L.V. Gaudet's Blog, page 39

NaNoWriMo 2010 Challenge

Last year I was too chicken to try competing in the NaNoWriMo challenge – National Novel Writing Month.

I made a lot of excuses for myself, volunteering in two classrooms, having a Kindergartener at home every other day, chores, other writing projects, etc etc etc.

So, I decided to give myself my own unofficial mini NaNo challenge.

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NaNoWriMo Challenge 2009:

The novel: Unnamed Murder Thriller

Nov 1st word count: 32,000

Nov 30th goal: 50,000

 The challenge: 18,000 words in 30 days

 Progress: 4827 words

 My conclusion: don't try this at home. At least not with little children under your feet, unless you are having a writerly compulsive disorder moment.

Result:  I failed utterly, completely, red-faced shamedly, and badly.

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This year I'm jumping in with both feet.  I've registered as an official NaNoWriMo challenge competitor for the first time ever and am taking the plunge.

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NaNoWriMo Challenge 2010:

The novel: I haven't the foggiest idea

Nov 1st word count: 0

Nov 30th goal: 50,000

 The challenge: 175 pages, 50,000 words in 30 days

 Progress: zip words

 My conclusion: I'd say I'm probablly nuts, but there's no probably about it.  I know I am.  We'll see what my conclusion is when I'm done with this madness.

Result:  pending.

Filed under: NaNoWriMo Tagged: NaNoWriMo, national novel writing month

NaNoWriMo 2010 Challenge – Day 1

It's the first day of NaNoWriMo for 2010, and my first time actually trying to compete.

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I'm expecting it to be a tough competition; after all I'm up against some pretty tough competitors.  Let's see, just to start I'm coming out of the gate with no preparation whatsoever, so we'll call competitor number one "Unpreparedness".  Yup, as crazy as it is, I have no story in mind, so characters, no plot, and no outlining done in advance of spending 30 days frantically trying to knock off a 175 page, 50,000 word novel.  Even my coffee won't talk to me this morning.

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Competitor number two is "Mind Block", who also runs by the street name "Blank Mind".  This  one is a devious hooligan who sneaks up on you when you least suspect it and can make you forget names, faces, and phone numbers at the most embarrassing moments possible.  And true to form, Blank Mind has struck before I could even get out of the gate and I have sat down to start NaNo with absolutely no idea what I'm going to write or even what genre it will end up being.

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Right now I'm wrestling with the third competitor, "Procrastination".  Procrastination has an insidious way of finding other things to distract you with so that the project you are supposed to be working on gets subtly shifted to the back burner while that rude little clock ticks down your time until it runs out.  Let's see, I've dallied around with picking at some housecleaning and laundry, fidgeted with the radio, drank two cups of coffee with visions of skeletal fingers and Halloween spooks dancing in my head, battled with will power to stay out of the kids over-sized over-stuffed bags of Halloween treats, and am now writing a blog post instead of working on my NaNo novel.  Heck, I've even tried getting onto the official NaNoWriMo website, and quite foolishly too.  Of course it's going to be overloaded, slowed down, and likely not even working.  Everyone from every country in the world is trying to get in to see if they have any new writing buddies, waste time with Procrastination browsing the site, chats, and searching for any useless blurbs they can read.  And, of course, posting that first paltry word count just for the sake of posting a word count.

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I can't say I've ran into "Writer's Block" yet.  I think I have to actually be writing something and struggling with it for that.  Since I haven't even broken past Mind Block to start writing, Writer's Block is still somewhere ahead of me on the track.  No doubt he's got some trick up his sleeve to cheat when I do catch up to him.  He's kind of like Wile E. Coyote.

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There are a lot more competitors out there of course; it is pretty stiff competition after all.  Maybe I'll go into more of them later.

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For now, maybe you can add to my list of NaNo competitors:

Unpreparedness
Mind Block a.k.a. Blank Mind
Procrastination
Writer's Block


Filed under: NaNoWriMo Tagged: blank mind, NaNoWriMo, national novel writing month, procrastination, Words on Writing, writers block

Spooks, Monsters, and NaNoWriMo

Spooks, Monsters, and NaNoWriMo

By L. V. Gaudet

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If there is one holiday that inspires me as a writer, it is Halloween.

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While many of the things we do for Halloween, running around in costumes and decorating our homes to scare the bogeymen away, yet inviting the spooks and ghosts with open arms and their favorite treats, have roots in Pagan rituals and beliefs – Halloween has become as Pagan as Christmas with Santa, flying reindeer and decorated trees is Christian.

