Author: Steph

The People by the Ford

 

For many a moon had WynnAlice had heard tell of the People by the Ford, who grew organic food for the city that was not too big and not too small, and yet never had she visited, until He of Kindness and Compassion did invite her to share of her skill of storytelling.

 

With great excitement then did she go, accompanied by the Well Spoken Harmony Gardener, to see for herself the People by the Ford.

 

In a circle of trees, quite the most idyllic school you can imagine had been created. In a circle of trees at the edge of the farm, did He of Kindness and Compassion and Tom the Enthusiastic spend their time working with children to show them how it was that fun was to be had doing all the things children of old knew from experience; build a den, light a fire, make things from wood, and forage for food.

 

To a circle of trees strode the merry bunch; WynnAlice, the Well Spoken Harmony Gardener, He of Kindness and Compassion, and Tom the Enthusiastic, passing first one brightly coloured shelter then another where they did gather around a fire pit of special design; to one end was a place for fire and to the other a place to scoop the fire leaving cinders and hot coals on which to cook, and all around the pink earth dug pit were stones to keep heat in, or to sit upon on cold chilly days.

 

Around the fire pit were seats dug out of the pink earth, and on the fire a kettle it did boil, and nettles were picked for WynnAlice’s tea. A storyteller’s chair, fashioned from wood by Tom the Enthusiastic was brought, and upon this fine structure did she sit and the tales they did begin.

 

Of stories for children did they hear and share and the best of all was the tale of the school in a forest where once a storyteller had come and heard how it was that came two young men with fire in their hearts to create for the children a better way to learn. Told they their dream to all who would listen until The Humble Farmer did hear, and gave to them a circle of trees to be theirs for as long as a school in a forest was needed.

 

And in the natural way of things each stage of the journey was paved with gold; one thing led to another as good things are wont to be, and people came and brought their children to the school in the forest and little did the young teachers charge, for theirs was to be a school for all kinds of folk and it really didn’t matter whether they be rich or poor but a wanting to learn in the great outdoors was all that was required.

 

And dedicated to a mix of children, diversity did they create and in the doing brought to the world not just outdoor education but loving kindness too, as child after child learnt s/he was loved for who s/he was and not for what she had or whence s/he had come.

 

Magical it was, and the Well Spoken Harmony Gardener did swear he saw figures in the trees, and pretty soon they were visible to all and the woods did they come to life with magic and story and the merry bunch did know this place was the beginnings of something good, and happy they were.

 

Of stories we will tell, dens we will build, living tales will we create, and fires shall be lit and camps shall be had, and in the circle of trees that is a school in a wood children shall go on a Quest and explore the kinds of challenges only politicians do face, and through play and imagination will they discover that it is only in this way that challenges get solved, with the help of a little dreaming, a whole load of diversity, and a belief that everything is possible. And fun will be had and the adventurers will see that each and every challenge is solved with just taking that first step into the realm of our dream; the rest follows naturally as ever it has, and if floods do come why we will work together and community form, and grow rice on our hillsides not lament the passing of former times.

 

And the storyteller saw that these young teachers needed not her skills, for in abundance already they had them, and in delight heard she of the tales they had made, and encouraged the use of a dressing up box, forgetting their words, and making it all up as they went along. With a twinkle in her eye she could see these young teachers would go far, and her heart was glad.

 

And took she and her companion on a tour of the Place of the People of the Ford did Tom the Enthusiastic, and met they with The Humble Farmer and saw they the fields and polytunnels full of fresh growing food full of juicy cherry tomatoes and wwwoofers a–smiling wherever you looked. And from Tilly the dog who loved cuddles more than patroling her territory to the happy faces of wwwoofers leaving their working day with carrier bags full of produce to eat that day the place of the people of the ford was clearly the place to be.

 

 

Of insulated pods,

 

and hotels for bugs,

 

of companion planting and exotic fruit trees out of doors,

 

the tale of the Place of the People of the Ford is one that will be remembered all down the years; the place where the fruit and veg of the city that is not too big and not too small, with a cathedral in the centre and a green all around, is grown, the place where the children of the future shall learn, the place where the city dwellers shall find that community is found, aye and fun and food too, a place stuff of dreams; dreams come true, in a time of Transition in the warm southern reaches of an ancient land.

 

My thanks go to Chris White and his Forest School partner Tom Lowday, and to Shillingford Organics, and Martyn Bragg, its humble farmer, for inspiring this tale, and providing an experience not to be forgotten.

 

The Super Heroes and Fun Town

 

Well, it seems that the girl in the blue top and the girl in a multi coloured skirt and the boy in green were not just the saviours of Pugsy, the rainbow coloured bat and Mr Hedgehog, no, things are never just exactly what they seem.

