Homes of Whimsy

Liminal space. Between day and night, I sit on a great rock, one of a pile put here to keep the tide out and small children in. the light races the sun to the horizon in wild swaths of yellow and pink, the blue veil of night just behind in silent chase. The clouds that float above and within the fray reflect all that they see, water table communities dancing, showing the world a glimmer of something ‘more.’

I am a part of that 'more,' I'm finding more and more recently. Separate, though not the cold, untouchable, museum kind of way. But in a dancing starlight, firefly in a field kind of way, knowing I've got one foot here and one there, caught between two worlds much like time in this receding twilight.

I was called 'bizarrely fascinating' today by a woman I find amusingly attractive. She'd watched from her car as I raced along a curb, trying to see how fast I could go without losing my balance, all before ducking under a tree to take the grassy, pine needley shortcut. As she put it, I "just didn't care."

I've been called bizarre before. I've been called fascinating. And I've even been called both a time or two, but it's rare that someone says that I don't care. It's happened twice now in as many months, and both times it was an outsider’s perspective of my reflection of simply being. It's not that I don't care. I simply care differently.

It occurred to me rather sadly that the world has lost the necessity of whimsy. The absolute requirement of existence the shove aside custom and pretense and expectation (read 'prejudice') and be willing to accept the ridiculous and fanciful as being. We have it as children, with our faerie tales and our knights and their dragons and pirate journeys in cardboard boxes. Yet somewhere along the road we let them drop away, these fancy, fanciful things. Not all of them, mind you, for they can cling to us tenaciously, drawing our eyes and hearts to these tales and treasures in the form of movies and books. Yet still do we succumb only a moment, letting fancy pass as amusement.

I cannot exist thus. I never allowed the fanciful to drop away. On the contrary I swept up these fancy friends and kept them to me in pockets and bags and song and verse, desperate not to let a single sparkling one escape my notice. I am not always successful, but what fun it has been! And discovering new ones, new moments of wonder, little glimpses of prose and color, alive and dancing.

I see now that so many of these children swirl and spiral on the winds. They are homeless, orphaned. Is it any wonder they cling to one such as me? Like cats, the whimsy eat well and live loved in my care.

The edges of the liminal fade as blue waters flow to black in the coming night. The waves crash upon the rocks below me, white foam waving goodbye as I climb back down and return home, the Moon growing stronger, showing more of her wondrous face with each day, keeping the stars company.