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While some of us will choose to celebrate either of these holidays in a more spiritual way, the bulk of us will continue to pray to the gods of commercialism and celebrate them as fun events celebrating family (Christmas) and your community (Halloween) with your family or community, holidays meant to bring us closer together, whether or not we celebrate the religious aspects of either one.

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But that isn't why Halloween is my favorite holiday.  I love it because the more wacky your decorations are, the better they are.  Skeletons having a tea party wearing Aunt B's hat, witches protruding from garage doors, and giant hairy spiders that look like they're doing the cha-cha-cha – it's all good.  Forget finding the perfect outfit and fussing over your hair for the holiday parties – just smear on some fake blood, back-comb that mop into an unruly rat's nest, toss on a goofy costume and go have fun!  And the gift giving couldn't be easier or more fun.  You buy a bunch of bags of candy and toss handfuls into the bags of eager kids while making the odd one perform tricks for your amusement.

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But even more than that, I love the whole theme of the holiday.  I love the festive spookiness.

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I've always loved a good horror movie; and a good bad horror movie too.  My favorite books have always been the likes of Stephen King, Dean Koontz, and other purveyors of the darker side of our imaginations.  As a child I used to sneak to the basement, crank the volume down low, wait for the television to warm up, and sit much too close to watch Vincent Price movies late at night when the house is in darkness and quiet, and I was supposed to be in bed sleeping.  He was my first favorite actor.  Of course in those days we didn't have cable and, being the second youngest of five, I didn't have any say in television viewing and wasn't allowed to watch those sorts of movies anyway.  So, my earliest experiences were limited to the B horrors playing late at night on the good old trusty rabbit ears when I hopefully wouldn't get caught.

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Halloween is like a good B horror movie.  You know it's all fake, and much of it looks badly faked too, but it's still fun to play at being scared and being spooky.

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My love of horror movies and books influences more than my choice in favorite holidays.  It has a strong influence on my writing.

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As Halloween approaches, I find little ditties and poems about witches, ghosts, and all manner of ghouls rattling around in my head.  I write little Halloween poems for my kids to share with their friends at school.  I feel a terrible itch to haunt the spookier realms of the stores in search of wonderful new frightening decorations.  I feel suddenly inspired to write like I've never written before, with both new and old story ideas popping into my head faster than I can possibly note them down, or even sometimes make sense of them.

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And then – just like that – it's all over.  The kids lay about in near candy comas, parents wander the house picking up candy wrappers, and plastic skeletons rattle their bones forlornly where they hang swinging in the wind down the street from ghosts that look abandoned and forgotten in the light of the new day.

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It is November 1st, the day after Halloween and – the first day of NaNoWriMo.

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For the uninitiated, and I'm more of an uninitiated myself than an initiated, NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month.  The whole idea of NaNoWriMo is to sit your butt down and write with it, literally.  Ok, almost literally.  It is writing an entire 175 page novel (that's 50,000 words!) in only 30 days, and you are writing by the seat of your pants.  There is no time for making detailed lists and outlines, no planning, no editing – just a crazed rush to write write write.

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It's like comparing Halloween to Christmas.  NaNoWriMo is the Halloween of story writing.

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Novel writing is like Christmas.  It's full of lists and rules and expectations, taking painstaking care to make everything perfect.  The house decorated perfectly, buying the perfect presents, and making the all the right appearances for family dinners and Christmas parties.  Regardless of your vision of it, that vision holds a certain amount of perfection needed.  It also takes a lot of work, but at the same time you have to remember to make it fun.  And, just like Christmas, you get out of it only what you put into it.

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For NaNoWriMo, you throw all of that to the wind.  It's about having no expectations other than to write something and have fun doing it.  It's throwing on fake blood, mussing your hair and wearing something wacky instead of being perfectly manicured with perfectly coiffed hair and your best outfit.  Instead of spending an entire evening at one party (working over that one scene or paragraph to perfection), you are running headlong from one to the next with wild abandon and a big smile on your face.

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And the best thing about it is that anyone can do it.  It's not a private club where members must be authors published by the big publishing houses or wear special robes and hats.  You don't have to have a degree, be fluent in a particular language, or have a special set of knowledge and skills.  If you can put words on paper or type them into a computer, then you can do it too.

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And those who doubt their ability to write can participate with the comfort of knowing that even the seasoned writers are probably writing no better than you because they're frantically rushing to put those words down too while crying out, "My lists!  My outlines!  My wine glass for some editing!  Oh, won't somebody please think of the readers?!"

