The Unicorn or Truth from Myth

The Unicorn or Truth from Myth

Written as a Thank-You to ‘The Red Lion’ at Waterfall

‘The peasants are the great sanctuary of sanity, the country the last stronghold of happiness  – when they disappear there is no hope for the race’ (Virginia Woolf)

His world had folded around him now she’d found another so he ached for the simplicities of childhood during which, when in childhoods’s griefs, he had fled into Nature’s balms in the fields round his long distant country home;  but neither simplicity’s solitudes nor Nature’s healing balms inhabited the big industrial city to which he’d travelled ‘to seek his fortune’ – in which all he had achieved was her.

Sitting bleakly with his regulation coffee in the nearest café he surveyed the bustling scene to realise those dreams of ‘advancement’, which he’d sprung into a web-of-dreams to bolster him for her belief,  were merely a reflection of his youthful yearnings to escape the cage of home; her presence by his side had disguised the rising discovery of the failure of the place he had come to seek his style of fortune for it having nothing of the virtues he’d been told he’d find there.

With her beside him  – hands interlocked to weave his dreams about them   – the streets had seemed to mirror the ‘paved with gold’ with which Fairy-Stories beguiled every child seeking to escape ‘the cave’  – but without her to gild his dreams he could see the truth of his position to have been spawned of myth.

‘There’s an engineer in you young lad’ the old hands back home had told him noting his way with mechanical things, regaling him with  their days ‘apprenticed-to-a-trade’  in the city which everyone told him had been the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution  – but the sad fact was little ‘industry’ remained which had told him bleakly, recognising its demise, ‘there’s no place for apprentice engineers now lad  – we buy it all from China’, to drive the lesson home the old men’s truths were dreams of a hallowed yesterday, but myths today.

Despairing he had managed a few temporary jobs to keep her hopes bright in their joint mystery, but he’d now discovered the saddest truth of all  –  however tightly held the hand  –  ‘joint’ had not existed in this whirling wasteland for bright new views beguiling out of screens to which she had migrated.  ‘Together’ had seemed such a powerful force with her hand in his while he lay his myth-world at her feet, but without it he had now lost his anchor to find himself being blown ‘where the wind listeth’ unable to chart the rocks.

Watching the rushing people more closely  –  now he did not have her bright eyes to close his  –  he could see them blank or staring into ‘phones aimlessly scrolling hoping something might lie within  –  but one thing he’d discovered with her engrossed in what she did  –  there wasn’t.  This truth had been hidden with her beside him, imagining all she did made miracle, but alone the truth of the ephemera which he’d watched her chase lay bare to have childhood’s chills seep deep into his soul.

Amongst the noise he dozed, now drained of all ambition, to allow his mind to wander home, to know with a surety he had not had before, ‘home’ for him did not lie amongst this bustling hell.  Ambitious he may have been but the warmth and smell of the ancient barn on his parents’ farm, the communion with the old horse whose eternal presence seemed to speak of ancient things, the clucking of the hens who peopled the ancient yard accompanied by the assertion of their squire’s early morning carillon crept inexorably across his vision to warm the chill of failure which gripped his soul.

They had used to walk The Peak to dispel the noise amongst which they had come together   –  tightly hand-in-hand to keep his new vision bright  –  but, he saw it now, she had never truly been of it – while it was him.  Could he re-discover her by re-tracing his steps to it?  – yet decided even if he did not he might find him, for now knowing he had lost himself amongst the mash of myth he had woven from the old men’s tales  – so verily gilt by her hand in his  – but he knew the way to the little mystery they had both lived to free them from the city’s consuming noise.

Bright, he rose, then striding more purposeful than since the day she’d gone, he set-off to his digs to collect what he would need for several days away which he stowed in his little walking-sack  – which very action freed his mind.  A quick visit to ‘their’ local convenience store had him what he deemed he needed for his pilgrimage.  A train then a bus set him down at the country inn from which they had based their weekend explorations  – to suddenly feel her with him from the silence he had shared with her.

