Puddle: A Tale for the Curious Read online

  The boy from the puddle stared at his pouch of dust, and picked up a handful of dirt under the gazebo. “You are correct. There is more to it. However, the soil here beneath these vines is potent. You must have spent time here listening with more than just your ears. Elsewhere nearby is not the same. Your land has quieted its voice. It has not been listened to. It has turned its attention elsewhere and has gone to sleep.”

  “I didn’t realize the ground had an attention,” I said.

  “It does. It has a long lifespan, longer than yours or mine, so its attention is different than ours. Similar to my planet, the land here was made of debris from the birth of your sun. It knows the universal language, too. You have listened to the soil here. That much is clear. The soil in this garden feels more responsive than the dust along those lines of power, from the puddle to here.

  “The electricity in those wires is forced and has created unnatural lay lines. The wires hold the energy captive, and it buzzes to be set free. The soil beneath the wires heard. To protect itself, it turned inward and fell asleep in the manner of soil. The dust dreams. It wants the symbiosis back between forms of energy and matter. Plant, animal, mineral, and the rest are all made of the same sorts of tiny particles vibrating at various frequencies. The symbiosis came from the forms of energy and matter listening to each other with reverence. The dust dreams its perfect world.”

  My loss of conversational skills did not surprise me. Not often did I talk of energy in the middle of the night with a person from a puddle. The tiny particles must be atoms. Atoms paid attention? I was still questioning the ground having attention and protecting itself. Did he pick all that up just walking around? If yes, his power of observation was great. I stood gawping and wanting explanations in the form of stories.

  He continued with words that made sense, “It is because you love these plants that the soil is paying attention. You can hear them, can you not?”

  “Sometimes I think I’m making it up,” I said. “Sometimes I trust it.”

  “Trust it. That love is real.”

  I asked, “Are you real?”

  He stared at me through shadows. “Well, are you real?”

  “I’m not always sure. Sometimes I think I’m someone else’s dream and will pop out of existence as soon as they wake up. But you came from a puddle, and people don’t usually do that. In fact, nobody has ever done that.” I inched closer to him in the sand and tried to see his secrets.

  He spoke quietly, “Ah, yes. Nobody ever sees me enter their world. I have waterjumped often, and none of the creatures from any of the worlds noticed me until I engaged them. Yet, you have. I wonder at your power.”

  My sudden smile almost laughed, but was too puzzled. Power?

  “Power? I was just watching the upside down world. Nothing much of power there.”

  “That may be,” he mused. “But perchance not. Watching in its own right is a powerful act.”

  “Heh. Actually, I was just thinking something like that. What is your name?”

  “…,” the boy said somewhat awkwardly as he continued watching me.

  “Well, if you will not tell me, I shall have to call you something,” I looked about for naming inspiration. Not much stood out. “Hummm. You came from a puddle, so I will call youuuu Puddle. How do you feel about that?”

  “Puddle,” he said with upturned mouth corners. “Puddle is nice.”

  “I’m Birch. I still think you’re a dream, but I like dreams. Day or night. I would like to know more about you.”

  “I want to know more about you and this place,” Puddle said. “Your world is intricate. Full of changes. I have found that the components of a puddle are major influences in the world to which they link. The puddle I traveled through to get here looked complex. I was nervous, as some pieces felt foreboding. But, there were some parts so beautiful that I was drawn regardless. What is this world?”

  I was not sure how to begin describing this planet, and reached for my necklace to touch the stone leaf there. It was smooth and evening-cool, but gave no answers this time. The planet was far too big and had too many names to be contained in one answer. At a loss, I said a name common to my ears.

  “Earth. It means soil. Many languages named this planet soil, or land.”

  “Earth,” he echoed. Puddle echoed. Thinking his name was… fun. It made me think of bubbles. Maybe because p’s and b’s and d’s are all the same, but flipped about and bouncy.

  “You really did come through that puddle, huh?” I asked in a way that didn’t require an answer. “Where are you from, then?” I asked in a way that did.

  “My origins. That is difficult to answer. Most of the places I travel to do not use language as you do, but speak with every movement. They ask more what I love than where I am from. What we love can be more revealing than where we are from.

  “To answer you most accurately, I am from everywhere I have ever been. The places and creatures, they have all had their impact on me. I suppose I have changed things while I went through their worlds too, because one thing cannot interact with another thing without something changing. Even sitting still, we are causing the breeze to go around us. Our conversation is causing other thoughts. We exist, and we alter existence with every thought and movement.”

  “What you love. I like that. I want to be from the stuff I love. I suppose I am from this garden, then,” I said, privately hoping he would also love the plants that I considered friends. “Helping things grow and listening to plants has helped me find my place around here.”

  Puddle smiled and was silent for a moment while his eyes surveyed the garden. Then he said, “I am not sure I even needed to dust you for us to understand each other. You saw me arrive though the puddle and can speak with the plants, even through all this external noise.”

  “The buzzing of those power-lines?”

  “That is one cause. There are a lot of other unfamiliar sounds. Also, this night has an orange tint. The stars are blocked. These were things I saw in the puddle through which I traveled. They made me hesitate to come here.”