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Last year was the first time I've ever heard of National Novel Writing Month.  In fact, I wondered if the first online stuttering I saw about it was some sort of slow moving viral madness travelling through the dark intangible world of the internet like a B thriller movie.  And this is despite my playing with my love of writing for years.  How can you write for years and never hear of NaNoWriMo?  Easy for me, apparently.

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I toyed with the idea of giving it a try last year, but was too chicken.  Instead I gave myself a mini challenge in honor of NaNoWriMo just to see if I could do it – a mini challenge that I failed terribly.  But, with volunteering in two classrooms and having a young child in half-time school, time when I could put in that kind of concentration on any task was a rare thing.

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I'm thinking about whether or not I should give it a shot this year.  Both kids are in school full time and I may have more time on my hands while looking for a job than I did surrounded by at least one kid most o f the time.  It may be my only best chance of making the word count by the deadline.  And, best of all, it comes fast on the heels of my best writing inspiration – Halloween.

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But, like anyone else, I am not happy with failing.  I balk to some degree at committing myself to something knowing that chances are pretty good that I won't succeed.  Considering that most writers will have to face a lot of rejection and failure in their lives, and many won't make it to ever having a book published, that's something you have to get over quickly as a writer.  You train yourself to concentrate on quality, not quantity, and you hold on to that knowledge that you write because it's what you love.  After all, being a writer is not about being published or famous, it's about doing what you love – and that is writing.

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For one month you turn that all on its head and write for quantity, not quality – and all just for the fun of it, to remind you why you fell in love with writing in the first place, before getting into the tedium of endless lists, outlines, drafts, and editing.

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Maybe we can help each other out by repeating this together:

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"It's all about quantity, not quality."

"It's all about quantity, not quality."

"It's all about quantity, not quality."

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– And I quote that line directly from the What Is NaNoWriMo? page on the National Novel Writing Month website.

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http://www.nanowrimo.org/

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Maybe I'll see some of you over there.  Maybe.

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Until then, happy Halloween!

Filed under: Halloween, NaNoWriMo Tagged: Halloween, NaNoWriMo, national novel writing month, Words on Writing

Halloween Bash – Halloween Fun

Halloween Bash

by L.V. Gaudet

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Ghost ghost, where is the ghost?

He is the party host.

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Which witch has the stitch,

the stitch to sew Scarecrow Mitch?

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We're getting ready for the Halloween bash,

with treats and tricks and dancing the Monster Mash.

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There will be eyeball stew and finger goo,

and enough candy for me and you.

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Sam Skeleton rattled his bones too hard,

and they fell all over the graveyard.

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Spot the dog stole his leg bone,

and now Sam is hopping after him all the way home.

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This party will be too spooky for me,

I think I'll just hide behind that tree.

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See see, did you see?

I think that pumpkin just winked at me!

Filed under: Halloween, Halloween Poetry Tagged: Halloween, Poem, Poetry

Grizelda's Rain Hex – Halloween Fun

Grizelda's Rain Hex

by L.V. Gaudet

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Bad witch Grizelda hexed rain in the air,

So here is a magic spell—if you dare.

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Rain rain now you go away,

So the spooks and goblins can come out to play.

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The houses are decorated quite a fright,

So we can have fun this Halloween night.

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We'll trick and treat and yell out "Boo!"

Because that is what little monsters do.

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Now if you say this spell just right,

It might just be a starry Halloween night.

Filed under: Halloween, Halloween Poetry Tagged: Halloween, Poem, Poetry

Anniversaries, Children, and the Death of the Date Night – Random Ramblings

Anniversaries, Children, and the Death of the Date Night

By L. V. Gaudet

© October 18,  2010

This past weekend was an anniversary of sorts for us.  It's not the traditional wedding type of anniversary, or moving in together, or engagement anniversary.  No, it's one of those girlie things some of us girls do that men tend to shake their heads at and say "That's not a real anniversary."

Saturday was the anniversary of when we met.  It was celebrated in what is probably a common theme after eleven years, married for four of those, and two kids together.  It was completely and utterly ignored.  He went out and played ball hockey, while I stayed home with the kids, one of them complaining incessantly about a sore throat that only seemed to hurt to moment you asked her to do something or said "No" to something she wanted.  And our wedding anniversary seems to be headed on the same route.

