Latest / Mooney's Mythic Podcast / On impostership, anger management, cheese, queenliness and an assortment of shoes

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On impostership, anger management, cheese, queenliness and an assortment of shoes · Mooney's Mythic Podcast

0:03
SPEAKER_01: When I'm an old woman I shall wear purple with a red hat which doesn't go and
0:10
SPEAKER_01: doesn't suit me and I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves and satin
0:17
SPEAKER_01: sandals and say we've no money for butter.
0:21
SPEAKER_01: I shall sit down on the pavement when I'm tired and gobble up samples in shops and
0:26
SPEAKER_01: press alarm bells and run my stick along public railings and make up for the
0:31
SPEAKER_01: sobriety of my youth
0:34
SPEAKER_01: I should go out in my slippers in the rain and pick flowers in other people's gardens and learn to spit.
0:43
SPEAKER_01: I ought to practice a little now so people who know me are not too shocked and
0:48
SPEAKER_01: surprised when suddenly I'm old and start to wear purple.
0:53
SPEAKER_01: From Warning by Jenny Joseph Welcome to Mooney's Mythic Podcast.
1:01
SPEAKER_01: You can probably tell already,
1:03
SPEAKER_01: if you've been with the podcast for some time,
1:05
SPEAKER_01: that I am not Sarah Mooney.
1:08
SPEAKER_01: If this is your first time with us, you are so very welcome.
1:12
SPEAKER_01: I am not Sarah Mooney.
1:16
SPEAKER_01: Do not cause yourself a mischief and alarm.
1:19
SPEAKER_01: Normal service will be resumed next week.
1:22
SPEAKER_01: In the meantime...
1:24
SPEAKER_01: This week's episode has my good self as holiday cover,
1:27
SPEAKER_01: stand-in,
1:28
SPEAKER_01: imposter,
1:29
SPEAKER_01: and is sponsored by shoes and cheese.
1:32
SPEAKER_01: Cheese and shoes.
1:35
SPEAKER_01: Say them with me.
1:37
SPEAKER_01: Cheese.
1:39
SPEAKER_01: Shoes.
1:41
SPEAKER_01: I've been eating Wookiee Hole cheese in an attempt to bridge the gap between Sarah and myself.
1:47
SPEAKER_01: The package says that the cheese has been aged in the caves,
1:50
SPEAKER_01: but I fancy it is in fact the goats themselves that live in the caves,
1:55
SPEAKER_01: told tall tales by the witch to make sure their milk will curdle just so.
2:01
SPEAKER_01: The shoes are magical and marvellous, and Moon is.
2:05
SPEAKER_01: Moon is marvellous, magical shoes, which I am attempting to fill with my own two feet.
2:13
SPEAKER_01: Only you can be the judge of if I manage this startlingly immense task or not.
2:20
SPEAKER_01: When Sarah asked me to step into her shoes,
2:22
SPEAKER_01: I thought back to the last time this had happened and how it ended up with me being
2:26
SPEAKER_01: placed in an anger management programme.
2:29
SPEAKER_01: That was even before I behaved as an imposter and got found out.
2:34
SPEAKER_01: It was inevitable, for when we try to be someone we are not, we will eventually come undone.
2:40
SPEAKER_01: Interestingly though,
2:42
SPEAKER_01: on that occasion,
2:43
SPEAKER_01: those that I had behaved badly towards and tricked with my shenanigans forgave me
2:47
SPEAKER_01: straight away.
2:49
SPEAKER_01: Let me explain.
2:50
SPEAKER_01: How I found myself in the delightful task of pretending to be Sarah Mooney.
2:55
SPEAKER_01: Dear listeners,
2:56
SPEAKER_01: how I have most certainly learnt my lesson and am not in the slightest pretending
3:01
SPEAKER_01: to be the Mooney of the Mythic Podcast with you.
3:04
SPEAKER_01: I'm not sure if it is more or less daunting than last time.
3:08
SPEAKER_01: At least I cannot see your faces now.
3:11
SPEAKER_01: Many years ago,
3:12
SPEAKER_01: in a little library in Glastonbury,
3:15
SPEAKER_01: I was asked to sit and read from Alice in Wonderland to a little sea of little
3:19
SPEAKER_01: eager faces.
3:21
SPEAKER_01: Not content with simply speaking out the text on the page, I decided I would take things a step further.
3:27
SPEAKER_01: What would it be like, I wondered, if I let myself be impossibly outrageous?
3:33
SPEAKER_01: In a family-friendly way, of course.
3:37
SPEAKER_01: badly could I sing the song of the Mock Turtle and how long might I get away with it for?
3:43
SPEAKER_01: It turned out that the answer was very badly and not for very long at all.
3:49
SPEAKER_01: Would you believe that my audience asked me, begged me to stop singing after just one verse?
3:55
SPEAKER_01: Please don't do that, they said.
3:58
SPEAKER_01: Should I sing one more verse, I asked sweetly and innocently, trying my best not to laugh.
4:03
SPEAKER_01: No, they chorused very firmly.
4:07
SPEAKER_01: Oh,
4:08
SPEAKER_01: what an utter joy it was in that moment to be so free in the not trying to be
4:12
SPEAKER_01: perfect or brilliant or wonderful or good.
4:16
SPEAKER_01: For there is some pressure in trying to step into fabulous and fantastic shoes.
4:21
SPEAKER_01: Just ask the stepsisters who sliced off parts of their flesh to try and fit into a glass slipper.
4:27
SPEAKER_01: Moony's mythic shoes I fancy are soft and worn and velvety with wonderful curling
4:34
SPEAKER_01: toes and maybe a bejeweled heel.
4:38
SPEAKER_01: I will try my best not to be too bad for you, dear listeners, but I confess the temptation is there.
4:44
SPEAKER_01: Not bad as in naughty,
4:46
SPEAKER_01: but in preparing to sing the Mock Turtle song,
4:48
SPEAKER_01: I ask myself,
4:50
SPEAKER_01: can I be as truly awful as possible at something on purpose?
4:55
SPEAKER_01: Would it be possible to be intentionally really bad?
5:00
SPEAKER_01: It turns out that with singing, it is definitely possible.
5:03
SPEAKER_01: It is surprisingly easy to be intentionally really bad.
5:07
SPEAKER_01: which carries its own kind of freedom.
5:09
SPEAKER_01: There is a joyousness in trying to be the opposite of everything that is hammered
5:13
SPEAKER_01: into us about being the best we can be,
5:16
SPEAKER_01: to excel,
5:17
SPEAKER_01: to be perfect,
5:18
SPEAKER_01: show our finest face to the world.
5:21
SPEAKER_01: Cannot be denied that there is a delicious fun in showing your worst side to the world.
5:26
SPEAKER_01: Except, of course, there will reach a point where people will say to you, please don't do that.
5:32
SPEAKER_01: For that is exactly what these under-10-year-old people said to me.
5:36
SPEAKER_01: They very clearly spoke their mind.
5:39
SPEAKER_01: Please don't do that, they said.
5:41
SPEAKER_01: Don't do any more.
5:42
SPEAKER_01: Of course, this brings up many contradictions.
5:47
SPEAKER_01: By setting out to be intentionally bad and succeeding, am I then being really good at it?
5:54
SPEAKER_01: And is there a limit to what we can get away with before someone will shut us down?
5:59
SPEAKER_01: In Hans Christian Andersen's story, The Emperor's New Clothes,
6:02
SPEAKER_01: It is the child again that calls out the falsity that is being paraded about and colluded with.
6:08
SPEAKER_01: Do we become too afraid to be the one to call out as we get older?
6:12
SPEAKER_01: Are we too ashamed or worry of shaming another?
6:16
SPEAKER_01: Or do we simply not want to draw attention to our own bad behaviours?
