I’m working on a new novel and I’m sometimes led to interesting places while doing my “research” (procrastinating). The book I’m working on is set in a small town in New England and it involves a psychiatrist and a scandal. There is also a theme that involves witches, but you know, the modern kind. Anyway, my internet meanderings led me to this article that was published in TIME Magazine in 1956. You can find it here.

I cannot urge you strongly enough to open this link. It’s an article about a psychologist in 1956 who published a paper in a journal of psychology about modern day witches. This doctor used, as case studies, six young female patients “all of whom were loathed by everybody, including the analyst.” He referred to these loathsome patients as modern-day “hags.”

“ Stein's half-dozen "witches in modern dress" were all youthfully slender, lively of expression, some of them bucktoothed and "prancing" of gait. Although they were married and active sexually, they secretly dreaded the sex act and remained "psychically virgins." They had a "miniminy mouth"; that is, they were " 'mim,' prim, reticent, shy, affected." They tended to be frigid, attract weak, boyish men, hated kissing on the mouth (a witch's kiss was believed to draw out the soul). Often they had affairs, mainly with married men. They hated and hurt men, yet believed they were of loving disposition; they were charming, and yet tortured men.”

This Stein fellow had six of these bucktoothed, prancing, miniminy-mouthed hags in one practice? Honestly, while reading this it occurred to me that I bear more than a passing resemblance to these poor women. I’m not loathed by everybody and I do not have buck teeth, but the prancing gait thing worries me, because I do have a rather animated walk and although I certainly don’t “dread” the sex act, I do consider myself a psychic virgin. I like to think that I’m charming and yet that I torture men, but in reality, especially in recent years, men really seem to take little notice of me at all. The piece is fascinating to me, though, because it was really not written that long ago. The shrink actually used the word “hag” several times to describe these patients. Read it, I’m telling you.

I had Oprah on the other day. I just had it on, I wasn't watching it. Anyway, as they cut away to a commercial, Oprah said, "Coming up, the words no mother wants to hear from her child..." This interested me because I had already heard the words no mother wants to hear from her child. These words are: "Mom, there's a bat on your pajamas."

This happened a few summers ago now, but I remember every minute of it like it was yesterday. It was early morning. I was sitting at our dining room table in my pajamas, talking on the phone and writing something down. When Devin came downstairs, I stood up for some reason, still nattering away, and she said, “Mom! Mom! Mom! Mom!”

I snapped my fingers and frowned - the universal mother’s sign-language for “shut your trap, I’m on the phone.”

“MOM,” Devin said again, her voice rising now. I looked at her, and that’s when she said THOSE WORDS. She was staring down at my thigh, backing up and stammering, “Mom, there’s a …bat on … your… pajamas!”

Time stood still then. I was staring at Devin, blinking, the phone held to my ear. Later, we would puzzle over my eventual response, which was, “Is .. it … real?” For some reason I was whispering and looking intensely into Devin’s eyes, when I said this. I couldn’t bring myself to look down at my pajamas.

“YES!” Devin screamed, and I then I had to look down and there it was - clinging to my threadbare, paper-thin pajama bottoms - a furry, hideously ugly, maniacally grinning brown bat. He gripped my pajamas with claws that came out of – get this – his wings!. He was grimacing up at me! That’s right, he was leering at me with his half-human/half-pig face and the next thing I knew I was standing at the opposite end of our house shrieking my head off and clinging to Devin, who was also shrieking her head off. In our flight through the house I had somehow managed to brush my cheerful, pug-nosed passenger from my pajamas (and drop the phone) and Devin and I just stood there, clinging to each other, alternately shrieking, laughing and crying.

