Under The Scholar Tree-Historical Fiction

-Written for a final project For history Class-Historical Fiction Piece as the 'lost last chapter' of the fabulous work of nonfiction, Wild Swans. I didn't ever write historical fiction, but I've been trying it lately and it has been an interesting experience. This is FAR from my typical piece of writing.-
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29. Under The Scholar Tree
(1985)

She ushers me under the scholar tree and motions for me to sit. She is a small woman, her hair is loose and greying but well cared for. She reminds me vaguely of my grandmother and her religious brushing of her hair. I smile politely and sit down. May follows suit, sitting besides me. She looks out of place with her  dirty blond hair and blue eyes. I breath in deeply. I never expected to be back here. The teahouse is under the embrace of a tall canopy of trees, low wooden square tables are placed around, bamboo chairs that give off a sweet aroma. 


It's 1985 and I am back in Sichuan, visiting with a British friend. By now, I have embraced London, made my home there. London  confused and scared me at first. I remember being lost in the train systems, unable to understand common English expressions, bewildered by the sea of English faces and signs all around me.  Though my English was strong, nothing prepares you for the actual experience of being in an English speaking country. My scant experiences with the sailors in China had barely prepared me for fluent conversations. My thirst for knowledge has by no means  been sated by my new life. I continued to read incessantly. I still fondly page through Little Woman, the first book I ever read in English. My ability to read English had benefited me greatly in China, and would continue to help me improve my English in London. The more I read, the more my English improved. I would sometimes read lines in books out loud, when alone, pretending I was the one engaged in the conversation: 


 “I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine!” (Pride and Prejudice.)


And so I have made my home there though sometimes I feel I left my heart in China. China is becoming very different from when I moved,  stains completely erased. The teahouses have opened back up, the standards of living have improved.  Slowly the taint of the past is vanishing. As I look around, the people seem more at ease, I even catch a few smiles. This is quite different from the China I left. 
 
 I too am different. England has given me a chance at freedom untasted in China. Comfort and leisure is no longer something that I have to mentally convince myself is morally wrong. When I first moved there  and had moments to myself, moments to sit, I  almost had a physical aversion to it. Mao had taught us that we must always be trying to work to build a better China. This was the purpose of our lives, and now my purpose was altered. I've come to love stolen moments of leisure like this, though I've never  quite been able to shake the feeling that they are indeed stolen. 
 
 Simple things have become extremely important to me. For example I have developed an extreme love of flowers. I remember ripping them out in Sichuan, tearing out the roots, dirt caked beneath my fingers. Mao urged us to rip out any plant life that could be deemed 'bourgeoise.” Now, I can't help but smile every time I see a patch of especially beautiful flowers. I sit under the scholar tree and take in the lush green shade of its pods, the moment to sit underneath it and simply breath. 

 But I've kept many things inside, blocking out many memories. I don't want to confront my past. In China we had all learned how to be actors and actresses, hoping to play our cards right. I remember when Mao died and those around me sobbed hysterically. I still wonder how many of those tears were real, how convincing my own acting had been.  Tears are left unshed.

 But now I am in this little Sichuan teahouse. May makes a few comments on how charming the atmosphere is. We make polite conversation as the woman begins to fill our cups with a kettle from two feet away, steaming jasmine tea.   I stare at the steam dancing in front of me in white wisps.  An old man is playing 'majiang', Chinese chess. I stare at him closely, as if looking at a ghost.


He smiles at me, revealing an almost toothless grin. 
“You play?” He asks
“No.” I reply truthfully.


 I may have once, but tea houses were banned along with chess during the Cultural Revolution. If I ever knew, I've forgotten how. I avert my eyes. I told May that this visit might be hard for me. 
The last time that I was here was in 1966 and I wasn't ordering tea. I remember being with the other students as they had yelled “Leave this bourgeoise place!!” to the customers, the old men playing chess. I remember my shock at how these elders were treated, my refuse to act with such aggression. But gentleness was  considered bourgeoise along with teahouses and chess. And yet here I am in the teahouse again, the epitome of 'bourgeoise.' Those sitting in a teahouse drinking tea, chatting and playing chess are not out making revolution, they aren't out building a stronger China. 
I look down at my clothing, a simple black dress and patent leather shoes. The last time I was here I was a teenager dressed in trousers, covered in patches to look 'proletarian.” My hair hangs loose around my face, the last time I was here it was in two plaits, not a hair out of place. Soon it would be cut off by my grandmother, never to be adorned with silk flowers by her again. 
The old man playing chess addresses me again. “Would you like to learn?”
“Maijiang?”
“Yes..your friend too?” May nods at me encouragingly.

The old man gives me an eager look, taking a puff from his long stemmed pipe over a plate of nuts and melon seeds. I am elated by this simple fact..I am really truly in the very same teahouse that so many years ago I pasted slogans on the walls of.  I feel a wave of guilt, remembering asking a man quite like the man in front of me if he would go home.


My face must have given me away my troubled thoughts.
“Miss, are you alright?” Croaks the old man
“I'm fine..It's just..when I was younger myself and many other students, we invaded this tea house. We..we closed this place down. We were young..we..”
I feel May take my hand and squeeze it firmly for reassurance.
The man takes another puff at his pipe. He nods“Then you never got a chance to learn how to play Maijang, did you?”
I grin, widely. “No, I guess I never did.”
I take a sip of the jasmine tea, savoring its pungent flavor, feeling a cloud of steam against my face as I tip my cup towards my mouth. I place the cup and saucer down, careful not to burn my fingers. I grin again and sit down next to the old man.
He begins to point each of the characters, the elephant, the soldier etc. May is enraptured, I can tell she is taking in every instruction, rapt. I listen, politely. But my head is elsewhere. I think of when when Lin Bao called for everything that represented old culture to be destroyed.
All around me people are drinking tea and playing chess. A waiter is shuffling around the bamboo seats pouring hot water from a kettle, which he pours from feet away. His aim is accurate and pinpointed, hot water tumbling into the pale yellow tea cups. 
This is one of the happiest moments of my life, I decide. For who are we without our culture? Who are we without our teahouses, our libraries, our chess games and old men?
“You ready?” He asks.
I nod. 


I am a wonderful Maijong player.












