Anybody out there remember Dark Shadows? I have a distinct memory of coming home from kindergarten, sitting down in front of the TV, and watching that show while my mom fixed me a hot dog. Fried in butter. With the butter drizzled on top afterward. It was the 1960s, after all.

I can’t quite believe it.

If I were parent to a five-year-old daughter—which I’m not—I would not under any circumstances let her watch that show. It has vampires! Ghosts! Even a female Phoenix!

But then, I was child number 6. And my mother told me once I was a very adamant child. Anything to keep the peace, I suppose.

There has to be a connection between that show, my love of vampires, and my fear of ghosts.

Hell, this show is scaring me now. Just imagine what it would do to a five-year-old.

The mystery of whether I really did watch it that young has only one solution.

I’m going to write a poem about it.

I’ve enrolled in a poetry workshop called “Writing in Your Life” on October 11 at the Tivoli in Denver. It’s given by Dorianne Laux, a poet I’ve known of for years but never read. I’m hoping to find a book of hers at the Tattered Cover today.

One of the assignments is to bring to class an “object that holds deep abiding significance for you, something that has a story you need to tell buried within it.”

So I’ll show up to class with a DVD set and a distinct but improbable memory, one of the few I have from that age, and see what I can make of it.

I don’t know yet how I’ll begin the poem, but I figure that information will rise to the surface. That’s how a poem usually comes to me, like a current rising up in a lake.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a lot of DVDs to watch.