Just rereading this post & saw Kat's song, must've missed it the first time, with the line
"Maybe your great, great grandmother was one"
Funny my great grandmother was a witch. She lived in Italy before coming here to the states where she had given birth to her last kid, my grandmother. My Grandmother & her brother both would never discuss their mother, at least not in front of me when confronted be my mother or one of her siblings, when it came to her odd doings but my mother & some of her siblings do & swear that she was a very powerful woman that helped out others when they came to her in need when no one else could or would help them (I often wondered that she sounded more like something out of the Godfather than the Great Grandmother). It was said (by the family elders & their friends) that in her village she was the one sent for & called by all the women during child birth so that any evil cast upon the child could be removed. As far as I've ever heard my Great Grandmother only did healing, except once when my Grandmother testified against one of her brothers. She cursed my Grandmother & I'm told that my grandmother paid dearly, costing her the same pain of being seperated from one of her own children (which did happen). Maybe the beliefs skip a generation, I've met many of my mothers friends that say she's a healer too but like my Grandmother & Granduncle I don't give it much consideration but I have seen her do some unexplainable strange things. Come to think of it my sister was a bit strange too at times when she was younger, she could always sense where spirits of those that departed tragically were lingering. But we're all a bit strange, aren't we??

Barry