Notes-
Jung Chang would not begin to write Wild Swans for two more years. Her mother visited her in London and told her the stories of her and her grandmother (as stated in epilogue). She would then reconcile with her past and begin to write Wild Swans. This fictional scene happens two years before this, as the 'lost chapter.” Jung Chang did in fact invade a teahouse in her youth , a scene she describes in her bool. And in 1985 she revisited it with an English friend, after it had re-opened. The book  Wild Swans makes the briefest of mentions to this visit, simply stating that she revisited it and it was the one of the happiest days of her life. I chose to imagine her scene at the teahouse and explore some of the thoughts she must have been thinking about the scene at hand and her experiences in London. I imagine what a shock it must have been to suddenly be in London, like discovering a new world. Jung Chang says that she chose to avoid thinking about the China she had left behind. However, her past would continue to catch up with her. I wrote this scene imagining how it would be like to reconnect with her past in ways that had been once deemed illegal by the Cultural Revolution.The Cultural Revolution was all about  'out with the old, in with the new.”  However, I believe that without our pasts we have no definition of our present. I believe Jung  Chang would say the same, leaving an amazing legacy in the form of  Wild Swans.

We'll Meet Again

 -When I grow up I want to be an old person.It is amazing how much of life..doesn't need any fiction added to it.-

We visited him today. He had lost weight and his skin was wrinkled  and pulled across his bones. His long gaunt hands were colored with purple veins. His eyes were bright, a cover of fog touching them. He was in the hospital, contained by white walls and smooth tile. He clutched a red pen in his hand, a note book of drawings at his side. When we walked in I clasped his old hand and he called us his family. He showed us paintings he was turning into place mats, still a business man with his gears turning. He said he went broke but he's turned out all right. He always says that. We always laugh. 

I told him that every morning when I wake up, in the room he used to sleep in the first thing I see is his painting of the birds and the sea. He told me those birds could be any bird I wanted them to be. They are. Sometimes I call them my silly geese, other days they are my swans. When he signed his name on that painting he added a little flag to the sail boat. I remember that every morning..what use is a boat without a proper sail? He's no different today.

He tells us about World War Two and his little white cap. He says everyone steals money. Everyone is a thief. But I know he loves them anyways. He talks about Carlos, who recently choked on his own vomit and died. He talks about how drunk Carlos could get. But when I think of Carlos, I think of the way he smiled shyly and always forgot my dog's name. He told me he had a dog once. The way Carlos said it, I know that dog was much more than a dog. I miss that old drunk with his greasy hair.

Sometimes I feel like I'm grasping at time, desperate to save these moments....because if I don't who will? He says no one calls and we write our number on a whiteboard and we ask if they'll let him hang his paintings on the wall. He says today the nurse said he could now. But his best painting is him. Every story is stretched across his forehead and his fingers are long like paintbrushes.

Last time I saw him, he demanded to know if the kids at school know how beautiful I am. I smiled.  But does he know how beautiful he looks to me right now? I wish I could bottle each of his queer funny sentences, his stories, and hang them from the ceiling of my room. When we leave he begins to sing in his croaky voice

"We'll meet again..

We join in, out of tune, smiling, filling the white hospital with loud flat notes..
"Don't know where, don't know when, but I know we'll meet again some sunny day."
See you then, Peter.

Bird Bones

Every time you close your eyes
what do you see?
Catch the moon and the sun
but too weak to see between the two
Sometime I feel inadequate like paper dolls
in a paper world
scissors through my white confidence
I don't bleed 
I just find the wind and sweep myself away into it
And I wonder if I seem too tongue tied around you
breaking into me
and all my mache walls
because I'm paper thin and waste deep
two steps forward and I'm your sinking sand
did I tell you I write because it's the only thing I'm true to?
the only thing I find myself as how
I want to be
I am
I will be
and I was
they said make your face delicate with bird bones
and I tried
But now i'm stuck with the feathers growing from my thoughts, hummingbird heart beat
and no where to fly
or maybe too many clouds to perch, but afraid of leaving my roost
Graffitied heart with pencil shavings between my nails
I'm a space cadet with a bad case of head dreams
and a broken image of skewed memories
I want them to write on my head stone 'She is Love'
not she was
but she is
But instead my life stone says 'she is a scatterbrained chatter bird with a mousy soul'
if you read my palm, you wouldn't see a fortune
just the pattern of a little girl with wide eyes and sheered hair, staring up at you
without the smallest clue of what she is doing, looking at you

                       ~Lady Of Bolinas~

Ode To My Dear Friend, Trouble.

-listening to Lenka's song  Trouble Is A Friend Of Mine..and voila..Trouble wanted me to write a story about my relationship with the imp.-


Trouble is a friend of mine. We first met at a young age. He was freckled, with sharp green eyes, an imp with long feet and even longer hands, which he never washed. I've found over time he has many forms, though. He recommended I steal marshmallows and feed them to my young brother.His logic was "You aren't allowed to eat them, but who said you can't feed them to your little brother?" No one. Once, Trouble told me to throw a banana at my mother. He was always imaginative like that.  To this day,Trouble convinces me to stay up late,till I rub my eyes and my eyelids threaten to peel off my face in the morning.


But the most annoying thing about Trouble is the fact that he makes me so mad at myself. I've never been a rebellious, radical child. But Trouble distracts me when I am supposed to be working and makes me forget simple things. Trouble convinces me that I have more time to waste then I do. His absolute favorite thing to do,  is hide my common sense from me. After that, he hides my lipgloss and logic from me. He tends to hide them in the nearest sock drawer (when he hasn't fed all my socks to a washing machine).


Trouble dropped my phone once and cracked it. He has a history of this. He also dropped my favorite book in the bathtub,a prior phone in the toilet and multiple favorite pieces of jewelry. This impertinent imp also rips up paper, loses assignments and stains my shirts when I'm not paying attention.  One of his proudest achievements is pouring bleach into a load of my favorite clothing. He is also quite proud of the time he put salt in my baking rather then sugar, while blowing up an entire tea kettle of hot cocoa. He even managed to make the hot cocoa explode all the way across the kitchen.


 Trouble is very skilled. I wouldn't suggest otherwise. The time he locked me out of my house, which was for sure unlocked ten seconds before, will attest to this.  This is not to mention how he likes to treat me to parental lectures on a weekly basis. 


And we seem to be inseparable. I should say that I don't like him very much. My record would say otherwise. Why just today he turned my alarm clock off and laughed as I had to get dressed and run to the bus in less than five minutes. He keeps me on my toes, if nothing else. He sat next to me on the bus and purposely dimmed the sun, so I couldn't study my math. He followed this up by hiding my gym shorts and stealing the lock for my locker. Sometimes I wonder if he is a magician. It would certainly seemed so today, when he ruined all the erasers on my pencils and blew my history papers onto the floor, without moving a muscle. 


Trouble, is a close friend of mine. Now, if you'll excuse me, he seems to be currently feeding papers the wrong way  into my printer.. ...

Show. Don't tell.

