The Nature of the Sky

                      When I was a babe, my mother, the earth, spoke to me.  "My child," she said, "the sky is a river, and our world swims through it.  The stars you see at night are other worlds, and we are all carried in the Great Maker's net."  Then she granted me dreams of strange skies and different seas, and I believed her.
                      When I was old enough to hunt alone, my father, the moon, spoke to me.  "My child, the sky is a great valley, and the sun a buffalo that roams through it.  The stars you see at night are the mighty warriors who pursue the sun."  And he granted me dreams of strong hunters and a shining prey, and I believed him.
                       You tell me that the sky is empty space, and the stars are giant fires burning very far away.  You tell me that the river and the valley are illusion, that the hunters and the worlds are myths and falsehoods.  You give me not dreams, but ideas as cold and hard as the iron tools you bear, and ask me to believe you.  And I do believe what you say, of the sky and the stars.
                       Yet just because the sky is empty space, why should it not also be a river, and a valley?  Just because the stars are enormous fires, why should they not be hunters and worlds as well?  You think you have knowledge, but you have closed your eyes.
                        Shall I teach you to open them again?

Celebrating Christmas

                  As Christmas has drawn steadily nearer, I have found myself, somewhat to my own surprise, honestly excited for the coming holiday.  My surprise stems from the fact that I have not identified as Christian for a couple years now, and with no traveling to do or small children to plan for, I fully expected that Christmas would pass more or less like any of the more minor holidays, save for the inescapable music.  Yet the closer the day in question, the more I have found myself anticipating it.  Never mind that I knew I would be working through the holiday, or that I would be unable to do much in the way of gift-giving - somehow the approach of Christmas filled me with a child-like joy I have not experienced since leaving home.
                  Earlier this month, I saw Rise of the Guardians in theaters.  While not a Christmas movie, it does have Santa Claus in a major supporting role.  In one of my favorite scenes, Santa explains that at his core, his purpose is to bring wonder into the world: Seeing the world with new eyes; giving a fresh look to the possibilities and magic contained in everything around us.  This, I think, is what I have been feeling since Thanksgiving: a renewed sense of wonder.  I still do not understand why, but frankly, I don't think it really matters.
                  Merry Christmas everyone.  Have a wonderful holiday, in every sense of the word.
Lots of Love,
~Jennifer

P.S.  If you haven't yet, I really encourage you to see Rise of the Guardians before it leaves theaters.  Here, have a trailer:

A Big Decision

                        As some of you may know, November is National Novel Writing Month.  Thousands of people are taking this month to write a 50,000 word rough draft, no editing, no "but that paragraph would go much better further up", just writing a novel in the roughest form.
                        I have decided to take this challenge.  I will be focusing on Jack, the character I introduced in yesterday's post.  I'm off to bit of a late start, I know, but with some determination and a lot of denying my inner editor, I am confident that I can do it.  In addition to this blog, I will be updating my progress at http://www.nanowrimo.org/en/participants/jeferragut so you can take a look there if you like.  While you're at it, explore the rest of the site!  You might just be inspired to take up the challenge yourself.

Jack: The True Story

                         "The stories are wrong of course.  It did all start with me selling a cow.  And it did end with a giant dying.  But that's just about all they got right."
                         This is the beginning of a story about a man named Jack, the same Jack that turns up in all the stories.  But he's here to set the record straight, because whoever circulated the stories (possibly that singing harp he's accused of stealing) mucked them up something awful.
                         What exactly did happen?  I don't know.  He hasn't told me yet.

This One Epic I Know

                       It has occurred to me that if people *cough*AuntVivi*cough* want to get to know me through my writing, I should probably spend some time talking about Ironheart.  You see, about four and a half years ago, while I was still attending College of St. Benedict in Minnesota, I started looking for online Dungeons & Dragons games to join.  I had been introduced to the game by a college friend, but no one on campus (that I knew of) had the time and motivation to run one.  So I turned to play-by-post internet forums, hoping to gain enough experience with the system that I might be comfortable running a game myself.  As it turned out, I did find and join a number of short-lived play-by-post D&D games online.  I also found Escape from Ironheart.
                       Escape from Ironheart was a free-form role-playing game, loosely placed in a D&D setting, but with no dice rolls and a much higher emphasis on characterization and storytelling.  It had already been running for six months, but due to several players dropping out, the DM, or storyteller, was looking for fresh meat  players to round out the group.  The concept was that Ironheart was the name of a prison, and all the players were prisoners attempting to Escape from Ironheart.  I submitted a character, Pyrene the Temptress, and was accepted into the game.
                       Little did I know, I was embarking on a literary journey that would last for years, meeting people who would become good friends despite, in most cases, never knowing each-other's real names.  There was Umber, one of the seven original vampires on a mission to save the love of his life.  Little Mar, an amnesiatic archangel trapped in a child's body.  Tare, the thief with a heart of gold and hidden powers.  Korram, a revolutionary who gave up his own arm for the power to oppose an evil ruler.  Ander, a holy paladin the gods returned from beyond the grave to cleanse the corrupt church.  And Sohssal, a mage who's search for immortality lead him to steal power from demons.
                       Together we wrote our way through Escape from Ironheart, and discovered that we had actually completed only the first part of a trilogy in the mind of Inspectre, the masterful storyteller who had woven our disparate tales together.  Invested as we were by then in the characters and the overarching plot, we all chose to continue.  As of this writing, we have completed the second part of the trilogy, Flight from Ironheart, and are a few months into the final installment, Return to Ironheart.  Other players have joined us, some only to fall away again, others staying for the long haul.  Those of us who have continued together have become a family of sorts, supporting each other through life events big and small, good and bad.
                       I have enormous respect for Inspectre and all my fellow players.  Every one of them has awed and inspired me with their writing.  Knowing them has challenged me to keep pushing the boundaries of my own ability, and for that I will be forever grateful.

The Fairy Tale Storeroom

                 The door to the storeroom is nothing special: just a rough wooden door, the wide boards ill-joined and ill-fitted to the frame.  It might be the entrance to any random broom closet.  Yet, when opened, a golden radiance streams out, one that ought to have been impossible to miss through the gaps and cracks in the door.
                 Should an observer, eyes watering in the sudden glare, summon the courage to step inside, he would see an assortment of priceless items tumbled in careless heaps under the magical light.  A pair of glass slippers, one with a broken heel, perch precariously upon an enormous mound of braided blonde hair.  A red woolen riding cloak, sized for a child, hangs from the spindle of a large spinning wheel.  The spinning wheel, in turn, balances atop a large stone bearing an inscription, the words half-hidden by a large black cauldron with three clawed feet.
                 This is where the discarded odds and ends of fairy tales ultimately come to rest.  Forgotten and abandoned by the heroes that relied upon them, they make their way here, waiting to be needed once again.