance out the bedroom window showed me no stars. The wide, dark, undifferentiated sky might indeed be a wall of mist. No lights were visible on the far shore of the inlet on which I live. Probably masked by fog.

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The horn lows again; its sorrow pouring out into the night. It’s supposed to be an alert to fog-bound ships and travelers. But this sounds more like mourning than warning; something too late to divert disaster.

I lay back and listen, my mind drifting among stories of the sea. Shipwrecks. Drownings. Hair turning shock-white overnight. Clinging to wreckage. Floating for days. Never found. Lost…lost…lost… Gravestones over empty plots. Bones resting beside coral reefs in anonymous, seabed tombs.

Some of these colorful, legendary tales incite suspicion in the light of day. But tonight, under the spell of fog with the soft wash of waves mere feet away from my window, my throat tightens at each welling of the horn.

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With dawn, the sky is clear, the day crisp.

I wonder about the lighthouse that kept such faithful vigil through the night. I search the internet. I pore over maps and information about the area’s beaches and shipping lanes.

Nothing.

It has been a century at least since a lighthouse operated along this section of coast.

I have no explanation…

…but I will be forever listening in the night.

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Just bitchin'

The Vapor Dancers

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Leonardo Da Vinci was fascinated by the changes night could bring.

He walked the streets at dusk, marveling at the beauty of the human face when bathed in twilight’s special grace. There was a muted loveliness denied the harsh illumination of the day.

It has always been so.

Things change at night. Stranger sights and seeming secrets feel freer to move among us. It’s one reason I follow Leonardo’s example, wandering after sunset, hoping to stumble upon lesser-known magic as it goes about its nightly routine.

But I never expected the Vapor Dancers.

I don’t know if this is a subculture or a single occurrence. I don’t know if they are called by another name, but to me…Vapor Dancers.

You’ll find them when the hour is late and the street deserted.

You’ll find them where plumes and columns of steam rise from manhole covers and vents.

The first one emerged from shadow, making a soundless way to the center of the street. Diaphanous fabric floated from her waist, pale and grey as fog. To the music of distant sirens, she approached the pillar of vapor where it escaped the city’s substructure, drifting upward as the breeze sculpted it into pleats and folds. Her arms rose in graceful imitation.

And then began what I can only call a dance.

Moving in silent harmony with the steam, she made it her partner. Then another, and another, and one more appeared, echoing the first’s performance.

But no city street is deserted for long. The dance lasted until a cab turned the corner, the sharp beams of its headlights interrupting, scattering, dispersing both dancers and steam.

I left, too. It was late, and this wasn’t my world. I was just a visitor who’d been treated to something strange and hauntingly beautiful.

Leonardo would have loved it.

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