Three Days, Three Quotes Challenge – Day 1

This Door is Alarmed was nominated by The Britchy One who writes one of the wittiest blogs I know. When I see she has posted, I set aside a slice of clock face with a cup of tea; I like to know I can fully enjoy her humorous and uniquely devious outlook on life. If you are not following her, you are missing out.

The GUIDELINES are:

• Thank the person who nominated you.
• Post one quote per day over three days.
• Nominate 3 blogs per day to take part in the challenge.

Unfortunately, I could not find who some of these quotes were by—if you know, please comment below and I will update the post. Credit where credit is due!

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I was four years of age when I queried and followed the fog between the trees. I was standing at the window of my parents’ bedroom, my little stature not quite sufficient to see out of the window.

My father came to stand behind me. “Hello, darling daughter,” he would say. He often called me darling daughter. The thought of those words today, as an adult, nurtures warmth and duvet comforts. He lifted me up, perching little me on the windowsill, sitting beside the trinkets that all parents collect—the trinkets that make a house a home—and I looked out over the small English village in which I grew up.

I looked out and beyond to the fields and the noisy tractor snores that found themselves muted by distance. I looked out to the hay bales and half-harvested summer crops in perfect pinstripe. I looked out to the turned-up noses of slender eavesdropping poplar trees—and there, in those poplar trees was the fog; a hazy, lazy, leaden sort of fog, a misty dense elusive sort of fog, a fog that settled between the branches, and fostered a child’s playground for thought. Could I spring about inside its soft and cushioned layers? Beneath the cloak, would I find a planting ground for rainbows or a secret escort of unicorns or chariots of elves?

What else does a child think?

“Dad,” I said, “can we go and stand in that fog? I have always wanted to stand in a cloud.”

“Yes,” he answered, smiling a knowing smile. “Let’s go to meet the clouds,” He said, “but what you find, may come as a surprise.”

With those few words, my mind conjured the fairies or gnomes or pixies that walked by the cloak of the heavens, and excitement stirred and wound in neat little coils in that ever-so-tiny little chest of mine.

And so we set out.

Back in those days, I didn’t have a bike of my own. Dad had a sports bike with super-slim tyres, big horned handlebars and a little red plastic seat in front, just for me. I would grapple my little mitts on the inside, and Dad’s big hands commanded the great horn rims themselves.  We never fell; he always took great care. In this way, we embarked on the intrepid journey into the fog.

We rode and spoke, actually, we spoke a spectrum of everything—it was quite a skill to silence my active little vocal chords in those days. I was always so articulate as a child, I wonder what changed?

Before I knew it, we had arrived, and I drew a double take at the scene.

I saw the very same trees, and the very same backdrop, but the clouds and pixies and fairies were nowhere to be seen. There were no gnome nurseries or planting patches for rainbows, there were no elves or giants or anything else magical. Actually, there was nothing, nothing at all—not even the fog we had travelled so far to see.

My father taught me a very important lesson that day:

“The future is always foggy,” he said, “it is not always until you get there that you can see the bigger picture”

Nominees:

This is, as always, entirely voluntary and just for fun! If you choose to participate there is absolutely no time limit on completion, I just wanted the opportunity to let let you know how wonderful I think your sites are:

Meher Gandhi

Jane Gealy

Simon J Wood