Storyteller offers thrills and chills

For one chilling Saturday evening, Poppies Gourmet Garden Market hosted a Lamplight Ghost Story Dinner to set the tone for the Halloween season, featuring the inspired storytelling of Susan Strauss, from Bend.

Guests seated themselves in the outdoor garden patio, surrounded by crackling firepits and a galaxy of tin lanterns, glowing mason jars and luminarias. Hay bales and benches covered with horse blankets and sleeping bags formed an intimate gathering spot as the candles flickered and the air grew still.

Kelsey Collins, of Sisters, sipped white wine and prepped herself for the noctural entertainment.

"I think Poppies is one of the most innovative places to open here and I want to support any of its activities and happenings," she said. "I came prepared to wrap my arms around myself tonight."

The event was also part birthday celebration for Wolftree, Inc., the local ecological research and restoration foundation. Earlier, guests were treated to a sneak preview of Executive Director Dale Waddell's new 14-minute film chronicling the life of a nesting pair of golden eagles and their two offspring in Whychus Creek Canyon. The eagles and their babies were featured on Wolftree's Web "Eagle-Cam," and the images shared around the world.

After the plates were cleared and friends settled in, Poppies owner Janet Zuelke introduced the black-shawled performer to a captivated crowd.

"I am so happy Susan is here with us tonight. This is my absolute favorite thing to do in the whole wide world, listening to scary stories," she said.

Strauss presented a chilling lineup of spooky stories and fables from Eastern Europe and Native American traditions. Illuminated by the candles and firelight, she delivered a story of magical red imps found in village sugar sacks, a tale of an old stone-skinned witch in the Blue Ridge Mountains who dispatched her victims with a long spear-like finger, and a Scottish ghost yarn about a sprightly tailor hired to sew a costume at a ruined churchyard for a castle lord. Unhinged by the appearance of a malevolent phantom, the tailor worked on through the midnight hour, casting off all fear to reap the offered prize of gold.

"I started storytelling in 1979 when I came out west from Virginia to work for a traveling outdoor school in Portland," said Strauss. "I replaced the Native American culture teacher and discovered a little Nez Perce tale about Coyote the Trickster and fell in love with these stories. That sense of oral tradition attracted me and I just followed it with my heart and it all evolved from there."

Nine-year-old Gabe Koiishe sat huddled in a down jacket with his family and pet basset hound named "Glady."

"I like the thrill of hearing creepy things in the darkness," he said, pulling a blanket up closer to his face. "It's fun."