  “The orange tinge is light pollution. Sometimes, when you’re away from town, it can trick you to thinking you’re watching the aurora borealis, which is much rarer than light from cities. I’m glad you came here.”

  Puddle nodded agreement, and picked a smooth pebble from his pack and handed it to me. It looked speckled, but the moon was difficult to read by. “Here,” he said. “Tree agate, in your words.”

  “Thank you,” I said quietly, holding the stone. It had a comforting feel, like it was putting a sleep on me. I blinked away the darkness. The feeling of comfort continued, and reached about my edges. It made my eyes heavy. I stared into the stone, lit by droll moonlight. I tried looking back at Puddle, but the mottling on the stone held my vision and blurred my mind. Movement became that of dreams, where everything was heavier than physics said it should be, like wading in cold molasses on a marshmallow mountain. I closed my eyes, and heard bird songs. When I opened them, morning gushed through my blinds and I laid in my bed. A dream.

  I rolled over to see the time, and on my side table was a smooth stone, mottled green and white. The tree agate.

  *~*

  The letter was written on a slip of parchment crafted from grass, leaves, and cottonwood seeds. The ink was from boiled walnut husks. It read:

  Dear Council Members,

  It is of gravest necessity for you to honor us with your presence this year at the Gathering of Veorda. Your guidance has served as a beacon of light and inspiration for the evolution of our society, and is needed once again in our moment of distress. A force is upon the land. Our design is to initiate conversation early on, and start building ideas. We intend for those ideas to have time to grow, in order to reach a beneficial solution for all.

  With gratitude and hope,

  H. Thorn

  *~*

  A Walk in the Park

  When we were children and exploring the reality of our
imaginations, Mae used to say bears lived in the miniature forest behind my house. One was named Alfred, who liked roller hockey and had a dream to learn to count on an abacus. Those were adventures. We would gather up our battle sticks and sneak through the trees, learning to walk quietly and avoid the hornet nest. I’m not sure why we had battle sticks in the first place, because we never really battled. They seemed like important inventory. Adventures needed weapons, and so on. The hornets had a right to build their home, and we had no desire to battle them. We learned diplomacy from their stingers.

  We had more wilderness when I was young. I’ve been around in this body for only seventeen years, and have seen too much green turn concrete. There were even horse stables a short walk down that quieter, yet still power-lined field. I was fifteen when a subdivision ate the stables and most of the trees between us. It’s not that I didn’t like the people who moved in. I didn’t even know them. I simply missed the trees, and the ponies. The land itself was hurt for not being asked to accept such a drastic change. The part of the land that got chopped up and covered over stopped speaking in retaliation, such like Puddle spoke about last night. I’m not sure anyone else noticed.

  Bulldozers couldn’t plow every quest. They could try. They did try. As I saw it, adventure and imagination were nearly synonymous. They were the slant rhymes of perception. Imagination would persevere. Adventure would persevere. Adventure could bide its time and prod to be let out at every opportunity. Each moment, the mind could celebrate or smush its imagination.

  Go ahead and walk out the door with adventurous intent. What becomes may not line up exactly with what you want, but that intent will always sneak in a wink of mischievous mirth. Once, my adventure came in the form of a conversation in front of a shop. I had a grumpy morning, and decided to follow some universe signs in hopes that the grump might go away. Mae and I walked around, and we picked our path by what felt right. A breeze pushed us left, or the sun hit a rock at a really nice angle so we turned to go past it. A half hour of walking placed us in front of a grocery store. Mae went inside to get a soda. I stayed outside because the sun was feeling so nice, and I didn’t like anything with fizz. My grumpiness dissipated as I waited.

  His name was Kelly, or maybe it was Kelley. We had never met. He rode up on his bike, wild curls blowing in the wind. We eyed each other for a moment, and I smiled to break the silence. Sometimes a smile said a whole lot. He introduced himself. Mae walked out sipping her soda. We, as three, sauntered around town and through the parks for the rest of the afternoon. Mae and I had met a Storyteller.

  His tales held truth, even if they didn’t hold facts. I didn’t know if he visited all the wild places he mentioned, or met all the characters he described. He could not have been much older than we were, and his travel map was extensive. Then again, everyone’s story was different. Perhaps, perhaps.

  I loved every moment.

  He saw straight into the heart of each person who entered his stories, and explained their beauty and their pain. He read more than facial expressions and minute movements. He read minds, in the way one read shadows on a sunny day.

  He told us about the missions of the neighborhood wild cats. Their sworn duty was to keep the balance, and fend off rodent invaders. One rough and tumble tom spelled his name with an h; Caht. His specialty was climbing. He would climb to the high branches, and mew so pitifully that the people living in the closest houses would venture outside, and talk in worried tones until someone got a ladder. Then, that wily creature would run down the tree, and off into the sunset, gloating on how he got people to drop what they were doing and go outside. Kelly’s story made me love cats on a whole new level.

  *~*

  Adventure calls to those who listen. The loot is usually tangible as the effect of a smile.

  Despite the tree agate, which found its way to my pocket, fully believing in last night’s garden conversation needed greater waking proof. Unexplainable things could still be valid. Still, I had difficulty accepting them without further examination.