“Hello Sir”, greeted the landlord upon whom their bright presence had made its mark, “no her”?   “No James”, he replied thoughtfully addressing the facts, “this’n me weren’t her, despite the hands, so I’ve come back to see if I can find her because while she was, she was the centre of my being”  – “it’s what we saw Sir, the hands”, the landlord replied to calm his guest’s troubled mind, “‘very together them two’ I said to me missus whenever you passed through  – but I think here is you Sir so you might find you even if you don’t find her then”, he smiled age’s wisdom gently, “when you’ve found you, she’ll sit before you in majesty again  – meanwhile here’s your pint  – er staying”?  “Not this time James because I need to wrap it round me”, he informed the intensity of his search, “so I’ve brought a little one-man with a billy stove to heat the dinner I’ve got with me  – but I’ll start off with one of your pie’n-two-veges offerings to give me a leg-up the hills”.

Sitting quietly in a corner window he watched the bustle on the little main street which ran past the Red Lion’s door  – to realise he wasn’t the only one alone.  Studying the Lounge he made a similar assessment to have him recognise a fact he had not before  – his hand so firmly grasped in hers which no-one else’s seemed to be  – that the statistics the papers were constantly showering around about ‘loneliness’ weren’t a fiction.   ‘I wonder which came first’?, he reflected addressing ‘outside’ seriously for the first time for ‘inside’ having so shielded him, ‘the mobile ‘phone or the singles  – or is one a concomitant of the other, she never seemed to find anything there, but was that because of me, do they?  – I wonder why she hung on to me then quit  – had she found something in it beyond me after all’?

“Might I have another please James”, he leant on the bar proffering his glass, “not many hands being held even in your paradise”  – “no Sir”, replied he for whom their show of hands had been a little joy, “rather out of fashion hands in these uncommitted days, everyone seems to ‘walk alone’ like Mr Kipling’s Cat, haven’t had a marriage in the church this summer – we used to look forward to the marriages me missus’n I reminded us of when we were young making-hay under the haystacks  – mm none of them about now with them huge black rolls, I wonder if they’re the trouble with no hands”, to a gentle burst of laughter from his guest, “perhaps tramping the High Hills will tell me James whose ascent your two pints should improve”.

He had climbed ‘their’ path more briskly than he had with she  – for his purpose now being different  – to tire himself by climbing higher  – while staying the night ‘out’ allowed him to venture further.  He had determined to reach ‘The Top’ then pitch his little tent in the lee of a giant crag they had admired from their lower vantage  –  a mystic pinnacle of Arthurian romance, but not to visit should romance not be its truth  – anyway her little legs had always tired easily for being of the city while his still knew country ways.

Standing on The Top he admired the panorama, with the sinking sun lighting the feathers of the evening with gold  – through whose mystic vision he placed his hand in hers.  Reluctantly he broke the spell to descend into the lee behind the crag he had chosen, then erect his little tent while there was still light for its intricacies.  He fired up his tiny ‘gaz’ on whose top he placed his pan of dinner, extracting also another pint he had bought from the landlord for an aphrodisiac.

Finally snugged inside his kipsack, his head resting on a bolt of heather he had plucked to make a pillow, he drifted off to sleep…………

Sir Myth

“I come to you in the verisimilitude of a dream”, the majestic apparition announced  – “why”?, he answered automatically stunned by the vision of the magnificent white Unicorn bowed before him, its regal horn touching his unconsciously uplifted hand to salute its presence.  “To lead you on a pilgrims progress like one of yours made three hundred years ago to find an answer to what he knew he lacked”  – “but what see you that I lack”?, he asked yet more astonished.  “Man’s eternal quest”, it answered royally, “for she who you can love, then have your love returned, so`with whom you can turn your dreams into reality”  – “but you bear the face of she I love”, he replied in doubt at what he saw  –  “I will lead you to the Truth of the face you see me bear”, replied the unicorn Olympically, “the Truth all men have sought since he set out to seek a mate, which is why my name is Myth”, it expounded the eternal, “the Myth of what they wish to see which blinds them to what is, which has been an honoured name in Man’s affairs from when he knew so little so made Myth his votive since he could think  – great civilisations were entirely conducted by Myth long before he invented the monotheisms to enslave himself”  –  “why”?, he asked on autopilot confused by the rhetoric  – “because he knew so little he needed to create a world he could understand, so I have been Man’s mainstay in his troubles for gilding his vision with his wish to see his future, which has been Man’s failing ever since he sought to scuttle from reality by inventing gods to do it for him”.