6:21
SPEAKER_01: Back to Alice, or rather the queens Alice meets.
6:27
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if Sarah still has them, but I made crowns for the Alice queens.
6:31
SPEAKER_01: and had used them as an excuse to behave badly once before.
6:34
SPEAKER_01: It is true.
6:36
SPEAKER_01: There was a public house in Bath called The Bell,
6:39
SPEAKER_01: and led by the comedy historian Jen Roberts,
6:42
SPEAKER_01: the unrehearsed theatre company would often put on performances there which were,
6:45
SPEAKER_01: you guessed,
6:46
SPEAKER_01: completely unpractised.
6:49
SPEAKER_01: Parts were distributed amongst whoever turned up.
6:52
SPEAKER_01: This could range from arguing with yourself if there were not enough performers,
6:56
SPEAKER_01: to there being on this occasion,
6:58
SPEAKER_01: multiple Alice's, which really can make one feel quite dizzy in the trying to keep up.
7:04
SPEAKER_01: With hands on hips and crown on head,
7:08
SPEAKER_01: I spoke clearly my authority on this occasion,
7:10
SPEAKER_01: and in the best possible violet from just William,
7:14
SPEAKER_01: mimicry,
7:14
SPEAKER_01: I insisted that I be the Queen of Hearts.
7:19
SPEAKER_01: How outrageous might it be possible to be in this role, I wondered.
7:24
SPEAKER_01: had on her crown made from Queen of Hearts playing cards,
7:27
SPEAKER_01: after all,
7:27
SPEAKER_01: with its centrepiece of a giant red harp.
7:30
SPEAKER_01: I bellowed and roared.
7:33
SPEAKER_01: An audience moment, because sometimes we did have those.
7:36
SPEAKER_01: Talking instead of watching.
7:38
SPEAKER_01: Off with their head!
7:40
SPEAKER_01: Sniggering at us.
7:42
SPEAKER_01: Off with their head!
7:43
SPEAKER_01: Leaving to fetch another beer.
7:45
SPEAKER_01: Off with their head!
7:47
SPEAKER_00: Side-eyeing me.
7:49
SPEAKER_00: Off with their head!
7:50
SPEAKER_01: And in that moment...
7:52
SPEAKER_01: everything that I had held tight and contained, tumbled and boiled through me.
7:58
SPEAKER_01: I was able,
7:58
SPEAKER_01: in those four words,
8:00
SPEAKER_01: to take a form of vengeance on every wrongdoing that I felt I had been dealt up
8:04
SPEAKER_01: until that point.
8:07
SPEAKER_01: With a short,
8:08
SPEAKER_01: sharp,
8:08
SPEAKER_01: severe slicing of the air,
8:10
SPEAKER_01: with my stiffened palm in front of my throat,
8:13
SPEAKER_01: their head was mine.
8:16
SPEAKER_01: Not a one person said a word in defiance of this decree.
8:20
SPEAKER_01: The response was quite different in that little library in Glastonbury.
8:25
SPEAKER_01: But I want to backtrack for a moment to my terrible rendition of the Mock Turtle
8:29
SPEAKER_01: song because it felt to me as if it were the kind of mournful lament that needed to
8:34
SPEAKER_01: be sung terribly.
8:37
SPEAKER_01: Will you?
8:38
SPEAKER_01: Won't you?
8:39
SPEAKER_00: Will you?
8:40
SPEAKER_00: Won't you?
8:40
SPEAKER_00: Will you join the dance?
8:42
SPEAKER_01: Take a moment to try it yourself.
8:45
SPEAKER_01: Be inspired by the intentional badness of your attempt
8:51
SPEAKER_01: It reminds me of something the American psychologist James Hillman once said on how
8:55
SPEAKER_01: the adult needs to be restored.
8:58
SPEAKER_01: As adults, we perhaps lose the sense of wonder that a childhood immersed in stories can give us.
9:04
SPEAKER_01: So taken with the idea of restoring adults am I that it became the starting point
9:08
SPEAKER_01: for the epic voyage of doctoral research I'm currently almost halfway through.
9:14
SPEAKER_01: But that is a tall tale for another time and another place.
9:19
SPEAKER_01: To actively call to life of wonderment as an adult seems to me to be to refuse,
9:24
SPEAKER_01: in this case,
9:25
SPEAKER_01: to be good at fitting in,
9:27
SPEAKER_01: to be good at seeing the emperor in his supposed splendidness.
9:31
SPEAKER_01: In case you are unfamiliar with the story,
9:34
SPEAKER_01: in a nutshell,
9:35
SPEAKER_01: the emperor is scammed into parting with a ton of treasure in exchange for the
9:39
SPEAKER_01: finest clothes ever.
9:42
SPEAKER_01: Except,
9:43
SPEAKER_01: The clothes are made of an incredibly special kind of fabric that only the very
9:47
SPEAKER_01: cleverest of people can see.
9:50
SPEAKER_01: If you're stupid, you will not be able to see the fine clothes and believe the emperor is naked.
9:57
SPEAKER_01: Nobody wants to be thought of as stupid,
9:59
SPEAKER_01: so all,
10:00
SPEAKER_01: except the child who cries out,
10:02
SPEAKER_01: tell each other they can see the fine clothes.
10:06
SPEAKER_01: Life to restore your adult self is to also believe in the emperor's marvellous attire.
10:13
SPEAKER_01: Maybe we could see this story in a slightly different way.
10:16
SPEAKER_01: For it not to be about pretending we can see the Emperor's amazing clothes when he
10:21
SPEAKER_01: is really just butt naked.
10:23
SPEAKER_01: It is not about blindly following the lie,
10:26
SPEAKER_01: but about being open to the possibility of the clothes' existence.
10:30
SPEAKER_01: What would it be like if we let our imagination be an open doorway and allowed
10:37
SPEAKER_01: ourselves to see the Emperor's clothes as really existing in the world?
10:41
SPEAKER_01: It's a tenuous balance to hold,
10:43
SPEAKER_01: for sure,
10:44
SPEAKER_01: that of self-delusion,
10:45
SPEAKER_01: fantasy and acknowledging the concept of multiple realities coexisting.
10:51
SPEAKER_01: In The Winter Before Last,
10:53
SPEAKER_01: I participated in Sarah's rich tapestry of an offering,
10:57
SPEAKER_01: working with Clarissa Pinkola-Ester's book Women Who Run With the Wolves.
11:02
SPEAKER_01: Dr E speaks at length on delusion and fantasy with her version of The Little Match Girl.
11:08
SPEAKER_01: The work Sarah does with this book,
11:09
SPEAKER_01: by the way,
11:10
SPEAKER_01: is a pair of shoes I am most definitely not going to try to fit in.
11:13
SPEAKER_01: They are far, far too big.
11:16
SPEAKER_01: What stuck with me was the idea that the fantasies the little match girl indulges
11:21
SPEAKER_01: in as she dies are not a refusal to acknowledge the reality of her situation,
11:27
SPEAKER_01: such starving as she is,
11:28
SPEAKER_01: but rather using the last remaining match to save herself,
11:33
SPEAKER_01: to die an imaginal good death.
11:37
SPEAKER_01: Her imagination feeds her soul in a way that the empty alleyway cannot feed her belly.
11:43
SPEAKER_01: It becomes the doorway into another world where she can be held by a life that is
11:48
SPEAKER_01: perhaps not quite as harsh.
11:51
SPEAKER_01: It is easy to see,
11:52
SPEAKER_01: of course,
11:53
SPEAKER_01: that from one perspective she is deluding herself,
11:55
SPEAKER_01: that she is pretending something that is not,
11:58
SPEAKER_01: and that she could be facing up to the hard reality of her situation.
12:02
SPEAKER_01: That I said should in that last sentence is a huge indicator to me of a wrongness in this idea.
