The Winder

"Hi! Over here!" she says.

I scan the length of the fence to search for her peering eyes through the crack in one of the panels.

"Can you see me?" she asks with excitement.

"Yes, I can see you. What are you doing over there?" She described her clubhouse she was building out of her stick collection. She showed me how she likes to climb the trees and then climbed on the side of her fence to have a better look into my garden.

She has short, straight, dark black hair. Bulging brown eyes with pin-prick pupils as she ganders into the sunny sky. Her name is Hazel, Hazel B., and she is 6 years old.

"I like your garden" she shouts from her fence perch. She continued to admire my life as she commented on wishing she had two dogs of her own. "I only have one tiny chihuahua named Joe and he does not like to cuddle. Your dogs are fluffy and so big. Do they cuddle with you?" I shook my head yes as my smile grew into her joy of exploration.

Hazel reminded me she sold me hot chocolate on a cold wintery day of January when I was walking the dogs. I remembered her pink puffy coat and olive green cups. She was serving warmth to all neighbors. Then, the conversation pivoted, as one typically does with wondrous imagination.

She hops down off of her fence perch. "Hey, look! A bigger hole! I want to share my stick collection with you. Come here!" She started to push a stick through the hole but it got stuck; she asked me to pull up as she pulled downwards on the stick so it could break in two. It worked. “Now you have one, and I have one. When we miss each other we can try to put our sticks back together.”

She proceeds to tell me about an invention she made called the "Winder", she wanted to be sure I knew she built it so she yelled to her dad across the yard "I built that, right? Dad?" he yells back "You sure did." The Winder watches the weather and tells you where the wind is coming from, how hot the sun is, and if it's raining.

“Hazel! Time for dinner!” a woman yelled from the doorway of her pale yellow house. She turns to respond, “Aw mom! 5 more minutes??? I just told my fairy about the Winder!” her mother granted her 5 additional minutes. We swirled around in our imaginative conversation, bouncing new ideas off one another about the Winder’s future potential. Shouting “I’ll see you tomorrow” as she scurries inside.

Grinning. I thought to myself, “she called me ‘her fairy’. What a magic moment” so I began gathering earthly floral delights to create a flower crown to share with my new friend. Camelias, carnations, delilahs, and daisies. I began wrapping their stems onto a wire circle. The finished product was made for a forest queen.

“Thump thump thump” I hear on my glass door overlooking the vegetable patch. It was a cat scratching their neck as their back leg would thump against the window. This was not just any cat. This was Mortimous and he is the Cat of the Trees. He scales the highest branches and drops off floral delights for the birds to enjoy in their nests. Mortimous watches over Hazel and is her biggest “Winder” fan. He yawns as he stretches his body out long before curling into his garden nest.

I pause in gratitude. “What a magical day” I begin to whisper to myself with a gentle grin, holding a hand on my heart. Feeling full of sparkles and joy, “I wonder what tomorrow will bring” rolling into my fluffy puppy Kings, as they kiss me with a great lick “goodnight”.