As most other parents of young children have also quickly learned, finding reliable and trustworthy babysitters can be hard.  This is especially so if you fall into the paranoid over-protective mom category like I do.  The kids who are eager to babysit are too young for me, and the ones that are old enough would rather be out with boys and their friends than spending a Saturday night with a couple of little kids.

So far, with the exception of one evening out in seven years as parents, we have relied only on the kids grandparents for babysitting services.  While that may work at first, before long you find yourselves going out less and less.

The very act of going out becomes a chore.

Before you realize what happened, anniversaries and date nights become once or twice a year events.  Soon they move into the land of "special dinner at home", which is never as special as one you don't have to cook yourself.

This is a far too populated place where couples try to recreate the date experience from the comfort of home after giving up on the whole business of finding neighbourhood kids to babysit.  You put in a grand effort to cook something special, the kids whine and groan about what you cooked, one says it's gross, and the other shoots food across the table from a wildly waving fork.

The alternative option, feeding and putting the kids to bed before your special meal, is destined to flop before it starts too.  They know you are trying to do something that doesn't include them and they won't stand for it.  Ultimately they will find all kinds of reasons why they can't sleep.

Kids have a unique ability to sense when something is up.  Sometimes they can even tell days in advance that something special is in the works.  They will fight more, be needier, misbehave more, and demand more attention.  This is, of course, because they don't want anyone doing anything they're not.  Their ultimate goal is to make you cancel your plans to be with them instead, or at least to make your plans center entirely on them.  After all, kids are the center of their universe and so rightly think they should be the center of yours too.  By the time your babysitter arrives, or it's time to sit down to your special dinner at home, you are tired, frazzled, and feeling completely un-special and wonder why you bothered.

So, you give up on the nights out, special at home dinners become ordinary dinners, and date night has had a timely death.  You tell yourself it's ok because – between the increasing costs for groceries and all the money you have to put out for school snacks, fundraisers, and activities for the kids – you really can't afford a night out anymore anyway.  And it really is ok because it's all part of being a parent and making sacrifices as a parent.

What makes it even more ok is remembering to remind yourself and each other often of that insanity that brought you there in the first place – love.

Filed under: Random Ramblings Tagged: anniversary, date night, kids, Random Ramblings

Life Changes – Random Ramblings

Life Changes

By L. V. Gaudet

© October 2010

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Life always seems to have a way of throwing changes at us.  Birth, death, marriage, divorce.

I weathered two big life changes with a mixture of fear, dread, wonder, and eagerness.  First, becoming a mother, and second, becoming a stay at home parent.  Both added a new dimension to my world, a whole new life full of trials both expected and unexpected.

The next life change had a much smaller impact on my world.  What is supposed to be perhaps the biggest day of a girl's life wasn't that big life changing day a girl dreams of.  But then, it was more of a public sharing of what we already knew – that we were already married in our hearts and home.  The party was done, the guests gone home, and bills waited to be paid.  There were no eye openers as everyone behaved pretty much as expected.  As with any wedding there will always be both regrets and good things.

Now life brings me to the next big change.  The girls are both in school full time and it's time to consider the next phase of my life, the return to work.  It may not be the biggest change my life has had, but at the moment it feels like the biggest.

As I sit here contemplating that next move – getting a job, I have to admit that I am a bit scared.  It kind of feels like getting your very first job as a young adult.

Let's face it, after six years as an unemployed stay-at-home parent preceded by almost seven years working with the same company, I haven't have to job search in roughly thirteen years.  And, six years of unemployment will hardly help my employability, regardless of its reason.

I need four basic items before I can even start.  The first two are easy enough.  My iron is older than my house, and they both certainly have seen better days.  And my ironing board, well I have my suspicions that it may pre-date womens' right to vote in our fair country.  It's well past time to retire it.

The most challenging problem, of course, will be finding suitable childcare.  Any childcare I find would have to be able to either get the kids to and from school directly, to and from their designated bus stop for our house, or to and from another existing bus route and just hope to heck there is room on that bus every year for them because the school board won't make room on a bus route that doesn't deliver them to their residence.  And, of course, there is always the possibility of having to change schools and send the kids to another town – assuming the school has room and is willing to take them, and there is some means of getting them to school from the childcare provider.  I desperately hope to keep them in their home town school where they can grow up knowing and becoming friends with the kids in their own neighborhood.

Of course none of this is new and I certainly am not the first parent to face this dilemma.  It's all part of being a working parent and dealing with a desperate shortage of childcare spaces and lack of school transportation for daycare kids.

