When my son was very small, I told him a fairy lived at our weekend cottage.  I said we were lucky because fairies only live in houses where there is a lot of love.  Each Friday afternoon when we arrived at our cottage, we saw signs the fairy was residing there.  She hid from us because she was tiny and shy, but she was surely there.  We knew because she always left a gift.  It might be a feather, an especially beautiful stone, a locust husk, a shell from the lake, sea glass, tiny dried flowers, or a seed.  My son loved these gifts as much as he loved his Christmas or birthday gifts.  He loved sharing his appreciation of nature with another being. He nestled into the thought that our family was singled out as especially loving.

We tried to find exactly where she lived in the cottage.  I sprinkled flour on our wooden floors just outside the deep, dark closet, and sure enough, the next morning tiny footprints were in the flour (fairies don’t always fly).   As he got older and I had a second child, I sometimes forgot to put the fairy’s offerings in the cottage and he remarked upon it.  Once he even asked if it meant we weren’t as loving a family anymore and if that had caused the fairy to leave.  I gave all the reassurances and excuses for the fairy I could and stepped up my efforts.  His love of and belief in the fairy lasted far longer than I would have expected of a toy-gun-toting boy.

He’s fifteen now, my son (I guess the fairy is a bit older).  He doesn’t mention the fairy anymore, but maybe three years ago he surprised me by saying, “Remember how you used to tell me there was a fairy living in our cottage?”    He got a faraway look in his eyes and I knew that magic remained with him.  He’s at high school right this minute, and I’m resisting the temptation to text him and ask him if he remembers the fairy who used to live in the cottage.  Poor kid to have a mother who actually needs to restrain herself from sending such a text to a high school boy.  I will resist, but I’ll definitely ask him about it when he comes home.