“But”, he replied stoutly not willing for Man to be made a slave to Myth, “look at the power of Myth, the most magnificent creations of Man have been built to honour Myth  –  without dreams there would be no new ideas, no new things, so we would still be in the caves” – “well thank you for the encomium”, the Unicorn smiled, “but as I’ve noted it is the turning of dreams into reality which is Man’s mastery  –  it is the measure of his majesty he achieves it  – sometimes”  – “then why are you here with me now”?  – “because by travelling with me you may turn the Myth to Truth”  – “can you do that Sir”?, he replied formally at the majesty of his address  – “I can only show you”, advised his host, “it is you who must make the change because what you see of me is what you wish to see, not what truly is  – Man’s mastery is making the reflections he makes in Myth show him The Truth”.

“I wish I could understand why she left me”, he muttered disconsolately after his so brisk defence of Myth, “then I might do better when I find her”  – “well at least you want to change yourself,  which so very few do”, complimented The Apparition, “which is the first step along The Way because what you seek is an eternal whose virtues you needs must uncover for she is not some face who beguiles you for an hour, not even hand-in-hand which you have found  – so we shall seek beyond the temporal”  – “how shall I recognise what lies beyond the temporal”?,  he asked now genuinely intrigued  – “because it will speak to you of the eternal”, his host announced Olympically.

“I can show you”, it assured, “but only you can see which has been Man’s puzzle since he wove myths to deceive himself about his condition imprisoned by the lies of the Gods he manufactures for his ease – where does the story begin to beget the Truth  – so Mount so we can begin the Pilgrimage together because you need to seek beyond the temporal which now holds you in its thrall  – I am your road to the eternal which Myth has always been if he has the wit to see the truth beyond the stories he binds himself within  – for how can he find Truth if he seek to deceive himself”?, The Unicorn announced sternly, “because Man is lazy wanting others to do it for him so has worshipped a Myth as if it were a Truth for 2000 years allowing the agents of The Myth to persecute him but those who worship any god remain trapped in the darkness it wraps round them so they shall not see the loss of their freedom  – no wonder Man is in a mess”, it snorted, which damnation of ‘ease’ had him sit back thinking into which The Unicorn continued, “when you were hand-in-hand you touched a truth; but in Man’s unceasing search for a mate to share his existence such truth is not immutable nor absolute because we must bring what we are to this truth to build it then change ourselves to build it into the eternity we seek  – so this truth is different for all of us  – albeit its practice consists of absolutes  –  man is always ‘searching for some new thing’, it observed caustically, “so passes by the old eternals  – if ever he gives them consideration in these fretted days but, if you have faith, I will show you those old things which have been man’s guide ever since he was sentient enough to seek one  –   therefore mount so we can seek together those immortals without which Man is incomplete”, to which command a magnificent gold saddle with reins and stirrups appeared while The Unicorn hunched down so he could climb, then stood raising its majestic head its horn now pointing to the stars to expand enormous wings announcing to lift them off ,“listen to hear The Winds of Heaven call you to the Cities of Peace”.  He did as commanded to have his head fill with the sound of harps while his host headed towards the orb of the sinking sun.

They landed in a shining sylvan glade surrounded by ‘green pastures by still waters’ with a little rock on which sat a mermaid,  to The Unicorn’s command, “dismount so we may discuss”  –  “but we are in the light yet I went to bed in the dark  – and who is she”?  – “which is the magic of dreams  – would you travel in light or darkness”?, his mentor smiled to introduce his lady, “she is the other half of Myth, the lady without whom I am not complete, normally she rides with me upon my ventures but she knew I would need an empty saddle for your rescue”.

When both were settled comfortably The Unicorn asked, “what seek you”?  – “why her of course”  – “but she walked out so what do you hope to gain by her recovery  – even if we can find her, what had she to verify your search”?  “Yesterday  – where I was before”, he replied a little nettled by the inquisition  – “but yesterday was yesterday with all the problems which had her quitting so I ask again, what seek you  – what did she create which now you think you have not”?