Going into the world of parenthood, I thought full time childcare spaces would be hard to find.  They are, but they're not as scarce as that elusive animal – the before and after school care.  There has been a big push lately for creating daycare spaces and the drive to get every child below school age into some form of preschool program.  But when it comes to the need for spaces and transportation for kids after they hit kindergarten, the ball has not only been dropped, it's been lost down the sewer grate.

The last thing I need is in a bit of a catch-22 situation.  Looking at my wardrobe it's very clear that, after two kids and so many years without replacing the items in my wardrobe, I'm going to need a job to buy the clothes I need to get a job.

So, while I ponder the how-to's of returning to work, continue my snipe-hunt for the ever elusive before and after school childcare that will actually allow the kids to get to school, and steel myself for the coming tide of rejections; I will try to not think about how returning to work will change the dynamics of our family life, or how I'll juggle cramming everything I do now into a few very short evening hours like all the other working moms do.  That is as thought for another day.

Filed under: Random Ramblings Tagged: Blog, job search, life, Random Ramblings, working parent

Guest Blogger – Author Wendy Ely

Midnight Secrets by Wendy Ely

Join author Wendy Ely today in discussing her new book Midnight Secrets

http://lvgwriting.blogspot.com/2010/10/in-my-shoes-guest-blogger-wendy-ely.html

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Go for a swim in the waves of passion and romance with a book by Wendy Ely

Jesse's Brother and Confession available at

http://www.lyricalpress.com/wendy_ely

Coming soon: New Year's Resolution, Midnight Secrets,

and Cross the Line!

Filed under: Guest Blog Tagged: Blog, Guest Blog, Wendy Ely

Writing is like reading a book for the first time.

Writing is like reading a book for the first time.  You can outline ahead and know how the story goes, or you can just sit down and write.  Sure, outlining is more logical and will probably bring a tighter storyline, but it lacks spontaneity.

Writing without knowing what happens next is just more fun.

Filed under: Random Thoughts Tagged: Random Thoughts, Words on Wr, Words on Writing

The Tooth Fairy and the Ivory Tower – Children's Story

The Tooth Fairy and the Ivory Tower

By L. V. Gaudet

© September 17, 2010

Once upon a time there was a little princess who lived in a beautiful castle in a beautiful land.  The princess had a wonderful life because she had everything she had ever wanted.

Whatever Princess Angelica wanted, Princess Angelica got.  Yes, everything!

In fact every year her father, the king, had to have a new, bigger, castle built.  And every year the servants packed up all of the princess's stuff and moved it to the new castle.

And every year, by moving day, the castle was so crowded that no one could move.  So, once again the servants would start packing all of the princess's stuff and move it to the new, bigger, castle.

One by one, the people in the castle would be freed as the servants took the stuff away.  And it's a good thing too, because they were all getting pretty hungry.

Finally, the servants made it to the princess.

But the princess was sad.  She just sat there on her Princess and the Pea bed, with her favourite snuggly stuffed dog with diamond eyes and ribbons made of golden fairy hair, and she just sat.  She sat and she sat, and she didn't move or talk.  She looked very sad.

The servants ran from the room crying.

"The princess!  Something's wrong with the princess!"

And everyone in the castle came running.

All the servants, even the cook who was usually busy cooking, came running.

The knights came running, their armour clanging and clanking, making a huge racket.

The lords and ladies pranced and danced, and capered up to the princess's room. The boy in the stable who cleaned up after the horses came running, followed by flies.

Even the dog who caught the mice came running to see what was wrong with the princess.

"The princess!  Something's wrong with the princess!" they all cried.

At last, the princess's parents, the king and queen, came running into her room.

"The princess, the princess," the queen cried, "What is wrong with the princess?"

"The princess, the princess," the king cried, "what is wrong with the princess?"

The little princess just sat there quiet and sad, hugging her snuggly dog.

The king sat beside the little princess and put a gentle arm around her, great worry creasing his brow.

"What is the matter my little princess?" he asked.  "Do you not have everything you have ever wanted?"

"Yes," the little princess said quietly.

"Well, do you not live in the most beautiful castle in the most beautiful land?" the king asked.

"Yes," the little princess said quietly.

"Then why are you so sad, little princess?" the king asked.  He was becoming even more worried.  "Are you sick?"

"No," the little princess said quietly.  "I was just reading."

"Reading?" the king said, shocked.

"Ban the books!" the king declared.  "The books have made the princess sick, take them all away!  All books in the kingdom are to be taken and burned!"

"No, Daddy," the little princess said quietly.

"No?" the king asked.

