Treasure, alien life, and ghosts

[mount_oregano]

I know of two supposed sunken treasures of gold in Wisconsin, one in Lake Michigan and one in Lake Mendota, both dating back to the Civil War. I’ve researched the one in Lake Michigan and even have the treasure map which locates the gold near Poverty Island Shoal at the tip of Door Peninsula, but I haven’t decided to go hunt for it. I don’t think these treasures exist.

What interests me is why these stories stay alive. Lies are common as leaves in a forest, so why keep certain ones?

First, there’s a simple wish for sudden wealth, the motive force behind lotteries.

Second, legends often say that treasures, buried or sunken, are guarded by leprechauns, mermaids, or at least a curse — by beings alien and magic to our existence. It’s a wish for a livelier universe. In the same way, some of us hope for life on Mars or Andromeda, which would also be a real treasure.

Third, it’s a wish to preserve and honor the past by keeping stories alive. Ghosts work the same way. I met a woman whose neighbors told her the troubled presence she noticed on the stairway of the house she’d just bought was of a teenager who had committed suicide some 50 years earlier because he was gay. She hung a gay pride poster in the stairway to soothe him, and it seemed to work.

Most importantly, treasure is real. Sometimes — at Troy and in the Caribbean — gold is found, and then our wishes are confirmed. I can see Mars at night, and I might be watching Martians. If there are ghosts, I have visited haunted houses. When I lived in Milwaukee, someone else in that city named Susan Burke (not me) won the Supercash lottery. Riches await, if we keep searching.

X marks the spot.