~ prose poetry attack..again!~

Show. Don't tell .

Here's the thing.

They say "Show. Don't tell." But isn't everything written on my sleeve, bleeding out from my heart? Maybe we all ought to tell a bit more. This whole showing thing is starting to drain me. I've shown this and I've done that, but in the end I've barely told anything. 

I'll show you how I feel about them, how I feel about you. You can read my face and the cracks in my skin. Feel free to watch me show you how to mess up and trip over one's own feet. I'll show you how to cry over nothing, how to get confused by the voices in your own head. I'll show you how to care so much your veins pop and your eyes bulge. I'll show you jittery nerves and perspiration on my brow. I'll show you every little paranoid quirk in me. I can walk up and down stairs with no purpose, just so my blood keeps pumping and I remember how to breath. It's perfectly acceptable to watch me raise my hand and bite my lip, waiting for the teacher to call on me. I tap my feet with nervous energy and burn it off by flipping my hair like a manic hair stylist. I will breath heavily so that you ask me what I'm thinking. When you don't I will sigh like a lonely hound dog. I won't howl at the moon but I will sing underneath it. That way  you know what a once sane person morphing into a night lunatic looks like. I will show you everything. Every layer of my rainbow skin and red blood, blue within.

But I wish I could tell you more, so I didn't have to make it all so painfully obvious. If I knew how to tell more, speak out better, then you could have a better sense of me without me falling over my feet and scraping my knees. I could tell you about blood, rather than you seeing the crimson dripping from my knees. But it seems I'm doing better with this showing, though not what I want you to see. I don't want to be the know-it-all with her nose in the air. Is that what I'm showing? I'm not the sure, steadfast door with wooden frames. But they said show, don't tell. 

I'm botching it all.

I'd tell you about the way the sun kisses the ocean and the birds sing to the trees. I want to tell you about the way I laugh in my head at every single strange thing you say. I'll tell you about the dreams I have, that clutter my eyes and are scattered through my bedroom.

But instead I'm stuck showing you how I can answer every question and still get it all wrong.

I Steal Words-Prose Poetry

-YAY FOR PROSE-Y POETRY!-

I collect words. I keep them in my pockets, smashed against my textbooks, in little golden cages, stuck to the bottom of my muddy boots. I drape them around trees and put them in glass bottles. I pick them up along the beach and steal them from people's mouths. I pluck them out of the wind and sweep them into dustpans. I sleep with words crumpled inside my hands and pressed against my closed eyelids. I step on words and hear them crackle satisfyingly beneath my feet. I throw them against walls and suck their meaning dry. I bake and broil them, candy and pickle them. I ramble and rant, toying at words with catlike menace. 

I devour words,smothering them in half formed ideas with a side of confusion. I bath them in delusions and scrub them till they glow. I keep them on leashes and drag them on long walks, pulling them through the dirt and mud of my mind. When they howl, I scold them and prod them with pens and pencils. I iron out their wrinkles for hours and hang them out to dry on rainy days. I cradle them till they fall asleep and steal their secrets one by one. I analyze and hypothesize about them, muttering like a mad scientist about their inner cores. I put them under microscope and strip them bare. I paint them bizarre colors and drop them in house paint. I rub them across my skin and absorb them in. I collect words

But when I need them most...

I can never find a single one

But then again....

maybe they find me

The Story Peddler

-For all of you who have wondered where stories REALLY come from-

He started like this "People always ask me where I get my ideas. They ask how I can phrase my sentences so. They ask where I find my characters."

We nodded, we wondered this as well.

He continued. "It's very simple. But it starts, as all things do, with a story. A story about me, because the stories about me are the best, you know." He winked.

 ~~

He walked silently, the rain washing away the sound of his footsteps and most of his thoughts. He pulled his jacket against his thin frame and shivered. His mousy blond hair was matted against his skull, wet and dripping and he didn't bother to open his umbrella. He loved the feeling of the rain pouring onto him, caressing his exposed face and skin. He walked with the awkward gait of a young boy, growing into his skin. His bright green eyes darted around aimlessly, taking in everything and processing barely anything. His book bag was slung across his shoulder, bulging and burdensome. He had one goal: get home and dry off.

He didn't notice the man at the end of the sidewalk, sitting on the wet sidewalk with a patchwork umbrella over him, so tattered that it served barely any purpose as an umbrella. The man was wearing an old faded top hat and he wore a bright orange tuxedo. A variety of luggage and strange items were laid out in front of him. The boy  kept walking, lugging his book bag around, unsuccessfully trying to flip a wet string of hair out of his face. He collided into the man. He caught himself from falling and began to profusely apologize, blushing bright red. The man stood up and looked at him intently in the eye.

"No harm done."

"I'M SO SORRY, SIR.I DIDN'T SEE YOU! I AM SO.."

"Oh, shush your blabbering boy!" the man grunted.

The boy's lip quivered. "I'm sorry! I wasn't trying to blabber. You see I just feel really.."

"Do you have any stories, boy?" The man interrupted.

"Any what?!"

"Any stories!"

"I'm not sure what you mean, Sir.."

"Then obviously you don't have any. I'm a story peddler, you see."

"A what?"

"I buy, sell and trade stories, of course. Sometimes school children have the best whoppers and characters, so I buy 'em off them."

"I don't really understand. How can one sell stories? Like books?"

"No. How do you think people write books? They need to buy a story or an idea, first. Right? You can't write a proper book without one, now can you?"

"So you sell people..plots and such?"

"Exactly! Why I sold Shakespeare half of his stuff. He was one of my best customers! You know Stephen King?"

"Yes?" The boy said, scratching his nose

The man grinned and proudly declared "You are looking at his main source!"

The boys eyes widened. "You sell stories? Like really truly, real authors buy things from you for their books?"

"Well yes. Bad authors and amateurs buy them too. But my stories are hard to handle and they end up killing a lot of 'em. A real shame, but business is business."

The boy looked at him in awe, still perplexed "Can I buy a story?!"

The man chuckled. "Well if I have anything you can afford, sure. But you will have to start with a tamer one. Nothing experimental or crazy or steamy. Youngins like you gotta' start simple. Understand?"

The boy nodded, excitedly. "Do you have anything about pirates?!"

"I might." He began to check through one of his overly large pockets and pulled out a small jar. "This should do."

"It's empty!"

"Well you think I would just let anyone see my prime merchandise right off the bat?!" The man said scornfully, his multiple wrinkles very visible. "If you buy it, when you get home you can see it!"

"Oh... How much?"

"A dream."

"How do I give you a dream?"