"No," the little princess said.  "It's just the picture, look."  And she showed her father, the king, the picture of a little princess just like her trapped way up at the top of a beautiful white tower.

"Ok," the king said.  "So, why are you so sad then?"

"The princess in the picture," the little princess said quietly.  "She's in a beautiful white tower.  It looks like it's made of ivory, and …"

But she didn't get to finish because the king interrupted.

"A tower!" the king roared.

"But – but – the b-books," a small servant said as he collected up arm loads of books.

"Forget the books!" the king said.  "It's not the books, it's the tower!"

 "The little princess wants an ivory tower, and by the jewels of my crown she will have an ivory tower!"

"But," the little princess said quietly.  But nobody heard her.

All the servants ran around crying.

"A tower, a tower, Princess Angelica needs an ivory tower!"

"Um, Sire," the little servant said, his arms still full of books."

The king leaned over and looked down at the little servant.

The little servant swallowed his fear.

"Ivory is very expensive, Sire," the little servant said.

The king swung his arm in a circle to include everything in his kingdom.

"I will give everything in my kingdom if I must," the king said.  "The princess will have her ivory tower!"

All the servants, even the cook, ran from the little princess's room.

The knights in their armour clanged and clanked out of the room.

The lords and ladies danced and curtseyed out of the room.

Even the dog who catches the mice ran from the room.

They had a beautiful ivory tower to build!

The little princess was left sitting alone on her princess and the pea bed, hugging her favourite snuggly stuffed dog with diamond eyes and ribbons made of golden fairy hair.

"But…" the little princess said.  And that was all she said.  She just sat.  She sat and she sat, and she didn't move or talk.  She looked very sad.

Soon, big wagons full of ivory began to arrive at the castle.

The little princess sat sadly and watched the servants unload the ivory.

"They look like curved poles," she said to her favourite snuggly dog.

"I wonder where ivory comes from," the little princess said.

"Oh, so you wonder where ivory comes from," said a little voice beside her.

Princess Angelica looked around but no one was there.

(Sigh) "So now I'm hearing voices talk back when I talk to myself," the little princess said.

"You are a wicked little girl," the little voice said angrily.

"What?  Me?" the little princess said.  She still couldn't find anyone around.

"You are wicked and terrible," the little voice said.  "You-you are just spoiled!  Rotten like a bad apple."

The little princess felt hurt by these words.

She looked around to see who was saying such mean things.

Finally, she saw the tiny person.

And tiny this person was!   She was as tall as the length of the little princess's finger.  She had tiny gossamer wings and a tiny dress made of ivory daisy petals.

"What are you?" the little princess asked, amazed.

"I'm not a what!" the little person said angrily.  "Who!  I'm a who!  Fairies are people too you know!"

"A fairy?" the little princess couldn't believe it.  "I never had a fairy."

"You can't have me!" the little fairy yelled.  "I'm a person, and you can't own a person."

"Sorry, I didn't mean it like that," the little princess said.

"Are you really a fairy?" the little princess asked.

"Yes," the fairy pouted.

"What kind of fairy are you?" the little princess asked.

"I'm a tooth fairy," the little fairy said proudly.  "My job is to look after all the lost teeth.  They get pretty sad and lonely, you know, after you lose them."

"Wow!  A tooth fairy," the little princess said.

"Can you grant wishes?" the little princess asked.

"Hmph! You don't have wishes, you already have everything you ever wanted," the little fairy said.

"But…" the little princess said sadly.

"What could you possibly wish for?" the little fairy asked.

The little princess thought and thought.  She thought hard.  This was such a little fairy, that surely she must have only enough magic in her for one wish.  She had to make it a good one.

She thought about the princess in her book that was trapped in her beautiful ivory tower.  She looked at the ivory being brought in from far away to build her own ivory tower.

"I would like to know where ivory comes from," the little princess said.

"Hmmm," the little fairy thought.

And with a wink and a nod, and a clap of her hands – and a little fairy dust too – the little princess and the fairy were suddenly in a very strange land.

Everything looked yellow and brown, and the grass was very tall and dead looking.  There were very few trees and very little green.

"Where are we?" the little princess asked.

"Africa!" the little fairy said proudly.

"Africa!  Why?" the little princess asked.

"This is where ivory comes from," the fairy said.

Just then, great lumbering beasts walked into sight.  They were huge!  They had great flat ears that flapped in the hot air, long snaky noses, and grey wrinkly skin.  The most amazing thing was that they had great big ivory tusks sticking out from beside the corners of their mouths.

