Last summer my friend’s mom discovered hundreds of teeny tiny toad tadpoles in a puddle in her driveway. It was drying up, so she asked me about moving them to a nearby pond. I told her not to, because moving amphibians unnaturally between water bodies can spread disease.
So she filled up a watering can every morning and every evening and replenished the puddle, adding dechlorinator drops she uses for her fish tank to make sure the water was safe.
The tadpoles survived and grew up into little toads who eventually hopped out of the puddle.
I think about the tenderness and compassion of this a lot.
“It was odd. As a girl, Sophie would have shriveled with embarrassment at the way she was behaving. As an old woman, she did not mind what she did or said. She found that a great relief.”
Consider this: every time you make a ‘hahahaha Welsh has no vowels’ joke, you personally owe every Welsh person £10. Most of us will accept this payment in cash, but a solid third of us are also able to receive online payments when the WiFi in the Mystical Otherworld is online, provided that you only attempt to send the payment at a very specific time whilst standing just inside the mouth of one of three designated caves.
In the end, Peter has always loved Narnia more than he could ever love Aslan. It is a simple, undeniable truth of the High King’s soul, woven into the fabric of his very being with untearable thread.
This is not to say that he does not feel love for the Great Lion. He loves him dearly, remembers fondly the feeling of warmth and bravery the mere mention of Aslan had brought to him that very first day. He loves him for the gifts he has been given, and therein lies the truth. Peter’s love for Aslan inevitably returns to what Aslan has given to Peter. The High King is not ashamed of this. Every musing on the Lion returns to the gifts of a family, a kingdom, and nothing more.
His love for Aslan can never be as steadfast and endless as Lucy’s faith, as bright as blossoms in spring. It can never measure up to the gratitude and relief forever kindling in Edmund’s heart for a sacrifice made out of love. Peter doesn’t fault them for their love for Aslan, for their unwavering faith and trust. He has always held admiration for the way their hearts don’t seem to struggle with the task of loving both Narnia and Aslan. Even Susan’s quieter, more reserved love outshines his so easily, not unlike the sun under which she was crowned. Peter’s love for Aslan pales in comparison to what he sees whenever his siblings speak of the Lion, is quickly cast into shadow in the light of their devotion.
His heart has always refused to split his love as much as his siblings manage. It can only ever find two paths, intertwined and crossed over as they are. Peter loves his family, and he loves Narnia. He loves them fiercely, loves them with every beat of his heart, loves them to the point of pain. He loves them with blood and tears spilt upon eager soil, falls upon enemies, declares victory in the name of Narnia and her sovereigns. He loves them with his sword in his hand, his crown on his head and fire in his heart.
Peter has always loved Narnia more than the Lion, and he finds peace within this fact. He doesn’t linger upon doubts, doesn’t compare it to his siblings. He has a family and country to look after, people and borders to defend, a sword in need of wielding and an army waiting on his command. There is no use in fearing that which he cannot help.
Aslan must have known that Peter’s love could never extend beyond those in his care. He supposes Aslan has always seen the depths and limits of Peter’s heart and perhaps chose him for this very reason. After all, is it not what Aslan asked of him, standing upon a hill all those years ago? How can the Great Lion condemn someone so utterly devoted to what was entrusted to him? Aslan has given him a throne, a kingdom to love, people to care for. Who can fault Peter for taking those gifts, for holding onto them with bloodied hands and ragged breaths, for loving them with everything he can ever hope to give?
Narnia is loved deeply by her High King, loved with every breath she takes through his lungs, loved with every foe that falls to his might in defence of her. She holds on tight; blood-soaked, alive and humming with joy. Her High King offers a love greater than his soul to her and her people. She takes it eagerly and loves him viciously in return.
(written for @narnianetworkvoyage 16: favorite characters - peter pevensie)
A criminally underrated line of foreshadowing in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is this:
“The coats were rather too big for them so that they came down to their heels and looked more like royal robes than coats when they had put them on.”
I just love that image. Right at the start, Lewis tells us that these four children look like kings and queens, and I think too often we just skip over it.
I want an online quiz that assigns you a hobbit family last name. Are you a Baggins? A Took? I want fist fights over who is assigned what in true fellowship fashion.
what’s really ironic about the “just let everyone get infected w covid!! herd immunity!!” arguments now is that letting the virus run rampant through the world has actually achieved the opposite: everyone may get infected, but then they’ll just keep getting infected. delta infections didn’t protect against the original omicron variant. omicron BA.1 doesn’t protect you against BA.2.12.1. none of them really protect you against BA.4 and BA.5. mass infection is not going to create mass immunity, it just means that with every infection you’re rolling the dice on what this unpredictable and very creative virus is going to do to you
