A Tightrope

Pleading brown eyes looked up into mine, "Teacher, she says it's only sparkles," Inayah said pointing to another girl during recess. "It's pixie dust...I know it!" she declared adamantly. I bent down to inspect the tiny vial of white sparkles on a chain around her neck, vying for time. God help me! I entreated silently.

What was I to do? Crush the beliefs of a starry-eyed six year old? I could be absolutely logical and destroy all the wonder God had put in her. For the life of me...I couldn't do it. She'll find out the truth one day, I thought to myself sadly, but I do not want to be the instrument to demolish her dreams.

"I can't tell," I finished lamely. "I don't know what it is." I watched her walk away with her head drooping down. I would not stoke the fire of her imagination either way.

I remember a few months before when she asked me point blank, "Teacher are fairies real?" Again the choice to respond was like walking a tightrope; would I fall on the side of reason or fancy?

I bent down and looked at her face to face, "Inayah, I have read wonderful stories about fairies. I have even written about two little girls having a tea party with fairies." I watched as her face brightened. "All kinds of worlds are real when you write them down. They have a life of their own."

"Maybe I'll write them too!" she said smiling with her dimples showing. "I think you will be a good writer because you have a wonderful imagination," I encouraged. For a while my answer seemed to satisfy her but now it seemed like I was at square one all over again.

She'll grow out of it, I mused but would she, or better yet...should she? What was the turning point for a young sixteen year old boy whose heart was becoming hardened by atheism? He picked up a book at a railway station called Phantastes and the fanciful tale changed his life. Who was he? C.S. Lewis and the author was a minister who still had a childlike wonder that was evident in all his stories, George McDonald.

I am fascinated that C.S. Lewis could write such great apologetic works like Mere Christianity and The Problem With Pain and also have authored the Chronicles of Narnia, The Great Divorce and The Screwtape Letters. The realist and the dreamer were melded into one consummate author. Why should there be a discrepancy between the two? Wasn't J.R.R. Tolkien of similar mold?

My heart cried out as the little girl skipped gaily back to class: dream on Inayah and I for one will join you!