gothic ramblings.

there is darkness and drama in every nook of the world, if you look hard and long enough

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Don't stand next to a parked car at night. You never know what might be taking shelter underneath.

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Window into a late July farm

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You take a walk through the cemetery at night, dressed in black and stepping quietly only because you are paranoid. It's past curfew. Better to seem more like a shadow than a person. Blending in may save you from being seen by prying human eyes, but it cannot protect you from the true shadows. You are in the company of the dead and the dead-adjacent. When the wind stills, when the creatures hold their breath, when shapes darker than night pace at the edge of the woods, don't be surprised. Don't be surprised when you hear a clattering from inside a sealed mausoleum. Don't be surprised when the air becomes harder to swallow, when the sound of your heart in your chest is the only sign of life that remains. This is not your home. They know it.

[ansiamericana]

🎆 4th of July gothic 🎇

On the 4th of July, you can't help but feel sorry for the ghosts of the civil war. They must be so confused and frightened to see these hills filled with gunpowder again.

The main drag is empty and dark. Windows are shut tight against the sticky heat, but the paint peels away and the wood decays and the heat gets in regardless. You turn down a side street and the noises get louder, and in the distance dim halos appear in the sky like the spots of color that dance inside your eyelids when you blink. The further you go, the brighter it gets, until you're on a country road and surrounded by light. The city sleeps while the poor blow their money into heaven.

You take a walk down an empty highway, grass growing up through cracks in the asphalt. You walk on the wrong side of the road to make sure that you know when someone's coming. Not too far off, the sounds of trucks and dirt bikes echo between the trees, and you can never be too careful on a night like this. The sun is almost fully set, and you finger the knife in your pocket. You side step down a grassy hill off the side of the road and sit at the bottom, a soy field spreading out before you. Lightning bugs rise from it to greet you, but their glow is soon overtaken by the myriad of colors in the sky, kaleidoscopic portals opening and closing. You lean back and enjoy the show.

Drunken men throw their hands up and cry freedom into the firecrackers. Somewhere in the dark, there's a man lighting another cigarette with his shaky hands and trying to ignore the things these sounds remind him of. He's not allowed to be unhappy today. This is an annual ritual, and their nation is their God.

Between the croaking of tree frogs and the desperation of a cricket, between the muffled laughter and the engines revving and the blanks shot into the air, you think you hear breathing. It's closer than it should be. Why did you come out here all alone? The moon was supposed to be bright tonight, but now you cannot find it, and the sporadic explosions above you only disorient you further. A twig snaps somewhere just out of sight. Why are you alone?

[ansiamericana]

Sliding over the hills and into the valley is as easy as letting the current of the river carry you away. Getting out is not so simple. The hills stretch themselves up and out, as far as the eye can see. The valley is safe, they whisper. The valley protects you. Stay. Stay.

[ansiamericana]

Your relatives have a cookout in your backyard. Of course they do. They always expect you to provide for them at the drop of a hat. And of course, they drink into the night, laughing under the light of tiki torches while you pick up after them. When they've finally all gone, and the torches burned out, the air is suffocating in it's silence. The sky is pitch-dark, and melts into the earth in an indistinguishable wall of black. There are no creatures making noise. You hear the wind in the trees, but cannot see it. You need to put the coolers away, take the food inside, fold up the chairs and the card tables. You think you know your backyard well enough that you don't need a flashlight. But when you bend down to pluck an empty beer can from the grass, you hear a rustling just inches from your fingertips. Something waiting- for what, you don't know. Your chest tightens and you draw your hand back. Maybe you were wrong.

[ansiamericana]

A form walks across the ground, crunching dry leaves with every heavy step. It stops outside the window. You cannot see it. You can only see the sliver of sky that is visible overtop of the curtains, and it is that shadowy, desaturated blue-violet of encroaching night. The last motorcycle to ride through town can still be heard from a distance, and when it finally fades there is only the cawing of birds and an occasional pitchy yowl echoing between the trees. The last car is locked, the last door slammed shut. All life is gone from the dark and static suburban streets. All except the thing that you know is still there, lingering in the silence. All except the thing outside your window.

It is still there.

It is waiting.

[ansiamericana]

Sometimes, you just need to walk. To see, to explore, to propel yourself forward for no reason other than that you can. But walking alone is not always wise. Sometimes a short trip turns into a winding journey. Sometimes the grass is taller than you remember, and the sun sets faster then it should. Blurry cars speed too close to you for comfort as you balance on the edges of narrow roads. Strange lights shine out from the windows of empty apartment buildings. Sometimes, you should really bring a friend along.

[ansiamericana]

...and in the static there were waves, like a true ocean, and one couldn't help but wonder if there were creatures lurking in the depths of this one, too.

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Thurber House, Columbus, Ohio.

Resident artists and volunteers often claim that the building is haunted. Whether by the spirits of the Thurber family, the restless soul of a previous resident who died an accidental death, or the tortured victims of a deadly penitentiary fire on the same grounds where the house now stands, maybe it's true.

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Grandpa's Cheesebarn, an Ohio staple. No roadtrip is complete without a stop here to wander through the shelves stacked with jams, mustards, pickles, candies, and all the free cheese samples you can stomach.

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are you walking? are you driving? is someone driving you? whatever the case may be, the circumstance remains the same: you are lost. you took one too many turns and now you are wandering through a nightmarish suburbia, every house the same, every family within their walls the same. the sun is almost gone below the horizon. the constant glow of the christmas lights is a reminder of the conformity you're running from.

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there it is!

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air hangs in the bare tree limbs like dust settling between the ribs of your ancestors.

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Historic schoolhouse, Morgan County, Ohio. Stumbled upon this on a short roadtrip, apparently it's still in use today for educational purposes and local charity events which is why it's so well maintained.

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Everything you've heard is true.

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It is three days before Halloween, and you are trying to fall asleep when you hear it. A woman's scream. It isn't long and drawn out, or pitchy and exaggerated; it's short and sudden, a burst of terror silenced as quickly as it came. The sound triggers something primal in you that you weren't aware you had. Your hair is standing on end. You won't be sleeping tonight.