“Love”, he tried diffidently aware he was being shown a door to which he did not have the key.   “Love is the core of it”, his host agreed setting off to expound some theory, “but the Love men say they seek is only the signature of a far greater state for this Love we speak of is not the ‘I found it’ sort the romances churn out in paperbacks piled high  – this Love is not what you go to search for like ‘Some New Thing’ through dating-apps on The Internet because they are all inspired by ‘I’”, it noted sternly to let this list of negatives slide.

“What is it then”?, he asked despairing having had convention’s understandings so regally swept aside.   “What is the opposite of ‘I’ if ‘I’ has proved a busted flush”?, his mentor in love’s quest enquired solicitously deciding to lead rather than tell.   “‘You’”, he replied diffidently realising he was in the hands of a master he did not want to fault.

“Indeed it is”, it replied eyeing its apostle thoughtfully, “‘You’ is what a teacher showed us 2,000 years ago when he brought his New Testament to Judah  – ‘that ye Love one another’ which can only be achieved by our positive gift of one to another to teach us ‘Love is The Gift of Ourselves to Others’  – that and only that”, he stopped to let this eternal sink in, then continued – “with beauty also for Man made beauty for himself to gild his everyday a million years ago by carving the things which surrounded him to manufacture the myths with which he made the unknown ‘knowable’ the first of which”, it smiled supremely, “were models of his mate – we still do the same today by weaving the most ecstatic fantasies with beauty in our dedication to The Arts, for if we can see beauty beyond the mess then surely let it abide for our ultimate helpmeet in our journey”.

“Beauty”?, he asked perplexed at the unfamiliar dichotomy  – “to marvel at beauty is its own benefice while if you serve beauty it will be served to you in return which adds immeasurably to our days to help us be beautiful also so we may serve beauty to our neighbour in whatever guise we may to shine life’s journey  – this is The Law & The Prophets – for when the eyes see no more with Love & Beauty all they see becomes a curse so”, he finished his encomium to a long thoughtful silence watching his apostle weave his way through this land to try to see beyond.

“I put it to you”, it began again, “in the insecurity of your barren chase in inimical surroundings you sought an anchor so ‘fell in-love’  the saying has it, with an idea, or to be more truthful you fell in love with love itself without analysing what it was you had fallen for  – is that not the truth of it”?   “She was nice to me”, he wilted under the Unicorn’s stern gaze, “not like so many of the stand-offish feminists with their ‘keep your hands off me you dirty little man’, nor the fashionistas celebing it around with their ‘look-at-me’  –  she snuggled  – and was nice to my cock”, he finished limply aware he was cutting little ice with his inquisitor, who smiled fondly at the struggle.   “You, training to be an engineer, didn’t ask yourself the eternal why”?  – “why should I when the answers seemed to lie before me”, he defended himself, to a guttural neigh from his mentor.

“It is Man’s greatest self-deception to build Myths round what he finds to justify not asking the vital questions he ought to defend the verity he thinks lie behind his acts”, to an unhappy silence of recognition.  “I put it to you”, The Unicorn announced Olympically, “she got exactly what you got, some surety in the whirling world of ephemera which is today and she got the possession of a man which has been woman’s goal  –  since Eve gave her love token of The Apple to he she wished for mate  –  who provided the possibilities of a way out of her own precarious predicament and”, it laughed immoderately, “since you mentioned it, she got-her-cock  – but you gilt a fallen lily  –  lilies are mesmerising flowers, till they fall”.

“How do you know”?, he asked perplexed at this omniscience.   “Seeking the truth in what is the most difficult search Man makes”, The Unicorn avowed, “the hunt for a mate with whom to share life’s tribulations while building the race  –  is so because He spends so much time weaving myths round what he finds to make it what he wishes it to be  – even were he to know what it truly is for which he searches  –  so Truth sinks below his judgments  – the worse when he is defenceless in a foreign land so his sureties out of sight  – he weaves a myth to reinflate them  – then when The Myth will not bear the weight of truth he runs away  – does my analysis fit the facts”?