I'm telling this story now because it’s bat season again. The bats are coming out of hibernation and will soon be darkening the sky around our house every evening. Don’t get me wrong - I love the idea of bats. When we bought our place in Connecticut, we were well aware of the area’s bat population and were pleased that our property was inhabited by so many of these useful creatures. According to an article in the local paper, a single brown bat can devour between 3,000 and 7,000 mosquitos in one night. At dusk, Denis and I used to watch them fly out from under the eaves of our old barn and dart about the sky, and we would gaze up at our little mosquito-assassins and smile. In our minds, there was a beautiful symbiosis between the bats and the Learys. We owned the property, but were willing to allow the bats to live on it. In return they would kill all the mosquitoes so that we could sometimes eat our supper outside. We lived under the misconception that there was a mutually understood, unwritten treatise clearly defiining the boundaries of our territories. The bats got the whole outside. The only place off-limits to them was the inside of our house. We knew that bats sometimes carry rabies, but what we didn’t know was that up close, the bat’s creepiness quotient is off the charts, and, like a terrorist, he doesn’t set much store by boundaries. He rules through fear and intimidation and travels about with the smug knowledge that he can go anywhere he damn well pleases. And he does.

NEXT: Bats: Part Two, starring Denis Leary

I just received an email reminding me that I promised another chapter in the Bats vs Learys saga. I meant to do a Part Two to this, but then couldn’t make up my mind which bat invasion I should write about next. I’m a little embarrassed that we have such a wealth of bat stories. We just went through a long period where we kept forgetting to close the chimney flue. If you’re new to country living, please take my advice and never leave the chimney flue open in the summertime. The first time we did this, we were in a rented house. It was before we moved up here full-time and were not so wise about the wild things that fly and crawl and slither into Connecticut country houses at all hours. Our children were very young – maybe three and five years old, and our friends Ted and Amanda Demme were visiting for the weekend. Long story short – I left the flue open and after dinner we saw something fluttering around the living room.

“I wonder what that is,” Denis said cheerfully. Then the thing came fluttering into the dining room, aiming straight for Denis’s head and all hell broke loose. The rapid-fire tragic-comic stunt sequence that followed included (but was not limited to) Denis trampling our children, Denis using the most foul language imaginable in front of our children and Denis nearly knocking the very pregnant Amanda down a flight of stairs.

It occurred to me during those frantic moments, that until that night, I had never seen Denis genuinely afraid. During our years in the city, his courage had certainly been put to the test. There was the night, for example, when I woke up with the spine-chilling suspicion that there was another person in the apartment. I poked Denis awake and he grabbed a baseball bat and searched each room, tapping the thick of the bat against his palm. Another time an agitated homeless crack-addict guy approached us on the street and Denis assuaged him with a cigarette. His bravery was most admirably on display when our building became infested with mice and he would walk ahead of me into the kitchen, while I clung to him, my face buried in his back, whining, “Do you see any? Do you see any?” I had watched Denis stand up to Harvey Weinstein, out-curse a frenzied cabby, walk past gangs from the nearby housing projects without lowering his eyes and once when a snarling pit-bull came barreling toward us in the park, Denis, who loves dogs, began slapping his thigh, and before I knew it, he and the dog were playfully rolling around on the ground together. What I didn’t know then, was that every man has something that makes his blood run cold. For Humphrey Bogart in “The African Queen” is was leeches. For Denis, it’s bats.

Next: Bats vs Learys Part III - The Final Reckoning

Remember when I was saying how much I love the country? Well, I take it all back. I want to live in a building. A building in a city with lots of other people in it. And no wild animals.

This is how my day began:

My dogs woke me up at 4:30 a.m, just as they have every morning this week, because there was a raccoon in our garbage. I decided to let Daphne chase the raccoon away. But did it run away? No, It climbed up our house and then stared at me with such pleading, terrified eyes, that I called off Daphne and was tempted to pack it a little "to-go" bag of garbage.