12:09
SPEAKER_01: And whose reality anyway?
12:12
SPEAKER_01: I have a little mantra these days.
12:14
SPEAKER_01: What do I think I should do?
12:15
SPEAKER_01: And what do I want to do?
12:18
SPEAKER_01: They are hardly ever the same thing.
12:21
SPEAKER_01: Now is perhaps the time to let you know that the idea for what to say to you as a
12:25
SPEAKER_01: moony imposter was deeply dictated to myself in the middle of the night.
12:31
SPEAKER_01: and I'm trying to stay faithful to it.
12:34
SPEAKER_01: It's what I do when I'm woken by story.
12:37
SPEAKER_01: Trust the sometimes nonsensical that it carries the transmissions necessary for the moment in question.
12:44
SPEAKER_01: That does not mean to say it follows any kind of logical thread at all.
12:49
SPEAKER_01: Why on earth would we want to do such a thing as make sense?
12:54
SPEAKER_01: Somehow,
12:55
SPEAKER_01: I've gone from believing the things I think I should do are perhaps what I think
12:59
SPEAKER_01: society wants of me,
13:00
SPEAKER_01: like pretending to see the emperor's clothes as a way of fitting in,
13:03
SPEAKER_01: to tagging on a thread that has the writer Joanne Harris attached to it.
13:08
SPEAKER_01: Joanne Harris is a writerly idol of mine.
13:11
SPEAKER_01: I think it is perfectly acceptable,
13:13
SPEAKER_01: by the way,
13:14
SPEAKER_01: to have turned 50 years of age and still have role models and idols and people that
13:19
SPEAKER_01: when you meet them,
13:19
SPEAKER_01: you suddenly turn into a version of yourself that is most definitely not regal.
13:25
SPEAKER_01: all sovereign, all queenly.
13:28
SPEAKER_01: There is no gliding, but stumbling over your own feet.
13:32
SPEAKER_01: Your head is not held high, but gesturing in a subservient, questioning, querying manner.
13:38
SPEAKER_01: And the words that come out of your mouth are stuttering and uncensored and incoherent,
13:43
SPEAKER_01: and a part of you watches from afar,
13:45
SPEAKER_01: shaking your head,
13:46
SPEAKER_01: sadly wondering why on earth you just said what you did,
13:49
SPEAKER_01: cringing,
13:50
SPEAKER_01: knowing you are the stupid person who cannot see the emperor's fine cloak.
13:55
SPEAKER_01: What are you saying that for?
13:57
SPEAKER_01: You ask yourself.
13:58
SPEAKER_01: Why are you still speaking words?
14:01
SPEAKER_01: And you want to beat yourself up because you are in the presence of someone you are in awe of.
14:07
SPEAKER_01: You want so very much to be your best self and the self that inevitably emerges is
14:12
SPEAKER_01: one that is nervous and vulnerable and unsure and can't seem to be witty and
14:17
SPEAKER_01: sparkling and clever and perfect.
14:20
SPEAKER_01: We have a deep desire to be recognised.
14:24
SPEAKER_01: Welcome.
14:25
SPEAKER_01: Seen, called closer by our idols and in that moment can't seem to access that most brilliant part of us.
14:34
SPEAKER_01: You guessed it.
14:35
SPEAKER_01: I felt I said all the wrong things to Joanne Harris and the more I shouted down my
14:39
SPEAKER_01: head to just shut up,
14:40
SPEAKER_01: the more I kept yammering on.
14:43
SPEAKER_01: She was very gracious about it, queenly, without demanding my head be cut off.
14:49
SPEAKER_01: Why do our idols leave us nervous and tongue-twisted?
14:53
SPEAKER_01: How much is it they hold that we cannot see in ourselves?
14:57
SPEAKER_01: For isn't there a saying that we can only recognise what we already contain?
15:02
SPEAKER_01: Dangerous territory this, I know.
15:04
SPEAKER_01: This must surely encompass the bad too, and not of the awful singing kind.
15:11
SPEAKER_01: During the discussion of her new book,
15:13
SPEAKER_01: Joanne Harris spoke of how she senses colours as tasting of things.
15:18
SPEAKER_01: Red might carry a taste of pomegranate.
15:22
SPEAKER_01: The point is,
15:23
SPEAKER_01: We can never know how another person experiences the world,
15:26
SPEAKER_01: so we all try and fit into a homogenised version that allows us to relate to one another,
15:32
SPEAKER_01: like all agreeing on the emperor's new clothes.
15:35
SPEAKER_01: Except for the child that refuses.
15:38
SPEAKER_01: The child that will call out the world it inhabits, it sees.
15:43
SPEAKER_01: And what if the story had been a little different?
15:46
SPEAKER_01: What if the child had not shouted out that the emperor was really naked?
15:51
SPEAKER_01: What if the child had gone further in the other direction and had really seen the outfit,
15:56
SPEAKER_01: truly conjured the clothes into being in a different way to the adults who are
16:00
SPEAKER_01: pretending to see the fine clothes?
16:03
SPEAKER_01: Because the adults don't see the clothing,
16:06
SPEAKER_01: but don't want to be shown up because they think everyone else can see the clothing.
16:10
SPEAKER_01: Perhaps they don't want their heads cutting off.
16:14
SPEAKER_01: The imaginal sense of the child, held by a storied imagination,
16:18
SPEAKER_01: could potentially open up the mind to the very real existence of the clothing.
16:23
SPEAKER_01: I can see them now in my mind's eye as I speak.
16:27
SPEAKER_01: How slowly, bit by bit, with each step the emperor takes, they become ever more present.
16:34
SPEAKER_01: His robe of rich colours, like a cascading waterfall of precious jewels spilling onto the path he walks.
16:42
SPEAKER_01: These robes that ought to be too heavy for him to bear the weight of, but they are not.
16:47
SPEAKER_01: He's able to carry them with dignity.
16:50
SPEAKER_01: But each and every individual precious jewel represents each and every individual
16:56
SPEAKER_01: precious citizen of the state for whom he does his best to serve.
17:00
SPEAKER_01: And between me speaking and you receiving it,
17:04
SPEAKER_01: and where your own imaginal senses now begin to direct you,
17:08
SPEAKER_01: something else starts to emerge into the world that carries a quality of aliveness
17:13
SPEAKER_01: to it.
17:15
SPEAKER_01: This is what stories can do for us.
17:17
SPEAKER_01: They can open us up to these multiple doorways of what if.
17:23
SPEAKER_01: In this case,
17:25
SPEAKER_01: what if we were able to recognise and acknowledge that our view of the world,
17:30
SPEAKER_01: our interpretation of the world,
17:32
SPEAKER_01: is just one of a multitude?
17:34
SPEAKER_01: What if there was no right or wrong, true or false, just many different flavours of the same thing?
17:43
SPEAKER_01: Take as if we could hold that hypothesis, even for a fraction of a second.
17:49
SPEAKER_01: This is my truth as I speak it,
17:51
SPEAKER_01: and what you receive,
17:52
SPEAKER_01: what you conjure,
17:53
SPEAKER_01: the story that lands in your mind will then be reinterpreted by you and breathed
17:58
SPEAKER_01: out in a very different way.
18:01
SPEAKER_01: What you see in your mind's eye is not what I am transmitting from mine.
18:07
SPEAKER_01: When I sing badly, say, and ask those around me to join in the dance,
18:12
SPEAKER_01: What dance might it be?
18:14
SPEAKER_01: On the occasion in the little library in Glastonbury, the dance involved the participation of lobsters.
18:23
SPEAKER_01: Or more exactly, lobsters were flung out to a far away sea.
18:29
SPEAKER_01: I'm very much hoping that the lobsters were able to give their consent to being
18:32
SPEAKER_01: flung out to a far away sea,
18:34
SPEAKER_01: but it might not have fully been the case.
