Chapter 1
HAPPY HALLOWEEN GRISELDA
In the beginning, Griselda looked like a grouchy old witch and she acted like one too. Her wrinkly skin, tangled hair, and scraggly teeth were green. Her skirt, cape, and pointed hat were black. She looked old enough to be your great-great grandmother, but she was shorter than most grownups. She wasn't really wicked but she wasn't nice either. She liked to play mean tricks on people and scare them.
Griselda lived alone in a cottage in the woods. She had no friends, not even a black cat to keep her company. She spent most of her time working on her magic spells, like the ones for making her broom fly and do work around the house, and the ones that made chairs, tables, and other things come alive.
For food, she ate mostly worms, bats wings, lizard's feet - things like that. No wonder she was so bad tempered. Actually, Griselda liked this kind of food, because it's all she had ever eaten, except for candy. Griselda loved candy more than anything else.
Griselda didn't usually have much to do with people. That's because her cottage was in the darkest part of the woods, which was thick with trees and thorny brambles. Anyone who wandered in by accident didn't stay around for long.
Griselda would make the wind howl, and the trees shake and moan. She would make the branches reach out and tickle the poor person's neck. And if that wasn't enough to send her victim running, the sound of her cackling voice as she stirred her cauldron always was.
One day, Griselda decided she needed a break from her spells. "This is getting boring," she thought. "I need some exercise and some adventure."
She hopped on her broomstick and flew out over the woods. It was thrilling to be out for a ride in the chilly, darkening afternoon. The wind rushed through her hair and snapped at her skirt. Griselda raced along for some time swooping in and out of the clouds. By the time she tired of this she discovered that she was flying over a small city.
"This is where people live," she thought. She had never seen a city before. It was very crowded. The houses were tall and the yards were small. Dipping down for a better view, she saw a sign that read, "Welcome to Somerville - A good place to live and work."
"Well, my work is scaring people," Griselda chuckled to herself. "I'd be pleased to scare the people of Somerville."
Griselda continued to fly over the city looking for the best place to do her mischief. The playgrounds and the ball fields were empty. A few people were going in and out of stores but mostly they were driving in their cars.
It was beginning to get dark and a big yellow moon was rising in the sky when Griselda noticed some people walking below. "This looks like a good place," she thought.
Griselda swooped down onto a street, called Ossipee Road. There she saw some people, even shorter than herself, dressed in strange costumes and carrying large bags. They were dressed as clowns, pirates, gypsies, ghosts, and even witches. But she could tell that they weren't real witches. Griselda didn't realize it but it was Halloween.
Griselda walked up to a child dressed as a clown, held up her claw like fingers, and said in her scariest witchy voice, "Ha, ha, ha, I am a witch."
To Griselda's surprise, the little clown didn't cry or run away. "That's a great costume," she said. "You look just like a real witch."
"But I am a real witch," Griselda protested. But the clown was already walking away, and did not pay any attention to her. That made Griselda angry.
She tried scaring another child dressed as a cowboy. "Boo!" she shouted at him. And to make herself extra scary she flew up into the air a few feet and puffed out her cape.
The cowboy looked startled for a moment but then he saw what happened to Griselda. Her cape had gotten caught in a tree branch and she couldn't get down. She looked so ridiculous with her arms waving and her legs dangling, that the he just laughed and walked away.
Griselda ripped her cape getting out of the tree. She couldn't understand why she wasn't having any luck frightening anyone. She was just about to fly away when she noticed what the children were doing. They were going up to people's houses, ringing the door bells, and singing out, "Trick or treat!" And then the most wonderful thing would happen. People in the houses would open their doors and drop candy into the children's bags.
Well, Griselda, who loved candy even more than scaring people, thought that this was her lucky day. She walked right up to a house, along with a group of children, and sang out "Trick or treat" with them.
The man at the door gave candy to all the children. But when he looked at Griselda, with her great great grandmother face, he said, "Aren't you rather old for trick or treating?" and shut the door without giving her anything. This made Griselda even angrier than before.
Griselda tried trick or treating several more times, but at each house she got the same response. No one would give her any candy. Now Griselda was so furious that she was fuming. She got on her broomstick and flew straight home.
But while Griselda was flying home, she got a mean idea. She might not be able to scare the children. The grown-ups might not give her any candy. But she could take the candy. Then all the children would be sad and she would have a mountain of glorious candy to eat. Griselda chuckled gleefully to herself as she thought of this nasty plan.
The next day, Griselda flew back to Ossipee Road. When all the children were at school and the parents were at work, she sneaked into the houses and stole the candy. By the time she was through, she had so much candy that she could barely carry it, and her broomstick bent under its weight.
