synecdoches

[This is a crosspost from an access-locked journal entry originally written 2023-10-31, with minor additions and edits today 2024-12-27. This post is about Fox, written in third person due to lack of clarity about fronters over the years. Most of this post was probably written by Merlin, with heavy input from Fox, and occasional input from Paul and Bash.]

When I was young, I read the book Catkin by Antonia Barber. This is a fairy tale about a cat and the child he loves. The cat considers himself the child's guardian, but one day he gets distracted and the child is kidnapped by the fey. When he comes back to her, she is cold and unresponsive. The local wise woman confirms that the child has been replaced with a changeling, and her parents are distraught. The little cat blames himself for her capture and travels to the fey realm to rescue her. In order to free the child, the cat needs to answer three riddles, and one of the riddles reveals the cat's true name, giving the fey the power to force him to stay. The child begs for the cat to be able to return with her. The fey are distressed at having to return the child and the cat, but after discussing with the local wise woman, they work out a sort of Persephone timesharing situation that makes everyone happy.

This story made me deeply sad-- it has a happy ending, but the story has strong potential for a tragic ending, and my mind would always dwell on that possible tragedy. In my memory, after the cat had to reveal his name, he was forced to stay with the fey while the child returned home. In his quest to return the true child to her parents and (in his mind) correct his own mistake, the cat loses everything he loves. I also thought a lot about the changeling. She only appears for a page or two in the story, but in my mind, the changeling was present for longer and it was less immediately obvious that something was wrong. Only the cat immediately noticed that she was cold to the touch and pulled away from him. This misremembered plot made me so sad that I often couldn't look at the cover of the book.

Something has always spoken to me about the hypervigilance and regret of this cat. Something has always spoken to me about a child who experienced something unknowable and came back wrong.

This post is about Fox.

( On Fox's history and role over time )