Finding Magic in Unexpected Places

You know that I am a sucker for magic. But magic can be conjured in many different ways, and found in the most unexpected places—sometimes between the covers of a book, and sometimes in real life when somebody says or does something brilliant and unexpected.

And sometimes you find it in places where magic should be but is rarely found.

My son sent me this link to a blog post by sports writer (emphasis on “writer”) Joe Posnanski about taking his daughters to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter. I’ve not been to the WWHP-- I almost got to go there a few weeks ago when I was in Orlando for NCTE. But it didn’t work out. And now I find out that there really is magic there and I missed it. But read it for yourself.

http://joeposnanski.blogspot.com/2011/01/katie-prefect.html

Posnanski’s story reminds me of the time my husband and I took our young sons to Disney World. First, it was brutally hot, and then it began pouring down rain and then Eric threw up (a common response to excitement at that time.) We tried to figure out how to salvage something from an awful day. So my husband sat with Eric in the picnic shelter and held him while he slept. Keith and I walked out in our yellow Mickey rain slickers to watch the parade.

The rain had thinned the crowd, and so, for once, we stood right in front where we could see. We heard the drums and the music and the parade flowed toward us like a ribbon of color through the midsummer dusk. We stood there holding hands while the parade marched by, like vinyl-clad refugees from a damp disaster. The mist rolled up from the hot pavement like magic and we held hands and I cried then, too. 

Conversations Off the Grid

A week or so ago I left work late on a Friday night after a horrible day. Out in the parking deck, a woman was having trouble getting her car started. The security system kept shutting it down. She asked if she could borrow my cell phone. I dug madly through my purse and handed her my I-phone toy.
“What’s this?” she asked suspiciously.
“Um. It’s an I-phone.”
“Hmmph. You going to get that rebate?”

So she called a friend for advice, and after a brief conversation handed back my phone and tried again. No luck. I asked if she needed more help, but she told me she was going back into her office.

A few minutes later, I am out on the road when my phone rings again. I answer.
“So? What happened? Did it start?” the caller demands pugnaciously.
“Well, no,” I said. “Actually, I’m just the person who leant her the cell phone and…”
“Well, where is she?”
“She went back in her office.”
“What do you mean, she went back in her office?”
“That’s what she said she was going to do. I….”
“What’s with you women? You get all these degrees and you still don’t have any common sense. I told her to call back if it wouldn’t start. What don’t you understand about that? Why would she go back in her office?”
“Well, um, maybe you should try her in the office?” and I hung up.

So the next morning I discover my keys are missing. After searching everywhere in a panic, I wonder if I might have dropped them in the parking deck while digging madly for my cell phone. When I get back to school, I call the University Police Lost and Found.

“I believe I lost some keys on campus and wondered if they’d been turned in,” I said.
L&F Lady: “Was this recently?”
Me: “Well, I think it was Friday night. In Schrank Hall south parking deck.”
L&F Lady: “What’d they look like?”
Me: “Well, they were attached to a magic wand.”
L&F Lady: “What did the magic wand look like?” No doubt so she can distinguish it from all the other magic wands turned in at L&F
Me, embarrassed: “Well, it had little sparklies in it that slide around when you turn it.”
L&F Lady: “Mmmpf. What kind of keys were on it?”
Me, after long pause: “Well, there was a Honda key with a thick black base.”
L&F Lady: “Anything else?”
Me, floundering: “Well, some other keys.”
L&F Lady: Were there any…cards, maybe?”
Me: “There was a library card, I guess.”
L&F Lady: “Fine. We have ‘em.”
Me:
L&F Lady: “See, the little sparklies weren’t sliding at first so I wasn’t sure if this was the one.”