 

For it turned out that they were actually Super Heroes in their own right! Yes, you heard me! Super Heroes!

 

How do I know? Aha, well, in the Time of Transition, as everybody knows, there were some who knew that making their town a Transition Town was going to save the world. And in a Transition Town, as everybody knows, everyone is a hero.

 

For in times gone by, in stories of old, there was but one hero, or maybe a heroine too, and everyone else was either a rescuer, or a big bad villain, and as everybody knows, no good came of that at all. For if you were not a hero, or a heroine, you must be a rescuer, and if you were not one of those, why, you must be a big bad villain, and nobody wants to be one of those, as we all know. So if you were not a hero, rescuer or big bad villain, why then you must be no one at all, and we all know that isn’t true, do we not?

 

So, as I was telling you, in our times, Transition times that is, everyone is a hero.  Gosh, well it turned out that the girl in the blue top could write like no one had ever seen the like of in many a year, and that the mum of the girl in the multi coloured skirt and the boy in green could make jam, ooh the like of which has never been tasted, and was known for her liking of Peace and Quiet, and how useful a skill this could be. The boy in green, well, sports were his thing, especially swimming, and he knew more about that that anyone could possibly tell and not only that, but he could make things too, like yurts and tents, and all manner of useful things could he build out of wood. And as for his sister, the girl in the multi coloured skirt, well, what did you expect, in a skirt like that, why she could sing and dance to charm the birds off the trees, though she wouldn’t do that for she loved nature far too much.

 

And as all good stories start, this one started with a challenge. Now for those of you who do not yet know, a challenge for a Transitionista, for so these brave super heroes were, and all the way from Transition Honiton, is a thing of great excitement, for a challenge means; A LOT OF FUN!

 

A LOT OF FUN!?! I hear you say. How can this be? Do not challenges mean things going wrong and a lot of hard work and complaining? Do words like Difficult, Hard come to mind? Well, if they do, you clearly have not read enough Transition Tales…

 

So, here be a Transition Tale, of the goodly folk of Fun Town.

 

‘Twas a long summer, and the young Super Heroes were sunning themselves, for there wasn’t a deal to do; after all, food came in plastic bags to the big shelf lined buildings where they went in small metal boxes with a wheel on each corner to collect it, and in school they learnt Facts and Figures, and about what other people had done, were doing, and were going to do, and clothes, well, they were made far, far away by people they had never met, and entertainment came inside a box with a screen and the people there they had never met either.

 

And then one day, came a challenge. What would you do, it asked, to celebrate when a child becomes a Teenager? Now that was a question worth answering, for does not every child become a Teenager, and who better to ask then, how it is this should be.

 

With a party of course! And pretty soon the Super Heroes had utilised their skills and dreamt up a day to remember, so that each and every Teenager would remember this special day for years to come. Drumming there would be, singing and  dancing, cakes with homemade jam, swimming lessons and more, and all of this would be written in a story by the girl in the blue top so that everyone would know the fun that had been had when they became Teenagers.

 

Phh, that’s no challenge, I can hear you say, and I say well, if it isn’t, where are all our tales of children being celebrated for reaching Teenagehood?

 

Well, just as our Super Heroes were relaxing after the party of all parties, came a new challenge, and it said that food would be rationed. Rationed! Ooh, well, now there’s a word not many like. Surely it will never come to pass that the big metal boxes carrying food in plastic bags will come less and less to the city that was not too big and not too small? But remember well, our SuperHeroes lived in the times when the dream of the Real Food Shop had come true, and looking about them they remembered their orchard, and their field where crops they could grow, animals raise, and barns they could build, and they laughed at the challenge and said why, you won’t bother us!

 

Food we can grow here aplenty, aye and have fun too! Grow fruit in the summer and make our own jam for wintertime, keep chickens and fresh eggs shall we have, and our goats, well, cheese and milk shall they provide like none you have ever tasted.

 

In great abundance did the Super Heroes live, with happy youth, and fresh local food, and when came they news that not everyone understood that times were a-changing, well, happily did they invite them… to a party to end all parties…

 

For you remember, they were well practised at this; every time a child became a Teenager was cause for great celebration across the town, and so parties they were very good at.

 

We’ll have a party, they said, and when the people do arrive, we‘ll feed them with our freshly grown, freshly prepared, freshly cooked food, the like of which they will have never tasted before, and then we‘ll host them in the fine yurts the boy in green has built, and keep them so cosy with wood burning stoves they’ll roast and be stripped down to their summer things in a trice. Then we’ll teach them our skills, for free and for fun, for each of us will be doing our favourite thing, and no one can resist a person doing what they love best. And before they know where they are they’ll be having so much fun they’ll be living the times, the Times of Transition, and they’ll have forgotten that there were any other times at all.

