Several year ago, I was walking in March along a gravel road that led to the ocean in Rhode Island. A very old and thin woman came hobbling down a driveway toward me. I waved and continued walking, but as I passed, she grabbed my arm, turned around and began to pull me in the direction of her house. I instantly thought of the witch in Hansel and Gretel, and tried to pull back, but that only made her clutch tighter around my wrist. Besides, she didn't cackle, so I relented.

She didn't say a word, in fact, until we approached her house: a shingle-style cottage with green shutters and a front lawn erupting everywhere in purple crocuses. She released me there, throwing her arms up in the air and shouting, "Look at this splendor! Isn't it a miracle?!"

— Dawna Markova, Giving Thanks by M. J. Ryan