Story By the Numbers- Effusia and the Magic Curlique Moon

 
I was tired of snow, and uninspired. I got some Facebook friends to help me choose pictures from my external hard drive. The series of numbers we got were 17-5-3, 13-3, 13-20, 7-14-2, and 21-4-8. I was thinking to share one picture, but no one wanted to be left out, so I now have five unrelated pictures, and I'll tell you a tale. (of some sort). And I had to work a little magic of my own. You'll see.

The actual pictures are photoweb/scenery/firstcurvebeach02, modeltrain/grass01, modeltrain/mvc-017f, gardenweb/r08/juncus6-04, and spw/people/kriegerdeb

Here we go.

Once upon a time there was a woman named Effusia who lived in a neat little white house with black trim. It was a lovely house, but the landscaping was somewhat bleak and boring. One day she scrubbed and polished and cleaned every corner of her little house until there was not a speck of dust to be found. (You can tell this person is not related to me.) This was most satisfactory and she smiled a big smile and made a cup of tea, and then she looked out the window, and said, "I like my clean little white house, but I don't like everything outside to be so white and bare. I'll have to take a trip."

And so, Effusia put on her kerchief, and her backpack, and she took a walking stick and set out to find some way to improve her landscape. She walked for several days until she came to a market where there was a sign that read Woodland Scenics. "This sounds promising," Effusia said, and she walked right over to the man in charge. "I can sell you some realistic field grass," he said.

"Well, I like that it's not white," Effusia said, "but it's very straight, and I was hoping for something a little more exciting." "Ah," said the man, wiggling his eyebrows. "I can see that you are a very practical woman, but this is not ordinary grass." "Right," answered Effusia. "And my name is Jack, and you are going to sell me some magic beans. I was not born just yesterday, you know." "I would not dare to agree or disagree with that perspicacious statement, madam. But this is indeed magic grass." "Oh, all right, I haven't got all day," she snapped, and handed over the money the man requested. "What's so magical about it?"

"If you dip it into the sea, by the light of the first sliver of moon in the first month of the summer of the very first year after it is purchased, you will see why it is desirable."

Effusia though about this all the way home with her package of straight brown grass safely tucked into her backpack. "But I don't live near the sea," she thought. "And apparently I have only one chance to make the magic work. I know what I'll do."

Oh dear, I forgot to tell you one thing about Effusia's house. It was only four inches tall and made of plastic. Effusia was no stranger to certain kinds of magic, which was why she was almost willing to believe the merchant.

So when she returned home from her quest, she simply picked up her house and carried it to the sea. She placed her house beside the water, where the last stretches of the tide would reach. "Now that's what a good foundation is for," she proclaimed wisely. Then she sat down to wait for summer. In the first month of summer, on the first night after the new moon, she planted her grass in the shallow water beside her little white house. Then she worked her own magic and popped into the house and went to bed.



A tiny silver, sliver of a moon, half a curlique of a moon, rose slowly over the water. But Effusia was asleep.

In the morning the moon had gone to bed, but Effusia awoke and rushed out the door to see what might have happened overnight. And this is what she found. Her straight brown grass had twined and vined and corkscrewed itself into the sand and created a yard filled with tunnels and curls and all manner of curious passageways.



"Most satisfactory," Effusia declared. "Now I can have another cup of tea." And that is just what she did.

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