Part Seven

Pugdeon's Nanna owned a yellow canary named 'Sunshine', that someone had given her after Grandad died. Sunshine's old home, a rusty bird cage, had been carelessly thrown behind the old work bench in the shed.

Pugdeon spent a great deal of his childhood exploring the deep cobwebbed corners of Nanna's back yard. He was never disappointed with the bounties it yielded.

During spring, small blue moths would arrive and pause momentarily on the yellow flowers that grew there. Often Pugdeon would lay on his stomach under the Feijoa tree with its ripening fruit and watch, mesmerised by the merriment, and ponder over what the world was like for a moth.

Pugdeon knew it was law that, no one, ever, should touch the wings of a flying creature. He decided, he would not catch the moths with yabbie nets that hung from the ceiling of the shed, like he'd first imagined.

Eventually, one day in late spring, Pugdeon took the bird cage and waited on his stomach in the grass and warmth of the midday sun with his nose pressed firmly against the wire bars. Freshly picked yellow flowers and a teaspoon of honey, Pugdeon's Nanna had told him may tempt the moths, were placed on the floor of the cage. First one, who came and went, four bees, to Pugdeon's dismay and eventually two, three, and once even four blue moths fluttered inside the openings of the small wire bars, and then left again.

It felt like forever that afternoon as he watched in awe. Pugdeon fantasized keeping the cage and wondered if he could convince the moths, with the promise of endless honey, to come with it. But with the sun, went the moths and Pugdeon felt sadness as he returned the old birdcage to the shed. That night however, the momentary wonder returned as he talked excitedly, recounting with his mother what the moths had taught him. Pugdeon fell asleep warm, smiling and with wonderful imaginings.

Pugdeon realised that afternoon, the parts of life that feel truly magical, are not magic at all. Sometimes to find them, you may need to just wait, very still on your belly, with the grass and earth beneath you, and allow them to fly in and out as they please.

Time didn't change that day for Pugdeon, and it never would. It would be days like that, however that would change Pugdeon.