Once Upon a Time

                        Fairy tales don’t begin with happily ever after; that comes after.   Once the struggles are over and done with, once the danger has passed, that is when our persistent heroine gets her happy ending.  And hasn’t she earned it? 

They earned it. (Source)

       In the face of all the pain, the heartbreak, the princess remained resilient.  Our beautiful dreamer always knew she would overcome her trials, and, lo and behold, there she is.  At the finish line, triumphant, facing a future so full of light that all the darkness of the past is engulfed by the brightness.

I am not that heroine.  At times, I have gotten lost in my own darkness. I have fallen off of the path that, hopefully, leads towards my own happily ever after.  And, most unforgivably, I have committed the fairy tale world’s worst sin:  I have given up.

I have let myself sink into my own, often inexplicable, sadness.  I have lost myself in my anxiety, my neuroses.  I have let myself get so twisted and tangled in the traps of day-to-day life that I lose the ability to move forward.   I lose sight of even a mediocre-ever-after.

And this is where the world outside of storybooks collides with the fairy tale kingdoms.   No prince in shining armor, or fairy godmother will save me from my trials and tribulations.  In my darkest moments, I even lack the princesses’ enduring hope that somehow, someway it will all work out in the end.    All I am left with, ultimately, is myself, sitting in my own shadow, waiting for the strength to try again.                                         

 

And it always comes.  Whether it is triggered by a well-timed word of wisdom, the sweetness of a friend, or some deep store within myself I didn’t know existed, I always have eventually found the strength to begin again.   From that first bit of strength comes the pinprick of light that ultimately leads me out of my darkness.

I still believe in the importance of happy endings, in whatever form they may come in.  I still am in search of the happily ever after.   I maintain that my life, despite any personal struggles, will consist of thousands of miniature fairy tales, combining to form one long story of a life well lived.  I uphold all this because I have hope that if I envision a happy life, I will be able to bring one into fruition. 

What I will suggest, however, is that the power of fairy tales lies not in the happily ever after but, instead, in the once upon a time.  I believe that the true strength of a fairy tale is contained in the first few words.  At this point, the trials are still ahead, and the road to the finish line is as yet untraveled.  The journey to happy ending, at this point, seems bleak.

 And in most real life fairy tales the happily ever after will be hard won, if victory comes at all, giving the beginnings all the more weight.  Once upon a time signals that, with banged up knees and a hopeful heart, a person is willing to pick themselves up and start again.  Risking failure, loss of faith, injury or worse, once upon a time is a chance to begin the story anew.  And it is in this prospect of new beginnings that the true power of a fairy tale lies.

So this is me, with banged up knees and a hopeful heart, picking myself up and starting again.  Risking failure, loss of faith, injury or worse, I am beginning my story anew.   I am embracing all the fear and excitement that comes with a fresh start.   I refuse to sit in my darkness, and allow this to be how the story ends.

Once Upon a Time… 

The Gentlest Soul

I met the boy with the gentlest soul in the Indian Himalayas.

Quiet voiced and mild mannered, his very being whispered poetry. Frail, bent and still, he was a tall Keats displaced in time.  It did not take more than a half step into the world of fancy to see his angled features, shadowy in flickering candle light, bent over a sheet of yellowed parchment.  He was an ethereal time traveler spirited away to rural India, looking at the world with the calmest eyes.  In another time, I would have fallen in love with him.

               
     In the here and now, he enlivened me.  Normally stifled by shyness and awkwardness, I fluttered around his stillness, talking breathlessly, continuously, carelessly.  He watched with even gaze, clarifying my half-thought out sentences and clipped words with careful questions.  I buzzed with a reckless energy and vivacity I had never before possessed, and he watched, with quiet intensity.

Sitting on a rock by an Indian stream, I talked.   I fixed my eyes on the boy, more a man than a boy, and I let the words come, curling my legs under my body.  He waded through the water, nodding at my words, an otherworldly half-smile gracing his lips.  As the sun slid down below the mountain peaks, the world was on fire and I burned with a desire to speak until I ran out of words. 

He listened. 

Maybe I was a little in love with him. 

And I wish him a happily ever after.

Once Upon a Time

“Before you met me I was a fairy princess

I caught frogs and called them prince and made myself a queen”

Faith Hill

         My mom tells stories. The story of the bullied boy locked in the cabinet, and the story of the package of bacon slipped into the grocery cart.  She favors the ever repeated and ever clichéd story of the walk to school along the railroad tracks, uphill, in the cold Manitoba winters. Her life puzzled together through tales of the bright, sparkling peaks and the dark, shadowy valleys.

         I want to tell stories too. 

         I am the daughter of an unconventional minister and an irreverent lawyer.  I grew up lakeside in Connecticut suburbia.  I have romantic sensibilities, mixed with a dollop of pragmatism.  Sometimes I do see myself as a fairy princess. And sometimes I find food in my hair.

         The online Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines a fairy tale “as a story (as for children) involving fantastic forces and beings (as fairies, wizards, and goblins)” and as “a story in which improbably events lead to a happy ending” (Source).  My definition of fairy tale is an amalgamation of the two. For my purposes, a fairy tale is a moment in life, so improbable, surreal and full of “fantastic forces and beings”, crystallized into story form.  It may or may not have a happy ending but, even if it doesn’t, that’s where I’m headed.

         According to Wikipedia the definition of what is truly a fairy tale is disputed, and this is how I justify creating my own definition, for my own purposes.  What is not disputed, however, is that “fairy tales do not require fairies” (Source). The fairies truly are optional.

But I’ll do what I can.

You'll have to forgive my pictures. I'll have a camera soon.

"And before you knew me I'd traveled 'round the world

I slept in castles and fell in love because I was taught to dream"

Faith Hill