"Prepare for barriers to be broken down," said the garden snail. "Work to rid yourself of them or what I will show you will be very uncomfortable. These barriers house deceit that corrupts your thoughts and deeds. You are responsible for their existence and they are unhealthy."

Peter the squirrel lost his special box, or it was stolen.

Peter never moved the box, it always sat in the middle of his small, round table. How could he have lost it?

His box held his notes and stories -- endless scraps of paper scribbled on front and back, erased and edited, re-erased and re-edited. The box held nothing that would be considered valuable to anyone else. Who would steal a box, made from a nibbled and discarded acorn, stuffed with scribbles of paper?

Peter laid down on his bed, positioned himself in a squirrelish curl and cried himself to sleep. At first Peter had terrible nightmares, monsters both real and imagined appeared to him. Peter soothed each monster in turn. Gradually, Peter began to fall into more colorful worlds -- pleasant dreams filled with family and loved ones, happy memories and fairy tales.

Rested, Peter eventually woke up. He was confused, but pleasantly surprised to find that his cherished acorn box was sitting in the center of his small round table, where he always kept it. Peter could not explain where the box went or why it was now returned. He decided not to think about it at this time, just have some breakfast and scribble a note or two.

Marybeth came down the hallway of the trailer, cigarette in one hand, a beer in the other. She positioned herself in front of Jason and slid up and onto the washing machine. She leaned back and spread her legs slightly to accommodate the incidental new life growing in her lanky, restless body. After a sip of room temp Budweiser and a slow contemplative drag off a Marlboro, "I need to get out of here. I don't care where. Anywhere but here."

Marybeth turned from Jason and blushed at her confidence in someone she hardly knew. She glanced out the window at some imagined noise in the driveway, satisfied it was nothing, she turned her attention back to Jason. Forgetting her problems for a moment she used the flat of her foot to playfully impale him against the opposite wall. She giggled, then remembered her serious mood, "You have to promise to take me if you leave. Billy went over to his ex's house again yesterday. I know he is thinking about going back to her."

She brushed her hand absentmindedly over her belly. Awkward, both from the alcohol and new, unaccustomed bulk she leaned forward sternly, "You have to promise me. And mean it!" Softening, "Please." She took another shaky drag off the nearly-spent cigarette. Looking away, tears welled up in her tired eyes.

sometimes the whole thing
all at once
every memory
every flower-strewn riverbank
every precious lover you took for granted
every moment that we all thought would last forever
and the scent of being alive
and every single dance in the warm sunshine
it all comes back in sweet, horrible, beautiful waves
and you just have to hold on to something till it passes

"I have to go now," said the snail, "the long shadows suggest I am in another's space and I am very tired. We will speak again in the spring."

"How will I recognize you?" I asked.

"You won't. Just remember to listen, my voice will be there."

Stacy sat in the driver's seat of the large SUV on her breaks. Mr. Simmons, the man that paid her to clean up around the house, had said it was OK, even though he seemed to think it was a strange request. Stacy was used to people staring at her in that funny way. 'Things just sound stranger when I say them', she often thought.

Sitting in the large, powerful vehicle with all the controls within reach made her feel special -- even though she did not know how to use most of them. Nor were they likely to work without keys or special instructions. Nor did she have permission to fidget with anything, just to sit.

Stacy had given herself the nickname Thimble-Sized Stacy. (...add here...)  When Stacy was in the car, she did not feel thimble-sized.

Titmouse sat in front of her dressing mirror staring at her feet. "They are so tiny. Such terribly, terribly tiny, feet. I will never be able to accomplish anything significant -- nothing even adequate -- with such frighteningly worthless, tiny, tiny, clawed, scaly feet."

Dustbunny, sitting behind her on the bed blurted out, "I've always liked your feet. The size of your feet. I like the way they feel too."

"Ughhh. That is so disgusting," replied Titmouse quickly hiding her feet under her chair, "How can you even say that?" She began to cry silently.

Dustbunny went out to make Titmouse a sandwich.

When we set foot upon the Strangeland, a steady rain fell from the blackened sky, artificial lights illuminated the innermost area. The surreal lawn we stood upon stretched in all directions into the gloomy darkness, white lines approximately 10 meters apart laid the lawn out in a checkerboard-like grid. The lawn was made of a material, resembling ordinary grass near our entry, but displaying increasing levels of artificiality towards the center. At some point the grass seemed to even lose its smell and organic texture -- a flexible non-material.

A two-dimensional man stood guard, halfway between where we stood and the entrance to a central, innermost area. From our original entry point circling forward, he seemed to become thinner and thinner, even disappearing for a moment when he became infinitely thin from our viewpoint.

Groups of armor-plated creatures knelt together within the fenced-in innermost area, as if silently praying before an armor-less creature holding texts of some sort. A larger, three meter tall creature resembling a stork kept watch just within fence's gate. None of these creatures seem to give warning or even notice our arrival upon the scene. In fact, the only sounds we heard within the Strangeland was our own bewildered mumbling, our dog's frightened barking -- especially at the two-dimensional being -- and the steady rain falling on our rain gear.

We circled around the entire field, discovering an exit on this far side. Before we could reach this exit, our poor dog became temporarily insane from the strangeness of it all: he began yipping in a deranged way, running fierce circles around us until he misstepped and took a hard fall in the wet, slippery grass. This seemed to sufficiently break his crazed fit, enabling us to take our exit while we collectively had the wits to do so.

"This abundance will not last forever", said the half-grown garden snail when I pushed its viney perch aside, "even the younger beans are starting to taste of hibernation and death."

---------------------------------------------------


The snail held its tongue for as long as it could, then abruptly, "Fear is the enemy of creation, it inclines us to well worn paths, softens steps past strange doors, favors the base and begs smiles from well-wishers."