By the pricking of my jackknife...

A sad tale's best for winter. I have one
Of sprites and goblins.
–Mamillius, The Winters Take II.1


Halloween has passed, (or Samhain), but between now and New Years seems to feel the most haunted; there are a lot of holidays revolving around the undead and spirits walking about… I mean on Christmas eve, people used to leave food out for their departed relatives. Actually, it’s not until after Halloween that the spirit world holidays really get going.
So it set me to thinking… and remembering. I’ve known people who’ve had encounters with the other world, and some are pretty damn impressive. I wouldn’t rate my own as anything too extra ordinary- only in that it happened to me, so I can vouch for it personally. So here’s my contribution to this time of eerie holidays, here at the waning of the year:

It was during a college production of The Threepenny Opera, that the two incidents occurred- but probably not related. I was playing Mac the Knife, and was young and full of energy and brave knowledge. I loved Theatre and theatre lore, and never failed to miss an opportunity to shock, or entertain. Now, while not completely comfortable with my singing abilities, I was full sure of my status as a “seasoned” performer, who was not afraid to test some old superstitions; even dare them, as it were. So during a pre-show warm up, I shocked a few of my fellow cast-mates by uttering the un-utterable: “Macbeth” I said, out loud and on stage. They gasped. I proceeded to educated them as to the history of why it was really considered bad luck, and that it actually wasn’t the most bloody play Shakespeare wrote, and blah, blah blah… proving to them that nothing would come of this by concluding: “Macbeth, Macbeth, Macbeth, Macbeth, Macbeth, and Macbeth.” So there. Nothing happened. At that point.

During the show that night, two things happened: The yellow gloves (Mac is usually famous for wearing white gloves, but our translation had them as yellow) I wore disappeared. Not a huge issue, but in such an impeccably run dressing room as we had, it was strange- nothing important had just disappeared prior, and to this date, I have never lost a costume piece before; they are as much a part of me as my limbs. It would be easier to loose my head than a costume piece- but, the gloves were gone and a spare pair had to be found.
Later, near the end of the show, when I was chained up in prison, one of the manacles just dropped off my wrist. They had been made to open quickly, but not by themselves. After all the tests, all the rehearsals, the few shows before, never had they just dropped off.
Nothing too bad. No one got hurt, no one died. Each of these things could easily have been explained…

The second incident, was very brief. I was waiting in the wings, watching one of the scenes before I was to enter, when out of the corner of my eye, I saw the girl who played Polly Peachum come stand next to me. This surprised me, because she usually entered from the other side, and appeared to be wearing her white wedding dress from an earlier scene (the white dress was what caught my attention in the dark backstage). I turned to ask her why she was in the wrong costume… and of coarse; there was no one there. I was alone.

A year later, I am walking to my car, after some show, or rehearsal. The parking lot was pretty much empty, and myself and a couple cast-mates were the only group around. I had just entered the parking lot, when there on the ground, were the original pair of yellow gloves that had been lost a year ago. The couple people I was with had also been in the show and had known about eh gloves disappearing… we stood there for a bit, in silence. Then I picked up the gloves and have never said Macbeth on stage again. Not for fear of any curse, or magic… but out of respect for the one or two theatre spirits out there who do believe in the superstition.