Week 4 Story: Amelia's Wisdom

(The Enchanting Land of the Fairies; online source, forgottenrealms.wikia)

Hey there! My name is Amelia. I grew up in an enchanting palace, more beautiful than words can describe. The walls are lined with ancient art, haled from all over the world and telling many stories of love, life, & tragedy. There are kind hearted servants in every shadow, waiting to serve those who stake claim to the place and their guests. It’s an incredible place and I was blessed to be born of noble blood and hold a rightful place within its borders. You’re probably wondering why you should care, right? Well, once you know my story, you’ll understand.

First, there is another facet of this estate that I forgot to mention; the enchanted land of fairies. Our home sits on a huge plot of land, with scenery farther than the human eye can behold. Among the acres of our land, there flows the waters of a breath-taking Caribbean blue fall into a small, magnificent pond. I’m captivated with ecstasy when my eyes consume the picturesque scene. It gets better though. When you dive in and swim beyond the fall, you emerge in another dimension.

The sweet smell of dewy foliage washes over as you surface. Greenery and flowers presents for miles around and the intricate tangle of roots threatens tragedy if care isn’t taken. Sparkling yellow lights loom about, suspended by magic in mid-air. The fairies live throughout, among the trees in tiny homes custom made for each. The fairies themselves are what you might expect; small, graceful flying beings, adorned with the characteristics of the most majestic of human beings, with the extra advantage of tiny wings used to flitter about. Blessed with magical powers, they can grant most anything you might wish for. Indeed, this is their life’s purpose.

Each fairy has its own specialty. Amorette, the fairy of love can grant you anything that deals with your hearts deepest desires. Felix is a fairy with whom you would speak for a request of a prosperous nature. The one to seek when you’re searching for joy is Euphoriella. The list goes on, from luck to friendship to tranquility and beyond.

Throughout my family’s history women have married, moved in with their lover, & birthed their first child before the age of 20. I was nearly 3 years past and the kindness of romantic love was lost to me. My parents told me not to worry. Love would take me off my feet soon enough and until such time, I could stay in the palace. One day in the not too distant past, I visited the land of fairies as I have so many times before. This time, however, I went in search of a blessing and asked Amorette to bless me with a suitor and of Euphoriella, I asked for our happiness in matrimony. Soon enough, a handsome prospect crossed my path. We fell fast and hard in love and my happily ever after had arrived.

I did what my parents had urged me against for years, “Be warned child; leave with nothing, less the pleasure of the land’s magnificent sights. Seek not from the fairies, blessings of body or soul, for in you, regret will eventually grow.” I tried to heed the advice but alas, loneliness had taken a toll. I went to the fairies amid desperation, forgetting my parents’ words. It soon became clear there was a part of all of this that I didn’t know.

My parents were displeased with my interest in a man born of common blood. They forbade me to see him. If I were to marry him, they said, I would be exiled from my family. Broken hearted, I returned to Amorette in search of a solution. “Could you bestow my parents with endearing affection for my fiancé?”, I requested. Only then did I learn why my parents have urged me not to make requests of the fairies all these years.

Balance, you see, must be maintained. For every blessing bestowed by one fairy, another dispenses a tragedy. For manipulating one to love, hatred befalls another. Joy is opposed by sadness, good luck by misfortune, tranquility by chaos, and so on. Ordinarily, my parents would have approved so long as I was happy but Heine, the fairy of hatred as he is, set their hearts afire with loathing. Amorette could not interfere with the cursed actions of another fairy.

I return home this evening with a heavy heart. I bade my lover farewell and assured him I will never forget his embrace. I knew this was a lie but he, as well as I, will remain ignorant of such. For when the sun brings a new day, I will rise filled with wisdom. I will not know this heart break, nor the comforting feel of his warm and caring touch. He won’t recall the pain of this separation, nor the joy of our union. Tomorrow, my parents will recollect nothing and their hearts will be freed of judgement. This is how things must be so that when my heart is again enamored, joy will find my parents’ as well.

I will appreciate the fairies’ beautiful domicile from this day forth but I will not again ask of them to interfere with my fate. I know now; without sadness, we can’t fully appreciate our joy. Without knowing hatred, we cannot truly cherish love. Without poverty, in wealth we are apt to be consumed with greed. If we know nothing of judgement, we will not value acceptance.

Author notes.

I took my inspiration for this story from "The Evil Eye of Sani" (3 parts), one of the first stories in "Folktales of Bengal". The original story is about a god of bad luck and a goddess of good luck. They have a disagreement about who is higher in rank and call upon a wise human to solve the debate. When he symbolically tells them that the goddess of good luck is higher in rank, the god of bad luck is infuriated and thus curses the man with bad luck. 

I liked the use of opposition in this story and I was immediately inspired to write about the art of opposition at work helping us appreciate things in our daily lives. When something good happens in our lives, it is typically sweeter when we have something bad to compare it to. For example, if we are born into riches and handed everything in life, we may not appreciate it as much as someone that is poor & works hard to obtain wealth. 

That was the whole idea behind my story; to show that we can find positivity even in negative things. If nothing else, the negative things in life help us value the good things more when they happen. I didn't stick very closely to the original story, in fact I didn't take much from it. I took some creative discretion and really made the story my own, only using  an overarching idea that came to me during the original story. 

Source.

Folktales of Bengal, recounted and translated to English by Lal Behari Day, online source.