"You tell me a dream of yours. Keep in mind, nothing really big. And then I take it and put in in meh pocket! Got it?"

The boy gave him a strange look. "What's the story about?"

"Lord have mercy..what's the story about? It's about pirates!"

"What about them?"

"It's about a pirate named Will Ferdinand who.."

"That's a dumb name!"

"WELL NO ONE ASKED YOU! Look boy, if you aren't interested I can go sell it  to Cornelia Funke or J.K Rowling!"

The boy sighed. "Fine. I'll give you one of my dreams. I just say it?”

The man nodded and wiped some rain out of his eyelashes

The boy shivered and spoke “ Here's my dream. I want to fly."

The man clucked. "Well that wasn't a small dream, but fine. Here is your story!"

The boy felt his stomach make a strange grumbling noise and he coughed loudly. He heard a whoosh in his ears. "What was that?!!"

The man rolled his eyes and pushed some of his gray hair out of his eyes. "Your dream leaving you of course. Here is your story! Now better get out of the rain before you catch a cold." He tossed the open mouthed boy the jar.

The boy caught it his hands and looked at it. He lifted his eyes to the man to realize..he was gone. The boy blinked over and over again. The man was just gone! He walked away slowly, glancing back at where the man had been. Finally, totally confused he began to run home. His heart was beating loudly and he could hear his feet slam against the pavement as he ran. He reached his home, ignored him mom and ran up to his room. He locked the door and stared at the jar. It was still empty. He opened it slowly. He looked inside. It was still empty. He became frantic. THERE WAS NOTHING! Then he became angry. He felt cheated. There was nothing in the jar. He sat on his bed and kicked the air.

The End

We looked at him, confused. "WHAT? Wait..there was nothing? WHAT? So you buy your stories?!"

He laughed. "Of course not. I fill that jar."

"What?!"

"The jar was empty. And I was so mad. I felt cheated and used. I had given away a dream for absolutely nothing. But then I realized how silly it was. It was silly to think that I could buy a story for a novel about pirates from some old man. He sold me another story."

"What other story?"

"The one I just told you. He gave me that story. It's not everyday one get's a story like that. And when I looked back into my jar I could swear I could see little words in it. So I wrote that story down, and another one grew out of it. The more I put into the jar, the more that comes out. That's where I get my stories." We looked at him like he was insane. "That makes no sense!"

"I know!" he laughed. He kept laughing

That's a dumb story!”we roared

“You want another one?” he asked

“YES!” we demanded

“Well it will cost you a dream, then.”

He winked.

Everything

"I don't know how I feel about it."
"About what?"
"About everything!"
"Define Everything"
"Everything is that moment when you can see a glimpse of your entire future in someone's eyes. Everything is when you spill milk on your favorite dress, right before school and you think 'I'm going to be a failure.' Everything is that smile that that random stranger gives you and you have to catch your breath, because it was a beautiful smile. Everything is making wishes on dandelions and blushing because your  wishes are ridiculous. Everything is when your legs are so sore that you walk like a bowlegged cowboy. Everything is lying under the stars thinking about the littlest things and pondering the biggest questions. Everything is when you want to touch some ones hair because it looks like it was weaved from moonbeams, but you don't because they will stare. Everything is when you scream so hard your lungs burst into a million emotions and your cheeks turn the colors of cherry tomatoes. Everything is talking to you and knowing exactly what I'm saying, and if I say it long enough that I will arrive at some answer. Everything is ripping petals off a flower. Everything is putting your hands in your hair and breathing deeply, hoping your heart doesn't shatter and reveal everything it hides. Everything is dancing in the rain, jumping in mud puddles and throwing paper at a wastebasket and missing. Everything is that girl yelling at you to leave for no reason at all. Everything is fake assumptions and false gossip. Everything is your brother hugging you so hard you can't breath and tousling his hair because he's getting too old. Everything is getting word drunk and losing yourself in prose. Everything is late nights where you can't sleep and your thoughts stray like lost dogs and bite at leashes. Everything is inside jokes and memories yet to be made. Everything is the sunset, pregnant with light and color. Everything is the sound of laughter, the taste of chamomile tea, the stench of sulfur, the rhythm of your heart in time with your soul. That's everything."
"So you're confused about..."
"Everything!"
"Which is.."
"Life."

Don't Call Me Sir

-No I have no idea what this is, but if you like Harry..comment!-


    The Mailmen waves and drives away. He's driving way too fast. His head is probably liable to fall off at the rate he is going. Not my problem. He's a good looking man, despite his sort of unfortunate ears. Not saying he looks like Dumbo, but he may be a distant cousin. He's approaching that stage in middle age where the guys get all ugly and weight starts to fluctuate. I feel bad for the wives then.I never had a wife to watch it happen to me, thank the dear Lord. Though come to think of it, she would probably be as ugly and old as me now. The Mailman's wife can at least take comfort in the fact her time will come too. Anyways I still have my eyes, most my teeth and a little hair, so I can't complain.But I bet he's got it coming.

    I don't remember the mailman's name.I always was bad with names. Sometimes I like to get all philosophical about names. Like do names define us or do we define our names and lot's of junk like that. When you get old thinking seems to become like a champion sport. Or you just don't think at all. I do a lot of both. I just call people by whatever they remind me of now. So I just call the mailman, Letter. It amuses him, but it's reasonable and it works. I call him sometimes when I am expecting something and it doesn't get here. He always is all polite and explains some junk like "I just deliver mail, I don't effect when it gets here." I understand that, but he could drive a little faster, to me, rather then away from me.

    I used to try to keep a phonebook with numbers and be all organized. Dear me, I still can't even remember to bring my groceries out of the car or where I keep my glasses. Now I just paint numbers all over the wall of my bedroom and little drawings of what the people remind me of now. The one next to me is of Ribbons, my neighbor and her number. She's a regular ol' good gal and she makes me food sometimes. She took me to her yoga class last week. It was boring. We all just sat on balls and hummed and did stupid moves like "Flying Dog On Water" or whatever. But the instructor was cute so I struggled through it. She said it might help the aches in my joints but so would eternal youth, you know. I like seeing all the phone numbers in my room because it makes me feel connected. Like all the numbers are symbols of connections I have made in my life and cocoon me, or something. Ha,next I will be saying I'm like a butterfly. If anything I am more of a grouchy old stink beetle.

    All the mailman brought me was a newspaper and a little postcard from some relative I don't remember who probably wants to get into my will, which will not happen, so sucks for them. Not that it will be anything grand or colossal though. You don't get to pick your family but you can ignore them. Except when they are persistent and annoying, which they usually are. Then you just  buy earplugs or move. I've done both. Oh,and I got some bills. People always want money. You give them a twenty and then they are all "Hey, so I know you gave me a twenty but I need a ten now because if I don't get it my children will starve and the world will explode..and oh, I will turn off your electricity." Darn them.I gave up cursing but some people need stronger words then darn.I'm going to have to get more imaginative.

