Taking flight….
Dear Friend
Imagination can carry us so far from our daily reality and show so much of our soul.
On my desk sits a tiny ceramic Mongolian tent, called a ger. If you look in through its multi-coloured door, you will see a candle flame flickering inside. That flame is the flame of my writing life that was lit when I lived for a while alone in a ger on the outskirts of Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia. It was in the silence of that circular creative space that I began to find my way back to my soul.
Today, as I sit at my desk, a breeze comes through the open window carrying with it the scent of dry, warm dust. My imagination takes flight and I am lifted and carried away, back, back, across oceans and skies, to a bench under a tree, whose leaves rustle as I land. This is the story that emerged from my memories of that place and of other children I have known in my time as a child psychotherapist. I hope it resonates with you.
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I curl my toes into the dusty Mongolian soil and listen to the dogs barking into the hills around me.
‘So you came.’ I open my eyes, blinking against the light, so much harsher than that left behind.
‘I came? Why? Where to?’
Sitting beside me is a man, middle-aged I’d say, half-shaven, faded t-shirt and cut-off jeans over feet in rubber sandals.
‘Does the where matter?’ he asks.
I rub my blurred eyes, trying to bring clarity to my confusion.
‘Does the where matter?’ I repeat. ‘I rather thought it did.’ I feel a familiar irritation – just answer me, give me a sense of where I am and what is expected of me in this place that feels so strange ad yet somehow familiar.
‘Look.’ He points across to where a small boy lies beside bins overflowing with rubbish, bare legs stretched out behind him, his face buried in the dust.
‘They call him the Dustbin boy. They brought him from the streets. He’s tough, violent, full of pain.’
The Dustbin Boy. My mind goes back to a neat well-dressed boy in an English classroom far away, frantically heaping paper, leaves and bits of scrap into a mound. I watch until he finishes.
‘Tell me about it’ I say.
His eyes are full of pain as they meet mine. ‘I’m under that pile of rubbish and no one hears me, however hard I shout. I’m just rubbish in a bin.’
I feel a nudge, pulling me back to the heat and dust. ‘Go on. He’s waiting for you.’
I walk over and crouch down beside the boy. He lifts his face and I can see the tears ground into the dirt-caked skin as his eyes meet mine.
No, the ‘where’ doesn’t matter.
‘Tell me about it.’ I say.
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Why not light a candle and free your imagination today. I’d love to hear where it takes you.
Miranda