 

And the girl in the multi coloured skirt will sing and dance for them, till they all join in, and sing and dance too, and the girl in the blue top will write the tale of how the Super Heroes founded the town of FunTown, and people a long, long time from now will marvel at the how the people did live, before the Times of Transition, when Fun was not the most important thing to be had.

 

Many, many thanks to Sharon Pavey of Transition Honiton and her lovely children and friend for playing The Quest and creating this tale.

The tale of Mr Hedgehog and Pugsy the Rainbow Coloured Bat

 

Once, upon a time that was, and was not, a time of Transition, there was a small hedgehog whose name was Mr Hedgehog. He was rather small and he had a friend who was called Pugsy the Rainbow Coloured Bat. Now quite how Pugsy got her name is for another time, for today our tale is another.

 

Came one day the two friends to a city that was not too big and not too small, with a cathedral in the centre, and a green all around, to see many people gathered all about.

 

“What are they doing?” whispered Mr Hedgehog, for as everybody knows, hedgehogs are shy creatures, and don’t like to be noticed.

 

“I don’t know,” replied Pugsy, “but I want to…”

 

And that said she flew up to the very top of the cathedral where she could get a better view. There were certainly a lot of people, and it was light.

 

Now by rights, being a bat, Pugsy really ought to have been finding a place to sleep, for as everybody knows, bats sleep in the daytime. Pugsy found a perch where she could hang upside down quite comfortably from one of the statues lined up along the top of the big church, but of course, she couldn’t get to sleep.

 

“What are they doing, Mr Hedgehog?” she called down.

 

And Mr Hedgehog, from his hiding place under an oak tree, where he hoped no one could see him, and where he too really ought to have been asleep, if it weren’t for all the excitement, said

 

“I really don’t know, Pugsy….but I want to”

 

The two young friends, who really ought to have been asleep, for the sun was full up and shining, just couldn’t get to sleep for curiousity.

 

“Maybe,” wondered Pugsy, “we could dress up. Then no one would know we were a bat and a hedgehog, and we could sneak out and see what all the people are up to?”

 

But sleepy Mr Hedgehog was taking a nap.

 

“Ooh!” exclaimed Pugsy, and taking her courage in both rainbow coloured wings she flew down into the darkened spaces inside the cathedral where no one could see her and where the sun was away from her eyes and she could see better.

 

“What have we here?” she said to herself as she landed on the edge of a big old dusty cardboard box “… dressing up clothes! Just what we need.”

 

“Mr Hedgehog!”

 

Sleepily, Mr Hedgehog opened first one eye, and then the other

 

“Ooh, what a fright!” he said in alarm, as an old man in brown trousers gazed down at him.

 

“It’s me, Pugsy” hissed his friend.

 

“What? How?”

 

“Well, people wear clothes, so if we do too we’ll be able to explore without anyone guessing who we really are” explained Pugsy. “My granddad wears brown trousers, and I found this grandfather mask in the dressing up box, isn’t it grand!?”

 

“What will you wear?” she asked, holding out a baseball cap.

 

Mr Hedgehog tried it on for size and Pugsy rooted around some more and found…a plastic parrot.

 

“Look,” said she “you could be a pirate!” and started to search for a pirate’s hat.

 

Just at that moment, with Mr Hedgehog sporting a rather large baseball cap making him look a little like a tortoise, was spotted by three children.

 

“ooh er” he mumbled.

 

“Hello” said Pugsy, “Maybe you can help us? Can you keep a secret?” For she was sure that of all the people in the world it was the children you could trust most of all.

 

The girl in the blue top, the girl in the multi coloured skirt and the boy in green looked down at the strangely dressed creatures.

 

“Who are you?”

 

“I’m a granddad and he’s a pirate in the making” said Pugsy. “Can you keep a secret?”

 

“Yes,” said the girl in the blue top and the boy in green, but the girl in the multi coloured skirt didn’t look at all too sure so the secret was whispered to the two who had promised that they could keep  a secret.

 

“I’m a rainbow coloured bat, and he’s a hedgehog!”

 

“Will you help us?” asked the two young friends, both looking quite starry eyed now with lack of sleep but full of excitement that they were finally going to find out what the people were doing all around the green.

 

“What is it you want to know?” asked the three children.

 

“We want to know what it is all these people are doing on the green this sunny day,” replied Mr Hedgehog and Pugsy the rainbow coloured bat, who were now Granddad and Pirate.

 

“We got dressed up so we could go and find out, but we really ought to be asleep, maybe you could tell us what is happening?”