18:38
SPEAKER_01: believe it was a competition to see who could fling their lobsters the furthest in the faraway sea.
18:43
SPEAKER_01: I like to think it was more returning.
18:47
SPEAKER_01: Let us decide together, you and I, in this moment, a sense of rightness.
18:52
SPEAKER_01: That this is not a story of animal cruelty.
18:56
SPEAKER_01: That all these lobsters that were being flung out to a faraway sea had in fact been
19:01
SPEAKER_01: stealthily retrieved from tanks in restaurants
19:04
SPEAKER_01: where they had been held captive and were thus saved from the terrible fate of being boiled alive.
19:10
SPEAKER_01: The lobster's rescuers were a group of ninja grannies who had hand-knitted their balaclavas,
19:17
SPEAKER_01: and each balaclava carried the idiosyncrasies of the women who wore them.
19:22
SPEAKER_01: The ninja grannies were women who refused to follow the rules.
19:27
SPEAKER_01: Perhaps there is a natural tipping point as we age,
19:30
SPEAKER_01: where we realise we have nothing to prove to the world anymore,
19:34
SPEAKER_01: so we can allow ourselves to naturally re-story and wander into different world
19:39
SPEAKER_01: views and different realities.
19:43
SPEAKER_01: These ninja grannies and granddads and everybody in between,
19:47
SPEAKER_01: these mischief makers,
19:49
SPEAKER_01: these elders,
19:51
SPEAKER_01: these who have no fucks to give,
19:54
SPEAKER_01: in their hand-knitted and hand-crocheted,
19:56
SPEAKER_01: perfectly imperfect,
19:58
SPEAKER_01: brilliant stealth outfits rescuing the captives,
20:01
SPEAKER_01: who carry a different kind of invisibility that becomes their superpower.
20:06
SPEAKER_01: It is not because they are quick in their stealth,
20:09
SPEAKER_01: but because societies refuse to see them as existing,
20:12
SPEAKER_01: as functioning members of society anymore.
20:15
SPEAKER_01: This then, for our ninjas, becomes a bonus as they free the lobsters.
20:21
SPEAKER_01: Lobsters who ended up in the hands of a group of under 10-year-old people in a
20:26
SPEAKER_01: little library in Glastonbury,
20:28
SPEAKER_01: already in amongst a terrible singing,
20:30
SPEAKER_01: to fling them back to a faraway sea that is the lobster's true home.
20:35
SPEAKER_01: Why did the lobsters have to be thrown?
20:37
SPEAKER_01: Because of course it simply isn't a done thing for under 10-year-old people to wade
20:42
SPEAKER_01: out to the depths that the lobsters would be safe and where they could carry on
20:48
SPEAKER_01: their journey on their own from.
20:50
SPEAKER_01: There is nothing for it but to sight the faraway sea, take aim and fling.
20:56
SPEAKER_01: There is just no other way to get the lobsters out there.
20:59
SPEAKER_01: And that's that.
21:01
SPEAKER_01: There probably is.
21:02
SPEAKER_01: But for the purposes of where we are now, that is that.
21:05
SPEAKER_01: Because we're so horribly entangled in all kinds of stuff with no idea where we're going with any of it.
21:10
SPEAKER_01: But my point, or maybe there is no point.
21:13
SPEAKER_01: Does it matter anymore?
21:14
SPEAKER_01: Are you even still here?
21:16
SPEAKER_01: Are you still listening?
21:18
SPEAKER_01: Come back, Sarah.
21:19
SPEAKER_01: All is forgiven, you cry.
21:21
SPEAKER_01: In the moment of flinging the lobsters out to the faraway sea from the little
21:25
SPEAKER_01: library in Glastonbury,
21:27
SPEAKER_01: one of the under-ten-year-old peoples came up to me and asked if they could work
21:31
SPEAKER_01: with a different lobster.
21:34
SPEAKER_01: Why might that be?
21:35
SPEAKER_01: I inquired.
21:37
SPEAKER_01: Because the one the under 10-year-old person was currently working with had bitten the person's finger.
21:42
SPEAKER_01: Or maybe the lobster had pinched the person with its claws.
21:45
SPEAKER_01: I can't remember.
21:46
SPEAKER_01: Anyway, whichever it was, I forget now.
21:48
SPEAKER_01: The point being,
21:50
SPEAKER_01: it was an unsatisfactory relationship for both the under 10-year-old person and the lobster.
21:57
SPEAKER_01: Because the one the under 10-year-old person was currently working with had bitten the person's finger.
22:02
SPEAKER_01: Or maybe the lobster had pinched the person with its claws.
22:06
SPEAKER_01: whichever it was,
22:07
SPEAKER_01: I forget now,
22:08
SPEAKER_01: the point being it was an unsatisfactory relationship for both the under
22:13
SPEAKER_01: 10-year-old person and the lobster.
22:16
SPEAKER_01: Where this might inspire us as adults in need of restorying is in the openness of
22:22
SPEAKER_01: this under 10-year-old person to completely change their worldview,
22:27
SPEAKER_01: to trust so utterly in where the story wanted to take them and to allow themselves
22:32
SPEAKER_01: to be completely immersed in it
22:34
SPEAKER_01: that they had to lodge a formal complaint about the misconduct perpetrated by the lobster.
22:41
SPEAKER_01: It would be easy to dismiss it, to harumph at a perceived absurdity.
22:46
SPEAKER_01: What is the point, the naysayers cry?
22:49
SPEAKER_01: It's just a story.
22:50
SPEAKER_01: It's not real.
22:52
SPEAKER_01: And if we do that, it would be such a shame.
22:56
SPEAKER_01: We would lose something of the magic of the world by not letting ourselves, just for a moment,
23:02
SPEAKER_01: believe in at least six impossible things, especially before breakfast.
23:08
SPEAKER_01: He might have become of the shoemaker if he had not believed in the elves who
23:12
SPEAKER_01: helped him at night when he was tired and worn out and unable to keep his promises.
23:18
SPEAKER_01: What if we could believe,
23:19
SPEAKER_01: just for a moment,
23:21
SPEAKER_01: that if we left porridge made with the finest cream out at night that we might
23:25
SPEAKER_01: entice and encourage a brownie,
23:27
SPEAKER_01: of the creature,
23:28
SPEAKER_01: not the cake kind?
23:30
SPEAKER_01: Entice and encourage to come and help us when we need to tidy our house.
23:35
SPEAKER_01: Maybe the brownie won't help us.
23:37
SPEAKER_01: Maybe it will gobble up the finest cream porridge and give a big belch of thanks.
23:42
SPEAKER_01: Just imagine if you did leave out porridge made with the finest cream.
23:48
SPEAKER_01: And what if you discovered the next morning an empty porridge pot?
23:52
SPEAKER_01: What if on seeing that porridge pot you entertained the delight of the fact that
23:56
SPEAKER_01: there was something in existence beyond our fixed knowledge of the world?
24:02
SPEAKER_01: How could this entertaining change the interactions of your day?
24:05
SPEAKER_01: What if suddenly you saw the house you dwell in as a living being that needed
24:11
SPEAKER_01: tending to,
24:12
SPEAKER_01: prompted by the discovery of the empty porridge pot,
24:15
SPEAKER_01: that we lived within the belly,
24:17
SPEAKER_01: the body of a bigger being?
24:21
SPEAKER_01: shift how we treated not only our home but ourselves and what might live within us too,
24:26
SPEAKER_01: both the physicality of us and the non-corporeal imagined things,
24:31
SPEAKER_01: the indwelling and the outdwelling of ourselves.
24:36
SPEAKER_01: All because we took that moment to believe in the brownie that ate the porridge made of the finest cream.
