Fairy Ring

Yes, I have a lawn ornament.

That probably seems out of character. I’ve been known to mock such things. But then, in September, when I was in the mountains with my friends, I was given a fairy.

We each got a fairy, in fact. It was night time, and we were all standing around the fire, a group of women eating homemade treats and all talking at once, everyone excited that we had a whole weekend together. That’s when Signing Woman brought out the fairy ornaments she’d bought at the state fair.

I have to admit, I liked my fairy the minute Signing Woman handed it to me. It was metal, with a little ball of glass that shone in the firelight. We stood there, a circle of woman, each holding our fairy, and then Mystic Woman said, “Let’s put them out in the moonlight.”

I didn’t even bother with shoes. No one did. In bare feet we ran outside, where we could hear the lake crashing against the stone wall that edged the lawn. We stuck the fairies into the ground to form a circle. Even though it was late September, the breeze was warm. We all stood there, talking still, laughing at the way the fairies were twisting and turning in the wind, glistening with moonlight.

The next morning, when I woke up early, the fairies were dancing in the early morning sun. We left them there all weekend, while we sat in the sun and ate scrumptious meals and talked and talked and talked. When finally, we had to leave, we each took our fairy home.

“What do I do with this now?” I asked Long Beautiful Hair, when we arrived at my house and were taking my stuff out of the car. She took the fairy without hesitation and stuck it into my front garden. It’s there still, and I smile every time I walk by, thinking about that weekend with my friends.