The bad witch

Genre: Wickan reflection
Inspiration: Unskilled labour

Selena was an awful witch. Not "bad" in the classical sense - she'd had an aunt who would willingly and without remorse of any kind permanently transform small children into forest critters; She was just really poor at being a witch. Factors beyond her control made her inordinately compassionate for instance... compassion as every witch knew was the downfall of even the most talented spell-caster. As an example, she'd once made a new years resolution to fill every house on a city block knee-high with filthy dust, but upon reflection decided that no one in the vicinity could possibly have that many vacuum cleaner bags at their disposal. Also, she wasn't particularly articulate having had a mumbling problem since childhood. The art in a spell after all is not simply in intention, but as it turns out, involves a hefty component of elocution. An unfortunate lazy tongue had just two months earlier caused her to falter on a spell intended to lite a fire in her hearth and instead, fired a ballistic missile from a major nuclear installation in Siberia. Her only saving grace was that in 1973, a Russian officer with a sense of humour had aimed the missile squarely at a small Atol in the Pacific which had, only 6 months ago lost favour with all western nations by decreeing their sole proprietorship of Antarctica and demanded from the UN compensation for all past explorations - the coincidence seemed divine, and no one in particular missed the 37 inhabitants of Rutitonga.

While many in the Wiccan community considered depression the debilitating affliction of mere mortals, Selena knew better. Too ashamed to see a speech therapist, and too sensitive for the requisite infliction of torment on mortals, she turned her complete attentions to conjuring up a generic cauldron of Zoloft to tide her over until her miserable demise, just 837 years hence (if the most recent statistics issued by the Ministry of Witchdom were to be believed). The gruelling process, of re-engineering the formula was tedious, due in large part to a complete lack of direction from her ancestors or peers; the fact that the big drug companies didn't publish their formulas was a source of further depression. Cursing the "Women in Witching Labourers Union" for their 1856 withdrawal of witch drug benefits, she continued to experiment with the various ingredients she knew to be integral components of all Pfizer drugs - Squirrels intestine, Dragon Sperm, Fish knuckle etc...

The irony of her efforts was that in her success she found destitution. For the brief but blissful 47 hours that she was able to enjoy her generic Zoloft (as it turns out it was almost 100% Dragon Sperm with a only a dab of Zippo lighter fluid) she was truly happy, but it was short lived. The lawsuit Pfizer unleashed was worse than the fire and brimstone she was capable of conjuring (but to kind to do so) and her life possessions were stripped from her. With no broom, no cauldron and no hearth for cooking To-child-ofu (her Tofu substitute for small children) she was destitute - aimlessly walking the hills and dales in desperate longing for the day that generic dragon sperm would flood the shelves at the local witch cooperative.