“I suppose when I couldn’t find an apprenticeship so had to fill in with grotty quickies she saw she had ‘built a Myth which wouldn’t bear the weight’ so fled”.   “Right”, it commanded, “now we have a truth let us seek onwards  – mount”.

The sinking sun was still where it had been when they re-started on their pilgrimage so light attended their flight  –  which landed in the corrie to which he had climbed to ‘view the world’.  “We’re back”, he exclaimed staring round the view  – “back where”?, it asked sternly, “to where you ran away when the myth wouldn’t bear the weight”  – “yes”, he admitted feebly  – “what sought you when you came here”?, it pressed again  – “what I told you at the beginning, her”  – “without asking any of the questions everyone training to be engineer should about the predicament in which you found yourself to guide your steps onward  – the immortal why”?, to his apostle’s guilty silence.

“Let us begin from the beginning”, his amanuensis comforted, “so we can tease the Truths from out the Myths”  – “where is the beginning”?, he asked mystified, “I’d never thought of a beginning, just an answer to the problem of where I was, some of which I thought I found with her”.   “She”, he admonished briskly,“you found soluble, but for a beginning we need the solid because castles built on sand collapse when attacked by the winds of circumstance”,  to a thoughtful silence waiting for the next thrust forward.

“What is missing you had at home on the farm”?, his inquisitor asked to bring focus to the journey.   “I was happy there amongst the fields with the animals, then there was my friend horsey who had been there always  – but I was young then knowing I had to move on”  – “no sand then”?, The Unicorn smiled indulgently  – “no”, he agreed reluctantly lost at this supposition.  “So you were happy”, it pressed on, “therefore now is the time to consider the roots of happiness because if we can tease them out of life’s tangles then we may build ourselves a guide”  – “can you define such a state”?  – “I can show you the elements”, Omniscience replied, “because the style of happiness is different for each  – but there are five desiderata which are common for us all  – it is the methods of their achievement which are peculiar to each”, to a wondering silence at this supreme assurance.

“Let us lay them out for our examination so you can see their unity, then address each one”, it announced engaging the debate.  “They are ‘To Love and ‘To be Loved’ ; then there are ‘To have a place in society and for ‘Society to know that place’ and finally ‘To have a fresh horizon for everyday’”, to a thoughtful silence while his apostle parsed their possibilities.

“To Love”, The Unicorn began a little sternly, “is to give ourself to another as I have just noted, without which we remain locked inside our own self-focused cage”  – “I thought I had”, he offered a little diffidently aware he was in uncharted waters.  “Perhaps”, it mused eyeing its acolyte, “but did you not accept her for merely a buttress to your dreams  – you told her about you, but did you ask about her”?  “No I suppose I didn’t for just revelling in weaving the stories of my dreams”  – “well”, it noted caustically, “better than comparing golf handicaps I suppose  – but you ended up knowing nothing real about her so unable to see she was not of your world  – little legs didn’t climb like yours”  – “I didn’t press them”, he replied in his defence.  “Well surely not”, it noted factually, “but that is merely kindness which, though an inner core of Love, is not the gift of you  – you asking her to climb in your world not you existing in hers, it is”, his mentor advised imperially, “Man’s greatest desire, indeed his greatest need, is to love someone  – something will do for a surrogate for a time but is a barren land without a mate to share it”  – “she shared what I shared with her  – I think”  – “if she had she would not have run away  – but she had not given herself to you so you could not know her  – you can not build a life of Truth without that deepest knowledge because you can not Love what you do not know”, so;

To Be Loved”, The Unicorn continued, “is the buttress against Dame Fortune’s Fates  –  together we can not be beaten for ‘together’, even dying in the desert, we die together which is the whole of it”.  “Gosh I hadn’t thought of that”, he reflected on this absolute.  “Far too many people don’t”,  it observed austerely, “specially in this ‘I’ focused self-regarding world  – but ‘I’ is an ‘I’solated ‘I’sland where ‘I’nstagram rules Inanity’s Idiocies, no world of gift of me to you lies there  – perhaps that’s what is what she ran away to do”  – “she seemed to ‘talk’ to it a lot”, he admitted, “but I never found any profit in it for us for I was not part of it  – just it and her, whatever the it might have been”  – “there isn’t”, it noted sternly to drive ‘together’ home, “right;

