I was living above a coffee shop on the corner of 20th and Sansom. It was right in the heart of center city at a time before the trend towards gentrification and renewal had really taken hold. The city's suit and tie yuppies of the business district tensely coexisted with a fearless populous of homeless people by day. At night the street people aggressively made their presence known by harassing the nervous suburbanites and Jersey weekend amateurs who flood into trendy Ritenhouse clubs and restaurants only blocks away. I encountered the Sansom Street Witch three times in my life, but each time made a more and more intense impression on me.The first time I encountered her was outside a busy Wawa at the end of my block. The 24 hour connivence store was a major hub for the homeless. Sometimes I would have to run a gauntlet of 5 or 6 of them. They were emboldened by their numbers, demanding change and spitting out insults if declined. I was taking a girl out for dinner and we decided to stop off to use the ATM. The streets were packed and right outside the Wawa there seemed to be a pedestrian traffic jam. As we shuffled through the crowd almost single file, I discovered the source of the slowage. It was the Sansom Street Witch in all of her glory. When I think of the phrase "old crone." I picture her. She must have been in her late sixties, early seventies. She had a gnarled street worn face and long thick ratty locks of untamed gray hair hanging all the way down her back. She was strangely overweight for someone who clearly lived on the street. She was sitting on a manhole cover with legs crossed, wrapped in dirty blankets. The steam from the manhole was blowing up into her face and her greasy hair danced in the air out in front of her like she was controlling dark magic. She was rocking back and forth with one hand extended out to her side, middle finger reaching to flip off everyone that walked to her right while she blankly stared forward. She was giving the bird to everyone and no one, like she was in a meditative trance. She was such a shocking sight to behold that the pedestrians were literally jumping into the street in order to avoid any vicinity of her. The girl I was with seemed to lack everyone else's common sense and saw a chance to do her good deed.
"Oh you poor thing." she said to the Witch and dropped a handful of coins into the old woman's lap.
With out changing her forward gaze the Witch responded by screaming "Fuck your whore face!" grabbed the change in her lap and violently flung it into the street. My date reeled in horror and I protectively nudged her into the door of the Wawa. As I pushed through the door I looked back. The
Witch had stood up and was pointing at me.
"Fuck your whore face! I see your fuck face I see it now!" she screeched.
When we came out she was gone.
The second time I saw her was about a month later. I was laying in my shitty little studio apartment reading and I heard a commotion outside. It was late on a weekday night and the streets were empty. There was a shrill screeching coming from down the block. It slowly got louder. "Fuck you all mother fuckers, You're all going to die." the voice echoed through the buildings over and over like a chant. I looked out my window but my view was constrained to the building in front of me and the sidewalk across the street. Now the voice was loud, as if the violent prophetic curses were coming from inside my third story apartment. After a couple of minutes I couldn't stand my limited view and I forced the screen up and popped my head out to reconnoiter the source of the madness. And I saw her. Standing on my corner was the Sansom Street Witch. Her hair was braided into two long thick grey pig tails that draped over her huge saggy breasts and she was wearing a filthy knit cap with a big fuzzy red ball on top. The basic get up should have been cute, but looked more like a filthy menacing mockery of the trendy young girls that would go clubbing down the street. She was down there with both middle fingers extended. Letting the whole neighborhood know the end was near. But just after I focused in on her, she focused in on me. I was spotted. Again she pointed at me. "I see you! It's your turn soon. I see you you're going to die." she wailed and I flung myself out of sight, literally diving to the floor. I was frozen with fear. She continued to scream insults up at me for another minute. Then it went quiet. I waited two long minutes of silence before edging my head over the window to peer out and see if...
She was still there.
Standing quietly staring up at my window. I bobbed my head back down with my heart jackhammering through my chest bone. I reassured myself that there were three locked doors between myself and the witch. I actually pondered the security of my windows imagining her ability to scale or float up the wall. After another couple minutes of silence and courage building I popped my head out for a peek. She was gone.
It took me another month of Witch free living before I let my guard down. So of course that's when I had my final brush with her. I was working a shitty office job and they had called me in to work on Sunday to catch up on some paper work. I stumbled down the stairs of my building still half asleep and hung over at 7 in the morning. At that time on a weekend my neighborhood was truly a ghost town. I lumbered outside fiddling with my keys. As I slid the key into the lock of the the outside door I felt it. That feeling you get when you know you are being watched. I turned my head to my left and there was the Sansom Street Witch. She was standing two feet from me with her back stealthily pressed against the building. Her arm was outstretched, violently flipping me off with all of her might. There was a two second stunned pause and then
in shock I said,"seriously?"
Then I flung myself back as I dodged the first of her punches. She began flailing herself at me screaming "I know you! I know who you are! I see you!" While she continued to swing at me with her right, she grabbed her shirt with her left and yanked it up to her chin. Her huge floppy old woman breasts came bouncing out at me with anger and I literally bound backwards down the street avoiding her scary fist and tits like I was in a bad kung fu comedy. Then she just stopped. She pulled her shirt down with a look of satisfaction, turned and walked away. I watched her casually march down the middle of the street without a person on foot or in car to witness or verify this surreal assault.
I never saw her again, but for the rest of my time on that block, I never stopped looking over my shoulder for the Sansom Street Witch.
My Company
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