  Easy explanation: I was never in the garden.

  Contrary evidence: The tree agate.

  Believing a boy could climb from a bit of grounded rain was unbelievable. I wanted to find him. If he was a hallucination, at least he was a good one.

  Today’s adventure of wandering to find Puddle whispered for me to bring my pack. I kept a small backpack full of provisions ready for times when I felt the pull of adventuring, and thought I might get hungry along the way. Along with some snacky bits, my pack held string, a warm shirt, some socks, and a bamboo fork and spoon set. It also had a tick removal kit, which consisted of tweezers, a lighter, and a jar to hold the tick. Ticks were indestructible, except by fire. They swelled in the heat of the flame until they popped. They were the only creeper that creeped me out because they sometimes carried the spirochete that caused Lyme disease, which could imitate other illnesses. Ticks were scarier than black widow venom.

  The trees around town were sparse. I decided to take the power-line path across a few streets toward the park, where a small, youthful forest grew older every year. I would go to those trees, and pretend the rush of vehicles from all directions was a strong, constant wind. The brain was funny in that it could believe whatever it wanted if it tried hard enough. Somewhere in there, it would still question. At the same time, wind and traffic sounded similar enough, and I found comfort in pretending I was far away from all the busyness that made my head spin. It took a persistent imagination to survive in this town.

  I passed a transmission tower. Bees sniffed some early dandelions. Ah-hah. I flew as a queen bee in search of a new home, with my arms out, and a buzz on my teeth. I pointed out tangy wood sorrel and the big leafed clovers with their crimson smiles. Then, even though nobody was watching, I got embarrassed and just walked. A worry had hit.

  Mae sometimes asked why I would be uncool and go outside, where there might be bugs and no temperature control. You needed a reason to go outdoors. Independent, mature people didn’t do things just because. They didn’t pretend to be bees. They made schedules and had reasons. I figured she was momentarily confused, and would join me outside when she regained her senses, dressed for the weather, and remembered how to play. Play shredded stress like concrete shredded knees at a high velocity.

  I had met too many people who preferred to have their stories written for them. To that, I sang only dead fish swam with the stream. I wrote my own story. I wanted play to be cool, and resumed buzzing back and forth about it.

  The park was a strip of land reserved for exercise and dog walking, and followed an opaque river that I would not consider drinkable. Still, the ducks seemed to have survived so far. Tough buggers.

  I stepped into the park, chained against motor vehicles, and felt like I was entering a different world. The ground was dappled in sun rays that sparkled as they collided with particles in the air. Young nettles watched from the liminal space between the trail and the trees, in their beautiful and dangerous ways. Either drying or heating rendered their sting safe. I liked to pick their leaves and steep them for a deliciously buttery tea piled with health benefits. I almost stopped what I was doing to go back and make that tea. They would still be there later, so I kept on.

  I took a left at one of the side dirt trails, hopping over fallen limbs and around scratchy blackberry bushes. Fiddlehead ferns waved in the gentle wind, and I stopped for a bite. They tasted like pale green furled up spring, tender as the music made by mist before it warms. As they stretched their full length, they became bitter and minimally toxic. A nibble would indicate the level of toxins via flavor.

  A clearing sat further among the trees, surrounded by old beeches and oaks. Drunken underage party people liked that spot too, and I often found myself cleaning up their bottles and butts. Never a thanks. No sorry for partying. I was glad the people at the park provided recycling as well as garbage cans.

  However, the trees saw my doings, and so shared their secrets. They
revealed the best reading nooks in curved branches, and pointed my toes to patches of chanterelles and morels. Last summer I spent a weekend with a group of people who partook in such delectable foraging, and they introduced me to several safe forest mushrooms and the care it took for responsible foraging. We didn’t want to deplete any resources for wildlife.

  Today, the space was clear of waste, and full of plants and dirt and singing birds. I sat with my back against some roots and took out the tree agate for further examination. Movement above drew my attention.

  “Good morning,” Puddle said from the boughs, his dreaded hair hanging like vines.

  Be still, my surprised heart.

  “Morning,” I mumbled, startled. “What are you doing up there?”

  “Waiting.”

  “Forrr…”

  “You.”

  How did he know I was going to this tree?

  I asked, “How did you know I was going to this tree?”

  He held up a stone similar to the tree agate in my hand. “The stones. Their language is particular, but they speak with each other, so I knew you were headed this way. I can only hear them when I am close to one of them, but they can speak to each across great distances. Like plants. The ones with the same stone or crystalline structures understand each other best, like these agates together, but they do communicate across species. Different stones have their own dialects and areas of specialty mixed within their molecular structure. Such as, these tree agates connect with plants, while amethyst connects with dreams. You speak with plants, so the agate is suitable for your situation.”

  He dropped down from the branches and faced me with his upturned mouth corners. He looked earthy with his dried oak leaf colored shirt and wild twig hair. He smelled of dew.

  I did not blush. My cheeks were… ahem… sunburned suddenly.

  “So, that would make the stones alive,” I ventured after a moment. “Even if they don’t have cells? You’re supposed to have cells to be considered alive.”