    I have a newspaper cave where I keep all my newspapers. You could say I am a pack rat but I'm hate vermin and  I'm a more elegant person. That's a lie. Don't believe me. 'Cept I do hate rats. So I like to think of myself as more of a collecter of time or even a pack monkey. Monkeys are always good animals to be associated with. I have newspapers dating all the way back to the 40's. Yes, I was alive then. Yes, I could have beaten you up. I would like to mention as a young man I had the best abs in five counties. But you can ask around. I used to read the newspapers before they became about what dumb thing the president said now and how good Tiger Wolf, or whatever is at golf. You know back when people were interesting and stuff. Back when Superman was still dating that reporter girl. You know what I hate most about newspapers now? Those advice columns. People say stuff like "My life is a ruin! My boyfriend and I have been dating for eighteen years and it's been the best time of my life. We were together constantly and I used to call him every hour. And now he wants to break up and says I'm suffocating and my life is messed up!" And then some pompous person answers, who in my opinion probably still lives in their parent's basement, saying that its obviously that he is just questioning the relationship and maybe he's cheating on you and it has nothing to do with you. It's like, honey it's been eighteen years, he should have put a ring on it, you are a creep, let people breath and get a life. Now shut the hell up. You know what I mean?

    But, I digress. I keep all my newspapers in this room. Whenever I am lonely because yes, I do get lonely, I go in there. I hate people who like "I DO POGO DANCING EVERY NIGHT AND I HAVE A MILLION FRIENDS AND I TEXT WHY I TALK TO YOU AND LIFE IS SO GRAND!" I'm human, I do get lonely and I don't think pogo dancing even exists. I sit with all the newspapers and let the years soak into me. I read little snippets and just sit with the history. It's like a pig sitting in mud.

    I really don't flatter myself with these comparisons. But I am just sitting in my one mud. Sometimes I look at some of the newspapers and want to yell "HOLY CRAP, I'M OLD!" I can spend hours in there thinking about everything, or nothing. Don't matter. Some of the newspapers I read on past vacations or painted, accidentally, while I was in one of my painting fits. I get those. I just paint so much I don't stop and walk around with a paintbrush in my hand, or at my worst moments, hanging out of my mouth like a cig.  I wonder if I put paintbrushes in my mouth because of some weird cigarette withdrawal I am still experiencing, 20 years after I quit. I still miss a cigarette after dinner. But I don't want to ruin my lungs and die coughing up cigarette butts. I may not be George Clooney but I still want to look okay when I die. I'm no ballerina or whatever a guy version is called (Ballerhino?),but dying with a cigarette shoved up my mouth, burning my lungs, makes it sound like I have no grace at all. But God has a sense of irony. Of course I'm going to like die the one day I forget to wear pants or while on the toilet. Not going to put that below God.

    But I'm still blabbering like an old fool. Like an old fool, yeah, that would be the day. I can't believe I even made half a living as a poet. People are so dumb. I'm actually kind of eloquent in poetry. It makes me sound all smartified and like I'm not some old man living with his fat old dog that likes messing up Bob Dylan lyrics and can only cook chili, when he don't burnt it. Keats, I'm not. I wrote a total of three poetry books and a bunch of critics with airs said things like 'the crisp, almost homely beauty of the lines in  this poetry book, are mesmerizing and yet radical in their simplicity. They read like a walk in a beautiful muddy park or crisp breeze heralding the scent of something else." BLAH, BLAH, BLAH. Like that makes sense. Using a bunch of metaphors and words no one understands somehow makes a critic smart and dignified and good. If you ask me, they are just spewing a bunch of sewer water while spraying perfume to mask up what they are really doing. They are just writing crappy reviews.  Thankfully, I'm a better painter then poet and everyone agrees with that. And I can play a killer poker hand. If I didn't become a painter I would probably be the world's best poker player. But I haven't had enough time to you know, let that skill develop.

    I don't really remember why I am writing this and my stupid dog is bursting my ear drums. She is howling at the moon. I named her Duke and that's her proper Christian name. She ought to be a Duchess, but I wanted to be all ironic because I am oh, so clever like that. Yeah, it sounded funnier then. She's pretty much the world's ugliest hound dog and I tell her that. But she don't care, though maybe it's why she isn't fond of me. We have a passing relation. I feed her, she doesn't bite my hand off. It works. It's not paradise, but you can't have a pleasant long term relationship with any female. They are all irrational, even the dogs. They do not getter better with age or chocolate or jewelry. That's why I joke the moon  is my girlfriend. Everyone says it's a man on the moon, so why can't it be an ugly woman? She gives me light, I tell her she's pretty and we break up every day. She always come back every night though, just like a woman.  She just can't stand being away from me. Can't blame her .So Duke is howling at my girlfriend because obviously Duke is jealous. Told you females are irrational. I ought to go yell at her and end right here before I drill your eyes off. I'm skilled like that.

    So anyways. I'm Harry. But they all call me P.J. If you call me anything else I will slap your nose off. And if you call me Sir, I will call you a slew of colorful names. I'm old but I'm not dead, when I'm dead you can call me Sir.Good Night.

Leaves Of Youth-Part 2

 -Continued....don't worry it is a third of the size of the other half..hehehe-

“Who are you talking to?” He asked

“Oh, ha..Aiken Drum the Brownie!” I replied,as if that was perfectly normal

“Like from the old nursery rhyme?”

“EXACTLY! Well, he isn't anything like the nursery rhyme. Not half as charming!”

Aiken elbowed me. “THAT WAS RUDE!” He quipped.I laughed. I told the boy “Well he thinks that was rude of me to say. But humans were always the least refined creatures, if you ask me.”

The boy grinned. “I think the elves are the most refined. But I've never seen one. Well, I'm not sure.”

“Well depends on the elf. The little impish ones are not refined at all. But there are some beautiful majestic ones in redwood forests, and such. They are hard so see.”

The boy sighed. “When I was little, I was convinced I saw elves. Maybe I did. But you know..maybe that was just being a child. But I cried when I couldn't see them anymore. I guess that is kind of silly.”

My heart skipped a beat. “Not at all, the elves are persnickety creatures. They will visit you again.”

I remembered my mom and her same words, and felt warmer then I had in a long time.

