Fairies Outfoxed
Nine is an enticing age: old enough to nag for body piercings; young enough to believe in fairies.
I tell my tweenager of the miniature feasts that I used to leave out for the fairies and of the miniature thank-yous that they would bestow in return and she is agog to feed the little folk herself. I'm not sure if fairyland abutts our part of London and I'm not sure if modern fairies will tolerate junket. Hoummous, she reckons, is a surer bait.
She transfers her dolls house dining suite to the patio and fashions a microscopic feast from bread. Her brother transfers his dolls house dining suite to the patio and heaps faux gold plates with Hundreds-and-Thousands. And I wonder long and hard what modern fairies leave for their benefactors.
The same, it would seem, as their 1970s predecessors. I know, because I glimpsed it, that tiny silver-foil baskets bearing tiny sugared eggs were left that night on the tables and that the tiny plates were emptied.
But the children never know it. Because when, come dawn, they hasten outside, there are screams. The Vicar hastens outside and he screams. The dolls house chairs and tables are upturned and scattered, the baskets mutilated and the sugared eggs gone. And on the lawn is a chewed dead piglet and a chewed dead frog and half of a lady's slipper.
The piglet, we find, is of life-sized rubber, but the frog is unpleasantly real and we shall never know what happened to the foot that had worn the slipper.
The children, ever hopeful, want to try it again tonight, but I am dubious. The rioting intinct that violated our town in the summer has evidently spread to fairyland and I'm barring my doors.
I tell my tweenager of the miniature feasts that I used to leave out for the fairies and of the miniature thank-yous that they would bestow in return and she is agog to feed the little folk herself. I'm not sure if fairyland abutts our part of London and I'm not sure if modern fairies will tolerate junket. Hoummous, she reckons, is a surer bait.
She transfers her dolls house dining suite to the patio and fashions a microscopic feast from bread. Her brother transfers his dolls house dining suite to the patio and heaps faux gold plates with Hundreds-and-Thousands. And I wonder long and hard what modern fairies leave for their benefactors.
The same, it would seem, as their 1970s predecessors. I know, because I glimpsed it, that tiny silver-foil baskets bearing tiny sugared eggs were left that night on the tables and that the tiny plates were emptied.
But the children never know it. Because when, come dawn, they hasten outside, there are screams. The Vicar hastens outside and he screams. The dolls house chairs and tables are upturned and scattered, the baskets mutilated and the sugared eggs gone. And on the lawn is a chewed dead piglet and a chewed dead frog and half of a lady's slipper.
The piglet, we find, is of life-sized rubber, but the frog is unpleasantly real and we shall never know what happened to the foot that had worn the slipper.
The children, ever hopeful, want to try it again tonight, but I am dubious. The rioting intinct that violated our town in the summer has evidently spread to fairyland and I'm barring my doors.
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ReplyDeleteWhat about the fairies who like to come in through the key-hole in the back door and find their feast on the kitchen floor?
ReplyDeleteNow that's a kind of fairy I'd forgotten about! And we had a cat flap fitted today which would accommodate a whole party. Bravo Midlife Singlemum!
ReplyDeleteThat won't work - cats love fairies.
ReplyDeleteOh no! How sad. Hope the fairies are alright.
ReplyDeleteHang on a minute though nagging for body piercings when they're nine? Noooooo. I thought I had much longer than that for those sort o conversations!
Depends where you live, I suppose. Tattoos, piercings and kitchen knives are all the rage in our part of town.
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ReplyDeleteAw, this was a really good post. Spending some time and actual effort to make a top notch article… but what can I say… I
ReplyDeletehesitate a whole lot and never seem to get
nearly anything done.
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