24:44
SPEAKER_01: Without realising it, the brownies helped us in many more ways than flicking a feather duster might have.
24:51
SPEAKER_01: But I almost forgot to tell you what happened when I tried to fill Sarah's shoes
24:54
SPEAKER_01: before and ended up in the anger management programme.
24:58
SPEAKER_01: The joy of telling stories is that we get to shift from the quiet,
25:02
SPEAKER_01: reflective reading that happens when we keep it to ourselves and engage with the
25:06
SPEAKER_01: story only internally in an almost passive way.
25:10
SPEAKER_01: As a storyteller, we get to bring the story into the world and give it a moment of life.
25:16
SPEAKER_01: We literally breathe it into being as the whole body of the teller inhabits and is
25:21
SPEAKER_01: inhabited by the story.
25:24
SPEAKER_01: So by bringing her off the page and into the room,
25:28
SPEAKER_01: the Queen of Hearts herself decided she would read the story to the
25:31
SPEAKER_01: under-10-year-old peoples for the second session.
25:34
SPEAKER_01: But despite the terrible singing and the argumentative lobsters,
25:38
SPEAKER_01: the under-10-year-old peoples did agree to my return.
25:42
SPEAKER_01: However...
25:43
SPEAKER_01: What the under-10-year-old pupils would not,
25:45
SPEAKER_01: most definitely not,
25:47
SPEAKER_01: tolerate was the Queen of Hearts' insistence that heads should be chopped off at
25:53
SPEAKER_01: every conceivable moment.
25:55
SPEAKER_01: Nor would they tolerate any kind of shoutiness from the Queen either.
26:00
SPEAKER_01: Quietly, but firmly, the under-10-year-old pupils sat the Queen of Hearts down in a tiny chair,
26:09
SPEAKER_01: handed her a tiny pencil sharpened just right for if she had been given a pencil
26:14
SPEAKER_01: too sharp who knows what damage she might have caused.
26:17
SPEAKER_01: They also gave her a tiny piece of paper and began to dictate to her.
26:22
SPEAKER_01: In this moment I who speaks to you now was not a woman reading story but the actual
26:28
SPEAKER_01: Queen of Hearts and it was time something was done about the Queen's anger problems.
26:34
SPEAKER_01: The under 10-year-old pupils gave the Queen a list of rules that from that day onward she was to obey.
26:40
SPEAKER_01: At the top of the list was the rule that under no circumstances whatsoever was she
26:45
SPEAKER_01: to chop off anyone's head just for the sake of it or because she was a little bit annoyed.
26:51
SPEAKER_01: It was not okay for her to shout really loudly in the house or in the garden,
26:57
SPEAKER_01: especially if it was going to disturb the cat.
27:01
SPEAKER_01: The Queen must learn to be quieter.
27:03
SPEAKER_01: It was as simple as that.
27:05
SPEAKER_01: They gave the Queen room to practice until it was all agreed she had reached a
27:09
SPEAKER_01: suitably acceptable volume of speech.
27:12
SPEAKER_01: It was okay,
27:13
SPEAKER_01: in fact encouraged,
27:14
SPEAKER_01: for the Queen to let off steam now and again as long as she didn't do it too loudly.
27:20
SPEAKER_01: This way the Queen could let out any frustrations without actively cutting anyone's
27:24
SPEAKER_01: head off because,
27:25
SPEAKER_01: after all,
27:26
SPEAKER_01: rule number one clearly stated it was most definitely not okay to cut people's
27:31
SPEAKER_01: heads off.
27:33
SPEAKER_01: You still have the list of rules.
27:35
SPEAKER_01: And they strike me as being one of the most marvellous of things,
27:38
SPEAKER_01: for in the moment of their creation,
27:40
SPEAKER_01: we all fully believed.
27:44
SPEAKER_01: From the incredible wisdom of these ten-year-old peoples who offered up the gift of
27:48
SPEAKER_01: a willingness to step into a different view of the world,
27:52
SPEAKER_01: we've been able to meet the elders whose invisibility is their superpower,
27:57
SPEAKER_01: which allows them to create subversive acts of rebellion if they so wish.
28:01
SPEAKER_01: For you have to earn your right to be a mischief-maker,
28:04
SPEAKER_01: have to be willing to step through those imaginal doors where lobsters need rescuing.
28:09
SPEAKER_01: And if you don't treat them right when flinging them out to a faraway sea,
28:13
SPEAKER_01: their claws will nip you good and proper.
28:17
SPEAKER_01: Previously,
28:18
SPEAKER_01: I mentioned that when I was thinking up the ideas of what I might possibly say of
28:23
SPEAKER_01: when I'm here not being an imposter of Mooney,
28:28
SPEAKER_01: I recorded in the middle of the night ideas that would catch me
28:33
SPEAKER_01: And earlier today, when I was going through these recordings, I found one that is quite odd.
28:41
SPEAKER_01: Not odd in its content,
28:43
SPEAKER_01: because I have done what it speaks of,
28:46
SPEAKER_01: and it feels perfectly normal for me to have recorded such a thing.
28:51
SPEAKER_01: But it's the fact that I've labelled it as Sarah No.
28:54
SPEAKER_01: 2 that I'm curious of, and why I include it here as another thread that has tugged at us.
29:03
SPEAKER_01: Maybe it has relevance, maybe not.
29:06
SPEAKER_01: Or maybe,
29:06
SPEAKER_01: as it speaks to,
29:08
SPEAKER_01: the meaning is not for me to decide,
29:11
SPEAKER_01: but to drop it in as an extra offering and let you choose.
29:17
SPEAKER_01: I stand in the middle of the field.
29:20
SPEAKER_01: There is a cup of sugar held between both of my hands,
29:24
SPEAKER_01: resting gingerly,
29:26
SPEAKER_01: tenderly,
29:27
SPEAKER_01: hesitantly in my palms.
29:30
SPEAKER_01: The cup is really not a cup but a sugar bowl, of course.
29:34
SPEAKER_01: And it is full,
29:36
SPEAKER_01: right to the very edge,
29:38
SPEAKER_01: like I've sliced it across the top with a knife to make sure that the sugar is even
29:44
SPEAKER_01: and crisp and level with the very rim.
29:49
SPEAKER_01: I'm quite surprised that I've managed to carry it all the way out here through the
29:53
SPEAKER_01: mud and the fog without spilling a single grain.
29:57
SPEAKER_01: But I have.
29:58
SPEAKER_01: The sugar is bleached white.
30:01
SPEAKER_01: And the bowl is china that looks like it's been handed down through generations.
30:07
SPEAKER_01: It has tiny little chips here and there.
30:09
SPEAKER_01: But in fact, I found it in a charity shop.
30:12
SPEAKER_01: Most of its gold rim is intact.
30:15
SPEAKER_01: And it has small little... And I fancy they are hand-painted.
30:21
SPEAKER_01: Little bouquets of burgundy and cerise flowers and green stalks.
30:27
SPEAKER_01: It is where the green stalk travels round down the bowl and meets with its bottom
30:34
SPEAKER_01: edge that the chips appear.
30:36
SPEAKER_01: If we were to look underneath the bowl,
30:39
SPEAKER_01: I'd see that there was a crown stamped there,
30:42
SPEAKER_01: but the date cannot be made out.
30:45
SPEAKER_01: This felt to me to be the right kind of thing to offer.
30:49
SPEAKER_01: Not necessarily the sweetness in the bowl,
30:51
SPEAKER_01: though I am sure there are many beings,
30:54
SPEAKER_01: many peoples that would appreciate that.
30:57
SPEAKER_01: But my standing here, in the centre of a circle of fog.
31:03
SPEAKER_01: not spilling a single grain.
31:06
SPEAKER_01: Who am I doing this for?