The young man smiled as wide as a mile. “Thank you, I hope so.” The subway stopped and the girl grabbed his hand, even harder, shot me a strange look and pulled him through the door. He stopped to wave and then disappeared into the crowd, just another head.

Two months later I found a small story in a local magazine about a lady who lived in the subway who conversed with elves. The similarities with my conversation with the boy and the story, were too similar to be an accident. He obviously wrote it, or someone overheard the conversation. I looked up his name. Yes, it was the same boy. The same character was later in a book he wrote, and many after.He became very well known.I watched his success with little pricks of joy in my heart. The elves had in fact, visited him again. They had visited him through the portals of words. And I had helped arrange the visit.

Sometimes I eat dinner after work at the cafe down the street with a gossipy tree nymph. I reserve a table for two and the waiter used to wonder why, because he only saw me. Once he asked me why I reserved a table for two, week after week.

I replied “Oh, it isn't just me. Don't tell me you haven't noticed Willow? I don't think you could miss someone with as loud a mouth as her!” I winked at him, and he just stared.

I continued, “I mean to you, she probably doesn't seem real. It's complicated. Did you ever have an imaginary friend?”

He laughed. “Uh,I did. He was a small dragon that I brought in my pocket to school till I was about 8. Then I guess he just disappeared. Growing up and stuff. But I don't think I ever reserved a table for him and me.” He laughed again.

I laughed as well. “It's kind of like that. But she is more..real..I guess”

We both smiled awkwardly and he fiddled with his thumbs.

“Ah, so I need to...”

“Take care of a table?”

“Yea..that..”

He scurried off, to my disappointment. He never asked me about my reservations again. I don't think we have exchanged two words since then. Too bad. I always thought he was kind of cute in a fawn-ish way. But I have noticed the cash register has a little stone dragon sitting on it now.

The butcher thinks I eat an awful lot of ham, but the truth is I indulge my teddy bears too much. He likes to make jokes about me having a hollow leg. I just smile. He barely ever smiles, but often I can get him to crack a smile when I ask him about how his music is going. He is a wonderful musician. He will wrap up my ham, while telling me all about the wonders of notes. He calls it magic. Then he laughs at himself.

“Sorry, madam. But it really does feel like magic.”

“I think it is.” I answer putting the wrapped ham in my shopping basket.

You would think being stuffed and all, teddy bears wouldn't eat. Silly me, offering them human food. But since I was little, I was always convinced if I were a teddy bear I would want ham. They are spoiled rotten, now. I'll go broke dressing and feeding my menagerie of stuffed animals, I worry sometimes. Then I laugh. Such may be my plight, but I happily resign myself to it. I find nowadays, I have to laugh quite a lot. It keeps one from losing your last bits of sanity. And it is a uniquely human trait. Mythical creatures are not half as good at laughing at themselves, as humans.

Yesterday after tucking my dolls in bed in the afternoon (they are very grumpy if they don’t take a nap) I decided to take a stroll. I mutter to myself, wondering about everything and nothing. I'm closer to an old lady, then a young one now. My hair is turning white as snow and the dwarves call me Snow White. They always had a sense of humor. The real Snow White, still doesn't have a single white hair on her head. But she is charming, nevertheless. I always loved her story. I've always just loved stories.

It's hard sometimes. No, most of the time. I'm like Peter Pan stuck in an aging body. That thought always amused me. I've always been easily amused. Some little children run past me.

“IT'S THE MAGIC LADY!” They chirp.

I feel a slight smile playing at my lips. I've always been most comfortable around children. Children are much more open to magic, to accepting me. Sometimes they even see the things I can see. The thought comforts me. The winds rustle the leaves and it sounds sort of like a hum. I hum the bars of the tune with them, it's familiar to me by now. I pulled my jacket, closer around my frame, as the wind brushes past me.

Then I smile, feeling the warm light behind my ear. I take a deep breath and marvel at who I am. I am not how I would have even chosen to be. But yet, I know that I am exactly who I am meant to be and happy to be her. I AM special. I close my eyes and listen to the leaves like so long ago. I sway back and forth till the end. I open my eyes and stare out at a figure with something in her delicate hand. I watch Fall dip her wand.

Then I grin and wave.

Leaves Of Youth-Part 1

By Hannah Yerington

-This is the first part of a two part story..because dearest blog, is complaining about the length of it.-

 

The green leaves glistened,the little glimmers of light dancing along the trees,in delight. A small gust of wind blew past, caressing my locks as they fluttered in the air. I sighed a deep and melancholy sigh. It was the year I called the Great Awakening. The year of reality. The year of departure. The year the fairies seemed to desert me. The year I was no longer a child. The year I discovered I was not a princess. The year my costumes collected dust and my dolls whispered “come to us, once again." I guess we all had that year or a series of years but I thought somehow I was set apart. I thought, like thousands before,I was special.

But no matter how much I longed for the realm of magic, it never revealed itself to me. Santa Claus’s reindeer no longer pattered across my roof. I cried, tears soaking my red face. “Mama, why don’t the elves visit me?” Mama smiled, stroking my hair. “Elves are persnickety things, they will visit you again”. But I didn’t believe her, so my eyes rained and my heart was a storm. I didn’t believe magic could exist anymore but my soul still fought trying to give it another chance. Some told me this was growing up. But I closed my eyes when they whispered such, trying to block out the thought. I wanted to scream “I'm different! I'm different!” as they rambled on about becoming mature, about taking up the responsibilities of an adult. So I sat on my lawn and sighed, staring at the rustling leaves. I felt drained and empty. I played with dead stalks of grass, between my dry fingers and tried to weave clover chains. Each one broke.

My mom worried for me. She wondered what I thought when I sat on the lawn, under the shade of the trees for hours. She wondered why I ripped the leaves into tiny pieces and whispered into the wind. She watched me, in rage once, throw one of my dolls against the wall. I was so scared of what I had done, afraid I was a monster. I swept my doll back into my arms and frantically whispered my extreme sincere apologies. Yet, still she did not speak. She didn't even wink, or look alive. For the first time her eyes looked like the dolls in that big department store. They seemed, glazed and painted, not even the smallest spark of life. I got goose bumps. My mom looked at me in concern, but wisely said not a word.

Tea parties weren't even the same. My gloves were too small, my best princess dress pulled against my chest. I showed my mom how it pulled and she just smiled and chuckled. I was embarrassed and crossed my arms against my budding chest to hide how the dress stretched. I accidentally cracked my best tea pot and it did not appear any of my bears weren't eating the scones I offered them.

