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The Mirror In The Attic
Dec. 31st, 2002 02:55 pmStacey sent me Gaiman's book, Smoke and Mirrors, for x-mas. Cool book.
I've started a bit early on my new year's resolution to write. This isn't long, but it's something.
The Mirror In The Attic
There was a mirror in the attic. As everyone knows, mirrors are scary things--is the mirror you real? What does she do when he isn't looking back at you? Does she wonder the same things about you that you wonder about her? Scary things to think about.
The children of Agdern House didn't mind the mirror. In fact, they loved it. There were pretty clothes and jewelry in the trunk beside it, and when the children put them on, even if they didn't fit right, the mirror showed them decked out like kings and queens.
The teens of Agdern House rolled their eyes whenever the children waxed on about the mirror. They could remember having down the same themselves--and not one could remember why he'd thought it so special, not so many years ago. It was just an old, battered mirror, with ridiculous ornamentation and a bunch of frilly clothes in the trunk beside it.
The adults of Agdern House hated the mirror. Not many of them had seen the mirror as children and teens--it's a rare orphan who will stick around the orphanage he was forced to grow up in. The adults had no fond memories, they would not wear the clothing, and the mirror never flattered them. That is why it had been stashed away in the attic in the first place, where no one would have to see it.
The people of Agdern House, child, teen and adult, are notoriously difficult to hoodwink and do quite well in the world. No matter what shows in the mirror, with the ornate, but worn decoration that might once have spelled a name that started with what might have been an M, it is never a true reflection of reality.
And that was, perhaps, the point.
I've started a bit early on my new year's resolution to write. This isn't long, but it's something.
There was a mirror in the attic. As everyone knows, mirrors are scary things--is the mirror you real? What does she do when he isn't looking back at you? Does she wonder the same things about you that you wonder about her? Scary things to think about.
The children of Agdern House didn't mind the mirror. In fact, they loved it. There were pretty clothes and jewelry in the trunk beside it, and when the children put them on, even if they didn't fit right, the mirror showed them decked out like kings and queens.
The teens of Agdern House rolled their eyes whenever the children waxed on about the mirror. They could remember having down the same themselves--and not one could remember why he'd thought it so special, not so many years ago. It was just an old, battered mirror, with ridiculous ornamentation and a bunch of frilly clothes in the trunk beside it.
The adults of Agdern House hated the mirror. Not many of them had seen the mirror as children and teens--it's a rare orphan who will stick around the orphanage he was forced to grow up in. The adults had no fond memories, they would not wear the clothing, and the mirror never flattered them. That is why it had been stashed away in the attic in the first place, where no one would have to see it.
The people of Agdern House, child, teen and adult, are notoriously difficult to hoodwink and do quite well in the world. No matter what shows in the mirror, with the ornate, but worn decoration that might once have spelled a name that started with what might have been an M, it is never a true reflection of reality.
And that was, perhaps, the point.