31:07
SPEAKER_01: I'm never entirely sure if it is for me or for somebody else or what point I'm trying to prove.
31:14
SPEAKER_01: What point is there of standing in the middle of a field in the fog with the mud
31:22
SPEAKER_01: grabbing at my army booted feet?
31:25
SPEAKER_01: What purpose does this serve?
31:27
SPEAKER_01: It serves none at all and that is the point.
31:31
SPEAKER_01: There is no reason at all,
31:33
SPEAKER_01: no trial overcome,
31:36
SPEAKER_01: no sense or rhyme or reason to me standing in the middle of the field in a circle
31:41
SPEAKER_01: of fog holding a bowl of sugar filled exactly to the brim.
31:47
SPEAKER_01: These are the sort of sacrifices that are demanded of you.
31:50
SPEAKER_01: If you want to try and connect,
31:53
SPEAKER_01: try and offer yourself to those that live beyond this veil,
31:58
SPEAKER_01: both the physical and the metaphorical.
32:01
SPEAKER_01: And I realised then where I will get myself into trouble,
32:05
SPEAKER_01: that I've used the word that I am offering myself,
32:08
SPEAKER_01: not the sugar in the bowl.
32:10
SPEAKER_01: It gives a shit about the sugar in the bowl.
32:12
SPEAKER_01: I've offered myself.
32:15
SPEAKER_01: And I'm now really, really fucked.
32:19
SPEAKER_01: But don't you worry your pretty little heads about me and what predicament I have
32:26
SPEAKER_01: found myself in,
32:28
SPEAKER_01: either real or imagined or somewhere in between the two.
32:33
SPEAKER_01: Instead, leave out the porridge made with the finest cream.
32:37
SPEAKER_01: Hand-knit your balaclava.
32:40
SPEAKER_01: And if you are,
32:41
SPEAKER_01: in actuality,
32:43
SPEAKER_01: the white queen who has stepped through the looking glass into the little library
32:47
SPEAKER_01: in Glastonbury and have pretended all this time to be the queen of hearts by
32:52
SPEAKER_01: stealing her crown,
32:54
SPEAKER_01: know that there are a group of under ten-year-old pupils who will gently take your
32:58
SPEAKER_01: hand when you are revealed as the dirty imposter you are,
33:02
SPEAKER_01: tell you that it's all right and that they will love you no matter.
33:07
SPEAKER_01: Watch as they draw you a picture that you can pin to your wall so you will always,
33:12
SPEAKER_01: always know how very special you are.
33:18
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for being.
33:21
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for your attentive listening.
33:26
SPEAKER_01: Normal service will be resumed on Mooney's Mythic Podcast next week,
33:31
SPEAKER_01: but until then I leave you in the good company.
33:34
SPEAKER_01: Once there was a cobbler.
33:37
SPEAKER_01: who was a good and true and decent man.
33:42
SPEAKER_01: He never borrowed, he never lived beyond his means, and he worked hard all through the day.
33:51
SPEAKER_01: He said his prayers,
33:53
SPEAKER_01: to the beings he most believed in before he went to bed each night,
33:58
SPEAKER_01: and he made sure to sweep the streets of snow so the older and infirm could safely
34:05
SPEAKER_01: make their way about.
34:08
SPEAKER_01: Times had been hard for the cobbler, as much as he tried.
34:13
SPEAKER_01: He was down to his very last piece of leather,
34:18
SPEAKER_01: stained in a bright,
34:21
SPEAKER_01: rich colour by his very hands with the last of his spices.
34:27
SPEAKER_01: Everything he had, he had poured into working.
34:30
SPEAKER_01: softening,
34:32
SPEAKER_01: manipulating this leather,
34:35
SPEAKER_01: and had carefully cut out the pattern so not a single scrap was wasted,
34:41
SPEAKER_01: and that they might make the final,
34:44
SPEAKER_01: finest pair of shoes he might ever make.
34:49
SPEAKER_01: for he knew that he had not the resources to keep going after this one pair put
34:56
SPEAKER_01: food on the table for him and his wife.
35:00
SPEAKER_01: Happy with this cutting,
35:02
SPEAKER_01: he laid all the pieces out on his work table,
35:05
SPEAKER_01: ready for the morning,
35:07
SPEAKER_01: turned off the lights and went to bed.
35:11
SPEAKER_01: His sleep was deep and true, for he was a true man, a good man, who did his very best.
35:20
SPEAKER_01: And he woke in the morning with a yawn and a stretch,
35:27
SPEAKER_01: and felt quite refreshed and ready to go,
35:31
SPEAKER_01: hope not having burnt out from him completely.
35:35
SPEAKER_01: After he had breakfasted on fine porridge,
35:40
SPEAKER_01: with a hint of raspberry jam,
35:43
SPEAKER_01: kissed his wife on the cheek and looked into her eyes with the love that he held
35:49
SPEAKER_01: from the very first day he saw her.
35:52
SPEAKER_01: And he went into his work studio, ready to start the day.
35:57
SPEAKER_01: Well, can you imagine his surprise?
35:59
SPEAKER_01: I can imagine his surprise.
36:01
SPEAKER_01: Can you imagine his surprise?
36:03
SPEAKER_01: When he looked and found that what had been flat pieces of leather were now fine shoes.
36:11
SPEAKER_01: And they were somehow better than he had ever imagined.
36:15
SPEAKER_01: And he was a good cobbler.
36:17
SPEAKER_01: He was good at his trade.
36:20
SPEAKER_01: But these were somehow exported to the next level.
36:24
SPEAKER_01: And he inspected carefully through his best glasses.
36:29
SPEAKER_01: each and every stitch, and he could find not a single flaw.
36:33
SPEAKER_01: They were perfect.
36:35
SPEAKER_01: They were almost beyond perfect.
36:39
SPEAKER_01: As he marvelled at them, where they had come from, what had happened in the night.
36:44
SPEAKER_01: Had he slept well?
36:46
SPEAKER_01: He'd never done such a thing before,
36:47
SPEAKER_01: and even in his sleep,
36:49
SPEAKER_01: he couldn't dream to be at this level of exquisite craftsmanship.
36:55
SPEAKER_01: And he was good at his job.
36:58
SPEAKER_01: Still as he peered at them from every angle and scratched his head and
37:03
SPEAKER_01: absentmindedly unlocked the door as the bell tinkled at a stranger come by,
37:10
SPEAKER_01: wanting,
37:11
SPEAKER_01: needing,
37:11
SPEAKER_01: desperately in that very moment a pair of shoes,
37:14
SPEAKER_01: he still wasn't quite sure what to do and what to make of what had happened.
37:20
SPEAKER_01: And he was half dazed,
37:22
SPEAKER_01: not really paying his usual amount of care and attention to his customer,
37:27
SPEAKER_01: when this stranger came in and said he had to have the shoes in the cobbler's hand
37:31
SPEAKER_01: that very instant.
37:33
SPEAKER_01: And wouldn't you know it, they fit perfectly.
37:37
SPEAKER_01: Like they were made for him.
37:39
SPEAKER_01: Like they were made for him.
37:42
SPEAKER_01: So pleased was this man with these shoes.
37:46
SPEAKER_01: Bright yellow they were, by the way, stained with tumoury.
37:51
SPEAKER_01: he promptly piled onto the counter all the contents of one of his money pouches and left,
37:58
SPEAKER_01: humming and marvelling and strutting and striding and saying,
38:02
SPEAKER_01: look at me in my fine shoes.
38:07
SPEAKER_01: The stranger, by the way, was on his way to meet with the fine lady who he intended to court and marry.
38:15
SPEAKER_01: He was quite smitten.
38:18
SPEAKER_01: And I'm quite sure the shoes turned her mind to thoughts of saying yes when perhaps
38:25
SPEAKER_01: they might have been saying no.