‘To have a place in society’”, The Unicorn trod briskly down the road, “is to have your place in the making of community which is the centre of civilisation, in which”, it advised, “we earn our place in the rewards society grants us for its service  – thus it becomes an essential of our guardianship for we having contributed our share to it whose converse is;

‘To have society recognise that place’”, it smiled at the neat reductio, “which places us not only in its regard for being a contributor to it, but its guardianship of us against possible predators  – it enfolds us into its ‘herd’ exactly like animals do in their own parts of the animal kingdom so we become ‘inside’ instead of ‘outside’ which helps keep our own castle walls inviolate apart from which”, it smiled benignly, “it’s nice to be liked for being tucked up inside society’s regard rather than sitting on the outside with it throwing stones at us”.  “That’s a lot of philosophy”, he remarked a bit dazed by the trip so far while wondering what ‘fresh horizon for everyday’ might portend.

“No philosophy about it”, his mentor noted sternly, “it is all the simplest obviousness if people could extract the enormous ‘I’ from out their eye they have grabbed to be their focus in life  – ‘I’nstagram driven by the selfie is not merely no life at all it is the nemesis of life even worse than old Narcissus staring at his reflection in the classicists’ pond because those who pander to the current god live trapped within its vices  – but at least there was only him-with-his-reflection but ‘I’nstagram leads hoards of ‘followers’ to their perdition to make the priests of The Inquisition seem mild men to show us ‘I’ is the antithesis of society’s regard which those who embrace it seeking ‘followers’ imagine it to be because ‘a million followers’ in a world which does not exist is the ultimate Myth of all  – whose nemesis is we perform the prostitution on ourselves by bowing down to nothing”, he relaxed after his tirade to smile, “the fifth desideratum of happiness is;

‘A fresh horizon for everyday’”, he sat back on his haunches, “whose merit, nay necessity if we are to ‘live’, is the ever present possibility of our chance to change the fix we find ourselves in  – it offers another door in the wall encircling us by offering us Hope we might make it better than it is”  – “you have such a door Sir”?, he plead  – “if you will it and are prepared to ‘see’”, it replied, “so let us consider the verities of Truth & Myth to their conclusion so you may never mix the two again”  – “please”.

“Myth is far too often taken to be the opposite of Truth”, his host reflected, “for Myth being supposed ephemeral while Truth to be actual, but even the simplest honest study shows Myth is nicely clear cut because ‘clear-cut’ is how we make it, but Truth’s interstices require more diligent application for leading us into the murky ways of private preference  –  Protestant/Papist  –   while the horrors of guilt vs innocence have been trying men’s patience since he first transgressed”.   “Myth”, his mentor pressed-on inexorably, “stands before he who creates it for his self-evident certainty  – God is so because I worship Him  –  whereas Truth is a fleeting lady who has to be disinterred from a myriad questions, honest or otherwise, whose ‘otherwise’ has taxed men’s minds since he had one”.  “Myth”, it continued its lesson, “is an escape, Truth is a confrontation  – Myth we make to blandish our hopes but Truth is a sterner lady who perpetually dashes them till we learn to face her foursquare to be brave enough to tease out her weavings, whose approach is hedged about with the half-truths of ‘what one wishes’”, to a considerable silence while this heady meal was digested.

“Most men”, his Mentor, rounded-off a little sternly, “fear Truth because it opens up the weaknesses they are too afraid to confront themselves, so live by Myths to quiet their fretted souls which”, it confirmed briskly, “are Man’s damnation in his search for a mate because she we travel with must lie curled up inside us in Truth  – far too many”, it continued this exegesis thoughtfully, “imagine they can live a life of lies to cement their bond  –  but Love is not born of lies because lies leak the bond out of our castle walls until it falls”.

“How do I begin”?, he asked fervently for now seeing a dawn where heretofore was darkness  – “I will give you a little tool”, The Master replied, “which I think your engineering bent may understand”.

