Thelma Marsh Powers

Thelma was born at Grassy, she won't say when. She met her husband one midnight at a seance in a Baptist church cemetery deep in the pines. She told me a story of how, as a little girl, she spent an entire weekend covered in black mud that had rained from the sky. Thelma came to see my show down by the lighthouse, on a street by the beach, hoping to see her portrait. I gave her five copies to share with her son and daughters. She left happy, holding her gifts. Back at her bungalow she tore a small piece from the corner of a print, passed her hand over it three times, repeating some words of gibberish, ...and then burned it. She took the ashes outside and blew softly over her palm until they lifted airborne. At that moment, miles away, a sudden updraft pulled a bag from my booth and sailed it across the break-wall and over the beach, searching for some chosen soul. The charmed bag floated down and landed at the feet of a man walking the sand. Picking it up, he headed directly my way and traversed the sturdy stone wall. I watched him holding the bag in his fist as he approached. "Oh! I love Grassy Sound" he said as he caught sight of my booth, "I wish you had the originals." And I did. He chose one and paid for it. Cash, ...a fair and respectable compensation which kept me in supplies for quite some time. Back at Grassy, Thelma waited. When I arrived she asked how I had done. She smiled a self-satisfied smile when I gave her the news. It was many years later when I found out what had actually transpired.

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