38:29
SPEAKER_01: But that's a different story.
38:31
SPEAKER_01: When the cobbler finally,
38:33
SPEAKER_01: perhaps a few hours later I think,
38:36
SPEAKER_01: snapped out of his daze and realised what had just happened and looked at all the
38:40
SPEAKER_01: coins that were scattered about,
38:43
SPEAKER_01: he saw that all was not lost.
38:46
SPEAKER_01: and that here he had enough money to buy the materials for two pairs of shoes.
38:53
SPEAKER_01: And he did.
38:54
SPEAKER_01: He spoke with a local tannery and instructed them on what colours to use,
39:00
SPEAKER_01: what stains,
39:02
SPEAKER_01: made sure it was the finest grain to the leathers,
39:07
SPEAKER_01: and came back and took down a pattern he hadn't used in a long time,
39:12
SPEAKER_01: one that was on the high shelf and getting dusty but had
39:16
SPEAKER_01: but in his imagination as he had walked back from the tannery.
39:20
SPEAKER_01: And on the rich plum-coloured leather, he carefully cut out the shapes for one pair.
39:28
SPEAKER_01: And on the deep blue leather, he cut out another shape for another pair.
39:33
SPEAKER_01: And as the sun set and the moon rose, he left the pieces as he had before and went to bed.
39:41
SPEAKER_01: Dreaming true dreams.
39:44
SPEAKER_01: of pleasantness as only the just can.
39:48
SPEAKER_01: In the morning the same scenario played out again,
39:52
SPEAKER_01: this time with apricot jam in the porridge,
39:56
SPEAKER_01: and a kiss on the other cheek to his wife,
39:58
SPEAKER_01: but still with the same look of love for her,
40:02
SPEAKER_01: and still finding the same outcome in his workshop,
40:06
SPEAKER_01: where the morning before there had been one pair of shoes,
40:09
SPEAKER_01: now there were two.
40:12
SPEAKER_01: Perfect beyond measure.
40:14
SPEAKER_01: Immaculate.
40:16
SPEAKER_01: But with some other quality to them that he couldn't quite put his finger to.
40:21
SPEAKER_01: They seemed to sparkle somehow.
40:26
SPEAKER_01: Almost like they had a life of their own somehow.
40:32
SPEAKER_01: A cobbler wasn't a man given over to jealousy, so there was no sense of rivalry.
40:37
SPEAKER_01: But he wanted to try and offer something to this unknown person.
40:42
SPEAKER_01: that was making these fine shoes for him and helping him.
40:45
SPEAKER_01: For again, they sold immediately to two sisters.
40:50
SPEAKER_01: Two sisters and the shoes fitted them exactly right.
40:55
SPEAKER_01: There was no squabbling.
40:56
SPEAKER_01: There was no arguing.
40:58
SPEAKER_01: They skipped merrily down the street in their new shoes and had left in return pouches of gold coins.
41:08
SPEAKER_01: because they were by far the finest shoes that anybody had ever seen.
41:13
SPEAKER_01: And with this money, the cobbler was able to buy materials for four pairs of shoes.
41:21
SPEAKER_01: And he dared to delve a little deeper into his box of patterns that was up on the high shelf.
41:29
SPEAKER_01: The shoes that weren't ordinary.
41:32
SPEAKER_01: The shoe designs that were fanciful and mesmerical.
41:38
SPEAKER_01: and not for everyday attire,
41:41
SPEAKER_01: or perhaps they were,
41:42
SPEAKER_01: for the patterns for shoes that were fantastical,
41:47
SPEAKER_01: mesmerical,
41:49
SPEAKER_01: impractical,
41:51
SPEAKER_01: delightfully so.
41:53
SPEAKER_01: He had never dared to make any of them before,
41:57
SPEAKER_01: for his sensibleness told him that he would be wasting materials and nobody would
42:03
SPEAKER_01: ever buy them,
42:04
SPEAKER_01: but here he felt a sense of,
42:06
SPEAKER_01: but what if?
42:08
SPEAKER_01: and could not turn his hand away from laying out the pattern across the leathers and cutting them out.
42:17
SPEAKER_01: A green pear, a white pear, a black pear, and a purple pear.
42:27
SPEAKER_01: This night,
42:28
SPEAKER_01: after he laid all the materials out on the bench,
42:32
SPEAKER_01: rather than climbing in bed next to his wife,
42:35
SPEAKER_01: he tapped her on the shoulder and said,
42:39
SPEAKER_01: I want to know who it is that is helping us.
42:42
SPEAKER_01: Yes, she said.
42:43
SPEAKER_01: Me too.
42:44
SPEAKER_01: I thought you would never ask.
42:47
SPEAKER_01: And so they crept back down.
42:49
SPEAKER_01: So familiar were they with the creek in the stairs and the one that sloped and the
42:56
SPEAKER_01: turns of the corners of the building that they needed no light to show them the way.
43:02
SPEAKER_01: But they crept down,
43:03
SPEAKER_01: feeling like naughty teenagers,
43:06
SPEAKER_01: trying to stifle their giggles as they clung to each other and tiptoed into the
43:12
SPEAKER_01: workshop and hushed each other,
43:15
SPEAKER_01: shh,
43:16
SPEAKER_01: shh.
43:18
SPEAKER_01: as they hid in a corner,
43:20
SPEAKER_01: trying their best not to be seen,
43:23
SPEAKER_01: but we all know their feet were poking from underneath the curtains.
43:28
SPEAKER_01: They stayed there,
43:29
SPEAKER_01: holding their breath till they could hold their breath no longer,
43:32
SPEAKER_01: and let it out with the mildest of sighs,
43:35
SPEAKER_01: trying not to disturb a thing when they heard the sound,
43:39
SPEAKER_01: like a creaking of a door,
43:42
SPEAKER_01: but of a door that surely was not there.
43:47
SPEAKER_01: But so they thought.
43:49
SPEAKER_01: And hearing a tipping,
43:50
SPEAKER_01: tapping sound of feet walking across tiled floors of feet,
43:56
SPEAKER_01: though that could not possibly be there.
43:59
SPEAKER_01: So small and tiny did they sound that the hearing had to really be stretched to catch them.
44:08
SPEAKER_01: And singing.
44:09
SPEAKER_01: There was a singing sound that was felt right in the heart
44:17
SPEAKER_01: fizzed and popped like a cherry soda up through the body, gurgling, deliciously so.
44:27
SPEAKER_01: From either end of the curtain,
44:29
SPEAKER_01: a head poked out,
44:31
SPEAKER_01: that of the cobbler and that of his wife,
44:33
SPEAKER_01: looking to see what it was that had creaked a door that wasn't there.
44:39
SPEAKER_01: And tip-toed and tappy-tapped across a tiled floor in a way that shouldn't.
44:44
SPEAKER_01: and sung a song that fizzed in the heart like a cherry soda.
44:49
SPEAKER_01: And there,
44:50
SPEAKER_01: quietly,
44:51
SPEAKER_01: in companionship,
44:53
SPEAKER_01: working together,
44:54
SPEAKER_01: sewing and sewing,
44:56
SPEAKER_01: sewing and sewing,
44:59
SPEAKER_01: were two small creatures.
45:03
SPEAKER_01: I say small, small compared to human size, but not small in their own race.
45:09
SPEAKER_01: The cobbler and his wife chose, at this time anyway,
45:13
SPEAKER_01: not to disturb them because they assumed that such tiny creatures might be easily
45:19
SPEAKER_01: startled by big things like humans.
45:23
SPEAKER_01: And so they hid back behind the curtain and waited until just before daybreak when
45:30
SPEAKER_01: the creatures stopped their singing,
45:32
SPEAKER_01: stopped their tipping,
45:34
SPEAKER_01: tapping and creaked the door that shouldn't be there back shut behind them and all
45:41
SPEAKER_01: was still.