“When skirting about for ‘what to do’ seek to place your foot on a piece of good-ground, it does not matter what it is when it is honestly of virtue which you think you can profit from any learning it may entail”, he paused watching, “then when you are well engaged cast about for another piece of good-ground to step upon it too  – it does not matter if you abandon one or continue both if you are fully engaged on your little journeys learning wider views about you on your way  – in Truth”.   “The more pieces of good-ground you engage”, it assured the doubter, “the wider will be your range of contacts, the more extensive your acquired skills so the wider your experience for horizons continually expanding out of which”, the magician announced, “will come the moment when you find your niche while”, he confirmed Olympically, “having had an extraordinarily good time which you will be able to put in your knapsack for the further journey ahead for everything you will have done will add to what you come to do  – somehow  –  while you will have become ‘a man of many parts’”, so saying it stood, then raising its majestic wings it cried ‘Bon Voyage’ to lift into what was still the sinking sun which gilt its wings with feathers of gold. (In a grim 6 years unemployed between two engineering ventures  – when  wife and children quit  –  I created exactly this method by picking up a number of activities to which I was relatively close but absolutely different to my engineering skills or bent, to carry them to high endeavour by innovating on the way  – working in our local Pub  with The Rector for whom I was Church-wardening  he suggested a novel method for ‘finding a mate’ which, for its engineering style, I engaged  – out of which came she with whom I have ‘held-hands’ ever since for she showing me a range of Truths  I had never before considered then we marched forward to discover  the first private-funder for my new venture from which a new ‘ we’ flew  –  whom I had found on a piece of good-ground)

Sir Truth

He awoke to the sound of the wings of the resident Golden Eagle, whose roost this crag was, landing on its nest safe out of harm’s way on the cliff edge.  Poking his head out of his tent he found himself facing the rising sun, exactly like it had seemed while journeying with The Unicorn.  ‘Was it real or was it a dream’? he asked himself shaken out of his normality, then crept back to reflect on what he had learned upon his pilgrimage  – ‘in the verisimilitude of a dream’ he laughed to himself at the well remembered quote his father had used to read him when showing him their proudly preserved Victorian copy of Pilgrim’s Progress, ‘had he’?, he wondered staring out at the rising sun begging him to be up doing on this shining morning, ‘but what’?, then smiled, ‘but I think I might have found my first piece of good-ground to begin my journey like Christian who found ‘where he would be’, he cheered leaping out of his sack to fill his billy with water for the morning coffee.

“I think James”, he greeted the landlord stopping for lunch at The Red Lion, “I have found me  – or at least the first step onto good-ground which may find me” – “how”? exclaimed the landlord, a little astonished at this conversion, “Moses on mountain-tops Sir”?  – “sort of James but a Unicorn in a dream who taught me many things while showing me what I had thought I wanted wasn’t, he showed me the five things you need for happiness none of which I realised I had  –  so I’m going back home to the farm to find them  – which I hope will be the first step onto the ‘good-ground’ my Unicorn advised to make my progress”.  “Well home at least is wisdom Sir”, pulling the expected pint to his guest’s observation, “I’ll come back with what I find James to show you when I’ve found it”  –  “we’ll look forward to it Sir, the missus’n I”.

“So you’re back my son”, greeted his mother thoughtfully eyeing the doubtful apparition.  “Yes Mum”, he admitted ruefully, recognising the end of one journey but not knowing whether going home really was a piece of ‘good-ground’.  “Where’ve you been”?, she asked suspecting somewhat more than ‘The City’.  “On a pilgrimage”, he admitted monosyllabically, not happy with the inquisition.  “Who with, to where”?, she pressed on suspecting more of the make-believe from his past.   “A Unicorn”, he admitted sheepishly at the improbability.  “A Unicorn”, she scoffed thrown out of her welcome by such a nonsense from one who had run-away from home, “Unicorns never existed, they were mythic heraldic animals to look regal supporting the shields of fancy-families like the ones you see on those arms of the FitzHeralds in the church  –  so what did this Myth show you”?