Now it's 11:00 at night and I’m typing this in my bed with my sweatshirt hood pulled over my head. I’ve pulled the drawstrings of the hood so tight that I’m left with nothing but a tiny hole to peer out of. Why? Because this just flew past my head:

Okay, well is was actually almost an hour ago, and it wasn't a vampire bat, but still – it was a bat, in my house, flying past my head. It flew a mission of terror through our house, provoking much hysteria and panic. It whizzed past my daughter's head and she did what anybody would do in her position - she snatched up a rug from the floor, placed it on her head, and then she screamed and ran in circles. My son, being 6'5", felt like an easy target so he assumed a squatting position and sped across the living room in a most comical crab-walk, bellowing about rabies. I chose to cling to my son, who, even squatting, is taller than me so I felt that he was a sort of human shield (I know, my maternal instincts could use some work). Finally we decided to flee the house and we sat in my car, huddled together like three terrified, twitching rabbits. I'm usually brave about wildlife but I have a history with bats so I was freaking out. We left the door to the house open and from the car we watched the bat put on a show that was clearly meant to shock and awe. First it swooped back and forth through our living room, our dogs chasing it and leaping at it. Then it landed on our floor and staggered around, dragging it's disgusting form across our rug with its winged feet. For some reason, when it did this the dogs stopped chasing it. In fact, they backed away from it and then began looking for us. Finally the bat found his way outside. But we're still worried he might have a friend or two hanging around. I mean literally hanging around (I'm afraid to look at my ceiling for fear of seeing one.)

I spent the weekend in Marblehead signing books and catching up with old friends. I also met a “medium” who talks to dead people, which gave me some fodder for the book I'm working on.

There were numerous shipwrecks and pirates and witches in Marblehead's early history, so of course there are lots of ghost stories, as pirates and witches aren’t much for keeping a low-profile in the afterlife, but instead enjoy shrieking at boats at night and, and casting lights on old cemeteries and chasing people up and down stairs. This medium, whose name is Maria, sees ghosts everywhere, all the time, and is very casual about the whole thing. I told her that we have a ghost in our house in Connecticut, and that everybody sees and feels her fabulous other-worldly presence, except for me. Denis sees this ghost all the time. I'm really annoyed by this because I like to think of myself as a very sensitive person, but I have never noticed this ghost. Even our dog Lulu can see her, it seems. She (Lulu) stares at the exact corner of our living room, where Denis tells me he always sees this gray lady pass by, and she growls and raises her hackles in a very suspicious manner (Lulu, not the ghost). When Lulu does this, I always run over to the corner, hoping to feel a chill or a draft or the hair rise on the back of my neck, or something, but apparently I'm too obtuse. It makes me feel, I don't know, rejected ... snubbed by the supernatural.

Anyway, as I was reviewing Marblehead history, I came across the story of the “Old Spite House” which was built on Orne Street in the 1700s.

According to Wikipedia, "In 1716, Thomas Wood, a sail maker, built a home in Marblehead, Massachusetts that subsequently received the sobriquet of The Old Spite House. One theory has it that it was inhabited by two brothers who occupied different sections, wouldn't speak to each other, and refused in spite to sell to the other.[6] In another explanation for the presently occupied, ten-foot (3 m) wide home that is just tall enough to block the view of two other houses on Orne Street, the builder was upset about his tiny share of his father's estate and his revenge was a house to spite his older brothers' views. The Old Spite House still is standing and occupied."

There are a number of "spite houses," in this country, I learned this afternoon. My personal favorite is the Richardson Spite House that was built on Lexington Avenue between 82nd and 83rd Streets in 1882. Click on the link, go ahead, it's a great story.

I love to be scared, but if you don't, I advise you not to click on this video. I found this ages ago on youtube. I was looking for "ghost" videos." One thing I learned when I moved up here from New York, is that EVERYBODY believes in ghost, and many have seen them in their own homes. In New York, you can ask just about anybody if they believe in ghosts and they'll likely laugh at you. Here in CT, you can ask anybody, no matter how learned or intelligent; you can ask a nuclearphysicist if he believes in ghosts and he'll tell you about the one that strides through his hallway every night at exactly eleven. I've mentioned before that we have a ghost in our house that everybody can see or "sense" but me, which really irks me because I like to think of myself as very sensitive and not quite of this world, myself. Denis sees our ghost regularly and describes her clothing and everything, even the way she moves. I am snubbed by this entity. She won't reveal herself to me, and that hurts a little.

So one night I wondered if I could get Denis to videotape our ghost and then I went on youtube to see if anybody has ever successfully taped a ghost. I saw some hilarious hoaxes, and then came across this, which scared me.

