I know very little about witches. I doubt that I have ever met one, although as a kid I had questions about a shriveled old woman who lived in a shack across the street that I and my friends only knew as Annie Gator. We would sneakily gather at her window at night to watch her in the glow of a candle as she fussed with thread and needle to repair her shawl.

Oh, there was also my arithmetic teacher, Mrs. Lenz, an assertive woman who would come to my desk, aiming an index finger at me and sternly demanded, […]