The Gift Of Invitation,

sealed with a crayfish claw of friendship.

David Knowles

1d

“Dear David. I try not to read notes. But the other day I peered through the sweet-shop window and came away with some tiny story by a lady who met another lady in a shop, a complete stranger, and they spoke for a while and enjoyed each other's company. As they were leaving, never to set eyes on one another again, the stranger lady turned to the lady who wrote the note and said, ‘will you be my friend?’ Not ‘shall we meet up sometime?’ or even ‘shall we be friends?’ The long-forgotten phrasing, the child-like openness to rebuff and rebuke, stopped me dead in my tracks. So. Will you be my friend? I’ve got a White-clawed Crayfish claw that I found in the Eden and some of my uncle's magic hooks with curvy shanks wrapped in the original grease-paper. Swop with you for something? It's OK. I've got spares.

(I am such a terrible Substacker - I can't find that note now and don't know who wrote it. Apologies to the author.)”

Dearest David,

What a magical spell you've cast across half a globe on a chill winter's day. I have been smiling since first reading. And my mind has raced.

You wrote: “…The long-forgotten phrasing, the child-like openness to rebuff and rebuke, stopped me dead in my tracks. So. Will you be my friend?"

Indeed, I will.

I am.

You continued: "I’ve got a White-clawed Crayfish claw that I found in the Eden and some of my uncle's magic hooks with curvy shanks wrapped in the original grease-paper. Swop with you for something? It's OK. I've got spares."

And now I am laughing...

An exchange to seal this pact of friendship. I am a boy again. As are you. Treasures writ in a secret language, exchanged with another who will almost certainly sense their import, perhaps even understand. A crayfish claw from a sacred river and ancient fish hooks passed along by a beloved uncle in their original grease-paper. They might as well be gold.

I read all this to my Mary, who sometimes speaks in this language as well and her eyes simply danced.

For my part of this 'swop,' I should like to send you A: a summer-shed snakeskin (quite magical with even the eyes intact), gathered from a clump of perennial bunchgrass while fly fishing deep in a desert river canyon in Oregon, two summers past, B: an owl pellet of uncommon beauty (as owl pellets go), weighty with bony tales, nighttime hunts and mousy victories, sans words but full of stories. And finally, C: a downy, Blue Heron feather that whispered a fluttering tale of flight and fall when found, rather than one of demise.

If this ‘swop’ suits you, friend, send your physical address back channel, so that I may send these small wonders your way, via post. And please know how deeply honored I am to be entrusted with such child-like openness to rebuff and rebuke, a White-clawed Crayfish claw you found in the legendary, River Eden and some of your uncle's magic, curvy shanked hooks in their original grease-paper..."

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And for those of you reading along and trying to piece the connective tissue of this tale together, David Knowles is a masterful, magician, storyteller who lives and breathes and writes Elvers by Moonlight on a distant continent but who, through the magic of modernity sometimes crosses paths with the likes of me, our stories passing in the ether and very occasionally, zoom calls with others of complimentary sensibilities, which sometimes feel like ‘pinch me, I must be dreaming’ kinds of moments.

I am loathe to tell anyone who they should be reading or what they are missing out on. Surely there are enough doing that already. So suffice it to say, David’s stories have, for this reader an unerring ability to whizz past distracting doubts and defenses, pulling me into the center of those held-breath moments he is conversing with and listening to, and attempting to understand, himself. Some of you might find yourselves as enchanted as I have been, again and again.

And in a world where there is never too much enchantment, a bit more couldn’t hurt.