Mimi and the Babling

"When the first baby laughed for the first time, the laugh broke into a thousand pieces and they all went
skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies." --James Matthew Barrie

Mimi and the Babling

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful young Abatwa Fairy named Mimi. She and other Abatwas were a
happy and hard-working group of fairies. They lived on the Island of Thoth, where all preborn bablings go.
Mimi and her friends cared for the bablings with tenderness and love, preparing them for the golden time
when they would be given to their own families. Mimi was particularly fond of catlings, and she spent a lot of
time in the kittenery, teaching them the ways of a cat.

One day Mimi noticed a new babling, hanging from a branch in a nearby tree. Dahlia, was tending the
babling.

Mimi called up, "Girl or boy?"

"Girl," replied Dahlia, "and she is a beauty. Look!"

When Mimi looked into the face of the beautiful babling, her heart was changed forever. The little babling looked into Mimi's
eyes and sighed softly. Mimi took the babling to her own dwelling until she would join her own family.

Even though it was strictly forbidden, Mimi called the babling a special endearment, "Freya." Some days Mimi would take Freya
with her to visit the catlings, sometimes stopping to pet and feed the little ducklings and goslings.

One day, as Mimi and Freya were feeding the ducklings, Mimi was startled to see Bean Nighe washing clothes in the lake
nearby. Bean Nighe only washed the clothes of those that were doomed to die. When Mimi drew close, she saw
that Bean Nighe was washing Freya's softest blanket. Mimi hid the babling under her wing and ran home.

That night, Brighid the Banshee began crying in Mimi's garden. Horrified, Mimi bundled up Freya and went to visit
Cluricaune, the Household Fairy who communicated with humans. Mimi begged him to go to the Human Islands and
find babling Freya's home immediately. Mimi knew that this was also dangerous, and that Freya's fate was still
unsure -- being sent to a family before she was fully formed. But Mimi felt that this was her only chance.

Cluricaune and his wife Huldra took Freya and set sail to the Human Islands. Huldra, a musician, sang lullabies to
babling Freya. Mimi also traveled along, ever vigilant in her guard of the babling. Behind them, a much smaller
vessel was carrying Bean Nighe and Brighid. Mimi knew that they must hurry.

When they landed, Cluricaune hurried to the village with babling Freya and took her immediately to her new family. It seemed as if
they were expecting her arrival already. But Mimi was never to see her babling safely in the care of the young couple, for the two
death fairies, Brighid and Bean Nighe, frustrated at the loss of the babling, took Mimi instead. They felt justified since Mimi had
broken the laws of caring for preborn.

Mimi's time as an Abatwa Fairy was over, but everyone knows that fairies have more lives than even cats! And soon Mimi was a
Natale Fairy, and she spent her next life happily overseeing births, bestowing fates on newborn children and dancing in the woods.

Fairy tale by Catherine Jane Trayer Shafer, February 10, 2006.
If I can do this, anyone in my class can, too. RIGHT??

PERCIVALLI CATLING, THE PERFIDIOUS POOK
THE POEM:
Percivalli Catling.
Happy, childish, silly, loving;
Friend to kittens, babies, good fairies, and puppies;
Lover of mushrooms, grilled cheese sandwiches, perfumey flowers, and bubble baths (also tin cans);
Who feels sad that Pooks are mean (though he is always loyal to them), loving to "underdogs," and splendid about rainbows;
Who needs the play of kittens, the trust of babies, the lick of puppies, and the kiss of fairies;
Who gives balls of yarn to the kitties, bones to the puppies, and glittery rainbows to the forest;
Who fears the other pooks, being alone, and ogres;
Who would like to see tigers love to be petted, all fairies be good, and Quempel;
Resident of Thoth.
The Perfidious Pook.

THE STORY:
Percivalli Catling came back to the Island of Thoth from Sicily, where he raised for the first 482 years of his life. Upon arrival
in Thoth, he joined the group of Perfidious Pooks living under the Western Marshmallow Forest.

