8 minute read
letter writers
• GIFTS
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morning Zoom. Good morning friends you hope to see soon. Good morning light. And a world not quite right.” By Lindsay Rechler and illustrated by June Park. Widely available. $14.99. Another possibility: The kid boredom buster “The Highlights Book of Things to Do.” Hundreds of activities between covers for $24.99. Widely available.
LIFE BOOKS: What better time to ask, “Um... How did I get here?” as 30-year-old entrepreneur Kathi Sharpe-Ross does in her book “Re:Invent Your Life! What Are You Waiting For?” The self-published, self-help guide i ncludes 30 interviews with executives to artists on their a-ha moments. Quincy Jones writes in a short foreword: “I believe that we are the biggest barriers to our own creativity and growth because of paralysis from analysis.” Available on Amazon and elsewhere. $19.99. Need to go in another direction? AcroYoga instructors Max and Liz Lowenstein are out with “Yoga for Inflexible People,” a beginner’s guide to Zen. $19.99. Not available until Nov. 11.
THE WORK WONNIE: Waistup dressing remains a thing, but one still has to dress. Enter this work onesie for the Everyman. It’s a button-down, suitable-for-meetings, striped work shirt attached to comfortable sweats on the bottom. It’s made to look like the shirt is loosely tucked in. And, wait for it, there’s a flap in the back. $55. Head to Workwonnies.com to pre-order for a Nov. 1 release.
EXOTIC SWEETS: With the world at home in extended, close proximity to kitchens and pantries, snacking is an ever-present pastime. Mix it up for a lucky loved one with a monthly subscription to the Japanese snack box service Bokksu. Each box is themed and includes tea. Among past themes is the Otsukimi Moon Festival box, with mochi puffs and red bean doughnuts among the offerings. Items sourced from Japan. From $36.99 on a year’s subscription at Bokksu.com.
WARM HANDS: As we live our best friluftsliv lives, we’ll be pulling double duty with gloves. The rubber ones may ward off germs but not do the trick when the weather goes frigid. Gifting nice gloves is usually a welcome thing, with options everywhere. For women, try a pair in cashmere and animal print from Amicale. $95. Widely available. There’s a matching headband for the same price. Plenty of cashmere-lined options for men, too.
Along the lines of the great outdoors, the folks at Oceas have on offer a fleece-lined waterproof blanket that comes with a carry pouch. In blue, gray and red. $33.99 at OceasOutdoors.com, Amazon and Walmart. com. At UncommonGoods.com, there’s an eco-friendly instant grill made for a single use out of cardboard, bamboo and lava stones. $15.
Have you got a luxury-level gift budget? Do you know a homebound exerciser with a design bent? Tech-
nogym notes its sleek Cross Personal elliptical trainer was designed by Italian architect and designer Antonio Citterio. The thing sure is pretty with its mirror-like steel finish. It has a live console with on-demand content and surround sound built into its handles. And it costs $14,815 at Technogym. com.
EXP. 10/31/20
Pixie post: Fairy letters offer advice, respite in Virginia
Maya Gebler and Cate Carroll read letters they’ve received from fairies in Norfolk, Va., on Monday Oct. 12, 2020. In the last few months, more than 700 letters have arrived at a fairy tree village outside the home of a journalist and children’s book author. (AP Photo/Ben Finley)
NORFOLK, Va. (AP) — With the coronavirus lockdown and school out for the summer, 9-year-old Maya Gebler’s social world had shrunk to her immediate family and a few friends.
When her human pen pals stopped writing, she turned to the fairies who had taken up residence at a tree in her Virginia neighborhood. And the fairies wrote back.
“They care about you,” she said. “And they want to write to you.”
Beneath a crape myrtle at the edge of a lawn in Norfolk lies a fairy village. A sign on a small wooden door shaped like a slice of bread lets visitors know fairies are sleeping behind the smooth bark. Tiny buildings with mushroom spires and flowers line the sidewalk below.
Perhaps just as important are
the cedar tables and chairs, the paper and the pens. One mailbox, often brimming with envelopes, welcomes correspondence. Another offers responses from the likes of the Fairy Godmother, Fairy Queen Lysandra and Tinker Bell.
The fairy tree village appeared in July outside the home of journalist and children’s book author Lisa Suhay, 55, a mother of five. Word spread online and now youngsters arrive wearing pixie wings or princess gowns and a website connects children who live farther away.
In the past few months, more than 700 letters have arrived — from neighborhood children but also from nearby cities such as Virginia Beach. Not a small number appear to be from students at Old Dominion University, a state school down the street.
