Figure 1 – A water tank with shades of the ritual of Chud, IPhone photograph, Wilmington, MA.

Yesterday I was out walking and came upon the water tank of Figure1. It is industry-proper orange.  It may even be that traditional triplumbic tetroxide, or red lead, finish that we used to see on park benches. It immediately reminded me of the outlet from the Derry sewer system in Stephan King’s novel “It,” wherein the creature Chud dwells. Chud is a giant evil spider that lives(?) underground, It can only be be defeated by the Ritual of Chud. This scary fellow harkens back to two classical horror fantasy elements: the arachnid character Mordred in J. R. R. Tolkein’s “The Lord of the Rings” and H. P. Lovecraft’s “Cthulhu Mythos of dark evil creatures beneath the Earth”

I offer all of this ominous foreboding from a lunchtime stroll and a simple IPhone photograph. But the great power of Stephan King as a horror writer lies in his realization that you do not have to be in Transylvania to be bitten by a vampire. They are all around us, even at McDonald’s.