 

“Well” said the three children “over there they are selling food”

 

“Selling food? You mean that stuff that comes on those road things in big metal boxes on wheels? The stuff in plastic bags that people get out of big cold buildings with lots of shelves?” asked Pugsy, who had quite often explored the world of people when she thought that no one was watching.

 

“No,” laughed the children “Real food.”

 

“Real food? What, like beetles?” said Mr Hedgehog hopefully.

 

“No,” laughed the children. “Local food, fruit and veg grown around here, and bread baked right here in the city.”

 

“Ooh,” said Pugsy, fascinated, “I didn’t think people did anything like that anymore. And what about the Book Cycle? Where is it going?”

 

 

“Nowhere” laughed the children “It re-cycles books”

 

“Re-cycles” echoed Pugsy “where to?”

 

“Round and round” explained the children. “Books get swopped and sold over and over again, so that lots of people get to read the same book many times.”

 

“Ooh,” said Pugsy, “you mean like in those horrid brightly lit places where lots of people come out with the same thing, each in another bag, and then throw the bags all over the ground and in the trees and in the water too, like the one that drowned our friend the sea turtle?”

 

“No,” said the children, horrified, “you don’t get a bag at all if you get a book from Book Cycle, and the books aren’t new, they’re old ones, and people can keep bringing them back and taking others and some books go all across the sea to children who don’t have so many books to read”

 

“Ooh,” said Pugsy, “I didn’t think people thought about things like that”

 

“So why are all these people gathered here on the green?” asked Mr Hedgehog.

 

“It’s a Green Fair” said the children.

 

“What’s a Green Fair?” asked Pugsy “are the people going to dig up all the grass so that Mr Hedgehog has nowhere to walk at night?”

 

“No,” said the children, ”of course not! The people here care about Nature, and about looking after places, and animals, and each other”

 

“Really?” said Mr Hedgehog disbelievingly. “You mean they aren’t planning to build a carpark here?”

 

“No,” laughed the children “these people like growing things, and having fun together outside, and teaching children about useful things.”

 

“Useful things?” said Pugsy, looking interested. “You mean like how to catch insects for supper?”

 

“No,” laughed the children, “children don’t eat insects! But look what we made!” And they showed their new friends the bracelets they had made with the forest school teachers out of natural things you can find in the forest.

 

“Artists! Oh look Mr Hedgehog,” said Pugsy, “they’re artists; real ones! How exciting!”

 

“What else can you learn in a forest school?” asked Mr Hedgehog, not being greatly impressed with bracelet making. He was hoping for something a bit more exciting.

 

“Fire lighting and den building,” called out the children in glee, “and how to collect things to eat in the forest.”

 

“Like beetles?” said Mr Hedgehog.

 

“Insects?” added Pugsy the rainbow coloured bat, now beginning to yawn as the sun got brighter and her night eyes got tireder.

 

“No,” laughed the children “Nuts and berries, and things children like to eat!”

 

“Ooh,” said Pugsy, ”well, I have to say I am surprised, have people turned over a new leaf then?”

 

“A new leaf,” said Mr Hedgehog hopefully “looking for beetles?”

 

“People here do seem quite nice. I think it might be time for bed though” Pugsy yawned, and thanking her new friends she flew back up to the top of the cathedral and perched upside down on the feet of a statue. From under one sleepy eyelid she could just make out Mr Hedgehog trundling off to his cosy resting place under the oak tree, plastic pirate still sitting on his shoulder.

 

“What strange people” said the girl in the multi coloured skirt, “I’ve never seen a pirate with a plastic parrot on his shoulder before, and what were those rainbow coloured wings sticking out of that granddad’s shirt?”

 

“Can you keep a secret?” asked the girl in the blue top and the boy in green.

 

“I think I probably can” said the girl in the multi coloured skirt, for if it’s one thing you can be sure of, children can usually be trusted to be honest about things.

 

“That was Mr Hedgehog and Pugsy, the rainbow coloured bat!” they said.

 

“Pugsy, the rainbow coloured bat!” exclaimed the girl in the multi coloured skirt. “Why didn’t you tell me? Why the last time I heard about her, she…”

 

But that, dear listeners, is a tale for another time. But if you would like to find out what they do down in the forest, you really should take your grown ups to Exeter Forest School, for you just never know who might turn up…

 

 

Many Thanks to the girl with the rainbow coloured bat finger puppet and her little brother with his hedgehog finger puppet for helping to create and tell this tale, and to the girl in the blue top and her friend the girl in the multi coloured skirt and her brother in green for helping the story have its ending. Thanks also to Chris and Tom of Exeter Forest School for teaching the children to make the bracelets that helped the story along, to the Woodcraft Folk  who made the finger puppets with the children who inspired this tale, and to all who made Exeter Green Fair happen and without whom this story would never have been born.