The Fire Fairies

If we wanted to be technical, we could say it was born on the day my mother and I sat at the kitchen table and composed a poem. But it wasn't really born then, it was thrust into existence with out us knowing of it's presence. Almost like a child, conceived, it's presences unknown.

No, it was undoubtedly born, born from the wombs of our minds, that night, my 11th birthday. An 11th birthday isn't special in any means. You've already been double digits for a year, you're not a teenager. You're awkwardly thrust in between.  But now, as I look back, I feel like that birthday was the most magical birthday one could have.

We did the same old, same old. Hang out, giggle, do something crafty, scarf down as many hamburgers and hot dogs we could mange, stuff down some more food (A.K.A cake and ice cream), then it happened.

Since my birthday is July 4th, sparklers were in season and we had several packs, just for us to swing around and have fun with. As soon as the sparklers were lit, it was like those tiny balls of explosive light, flickering, blinking, reminded us of the light inside us. That light we cherish with all our hearts. That light we know what a gift from god. That small, illuminating light that bounced around inside of us called Imagination.

It had always pulsed through our veins, almost more than our own blood did. It was a part of us that we absolutely feared losing. A life with out imagination is a life without air; there's no point to it. You're doomed with out it.

Those crackling lights connected with the one inside of us and quickly formed the best idea our young hearts could ever come up with:

Fire Fairies.

We were Fire Fairies. Our minds joined together, ideas running wild. The make-believe game swiftly came into play and, like professional actors and writers, we made the story began to unfold. It began with the sparklers, then it went to the candle that we lit the sparklers with. My fake food toys were even involved as our  lights grew brighter, bigger, hotter.

Who knew what this idea would do? Who knew that those names we gave each other that night, Star Dancer (which was later changed to FireFly), Ember, Flare, Sparkle, Flicker, and Comet, wouldn't be play names, they would be our names? Who knew that a whole story would be written by the joint efforts of our crazy, untamed minds? Who knew, that five years later, we'd spend on Friday night, remembering all the things that the Fire Fairies story did to/for us?

Our lives, I feel, will never be the same due to that one night. That one spark of an idea.
Maybe it did begin when my mother and I pieced together a poem  about Fire Fairies. Or, maybe, it began when that flickering light, bouncing around in our souls, met with something, something that none of us knew about, and grew from a small, ball of heat to the sun that warms every thought and idea that crosses our mind.

I will never forget the girls that have helped me shape me life. God, love them tenderly. Take their suns and let them shine, brightly and boldly, on the world around them and don't ever let them fade away.

**Flare**