A Perfidious Pook is known to be a bad fairy, or even a false fairy. The Perfidious Pook is known for manipulating humans into
pretense and hypocrisy, inspiring lies and deceit. They throw glamour over all things false so that they seem plausible and
worthy.

Percivalli Catling is rather a failure at being a Perfidious Pook, because he was raised by a nanny goat in Sicily, and never learned
pookish ways. The nanny goat, Quempel, found Percivalli in a pile of donkey dung, where he had been unceremoniously dumped
after being found kissing a kitten.

Percivalli was found kissing the kitten by the farmer, Obadiah Oddtooth. When Obadiah first saw Percivalli, he was unsure what
this odd creature was. To Obadiah, Percivalli appeared feline, but with odd features, such as wings and a glittery lavender coat
(and a green undercoat).

Regardless, he was somewhat sure that Percivalli should not be kissing the kitten. Zuzu Petals, the Mother Cat, tended to agree
with Obadiah Oddtooth.

Jalope, the kitten Percivalli was kissing, was the only female in the entire litter of kittens. She and her brothers were mewing in
worry for the shiny little catling (Percivalli). He was being ritualistically tortured by their mother.

The kittens admired Percivalli’s beautiful, shiny, lavender coat. He was a whale or a caribou. (They surmised). But he smelled like
a kitten. He looked somewhat like a kitten. He tasted a little bit like a lightning bug. This was puzzling.

Zuzu Petals, the Mother Cat, found Percivalli flitting around the farm yard. She made a magnificent jump and picked Percivalli
clean out of the air. Her kittens looked at their mother in amazement and admiration. They couldn’t wait to see what she had
caught! It must be a caribou or a whale! (They surmised.)

Zuzu Petals brought Percivalli back to the haystack, and began batting Percivalli around, strutting for her kittens and teaching
them the fine art of torture. (“Zuzu Petals” was a name she had given herself. Obadiah called her “Snowball,” much to her
consternation.)

Percivalli, making assumptions, playfully bounced and giggled as Zuzu Petals pummelled and tossed him about. When Zuzu Petals
stopped to clean her right hind leg, Percivalli made the mistake of kissing one of her kittens. This particular kitten was the only
female in Zuzu Petals' entire litter. Her name was Jalope. (Obadiah called her “Fluffball.” Really, it was horrid.)

Quite suddenly, Obadiah entered the barn. The cats scattered in a frenzy – they knew that Obadiah fed and watered them, but
he wore big, dirty, brown farm boots that stomped indiscriminately. They called him “The Man With the Boots,” (Cat: “Food
Giving Slave”) and they were scared of him.

He looked at the odd catling, then at Zuzu Petals, who seemed to be in tremendous panic (Cat: apathetic). He picked up the little
catling and slung him into a big pile of donkey dung. Problem solved.

Quempel (the nanny-goat who found Percivalli) loved Percivalli as her own and raised him to be an empathetic, cheerful, and
joyful fairy catling, though somewhat given to eating tin. Quempel, with the aid of fairy dust, lived to the ripe old age of 560
(104 in dog years) (23 in human years).

The kittens (Jalope and her 4 brothers) visited Percivalli and Quempel often. The kittens practiced the fine art of ritualistic
torture on Percivalli. Percivalli, continuing to make assumptions, continued to play and bounce. The kittens loved him. Jalope
ESPECIALLY loved him! Zuzu Petals didn’t love him. Quempel didn’t love Zuzu Petals.

After his nanny goat mama's death, Percivalli returned to Thoth.

How did Percivalli come to be flitting around Obadiah's farm to begin with? Many many many many years before Percivalli was
found by Zuzu Petals, he was born to a beautiful indigo fairy catling (also a rather unusual Perfidious Pook), Clytemnestra.

Though it was against all of her better instincts and assumptions, she had fallen in love with Sibelius, a handsome green cat.
Sibelius was actually part cat, part lightning bug. He was effervescent and incandescent, qualities that Clytemnestra both
admired and envied.