"What are those?" the little princess asked in excitement.

"Those are elephants," the little fairy said.  "That's where ivory comes from."

"From the elephants?" the little princess asked.  She couldn't believe it.  "Are those horns?"

"No," the little fairy said.  "They're kind of like teeth."

"Teeth," the little princess said.

"That's why I was at your castle," the little fairy said.  She looked very sad now.  "All those poor lost teeth."  She shook her head sadly.

The little princess stared at the elephants.

"Do they just give us their teeth?" she asked.

"Give them?"  The little fairy laughed.  "Would you just give me your teeth?"

The little princess shook her head, "no."

"The men come and they take the teeth," the fairy said.

"Does it hurt?" the little princess asked.

"Of course it does," the little fairy said.  "They have to kill the elephants to take their teeth."

The little princess was shocked.  This was terrible!

"Those poor elephants!  We have to help them," the little princess cried.

Just then the elephants started crying and yelling.

A little baby elephant who looked so tiny and cute next to its huge mother squeaked and cried.

The whole herd started to run for their lives.

Men came.  They chased the elephants.

"No, don't hurt them," the little princess cried.

"Hurry," the little fairy said.  "The only way to stop them is to stop building the tower."

With one last sad look at the fleeing elephants, and with a wink and a nod, and a clap of her hands – and a little fairy dust too – the little princess and the fairy were suddenly back at the castle.

"Hurry, we must find my father and tell him to stop building the tower!" the little princess cried.

The little princess and the fairy rushed all over the castle, but they couldn't find the king or the queen.

"The king has gone to the town plaza," a servant said.

The princess and the fairy rushed to the town plaza, but the king wasn't there.

At the town plaza the little princess overheard two old women talking about her.

"That princess, she just has to have everything she wants," one woman complained.

"She wanted my little dog who catches mice, and now my house is full of mice!" the other woman complained.

"She's just a terrible princess," the first woman said.

"Why do you look so sad?" a little boy asked the princess.

"Do you know where my mother is?" the little princess asked.

"I saw her going into the bakery," the little boy said.

The little princess and the fairy rushed off to the bakery, but the queen wasn't there.

At the bakery, the princess overheard the baker talking to an old man about her.

"That princess is so selfish," the old man said.

"She wanted large pans to plant her flowers in and the king gave her mine," the baker said sadly.  "Now I can't make my beautiful big cakes!"

"Oh, those were the finest cakes," the old man said.

"Why do you look so sad?" a little girl asked the princess.

"Do you know where my father is?" the little princess asked.

"I saw him by the mill," the little girl said.

The little princess and the fairy rushed off to the mill, but the king Wasn't there.

At the mill, the princess overheard the miller talking to his wife.

"That princess is horrible," the miller's wife said.

"She liked my ox and the king just gave it to her," the miller said.  "Now I can't turn the mill to make flour.  How can people bake bread without flour?"

The little princess ran from the mill crying.

"Why are you crying?" the little fairy asked.

"Everybody hates me!" the little princess sobbed.

"Of course they do," the little fairy said.  "You get everything you want – EVERYTHING!  All that stuff has to come from somewhere.  If you have it, then somebody else doesn't."

"I never thought of it that way," the little princess said sadly.

Then the little princess remembered – THE ELEPHANTS!

"Hurry, we have to stop the tower to save the elephants!"  The little princess cried.

They rushed to where the beautiful ivory tower was being built for the princess.

"The queen fairy is very cross with you, you know," the fairy said on the way.

"Queen fairy?  Why is she mad at me?"

"Your wishes," the fairy said.  "You have everything you ever wanted given to you.  You have no need of wishes.  Fairy's must answer wishes or they die!"

"You mean I'm hurting the fairy's too?" the little princess asked.

"Three fairies have died already," the fairy said sadly.

"Just because I don't need to wish for anything?" the little princess asked.

"Yes," the fairy said.  "And now your ivory tower is taking all the elephants' ivory.  You are killing all the elephants."

"But I didn't know!" the little princess cried.

They arrived at the ivory tower and the princess ran to block the servants building it.

"Stop!  Stop!" the little princess cried.

The servants all ignored her and just walked around her, building the tower.

"Oh please stop," the little princess begged.

"What's this?" the king roared.  "Why is my little princess so sad?"

"The tower …" the princess started to say.  But the king cut her off.

"Yes the tower, it's magnificent!  Magnorious and glorious!" the king said proudly.

"But, the elephants…" the little princess said sadly.