I think this video has been around the block a few times so I apologize if you've already seen it.

For more than a decade, the Learys have pursued patient and honorable efforts to defend ourselves against our enemies - The Mice - without war. In those years we have used various nonviolent efforts to reinforce our boundaries, while sending clear and indisputable signals that we will not tolerate their threats of invasion. These efforts have included completely reinforcing our basement walls and packing steel wool into every hole we could find, no matter how small. These nonviolent efforts to disable the rodent forces have failed again and again - because we are not dealing with a peaceful, God-fearing species. We are dealing with vermin.

Our boundaries are very clear. The mice get the whole outdoors. The only areas off limits to them are the indoors of our house and barn, both of which are the indisputable territory of the Learys. Our rights to this territory are spelled out in a document that we hold sacred. A document know as the Title of Ownership that proclaims the house to be under exclusive ownership of the Learys (and our allies, Wachovia Bank).

We never provoked the mice, but on the occasion that a renegade ran under our stove, it would be killed in a trap. This was meant to be a deterrent. We never attacked ALL the mice. We never tried to topple their entire empire.

Unfortunately, intelligence gathered this week has proven to us, beyond any doubt, that the Mice are intent upon destroying the Learys as a people. It was brought to our attention that heat hasn't been working in the kids' bedrooms and our furnace is only a couple of years old. So we called in an elite heating squad. After the specialist examined the furnace, he was debriefed. This man has served honorably in his field for many years, but he was visibly shaken. The mice had chewed through cables attached to the control panel on the furnace. The result was that they allowed a small amount of gas to leak. In addition they had shorted out the power switch so the thing kept trying to ignite every few minutes, sending off little sparks, right into this little stream of gas! The mice almost blew up our house.

In addition, the mice have been covertly engaged in germ warfare for months. They enter our kitchen under the stealth of night and plant little hanta-virus laden bombs in the form of their droppings, all over our kitchen.

The danger is clear: using biological or explosive weapons, the mice/terrorists could someday achieve their aim and destroy all Learys.

I will not divulge our tactics here, as I don't want to compromise our intelligence. Although we appreciate all efforts to support our objective of eradicating the mice, we will not tolerate vigilantism. Reports that a mouse was slain and then placed on my bed last night are true. We are confident that we know the perpetrator of this lawless and reckless act and she will be reprimanded.

My fellow Learys, the dangers to our home and our way of life will be overcome. We will pass through this time of peril and carry on the work of peace (and defending things that some of us wrote and which were printed out of context in tabloids). We will defend our freedom. And we will prevail.

.

HAUNTED HOUSES
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

All houses wherein men have lived and died
Are haunted houses. Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
With feet that make no sound upon the floors.

We meet them at the door-way, on the stair,
Along the passages they come and go,
Impalpable impressions on the air,
A sense of something moving to and fro.

There are more guests at table, than the hosts
Invited; the illuminated hall
Is thronged with quiet, inoffensive ghosts,
As silent as the pictures on the wall.

The stranger at my fireside cannot see
The forms I see, nor hear the sounds I hear;
He but perceives what is; while unto me
All that has been is visible and clear.

We have no title-deeds to house or lands;
Owners and occupants of earlier dates
From graves forgotten stretch their dusty hands,
And hold in mortmain still their old estates.

The spirit-world around this world of sense
Floats like an atmosphere, and everywhere
Wafts through these earthly mists and vapors dense
A vital breath of more ethereal air.

Our little lives are kept in equipoise
By opposite attractions and desires;
The struggle of the instinct that enjoys,
And the more noble instinct that aspires.

These perturbations, this perpetual jar
Of earthly wants and aspirations high,
Come from the influence of an unseen star,
An undiscovered planet in our sky.

And as the moon from some dark gate of cloud
Throws o'er the sea a floating bridge of light,
Across whose trembling planks our fancies crowd
Into the realm of mystery and night,--

So from the world of spirits there descends
A bridge of light, connecting it with this,
O'er whose unsteady floor, that sways and bends,
Wander our thoughts above the dark abyss.