SOUTH AFRICAN FAIRY RINGS

Catherine Nicolette
Dad had been telling us his Celtic stories again. Wide-eyed, we huddled around as he spoke of dark nights, owls hooting and fingers tapping against window panes.
He imitated the howl and terrifying sweep of the banshee; and spoke of things of long ago.
  He would always recount our favourite story, Treasure Island. 
  Jim Hawkins and Long John Silver became as familiar to us kids as the neighbours next door.
  Every now and then, we'd cuddle up around Dad and plead with him, 'Tell us a story! Tell us a story!'

  He knew the drill. He'd start in his storyteller's voice, "It was a dark, cold night. The wind was howling through the eaves. A tap . . . tap . . . tapping sound came slowly up the road ..." and we'd wait wide-eyed for tales of adventure and other lands.

Anyhow. Dad had also, in one of his anecdotal moods, told us about Celtic faerie queens, changeling babes, and fairy rings.
  The idea of mushrooms in a ring fascinated me, and thereafter I used to dedicatedly hunt the kikuyu grass for any mushroom in sight.

  In the subtropical heat of South Africa, mushrooms didn't abound. But sometimes, you were lucky.
 I got into the habit of early rising, climbing through the high bedroom window and swinging through the great peach tree which lived next to it.
  Then I'd go - still pyjamas clad - and dance on the lawn. 
  One day in soft summer - after some recent rains - I found a somewhat haphazard ring of mushrooms on the lawn. 
  Delighted with life, I closed my eyes and started dancing in the middle of the ring.
  Maybe - just maybe - I'd see the beautiful Queen of the Faeries.

  And thus it was that Dad - up early, and coming out to admire the sunrise - found his little offspring in summer pyjamas dancing with pointed toes on the lawn.
  "What are you doing?" he asked in surprise. "Look, Dad, there's a fairy ring here," I told him. "I'm dancing so that maybe I can see the Faerie Queen."

  "No, no, no," said Dad, "True fairy rings only exist in Ireland. They don't show up here in Africa."
  I was indignant. "Well, that's not true," I said, indicating the mushrooms which at a stretch of imagination loosely described a circle.
  "Those are Irish fairy rings. This here is a South African fairy ring. 
  They're totally different. Now in Ireland there'll be an Irish faery queen, here in South Africa there'll be a South African faery queen."

  Having explained this to my satisfaction, I stood awaiting his response.
  Dad's eyes twinkled at me from his - at the time to me - great height.
  "Well, who'd ever have thought this family would one day have our very own little Miss Jumping Joan?" he said, and returned indoors to oversee breakfast pancakes . . . 

Here I am, Little Jumping Joan
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