There is a very old woman at a produce stand on a corner in Clearwater. She has the look of a gypsy. Her skin shows the ware of many years and she moves very slowly. Nevertheless, she has many stories if you have time to listen. An old house sits just behind the stand. One day I started talking with the old woman about her house. It is one of those hacienda type houses. She told me the woman who first owned it moved here from Paris, that it took two ships to bring all her antiques, that this woman had married her chauffeur but alas, the woman never made it from Paris. The chauffeur would leave her furs lying out around the house but they never lived together after she had gone back to Paris. I went back the other day and she told me more. At first she told me all this happened in 1926, when the house was built.

The weeks that followed got weird. For one thing I started reading the history Clearwater library had about that period. It seems that 1926 was a boom period for Pinellas. I read old newspapers covering that era and found great ideas for characters for my story. Then one night while listening to the Royal Family’s story on PBS I was confronted again with what was going on in 1926. I had already associated Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald with the woman from Paris when I started a story. Eerily, in the following, weeks the year 1926 kept coming up.

I have not been working on the story the past few days. Some bazaar things had started happening. First, while I was writing, I created this character in my head. She started talking to me. (Not really but you know) She said things like don’t talk to anymore locals I can tell you all you need to know. She said that if I did not listen she would return to the dreams of the old dying people now living all over Pinellas County. They needed her comfort more than I and if I would not listen to her …well she was gone.

Ok this was not so bad…but then as I was reading about the history of that down town Clearwater area, there was an old Inn and someone owned it named Verona. My voice’s name was Vera. Saturday the old lady at the produce stand said that she herself had a name that began with a V…. Her father had insisted on all of his children having names that began with V. I don’t know it was just another coincidence I guess. It made me want to keep working on my story.

Also, I was sitting on the sofa starring out the window mentally seeking inspiration. Condensation was all over the window. Right next to the door handle there was an imprint of a face and a white arrow pointing to the side of the building. Later I walked to the side of the building where three palm trees with a huge rock between them stood on a mound in the middle of what used to be a pond. Upon closer examination it was not a rock but a huge chunk of shells. This land had belonged to the Harn Family. On a third visit to the produce stand the old lady said Lester Harn had a feed store and embarked on another tale I’ll save til later.

I superstitiously put this incident together with the pictures I had taken of my fountain. When developed there were images of faces in the stucco wall and behind the plants…. Just as clear as clear could be …and you can understand why I laid off the voice stuff in my head for a few days and Vera telling me about three women who lived here in 1926. I mean really. Maybe it’s the herb tea.

I will just read, I told myself, I would just research the history. In my research I stumbled upon Carrusoga or Deland, Florida. These are two other Florida towns were a group of spiritualist moved between 1900 and 1930. Their story was very interesting. I have been lead to them for some reason …I think. Or at least I could make them part of my Clearwater Saga.

Further reading brought me to Scientology, the cult that has Clearwater captive. They believe that your Theton (soul source or force) can be cleared of as many as 3000 years of spirits…or identities…and that is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to their strange beliefs…I have been reading about them for years. They too seem to be spiritualist of some sort. This could be part of my story. The old lady at the produce stand said that one of the scientologists has been visiting her every morning. Mike and I joke about how they walk around zombiefied. We are always pointing at them saying there’s another one. Mike caught one of them looking at herself in a window. We conclude that this is not allowed because they all walk around with these fixed expressions looking forward and not making eye contact with anyone.