Griselda licked her lips in anticipation of the tasty supper she would have that night and for many breakfasts, lunches, and suppers to come. "No more bats wings and lizards feet for me," she thought with delight.
Griselda knew that it was important to have a well balanced diet. But she thought this meant that she should eat different kinds of candy at each meal.
So for supper Griselda had a lollipop, two candy bars, three marshmallows, four caramels, and whole handful of candy corns. She had red and black licorice for bed time snack.
The next day she woke up and eagerly jumped out of bed. She stuffed herself with candy all day long.
The next morning when Griselda woke up, she didn't jump out of bed. She felt just awful and she looked awful too. Naturally she had a stomachache, and her naturally green face was even greener than usual.
Griselda didn't eat any breakfast and stayed in bed until lunch time. When she finally staggered out of bed, she still couldn't eat. Even worse was that being sick made her magic work funny. She could barely fly her broom straight and her magic spells didn't work at all. Not even the ones she tried for making herself feel better. So she decided to see a doctor.
Griselda had never been to a doctor before, but she got on her broomstick and flew back to Somerville. She couldn't find a witch doctor but Dr. Morton, a family doctor said he would see her.
"You don't look well," Dr. Morton said when he examined her. "Your face is green."
"Of course it's green," snapped Griselda. "But usually it's light green."
"What have you been eating lately," Dr. Morton asked. When Griselda told him about the candy, he was horrified. "No wonder you're sick," he told her. "Is this what you always eat?" Griselda told him about the worms, bat wings, and lizard's feet.
"Griselda, if you want to get better, you have to stop eating candy and those other witch foods." Dr. Morton said.
"No candy!" Griselda wailed. "Not even for bedtime snack?"
"Not even for bedtime snack," he said.
"What kind of food can I eat then," she asked sulkily.
"Nutritious foods," he answered. "Like meat, fish, and peanut butter. Milk, cheese, and yogurt. Bread and cereal. Fruits and vegetables. And eggs."
"I've never eaten anything like that before," Griselda said. "I don't think I'm going to like it."
"Well, don't give up before you've tried", Doctor Morton advised her. "Once you start feeling better you can have a little ice-cream, cake, or cookies for a special treat. But make sure you've eaten the nutritious foods first and STAY AWAY FROM CANDY. Here's a shopping list to take to the supermarket. Call me if you don't feel better soon."
Griselda found a supermarket and went inside. Everything looked so strange to her, she was sure it would taste awful. But she was determined to give the nutritious food a try, even though the thought of it made her very grouchy. People stared at her as she passed them, grumbling to herself and throwing food into her cart.
"Ugh," she said, picking up a shiny red apple. "No worms in it."
"People eat this stuff?" she said looking at a juicy tomato. She hurled it into the cart and it splattered all over everything.
"I wouldn't feed this to a cat," she said, picking through the heads of lettuce, but she finally chose one with a bug in it.
And on she went like this until she had filled her cart.
She followed the other shoppers into the checkout line. When it was her turn to put her food on the counter, she looked up at the check out girl and snapped rudely, "You call this a food store? I looked all over the place and couldn't find any lizards."
It was the poor girl's first day on her after-school job. She took one look at Griselda's nasty green face and turned pale. She was so frightened she couldn't even ring up the order in the cash register. "I'll take my food now," Griselda snapped, and she left without even paying. Then she opened her mouth wide, and cackled wildly. She was pleased that she could still scare people.
When she got home, she looked at all the strange new foods with disgust and wondered if she could really eat them. She had already begun to feel better and she looked longingly at the bag of candy and peeked inside.
"Maybe one candy bar won't hurt," she told herself. She chose a nice chocolate one and peeled off the wrapper. But when she took a bite she began to feel dizzy. She sat down hard on the floor. This was really serious, she thought. Maybe the doctor was right after all. Maybe she really would never be able to eat candy again.
When she began to feel better, she got up and looked at the groceries again. "Be brave," she told herself as she reached for the eggs.
Griselda took an egg out of the box, looked at it suspiciously, shut her eyes, and took a bite. "Yuck," she said as the drippy egg ran down her arm. She didn't know that she was supposed to cook it first.
"Too messy," she thought. "I think I'll try something else."
Next, Griselda took an apple. "Ouch," she said as she bit into it." It tasted good but hurt her teeth. "This isn't any good either."
Next she tried some peanut butter. She stuck her fingers in the jar and licked them off. "Not bad," she thought as she reached for the bread to wipe up her messy fingers. It tasted even better with the bread, but still her mouth was all sticky, so she drank some milk. She liked the milk, too.
Griselda was glad that she liked some of the food, but she didn't like the way her teeth hurt from eating the apple. "I'd better see a dentist," she thought.