So I gave up. I sat on my lawn and blew dandelions and threw rocks, aimlessly. I sang quietly with the birds chirping. Finally one day I blew one dandelion and loudly yelled “I DON'T KNOW WHAT IS HAPPENING, BUT I WISH IT WOULD STOP. I WISH I WOULDN'T GROW UP!” I sat down, flustered, my cheeks red and blinked back tears. The wind frolicked with my tresses and I stared up at the clouds.

I remember it clearly. The rustling of the leaves became louder till it resembled a humming sound. The winds playing with my hair grew still and silent. I sat up a little straighter and stop gazing at the clouds. The humming got loud and louder. Notes, notes were playing. Awestruck, I listened attentively to the leave's tune, till it formed words:

Fall does come, her beauty regal.
Strewed with gold, She takes her wand.
A new gown to serenade the eyes.

Abruptly they stopped, words no longer uttered and the wind, rushed, a siren song it blew. Then once again it was silent. Before my eyes a maiden appeared. Fall, in her full glory began to dip her wand in the hearts of the trees. The tree nymphs smiled and slowly found themselves lulled to sleep by falls song. Why had I never noticed the tree nymphs in the trees before? To each leaf she bestowed a new gown and they crackled in appreciation. I could not speak, my tongue made of stone. Slowly she turned toward me, her soft face radiating with joy. She reached out and touched me gently behind my ear. Then as quickly as she had appeared, she vanished. I blinked, terrified and entranced.

I ran to my house, legs pounding across wet grass. Behind my ear was a small gold light resembling a fingerprint. I smiled. I heard my dolls chatter noisily and swore I saw an elf’s face peer behind my closet door. My doll's eyes twinkled with merriment. My bears grumbled for some ham at my next tea part. Grinning, I entered the gates of magic once again.

When I tell people of Fall and the leaves singing, they laugh. They always smile politely. Then they thank me for the lovely story.

~~

While, the rest of the world, grew up, I didn't. My body aged, my back got aches and cracks. I went through school and then even college. People called me innocent, even slow sometimes. But that wasn't it. I just saw the things they couldn't see, or had lost. That imaginative part of me, the child who believed in magic, just grew stronger and stronger. I no longer even needed to imagine the fairies or wonder if my doll was really talking to me. I just saw, I just knew. My experience with Fall had forever altered me.

I remember my friends telling me to grow up, hear them whisper. They wondered why I stared in raptures at rosebushes or sang to the moon. At first I tried to point things out, marvel out how they couldn't see what I saw. But soon, it came apparent that something in me, was different. I wondered why, I of all people had this privilege, yet at the same time, this curse. I gained an entire world of magic, yet lost so much of this world. The one I inhabited barely understood me.

But then, wasn't the very point of magic, that it can't be explained? That in fairy-tales, the strangest things happen to the ordinary-est of people? I could have grown up, just like everyone else. But that wasn't my destiny. Instead, I became part of a fairy tale. I often wonder if one day, someone will write my story down in a little bound book and a publisher will find it in a book. But I'm not all that old fashioned, so I find myself writing bits and pieces of it, often. .

I also wonder quite a lot about Fall. Who she is exactly. I met her sister, Spring, once. I've asked around but no one seems to really now. She just is. She always was. I'm at the age, where sometimes I just accept things. It is not a lack of curiosity as the young might believe. I never lost my tireless childlike curiosity. But though I kept my childhood burning bright within me, I've also gained much of the wisdom of time.

I'm content with the allure of mystery. Isn't that what made childhood so exciting? Getting as close to a mystery as possible, almost touching the magic...but never quite figuring it out? Knowing there was a monster in the closet, was the allure, but it actually responding to you yelling at it to leave..well that might have ruined it. The mystery of what is was like, why it was there, might be shattered. And then, the monster wasn't appealing anymore. It's the same way now. I don't know where I would be, without my mysteries. So I never forced answers. Answering everything is for those who don't have know how to just live. It's for those who can't find poetry in the roses or magic in the mystery. People might call it faith and say I'm being irrational. But why would I want to know everything? Because life is nothing when you can reduce it to facts. Why would fairy-tales exist in the first place, if everything ought to be answered?

It's always been a question of mine, if there are other people like me. There has to be. I met one once. She was in her eighties, driven mad by her fantasies, or so they thought. She kept mumbling about goblins and how bothersome they are. I visited her in her rest home. I didn't see any goblins, but I told her a little spell to ward them off, anyways. I brushed out the frizzy, matted, auburn hair of her doll and had tea with her. I enjoyed my time with her. But it also worried me. She had obviously become so entrapped in this other world, if it can be called that, that we both at access to, that she lost touch with earth. It was literally as if her mind was caught in some vortex. She had access to two worlds, yet somehow had got lost in one..and couldn't find her way back. She barely knew how to operate a sink, she never learned how to drive. She burnt her fingers on the stove, when I heated hot water for tea, on the stove. I yelled, in panic, but she said something about the fire not being alive. I wondered if she ever used a stove. The entire world had defined her as mad. I could see why. We both had the same blessing and curse. But she had taken it to far. She was literally trapped in her imagination. She spoke of nothing besides the goblins, how bothersome imps are and an old lover of hers, a handsome kobold.

I was scared that I would turn out like her. I resolved that I wouldn't. I couldn't lose contact with Earth. But I couldn't lose contact with..my other world. The world that was somehow part of earth, yet not at all. The world where teddy bears talk and there really is a man on the moon. So I lived my fairytale but I also kept contact with Earth. I made sure to talk to people, to not revert into fantasy.

For a while I became a drama teacher, because having an eccentric drama teacher seemed socially accepted. It was a role, in which crazies were accepted. Though I had done a lot of drama through the years and was qualified for the role, I soon found I was not meant for it. I never was shy, but always confined. I liked my privacy and suddenly my world became a stage. For the quote "The world is your stage, you are always auditioning.", I have doubts about. When I am smelling a flower, I am not auditioning. But I guess that is being technical. But suddenly I felt like I was auditioning, constantly. People think there are three acceptable kinds of crazy. The first is flat out crazy. The kind of homeless man wearing a fuzzy hat, crazy. It freaks people out, but without it the world would be a lot less interesting. So we tolerate it. The second acceptable form is genius crazy. Basically people assume you are so smart that you are crazy. The third form is the flamboyant crazy: The David Bowie's, Andy Warhol's, Auntie Marm's of the world. You are an artsy hipster and punk, so you are acceptable. In comes in varying levels, but it is still the acceptable kind of crazy.

My main problem was that I wasn't any of those. I tried the hipster crazy, but that wasn't me. I was a reserved, somewhat quiet person who was deemed slightly insane. But in order to make that insane acceptable in a role as a drama teacher, I had to form it into the right crazy. So when I made comments about fairies, suddenly I needed to tie it into Midsummer's Night Dream and quote a overly dramatic scene from it, playing Puck and Oberon all at once. Needless to say, I lasted less there two years and then resigned.

