When Courtney and I were mere youths in Blue Ridge, South Carolina, we were obsessed with this book called Changeling: The Dreaming. It was a modern fantasy roleplaying guidebook from White Wolf, based in Stone Mountain, Georgia. The premise is that at times of deep collective inspiration and hope, the gateways between the human world and the faerie world can be flung open, allowing the fae to cross over for a little human adventure.
That’s all well and good until the trods close. What do you do when you can’t get back to Arcadia?
You lament. According to the book, the song goes something like this:
“When you don garments spun of pure moonlight and drink wine distilled from mountain mists, how can you go back to polyester and soda pop?”
What if we believed you don’t have to?
Don’t you think there are enough dreamers here to make this world something that we don’t find so… itchy?
Look Around…
Do you see your fellow dreamers? Your kinfolk? Amorous freaks in love with the universe? In love with future possibilities?
Land stewards. Solar punks. Blenders of ancient and new technologies.
Artists. Musicians. Clowns and pretenders. Timeline jumpers. Creative resourcers and trash sorcerers with hearts of gold.
Pessimists willing to be carried up the mountain. Structural idealists.
Prefigurative visionaries with dreams of a life where there is enough mountain mist, moonlight sips, fruits, veg, and love to keep us clothed and nourished. And enough to share with our neighbors.
Maybe we’re all fae. Maybe we’re changelings. Or maybe we’re human beings that just might have the capacity to create our own beautiful world.
If we believe…
“It’s like everyone tells a story about themselves inside their own head. Always. All the time. That story makes you what you are. We build ourselves out of that story.”
- Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of the Wind. Image from Changeling: The Dreaming, White Wolf Press.
Title image by Courtney Adair Johnson.