The next day, Griselda flew back to Somerville, and found a dentist named Dr. Glover to look at her teeth.
"Good Heavens," Dr. Glover said, when she looked into Griselda's mouth. "Your teeth are green. Don't you ever brush them?"
"No, what's that?" asked Griselda.
Dr. Glover gave her a tooth brush and a tube of tooth paste and showed her how to brush after every meal. Careful of her long fangs, she cleaned each tooth. To their surprise, Griselda's teeth were actually white.
"Griselda, this is not good," Dr. Glover frowned. "You have a cavity in every tooth in your mouth. It's going to take me a long time to fill all these holes. Tell me, what kind of food do you usually eat?"
Griselda told her about the candy and about the worms, bat wings, and lizard's feet.
"Griselda, if you want to have healthy teeth, you're going to have to eat nutritious food." Dr. Glover said. "And that means no more candy."
"No more candy?" Griselda said sadly. "Not even for a special treat?"
"Not even for a special treat," said Doctor Glover. "And if you do eat any other sweets, remember to brush afterwards."
"That's what Doctor Morton told me," Griselda said. "I like most of the foods he told me to eat except for the eggs. They're too messy."
Doctor Glover asked her about the eggs and figured out that Griselda didn't cook them. "Some foods have to be cooked before you eat them," she explained. Go to the library and take out some cook books if you want to learn how. Here is a recipe for eggs. Try them this way, and use a fork, and they won't be messy at all."
Griselda left the dentist's office and went straight to the library. "Where are the cookbooks?" she demanded in a loud voice. Everyone stared at her, and the librarian rushed over to help.
The librarian was a little nervous about having a loud green witch in the library. But she was always eager to share her love of books with anyone who came in.
"We have many cook books. What kind would you like," she whispered, hoping Griselda would take the hint and lower her voice. And she showed Griselda a whole shelf full of them.
"I want one with nutritious foods in it," Griselda answered, not quietly, but not as loudly as before.
The librarian helped her chose a book and showed her how to take it out. "Remember, you have to bring it back next week," she said.
"I do, do I?" Griselda demanded. She was tired of having people tell her what to do.
"If you bring it back on time, we'll let you take out another one," the librarian explained, a little timidly.
"All right then," Griselda said. "Maybe I will."
Griselda was so eager to begin trying the new recipes that she read the cook book while she was flying home and almost got lost. She tried scrambled eggs and was surprised at how delicious they were. The next day she tried some of the simpler recipes from the cook book. She made pancakes for breakfast, hamburgers for lunch, and tuna noodle casserole for supper. By the end of the week, she was making the more difficult recipes, like crepes and baking her own bread.
"These nutritious foods are pretty good," she thought. "You'd never guess it to look at them though."
But don't think that just because Griselda liked the nutritious food that it was easy for her to stop eating candy. On the contrary, she wanted candy so much that every time she went into the kitchen she would open up the bag of Halloween candy just to smell it. If it weren't for the fact that even this made her a little dizzy, she certainly would have eaten some.
One day she couldn't stand it any more and she turned all the candy into a flock of geese. The geese flew away, honking noisily as Griselda waved tearfully good-bye. But it was a relief not to have the temptation so near. To make herself feel better she made some chocolate ice-cream. She cheered up when she discovered that it was just as good as candy.
At the end of the week, Griselda went back to the library to get another cook book. She was pleased with the way the librarian jumped up to help her so she didn't bother people too much.
But when she went to the supermarket the manager met her at the door and wouldn't let her in. Griselda glared at him and thought about turning him into a frog or a worm, but something made her stop. She didn't realize it, but all the nutritious food had begun to make her a little less nasty. "Humph," she said and walked away. She decided never go back to the supermarket again.
When Griselda got home she experimented with her magic spells to find a way to get food without going to the supermarket. Soon she figured out a way to take one egg that she had left over from last week and make a dozen more. She even was able to make a half a pound of Chinese mushrooms, starting off with nothing but one regular mushroom and a picture from a cookbook. Within a few hours she had created a whole week's worth of groceries in her kitchen.
Eating nutritious foods changed Griselda's life quite a bit. She never got stomachaches anymore and her teeth didn't hurt. Now, instead of making nasty potions and brews she used her magic spells only to make new food or help chop and mix them. Although she wasn't what you would call a friendly witch, she wasn't so grouchy anymore either.
But one thing that Griselda couldn't do was give up all her old witch foods completely. Every once in a while, she would allow herself a special treat of them, but they never made her sick. Maybe it was because now she cooked them with the nutritious foods, creating daring new recipes like worms with spaghetti and meatballs and Bat Wings Hawaiian.
"This is the life," she thought one day as she munched on some barbecued chicken with garden slugs. "I'll never want anything more than this."