45:42
SPEAKER_01: as the sun's first rays shone through the window onto four pairs of impossibly perfect,
45:53
SPEAKER_01: marvellously magical,
45:55
SPEAKER_01: impractical,
45:57
SPEAKER_01: frivolous,
45:58
SPEAKER_01: brilliant,
46:00
SPEAKER_01: gorgeous shoes.
46:04
SPEAKER_01: Shoes.
46:07
SPEAKER_01: The cobbler had to fair beat off, but not really beat off.
46:12
SPEAKER_01: The money he made from the people that wanted these shoes and from the queues of
46:18
SPEAKER_01: people putting in orders for more shoes.
46:20
SPEAKER_01: I want a pair like that.
46:22
SPEAKER_01: I don't care how impractical they are.
46:24
SPEAKER_01: They are the most brilliantly,
46:26
SPEAKER_01: marvelously,
46:27
SPEAKER_01: magical,
46:28
SPEAKER_01: fantastical shoes I have ever seen in my life and I would just be so unhappy if I
46:34
SPEAKER_01: didn't have them.
46:36
SPEAKER_01: These shoes brought joy to the saddest of faces.
46:41
SPEAKER_01: And the cobbler and his wife were set for life.
46:45
SPEAKER_01: All he had to do was dive into the box of patterns that he felt he had no right to make,
46:53
SPEAKER_01: but lived within his imagination regardless.
46:58
SPEAKER_01: The wife of the cobbler spoke at first when she said,
47:03
SPEAKER_01: we should do something to offer our thanks,
47:06
SPEAKER_01: don't you think?
47:07
SPEAKER_01: Of course, the cobbler agreed, he's a good man.
47:10
SPEAKER_01: He's not a selfish man.
47:13
SPEAKER_01: He doesn't want to take, to an extent he has though, hasn't he?
47:17
SPEAKER_01: He has taken credit for something that wasn't his.
47:20
SPEAKER_01: or the workmanship wasn't his.
47:22
SPEAKER_01: And he knew that this needed to be put right.
47:25
SPEAKER_01: So he decided the two between them, they would sit.
47:29
SPEAKER_01: They wouldn't lay out
47:31
SPEAKER_01: anything else to be cut and sewn,
47:34
SPEAKER_01: but they would sit quietly and patiently and wait to see if these small creatures
47:39
SPEAKER_01: would open and creak the door that shouldn't be there and make tapping sounds
47:45
SPEAKER_01: across tiles that shouldn't happen and sing their song like cherry soda fizzing
47:50
SPEAKER_01: through the body.
47:51
SPEAKER_01: What was on the work table were two parcels tied with the prettiest of bows.
48:00
SPEAKER_01: And in each parcel were carefully knitted sweaters for days when it was cold,
48:07
SPEAKER_01: and carefully sewn breeches for days when you're wanting to stride out in long strides,
48:14
SPEAKER_01: and carefully made shirts when only a day of fine silk would do,
48:22
SPEAKER_01: and the tiniest,
48:23
SPEAKER_01: most perfect pairs of bright-coloured shoes.
48:30
SPEAKER_01: Coppola and his wife had worked all day to make these things as an offering of thanks,
48:37
SPEAKER_01: for they had both noticed that while the two small creatures had worked hard and
48:43
SPEAKER_01: meticulously and perfectly without a single flaw to their work,
48:48
SPEAKER_01: their own attire,
48:50
SPEAKER_01: left much to be desired and was threadbare and holed and smelt just a little if you
48:58
SPEAKER_01: happened to catch the breeze in the wrong way.
49:03
SPEAKER_01: Seemed to the cobbler and the wife,
49:06
SPEAKER_01: the least they could do was offer they these small parcels of clothing,
49:12
SPEAKER_01: except at the last minute,
49:14
SPEAKER_01: when a pitcher of beer was placed,
49:17
SPEAKER_01: and an offering of cake,
49:20
SPEAKER_01: chocolate of course,
49:21
SPEAKER_01: was placed,
49:22
SPEAKER_01: in exactly right small portions,
49:26
SPEAKER_01: or big portions,
49:27
SPEAKER_01: depending on the size of you.
49:30
SPEAKER_01: They didn't hide behind curtains, the cobbler and his wife, not this time.
49:35
SPEAKER_01: As mentioned,
49:36
SPEAKER_01: they sat on chairs and patiently waited,
49:39
SPEAKER_01: and lit a candle,
49:40
SPEAKER_01: and hoped not to startle their new allies.
49:45
SPEAKER_01: They sat patiently, and eventually the door creaked.
49:50
SPEAKER_01: The tipping-tapping happened across the tiles, and the song like cherry soda fizzed through them.
49:58
SPEAKER_01: The two small creatures looked at each other quizzically to begin with when they
50:02
SPEAKER_01: saw that there was no leather waiting to be cut,
50:04
SPEAKER_01: for they did truly enjoy their work.
50:07
SPEAKER_01: They got great satisfaction from helping the cobbler.
50:11
SPEAKER_01: They loved seeing those long-forgotten patterns come to life.
50:16
SPEAKER_01: Who could resist cake that's chocolate after all,
50:20
SPEAKER_01: and beer,
50:21
SPEAKER_01: and parcels with brightly coloured ribbons that say,
50:25
SPEAKER_01: for you.
50:26
SPEAKER_01: Well, some languages are universal.
50:30
SPEAKER_01: It was only after they'd been prancing and admiring each other's finery that they
50:36
SPEAKER_01: suddenly noticed the creatures,
50:39
SPEAKER_01: noticed the cobbler and his wife sat side by side on the chairs by candlelight
50:45
SPEAKER_01: waiting patiently.
50:47
SPEAKER_01: And everybody at the same time went, and nobody moved.
50:51
SPEAKER_01: And then they laughed.
50:54
SPEAKER_01: And then a small hand shook a big finger and they all spoke at once and then all
51:01
SPEAKER_01: fell silent,
51:02
SPEAKER_01: politely waiting for somebody else to take their turn and knew without hesitation
51:09
SPEAKER_01: or doubt within that very moment that they really liked each other and they enjoyed
51:17
SPEAKER_01: spending time and helping each other.
51:20
SPEAKER_01: And so, the small creatures, who were elves, by the way,
51:27
SPEAKER_01: agreed that if the cobbler and his wife didn't mind at all making more cake,
51:33
SPEAKER_01: perhaps,
51:35
SPEAKER_01: once in a while,
51:36
SPEAKER_01: if they felt up to it,
51:38
SPEAKER_01: and the jumpers were so snuggly and warm,
51:42
SPEAKER_01: and if the cobbler would,
51:45
SPEAKER_01: you know,
51:46
SPEAKER_01: see to it that it's all those plans that his imagination that he had never dared
51:51
SPEAKER_01: before make were the ones that
51:53
SPEAKER_01: were cut out of the leather.
51:55
SPEAKER_01: Then the elves were more than happy to pop in from time to time and sit and sing
52:02
SPEAKER_01: their song and so and so and so and so.
52:08
SPEAKER_01: And so, of course, this is the kind of story where everybody lived happily ever after.
52:16
SPEAKER_01: The cobbler never stopped looking at his wife with the eyes of love he had when he first saw her.
52:24
SPEAKER_01: Yells continued to stitch without fault, and it wasn't long before...
52:30
SPEAKER_01: The joyousness of having such marvelously,
52:33
SPEAKER_01: fantastically,
52:34
SPEAKER_01: magically brilliant shoes spread far and far and far until we might fancy the world
52:45
SPEAKER_01: turned to one that spun to the sound of joyousness.
52:51
SPEAKER_01: The end.
52:53
SPEAKER_01: Goodbye.