"Elephants?  If my little princess wants elephants then she shall have elephants," the king declared.  "Bring elephants!"

Then with a flash of glimmering light a splendidly beautiful woman stood before them.  Her golden hair flowed with her flowing gowns.  She had delicate wings of gossamer.

"The fairy queen!" the little fairy gasped.

The little princess just stared.

"Enough of this selfishness," the fairy queen said angrily.  "Your greedy wants have hurt everyone around you and it must stop!"

The king just stared.  He had never seen a fairy.  He didn't even believe they were real.

The fairy queen looked around angrily.  When she saw the little princess she stared at her, pointing at her.

"For your crimes I sentence you thus," the fairy queen commanded.  "Your wish that brought about this," – she gestured to the partially built ivory tower – "shall be granted, but it will be your prison.  You will be forever trapped within that which you wished for.  You own it, it's now yours to cherish forever."

"No!" the king and queen cried together.

The fairy queen turned to the king and the queen.

"You, who have blindly given your daughter everything she wanted, have left her with nothing more to want.  Without want, there is nothing to dream of.  I sentence you to finish what you started.  You shall never rest or age until the ivory tower is completed."

The king laughed.

"With all this ivory, the tower will be finished quickly," the king said.

"No!" the little princess cried.  "The elephants!"

And with a wink and a nod, and a clap of her hands – and a little fairy dust too – the queen fairy turned all the great elephant tusks into tiny little baby's teeth.

"No longer will you take your ivory, but it will have to be given to you willingly," the queen fairy said.

"But, baby teeth?" the king begged.

"Baby teeth," the queen fairy said.

The queen fainted.

The king cried.

"The tower will never be finished," the king cried.

"I know," the queen fairy said.

And with a wink and a nod, and a clap of her hands – and a little fairy dust too – the queen fairy was gone.

"I have to help my parents," the little princess sobbed.

The little tooth fairy felt sad for the little princess.

"I will help you," the little fairy said.

"How?" the little princess asked.  The little fairy was much too little to help.

"I'm a tooth fairy," the little fairy said.  "I'll help you get the teeth."

"But we can't take the teeth.  They have to give them to us," the little princess said.

"I'm sure they wouldn't mind giving us their lost teeth.  They are lost, after all," the little fairy said.

"I can't leave the tower," the little princess said sadly.  "The queen fairy cursed me."

The little princess was very sad.

And so the little fairy set out to ask people for their lost teeth to give to the little princess.  But no one wanted to give the little princess anything because she already had everything.

Then the little princess had an idea.  She would give gifts to anyone who would willingly give her their lost teeth.

It was very hard work finding lost teeth.  But when the little fairy did find one, she would return it to its rightful owner and ask to give it to the princess.  If the person said yes, then the little fairy gave a present from the little princess.  It might be a book or a pot, a toy or a coin.  But the princess made good on her promise to always give a gift.

Soon, teeth were no longer lost.  Instead, children would place them under their pillows for the tooth fairy to find them.

But the tower could never be completed, and so the king and queen continued to build the castle, one itty bitty little baby tooth at a time, forever.  The princess sat in her beautiful but unfinished ivory tower, always waiting for the tooth fairy to bring her another tooth.  And the tooth fairy finally found a home for the lost teeth and went out every night while children slept to collect their lost teeth to build the beautiful ivory tower.

And they lived this way for ever after.

Until …

One day the little tooth fairy asked the princess a very important question.

"Why did you want an ivory tower?" the little fairy asked.

"I didn't," the little princess said.

"But the picture of the tower," the little fairy said.

So the little princess showed her friend the picture of the princess trapped at the top of a beautiful tower that looked like it was made of ivory.

She pointed at the princess in the picture.

"The princess?" the little fairy asked.

"She's lonely like me," the little princess said.

"You didn't wish for the tower at all?" the little fairy said.

"No," the little princess said.  "I just wanted a friend."

The little fairy screamed with happiness.

"What?" asked the little princess.

"You aren't trapped in the tower," the little fairy said.

"But the curse," the little princess said.

"Said that you would have to live forever with what you wished for," the little fairy said.  "She made you my friend forever!"

And so they were friends forever, and the little princess wasn't a prisoner of the beautiful ivory tower after all.  But the foolish king and queen still had to keep building it, one itty bitty tiny little baby tooth at a time.

The little princess still had so much stuff that she, and the little tooth fairy, continued trading presents for teeth to help her parents finish the ivory tower.

Filed under: Scribblings for Children Tagged: Children, childrens story, tooth fairy