For some, the letters offer a reprieve from days stuck at home and in virtual school. They also provide something much deeper — a therapeutic opportunity for wishing, confessing and venting.
One child writes: “Can U please make the corona disappear very soon?”
Another says, “We are moving to Guam but will you still be my friend?”
And yet another tells of a mother, a teacher, who was crying and asks, “Can you help her?”
Some are drawings of Tinker Bell. Others come with gifts, such as a cicada shell.
There are complaints about school. And demands to know if fairies are real.
SEE FAIRY LETTERS, PAGE 15
• FAIRY LETTERS
Continued from page 14
“Dearest Queen Lysandra, I’m sorry I ever doubted you,” began one letter, clearly not the first from its author.
Older letter writers share anxieties and insecurities. One thanked the fairies for advice to break up with her “toxic” boyfriend. “I’ve never felt so free!” she wrote.
Some express gratitude. Many wish for peace.
And then there are those like Maya and her two friends, sisters Sophie and Cate Carroll. They’ve become deeply engaged in this fairy world, which includes pixies, elves, gremlins, hobgoblins and trolls.
The fairies reached out to a local cable provider when Sophie and Cate’s Wi-Fi went down as school was starting and the company made their network “gremlin free.”
Maya wrote about her 5-yearold brother Aiden, whose hearing disability made communicating through masks difficult. The Fairy Godmother sent along masks with clear plastic windows around the mouth.
“It’s given her an outlet to vent some of her concerns and fears and feel a little more secure,” said Maya’s mother, Jennifer Gebler. “She can have a sanctuary that’s removed from all the craziness that we’re seeing this year.”
And the children who visit the wee village under her tree bring Suhay something in return.
“I find myself feeling weighed down by all the negativity,” Suhay said. “And all it takes is looking out my window and hearing a little girl singing a song from ‘Frozen’ at one of the doors to the tree. There are no bad days when this is in front of your house.”
Cate Carroll shows off letters she’s received from fairies in Norfolk, Va, on Monday Oct. 12, 2020. In the last few months, more than 700 letters have arrived at a fairy tree village outside the home of a journalist and children’s book author. (AP Photo/Ben Finley)
FromMillion Dollar Quartet
Call417-320-3418orvisit www.bransonstartheater.com
Artist Rob Mullen walks down Long Trail, the country’s oldest long distance trail, in Manchester, Vt.. Mullen was nearing the end of his 272-mile month-long hike down the length of Vermont, painting along the way. (AP Photo/Lisa Rathke) Artist hikes length of Vermont, painting sights along the way
MANCHESTER, Vt. (AP) — After hiking over 200 miles (320 kilometers) on the country’s oldest long-distance trail, Rob Mullen had just 3 miles (5 kilometers) to go in the rain to meet up with his wife and father for a break.
He kept dry with his foul weather gear as he walked down the trail with a backdrop of trees sprouting fall’s orange and yellow leaves and carrying trekking poles and a big stuffed blue pack on his back that held his precious painting kit.
Mullen, a 64-year-old wildlife and wilderness artist, is hiking the 272-mile (440-kilometer) Long Trail that runs the length of Vermont and over its highest mountains from the Canadian border to the Massachusetts state line and painting sights along the way.
He was nearing the end of his monthlong journey and planned to finish as soon as Saturday afternoon with half a dozen paintings and several thousand photos from which to paint. He’s also coming away with sense of hope about the country from the people he’s met along the trail.
“I’ll be painting from this trip for a long time,” he said during his break off the trail in Manchester on a Tuesday.
Mullen, who has done a number of wilderness canoe trips in Alaska and Canada, had planned to paddle in the Northwest territories of Canada this year with three others. But then the coronavirus pandemic hit.
He decided to do the entire Long Trail as a painting trip and to raise money with his art for the Vermont Wildlife Coalition, of which he is a board member, and the Green Mountain Club, which maintains the Long Trail.
Mullen managed to fulfill his plan to hike a certain distance and then paint a painting on the first day. He got to a shelter around 4 p.m., banged out a painting of an erratic boulder, cooked dinner and went to bed, he said.
But the northern part of the trail with the bigger mountains is tough and he admits he hadn’t trained properly, which slowed his pace.
“I mean I was really suffering,” he said, adding that he stopped to meet up his wife to hand off some weight, including his 8-pound (3.6 kilogram) painting kit. But he wasn’t about to give up. As he continued, he gained strength
