Bottle Spells

Lafayette, Louisiana, September 3rd, 2004 :

Among the soda bottles and lost basketballs floating down the Vermilion River, there are things much odder and mysterious.

The Vermilion River could be called a one-way hoodoo highway.

Over the years, more than four dozen ordinary, little brown plastic prescription bottles have been found in the murky water — each filled with blue or pink powder and strange, rambling spells meticulously written on scraps of paper.

Paul LaHaye, the watershed projects manager with the Bayou Vermilion District, oversees the collection of tons of debris pulled from the river each year.

Each time one of the brown bottles surfaces, LaHaye dries out the contents and places them in a plastic baggy or cardboard box labeled “Voodoo,” that sits in his office.

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