The First of the Folk - The White Hare

My journal entry (text in bold represents a truth or factual event):

I began on the full moon, drawn towards the Fairy Ring. The night was cold, but the season was beginning to turn towards spring. I am sad at the passing of winter; where others bemoan gloomy skies, the rain brings me comfort.

I had not gone far when, in the middle of the path, sat a white hare wearing what appeared to be an old bridal veil. Once white, it had softened to the beige of aged thread. It was clearly made of cloth once fine enough for a noble bride, but time had taken its toll, and moths had had their fill, leaving a remnant that looked like lace.

 

She stared at me with eyes dark enough to mistake for shadow and deep enough that looking into them felt like looking down a well with no bottom.

 

This must be the White Hare, one of the Forest Folk—the keeper of the Ring. I had heard tales in the village of the Forest Folk but had given them little merit. Until now.

 

Rumour has it that she never lies, but the truths she offers are always sideways, leaving the recipient to do the inner work of making sense of them.

 

Ironically, knowing I could ask anything left me without anything to ask.

 

What if I asked the wrong question? I have always been timid, afraid of making the wrong choice, of choosing the wrong path. The longer I stood silent, the more certain I became that the right question had already passed me by.

 

I blurted out the most ridiculous question and immediately regretted it.

 

“Are you real?” I asked.

 

I was reminded of an encounter many years ago in a crowded bookshop, where I met a man who could see the Fae. Filled with scepticism, I challenged his gift, an exchange I will always regret.

 

“I am a mirror,” she replied.

The Truth In the Text

In 1998, I travelled to San Francisco for a first date. It sounds mad now, and it did not go well. Luckily, I had friends in Portland, Oregon, who paid for me to fly north and spend the rest of my week with them. That part of the trip was wonderful: they took me to Mount Hood, where I saw snow for the first time, just before Halloween. I still have the plush moose I bought there, Willy, named for the Willamette River.

But this is not really a story about snow, or bad first dates, or even Willy. It is about the man who could see the Fae.

A large Portland bookshop was hosting a signing with Brian Froud. I had loved his work since Labyrinth, and I was thrilled to meet him. He spoke about his art, his vision, and the Fae... not as something seen with the eyes, but through the heart, in the in-between places: between waking and dreaming.

My practical, sceptical mind could not make sense of it. If he could see fairies, why could no one else? Still, as people raised their hands and asked their questions, he answered each one with warmth and grace. When I put up my own hand, I repeated one instruction to myself: Do not ask if they are real. Do not ask if they are real.

Then he pointed to me.

“Do you really see fairies,” I asked, “or is it just a gimmick to sell books?”

I wanted the floor to open beneath me. Who asks Brian Froud whether he is a fraud? Apparently, me.

I have often wished I could return to that moment, not to ask a cleverer question, but a kinder one. A question that made room for wonder rather than demanding proof of it.