By: Blonde Two
Well dear Blondees and Blondettes, it would appear that Dartmoor’s “Little People” have been up to mischief again. I am not sure that I have told you much about the pixies before but one has to be very careful not to offend them, especially if you are likely to go wandering around Dartmoor in the mist.
Blonde One and I were sitting (well maybe huddling) behind the Christmas Tree rock on Monday evening. To say it was windy would have been like describing Aune Head Mires as “a bit on the damp side”. We had de-baubled the Tree and were enjoying a well-deserved cuppa when I remembered a bit of Christmas chocolate that I had stashed in my rucksack. We shared the chocolate and just before we set off back down the hill, I felt a compunction (compunctions, it turns out, feel kind of squishy) to leave a tiny chocolate offering for the Dartmoor pixies (piskies).
Anyone who is proper Dartmoor born and bred will tell you that leaving a little something tasty or useful for these tricky creatures will go a long way to making sure that they are on your side. The moors are full of tales of poor, silly, humans who ignored this local advice at their peril. Being a non-native, I often forget about this (despite having once been a gnome) but on Monday, I was glad that I hadn’t.
When we got back to the car park, Blonde One couldn’t find her car key. We checked pockets and engaged head torches to look around the car. A slight Blonde panic was just beginning to set in when I remembered the pesky pixies and pointed out to them, in a friendly but tense voice, that I had left some rather posh sea-salt chocolate for them up at the Tree. It was almost a second later that Blonde One put her hand into her pocket and, as if by Dartmoor magic, the pixies had returned the key.
That must be why I never found mine – I forgot to give some chocolate to the snow fairies on Beacon Hill! Or maybe it should have been the Wood Sprites, but there was a good six inches of snow.
On the matter of having lost or misplaced things I often appeal to my personal Lit-God (I subscribe to pagan destinies) in the following desperate way: would it matter in the great scheme of things if my keys (wallet, copy of Ulysses, map of Malvern, etc) were here on this coffee table in front of me; yes I know they are elsewhere, somewhere I’ll “always remember” but who would know (other than you or me) if they were transported here? Who would care? What value to anyone is there in my frustration? The hairs on my chest prevent me from communing with pixies but I see your method as a variant and – not to put too fine a point on things – more successful.
On top of this I am a true clawpoke (Northern word, unsuitable for your well-brought-up ears) re. the so-called e-mail address. And will it have an attachment facility?
Whoops! I’m even clawpokier than I thought. Ignore final para of my above comment.
Spoohw! (That’s Whoops! backwards) Address you provided either disabled or discontinued.
I find the letter ‘s’ causes a lot of trouble – in this case, the fault was mine, I missed it out.
blondestwo@ymail.com
If it was Green & Blacks salted milk chocolate I’m surprised they didn’t magic up a whole new car….that stuff is deeelicious!
Amazing eh – I have a tiny bit left in my rucksack. For me or the pixies … who knows!