Finding Far-far-away.

This post has been long overdue. 

It feels great to be home- ink dipped in faith of what's yet to come.

"Fairy tales are more than true; not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us dragons can be beaten." - Neil Gaiman, paraphrasing G.K. Chesterton. 

I love fairytales. A love that consumes all of me, perhaps even bordering on obsession. Of all stories, I like them best. And if you happen to know me in reality, you'd know exactly what I'm talking about (and have tolerated/enjoyed my many Disney one-woman-shows). Simply put, they've cast a spell on me that doesn't have or need a cure. To many, this may seem immature or childish or weird and I've had my fair share of "Aren't you too old for-?" questions. I don't really mind. For there is no feeling that I would ever choose over the magic and hope you feel coursing through your veins when the shoe fits Cinderella or when Sleeping Beauty awakens or when Pinocchio becomes a little boy and Wendy flies for the first time. J.M. Barrie said it best when he said "All the world is made of faith, and trust and pixie dust." This just happens to be all we need, too. But we let reality get in the way, and we shouldn't. I don't see why Neverland has to be left in the fairy dust. And I most definitely don't see why we can't keep the hope we once had as children, alive and afire. Like it has been said, growing old is mandatory but growing up is optional. What happened? Why did you have to go from loving fairytales as children to ridiculing them as teenagers? You're probably thinking- "Life happened. We've changed and we're now driving past our former selves- we don't know us anymore." Yes. Life is frustrating and chaotic and sometimes unbearable and we cannot do anything about it. Dark clouds block the sunshine often for me as well- but what I do to pull myself out of this 'funk' is wish 'Once upon a dream' like Aurora or 'Let it go' like Elsa. Point being, fairytales do not deny the existence of heartache or despair or sorrow but they do deny defeat and failure and unhappy endings. 

Lessons learnt from fairytales are lessons learnt for life. Now I don't ask you to believe in the unnatural- poisoned apples or pumpkin carriages- I ask you to believe in the concepts that these stories were rooted in. Fairytales, in all entireties are not an escapade from realistic situations- our world is not unlike theirs, in which good and evil both exist. The difference being perhaps a legit complaint that we don't have magic or a fairy godmother to save us from the clutches of the evil. What we don't realise is that this magic exists. Wit, a good heart and a spoonful of courage to use kindness and goodness wisely- that's all the magic one really needs.

Once upon a time, for that's how all stories should begin, your story began, truer than true.
And they all lived happily ever after, for that's how all stories should end, and yours will too.
Life is a story- with good parts and bad, How would you know happiness without knowing the sad?
A short story compilation, chapter after chapter,
If you don't like the story you're in- leave and find your own happily ever after.
The best part of fairytales is probably how applicable they still are in our lives- of course not literally. but metaphorically or symbolically and how we are so oblivious to it all, and here's how.
It may have been centuries since Little Red Riding Hood took on the Big Bad Wolf or Dorothy against the Wicked Witch of the West but 'Fear' has not changed. We were frightened as children, we're possibly more frightened now. What frightens us today might not be what frightened us then, but it is just a different wolf, a different witch. That we need to overcome. Right? It has been said, and I quote- "Fairytales since the beginning of recorded time and perhaps earlier, are the best means to conquer the terrors of mankind through metaphor."  And for me, this is what seems to be the most sensible (bear with me :p) approach to feeling better about this world that we live in- if we could only believe in making our own magic.

"Stories you read when you're the right age never quite leave you. You may forget who wrote them or what the story was called. Sometimes you'll forget what precisely happened but if a story touches you, it will stay with you, haunting the places in your mind you rarely visit."- Neil Gaiman


One of my favourite metaphors is as follows. Just like that of Baby Bear's porridge in Goldilocks and the Three Bears- the universe is 'just right'. A friend once called me a "Disney princess stuck in a shitty world." Albeit super mega flattering, in reality, fairytales and happy endings, like we oft say, 'don't exist'. Do they? I, for one, love fairytales. I certainly do not believe in magic mirrors or princes on white horses, or "Bibbidy Bobbidy Boo" granting me the most beautiful glass shoes. (Jimmy Choo comes pricey for real-life- fairy godmothers.) But, what I do believe in is the idea of hope and love, which runs from the end of one story to the beginning of another- the idea that happiness does exist. Love believes when you don't. That is all the validation and motivation I usually need to get on with life. The 'bare' necessities. If you know what I mean. *Waddup Jungle Book Reference* 

To wrap this all up with a flick of a wand *cue sparkly glittery stuff*, I wish you all find the same joy and inspiration that I do with fairytales. For, 'Laughter is timeless, imagination has no age and dreams are forever.' Fairytales have the beauty of always giving one a new perspective of things, a transformation of ideology from 'I wish' to 'I will' and a belief in trust, kindness, goodness, hope and love.

I wish you all Hakuna Matata and lots of love, 

Ankita.