- Through to the Other Side
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24: A Secret Uncoiled
These things tend to unravel.
secrets, tightly bound, always have a way of slipping those binds.
They always tends to unfurl and proclaim themselves.
Its always a slip up, a trick of the tounge.
never is it kept safe and quiet.
for secrets are louder than you know.
and the always strike when you least expect them to.
all it takes is 6 little words…
“Do you wanna know a secret?”
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- A Secret Uncoiled
It’s a secret I’ve kept for years, how I first came to magiq, or stumbled on it, pretty much literally.
I was out on a three-day hike-through alone. It was chilly, so on my second morning I got up before the sun, packed, and started out so I could warm up.
I thought that there were other hikers on the trail ahead because I kept seeing a light flicker further up the path.
I got closer and saw that the blue-green light was down an old trail that wasn’t part of the main run. I’d done the trail a few times and even I had never seen this trail before. I didn’t want anyone new to the hike getting lost, so I called out. When they didn’t answer, I followed the old trail after them. They never answered me, never turned back.
Eventually I found the light in a clearing. It wasn’t a backpacker’s lamp. It was fool’s fire. A wil-o-the-wisp. A few rangers had seem them up in that area, but they’d follow them thinking they were lost hikers and end up lost themselves.
But it wasn’t swamp or bog fire. We were way too high for that.
The little wisp hung over a big ring of old stones along with a dozen other wisps. It had led me there, and then they’d all vanished. There was something about that place. I ended up making camp there that night, and well, that’s a whole other story, but when I got back home I went searching online, and one thing led to a thousand and that’s how I found the Low.
And it’s how I got my name. 
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Fools Fire, I have never heard that as a name for Willow-of-the-Wisp. That’s awesome! Is that a Low term?
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Hmm, I’m not sure. I just know that’s what my gramps calls them. 
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A secret uncoiled
I mean, I may have given Grim info on the inspiration/source material for those mysterious letters that I don’t think have been decoded yet? back when we met in person…
I think I’m probably going to do some finagling so folks without a hard copy of the decoding document can solve it too… Eventually.
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- a small comfort
She crocheted us each a blanket when we were young. She loved us, all seven of us, differently. My parents would grumble about how one or the other was her clear favorite, but looking back, I don’t believe it. She just loved each of us differently. She watched us, my brother and I, in the summers when our dad wasn’t around and our mom was at work. I remember those summers and how much fun the three of us had. She took genuine interest in the things we were interested in, my brother and I. She would cook for us, and boy was she an amazing cook.
The blankets she made us were heavy. Mine was my favorite color: forest green. She made it to fit a twin bed but when I moved into a full bed, she added to it. She couldn’t find the same green, so she added black to either side. That was right before she forgot how; it was the very last thing she crocheted. The neurologist told us, told her, that it was Alzheimer’s. Slowly, year after year, she forgot everything. She forgot how to crotchet. She forgot how to cook. Eventually, she even forgot us. I used to cry with my cousins, about how this woman that loved us all so much, so differently, was slowly slipping away. Sometimes, I still fight back tears when I think about her.
Now, all I have left is the weight of that blanket, the blanket she made me before she forgot it all.
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A small comfort
It was my birthday. My dad’s call while I was at work (heavily paraphrased) consisted primarily of “Happy Birthday, your grandmother passed today.”
On my walk after work, a butterfly accompanied me down the sidewalk for a noticeable stretch (in true Disney princess fashion, all that was missing was singing and/or it landing on me).
~~
Or, on a happier note, the reminders I keep in my wallet:
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25: A Small Comfort
The smell of warm coffee.
the taste of warm tea
the low buzz of a busy coffee shop.
the warm feeling of your hands around a cup.
small comforts. small warmths, and small thoughts, relaxing.
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25: A small Comfort.
Master Lin/Tal/Keeper Lavant - Today at 8:23 PM
“Well, lets see… anything else we’re missing? I suppose we want to make sure the party expects a fight. Whatever he is now, hes probably going to want whatever we find.”
Olivia Cola -Today at 8:27 PM
“If he can figure out they have it despite them not telling anyone, we have bigger issues on our hands. but you make a good point.”
Master Lin/Tal/Keeper Lavant - Today at 8:27 PM
tal nods.
“I suspect a spacetime entity can probably sense things of the same kind as it, is all. It pays to be careful.”
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26: Once Grand, Now Forgotten.
The castle stands, tall and worn,
the light house’s light shines no more,
the workshop’s halls lay quiet,
the compound’s rooms have gone silent
the tree’s boughs move no longer
and the ship’s sails no longer wander
Once Grand, these places were locations of light
full of laughter, love, and magiq alight.
but now these places stand forgotten
their halls, decks, and grounds no longer trodden
I think its time to relight the fires,
and return to the homes of our guild forbears.
its sure to be tough, to find what was lost,
but if anything, im sure, we can find it in trust.
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Once grand, now forgotten
For the past few years, this was my turn to the south while racking up miles, whether for race training or my misguided (still successful) foray into logging miles to equal the year (2017 in 2017). There was an orange grove there, and all along that east side of the loop I would be inundated with the smell of citrus if the time of year was right, like jasmine only less overwhelming in the humidity.
But the baseball team has done so well, and they can’t possibly just upgrade the field they already have…
So now the east side of my usual loop is blocked off, and the orange grove is gone, and if the weather’s right you might be lucky enough to avoid the dust clouds kicked up by the construction equipment as you pass by.
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Once Grand, Now Forgotten.
The temple of Coba, in cancun mexico, is the only climbable cluster of mayan temples left in mexico. Once a glorious seat of an empire, now nothing more than dust and crumbled stone. Whenever i travel to Neithernor, i find myself reminded of this place, and wonder if perhaps one day our people will be just like this, nothing more than whispers amongst the cold stone.
This last image is quite interesting actually, as its a field for playing a type of sports game popular amongst the mayans, where the players run along a field, bouncing a sewn ball with their hips through stone rings. It was played as a festival and ceremonial game, and was dominantly displayed in “The Road to El Dorado”, one of my favourite animated films as a child, and even now in adulthood. It was a glorious day for me, to finally see one up close and personal.
The team at coba was sort of like the calgary flames, a sub par team that still managed to occasionally score, but STILL. (calgary shots fired)
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A window to nowhere
It’s hard to see, but the window looks in on an area behind a door labeled 404. Computer jokes ensue.
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27: A Window to Nowhere
An empty frame, devoid of glass,
sits in the clearing, stood up against a log. It was once a portal. An entrance to another world. But now it is forgotten. It’s simply a window frame. A true window to nowhere.
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- a window to nowhere
I flip through the channels,
only to find nothing I want to see.
I press a button and cut the power.
I snuggle in deeper, book in hand.
The great black window to nowhere stares at me from the wall.
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I stare into my black mirror,
As the midnight moon hangs overhead,
The clouds have all gone to sleep,
And I miss my long departed bed.
I stare until only stars remain,
And soon they begin to go too,
In the light of the black mirror
The sun begins to bloom.
~A Window to Nowhere~
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