I knew I needed a challenging job because a challenge would keep me grounded . It gave me a dose of what is considered reality, even if it was not my reality. I wanted to write fairy-tales, as they came easily to me. But I knew the danger of that. So I took up journalism. I find that in journalism, crazies are also allowed. In fact writing is a safe haven for all the lost loons of this world. By writing reality constantly, I had a reliable tug to keep me from drifting away. I would hear fairies singing outside my office constantly as I stared at my dim computer screen. I would talk to them occasionally, but I refused to let them in my office. I knew if I did, then soon I would be pulled completely into their blissful world. I was in no way ignoring it, just making sure that I didn't completely exist in their world. But I did write fairytales in my spare time and published a few volumes of them, here and there. They did well and I was comfortably off, never being an extravagant spender.

But journalism was not in any way, my love. I enjoyed it, it was hard, but I was not passionate. I never had children, much to my dismay. So later after years of journalism, I gave little writing seminars on request, for middle school students. I was a well known writer and journalist in my town and so for many years now, I've visited the middle school and taught writing workshops. I saw some of the children, already men and women of the world, and they don't understand me in the least. The artsier, philosophical ones love me, though sometimes I wonder if it is just to analyze me. I like it there, it's peaceful. I teach classes, but I am famous for my off subject rambles about fanciful things. I lead them on tours through their school, which they have seen a million times and tell them to notice something new. I make them stand on ladders, ask them how it feels to be so tall, and then write from the perspective of some who is that tall. A giants, perhaps. I have them crawl on the ground, and ask them how that changes their perspective. Then they will write from the perspective of some one who must crawl. A baby, perhaps. I've since retired from journalism, but I do this and write my stories. I don't drift off into fantasy and I don't get chained to Earth. 

But it hasn't been easy. My other world, seem so much safer. There people don't back stab you, and beauty is always obvious. I've struggled to find the beauty in people, in this world. But I find the less I concentrate on finding it, the more obvious it becomes. Funny, how things are like that. I always like to think I am living somewhere between the fairy gates of earth and childhood.

I knew people would never really get me. That I wouldn't be accepted. That sometimes people would label me as mad.

My family wondered why I told my sister's kids that they definitely WAS a monster in their closet, when my sister was trying to convince them there was not. My sister yelled at me, thinking it was a joke. She mentioned the times I told her kids about how some goblins want to eat children, and that mermaids have fangs. She was livid. I tried to explain how these things do exist, for the last time. She said she didn't even know me anymore. She screamed at me to grow up. She is my baby sister. We barely talk anymore. But my mom says her kids always ask if they can visit the magical aunt. They think I'm a fairy.

My mom has never mentioned anything about me growing up, about me being strange. I'm happy, and I am mildly successful. She doesn't pry. I think magic has slightly touched her sometimes. I first thought this when she hummed a little familiar tune..very similar to the one the leaves sing. I asked her about it and she just murmured and walked off. I was probably mistaken. My father, a writer himself, just uses me as writing material. We never had a strong relationship and so in the later years, he has connected with me through making me his muse. It's a strange, strained relationship, but it is better than nothing. He still thinks I am insane, though.

I've lost contact with lot of friends, a lot of relatives. Something about saying "I need to go home, it is my doll's bedtime." or "Why look..the sun is being pulled away by a Phoenix today! I wonder how the sun feels about that! That's odd!", does not always go well. Once I told my doctor that an infection on my neck might be from a vampire. He said he would check it out. I told him to be careful, I was fighting an urge to bite him. I kind of regret saying that, as he won't look me in the eye, now. Some people think I have a great sense of humor, till they realize I am serious. This either scares people or they love it. Sometimes I worry I am just a fun circus for people to watch. That they keep me for amusement. And yes, some do. But what hurts the most, is those that were once close, pulling away.

My best friend from elementary school, a very artsy creative girl, pretty much abandoned me in high school. I was getting more and more involved in this "other world" of mine, and she kept mentioning this. She put up with it freshman year, but it embarrassed her. I remember once I told the cafeteria lady "I CAN'T EAT THIS...AN OGRE GOT HIS MUCUS ON IT! YOU ARE POISONING US ALL!" She pretended she didn't know me after that for the rest of the day. By sophomore year, she announced that she couldn't take it anymore. After that, we didn't even look at each other in the halls. I cried, but I knew it would not be the last time I would cry over someone. It wasn't. I lost my first boyfriend when I told him that he definitely had kobold blood and should try shape shifting. I laugh at that, now.

But this is my fate. I've had trouble accepting it. But most of all, I have had trouble accepting that I am this way. I wonder to what purpose, to what aide it is for years. That's been the hardest struggle, of all: to not know why, or to what purpose, I have become who I am.

I think that I am here to live. That sounds very simple. It is. But I think that I am meant to live in this manner, to drop a little pixie dust. That also sounds so very simple. But it isn't really. They say that we all have the soul of a poet within us, that died young. Well I am here to breath life into those poets. I find that the lost souls, the wandering artists, those starved of childhood, flock to me. I didn't understand it for years. But now I do. I'm meant to breath little breaths of magic back into their lives. Sometimes I can show people the fairies, or just make them laugh like they haven't for years. It's satisfying, but also tolling. I've been called the muse, the magic lady, the stark mad lady. All fit, quite well. I'm sort of, whatever people want to see in me.

Once on a subway, I conversed with my friend Aiken Drum, the brownie, and a young couple peered at me suspiciously. I was muttering to Aiken about how confusing subways are and who ever thought of creating such a thing. Aiken just rolled his eyes at me and stroked his beard. I kept muttering in a hushed tone, not exactly talking to him anymore, lost in the complexity of the map of the Subway station, sprawled on my lap. I never have quite got the hang of such things. Sometimes I think it's the kid still inside of me..who would much rather be escorted around.

The young couple kept staring at me. I believe the girl whispered “Is she okay? Why is she talking to herself?” The boy put his hands to his lips and squeezed her hand. The girl was obviously very uncomfortable with me. Well I was agitated as I had no idea how I was going to navigate around the subway station, once the subway stopped. So I kept blabbering to Aiken Drum, about how aggravating subways are. But I stared at the girl out of the corner of my eye.

She kept whispering to the boy, squeezing his hand. She seemed was convinced I was mad. But the boy kept rolling his eyes. He smiled widely at me, and I smiled back. Finally we struck up a conversation.

END OF PART 1..TO BE CONTINUED