The other pooks were embarrassed and shunned Clytemnestra, her Sibelius, and their kittenish pook, Percivalli. The Perfidious
Pook Community (PPC) put Clytemnestra and her colorful family on the Winds of Sicily to float seaward and landward and airward
to a place far from Thoth.

And that is how Percivalli came to live in Sicily. And what of his parents? They were carried on a rogue gust to southern
Delaware, where they live to this day.

And that was the beginning. The end comes much later.

Written Spring 2010, by Catherine Jane Trayer Shafer

Where Do Babies Come From? a fairy tale by Catherine Jane Trayer Shafer, Spring 2011

Right here. Sagittarius A Star (Sgr A*). It's not a star. It's not a planet. Baby stars and planets are born here.

Sgr A* is right in the middle of the Milky Way. Once every million years or so, a baby galaxy is born here!

But mostly, ordinary things like owls, snails, moons, oceans, dogs, spiders, rocks, rainbows, girls, jellyfish,
boys, eagles, daisies, cats, dragons, trees, diamonds, little brown bats, unicorns, peacocks, bees, ladybugs,
shells, and hamsters are born here.

Here's how it works. A hyper-velocity star speeds by!

A herd of oaquines dwell in bottoms and tops of oaque and beech trees. When a star speeds by, they gallop to Hard Rock Candy Mountain to gather
crystals.

Floating above Sgr A* are ichthyonimbus clouds. When a star speeds by, they grow and darken. Soon they rain down seedlings.

Nursery bumblees tend fields of poppies. When ichthyonimbus drop seedlings, bumblees catch them on their hairy legs and begin gathering flowers.

Babbling brookingly down Butterfly Falls is the Indigo Euphilotes River. Already plashing and rippling, the star
causes the Euphilotes to burble and gurgle, gush and rush, laughing up droplets of oxygen.

Storques play all day long. They prance and dance in the Euphilotes, dive through clouds, tickle oaquines,
and bumble bumblees. When a star speeds by, storques prance and dance and dive and tickle and bumble.

Look! There goes a star!
Look! Ichthyonimbus are getting big and dark!
Look! An oaquine is galloping to the mountain for nectar!
Look! A storque is playing in the Euphilotes! Hmmm.

Nursery bumblees gently wrap each seedling in a pod of petals and honey. They feed the growing babies
nectar and droplets of oxygen.

What will the seedlings become?

Will it be a galaxy, fairy, octopus, rosebush, or fish?
Possibly a star, Loch Ness Monster, crab, butterfly, elephant, or falling star?
Or even a blue-footed booby, lamb, turtle, comet, Martian, or snake!
It could be a planet, moose, firefly, dinosaur or penguin!
You never know. It might be an ant, pumpkin, whale, snowman, perfidious pook, goblin, cloud, or baby.

Who is that? Look!

See? Meet Johann Sebastian, a little brown bat; Zuzu Petals, a tabby cat; and Kezia Babd, a ridge-back dragon. They are almost big enough to leave
Sgr A*.

Deep in Werm Woods live Seven Sisters: Maia, Electra, Taygete, Alcyone, Celaena, Sterope, and Merope. Each guards a wormhole that opens briefly
so storques can carry babies to far-flung galaxian archipelagos.

These babies are going to the Island of Thoth on your planet.

Esmerelda is carrying Johann Sebastian. When she's not busy relaxing and star-bathing, she is a tooth fairy.

Mortimer is carrying Zuzu Petals. He loves to splash in the Euphilotes and to knit.

Humphrey is carrying Kezia Babd. He spits seeds at Ichthyonimbus and enjoys sushi.

Thoth. Babies are tended by Abatwa fairies until they are ready to be born or hatch. Johann Sebastian will join a bat colony in Indiana. Zuzu Petals will
be a farm cat in Sicily. Kezia Babd will join a flock of feral dragons in Romania. How many fairies do you see?

Poppy Pod Baby dolls: Johann Sebastian Bat, Zuzu Petals Cat, Kezia Babd Dragon, Freya Baby Girl