“I think he showed me the way to find me, with lots of other things besides, like the five necessaries of happiness”, he admitted brightly  – so now I need to find her”  – “but happiness with she has been here always”, his mother relaxed on home ground adding fondly at the stupidity of youth, “go ask your old friend Monty, he’s wise in the ways of the animals, because Man is but an animal till he finds his way”, then smiled putting an arm round him to show him the first desiderata of home, “Vanity Fair is no place for a country boy however the oldies imagined it might be  – they’re only dreamers too who’d never really been there”.

“Thank you Mum”, he cuddled his reply feeling ‘home’ beginning to enfold him, then walked out into the fondly remembered yard to her following advice, “you’ll find him enjoying his retirement in the ten-acre”, to which he set off, yet having no clue what his old friend might have to add to his part-knowing  – for dreams, we all know, are impenetrably difficult to re-create in detail.  It was quite a stiff climb to the ten-acre but country-legs hadn’t deserted him, so opened the well-remembered five-bar he had done so many times hay-making when a lad.

“Oo gosh Monty”, he exclaimed to his old friend rubbing his much loved nose, “you’ve gone grey”  – “I believe”, noted his erstwhile mate a little severely, “it is usual for the retired to go grey, it’s a well regarded sign of wisdom”  – “but where’s your horn”?, he asked confounded by the similarity to his inquisitor from his pilgrimage for also his old friend bearing the face of ‘her’.  “I am not he”, his old mate replied serenely for being likened to such a one as his fairy alter-ego The Unicorn, ““I am the Truth of the Myth who flew you to discover yourself  – so I am the reality to hold your hand in your journey onward to find the ultimate truth of all”, he raised his head to smile for knowing he had the answer to life’s great mystery, “she you seek is in the byre with her beloved beasts she’s always tended, had you not been blinded by the apparent delights of Vanity Fair where my visionary mate Myth found you  – from your presence seeking here I see he showed you some truth from your delusions”  –  “it seemed the first piece of good-ground he advised me to set my foot upon”, he informed a little lamely.   “Home”, informed the old horse Olympically, “is always a good first step, you may spring from it but it always speaks to you in your tribulations”.    “Is she still pretty like she used to be”?, he asked seeking the actual from amongst the metaphysics, “it seems like an age ago  – which I’ve forgotten in my supposed passion for another”?

“Yeees”, the horse mused eyeing him yet more fondly, “if sadder for the loss of he she loves who was spirited away by a myth the old-men dreamed”.   “Myth seemed so easy”, he admitted ruefully recognising his craven departure from what he thought a cage, “run away to ‘seek my fortune where the streets are paved with gold’  – but all I found were spilt rubbish bags round closed doors  –  with an emptyness I didn’t understand”  –  “for not knowing yourself nor the terrific powers of Love upon which to build a future”, The Horse averred, “all you thought of was the omniscience of what ‘I’ can do because You-&-Me having no place in your equation, so you turned your back on everything which had made you, some”, his mate noted austerely, “manage it but always search for the missing bit they left behind, so build a myth round what they’ve created to certify its success by disguising the missing’s lack  – but the sand on which it’s built never ceases to trickle from its footings  – at least you didn’t deceive yourself by marrying the first who made approach like so many do to disguise the fact they’re lost –  she”,his old mate laughed at the connection, “ran away because the surface you wove lacked substance, because”, it noted sternly, “she wasn’t interested in ‘You’ but only the myth you wove her, such are not fit life-mates whereas she”, he stood back from his stiff lecture, “is waiting for you still for knowing you better than you know yourself  – she is Truth because she loved you for you alone which in this ‘I’ focused age is a rarity with whose energies you can build a castle together against all Dame Fortune may fling at you then”, wisdom noted fondly looking at the possibilities of conversion on the hoof, “you will discover the other four desiderata my mate Myth told you of because they follow on from an honest creation of the first  – because ‘the gift of you to her’ will become the signature of all you do thereafter”.

“You weren’t so wise when I went”, he observed his old friend who seemed to have donned the mantle of The Inquisitor  – “oh indeed I was, but you didn’t ask”, the horse replied briskly, “the animals don’t rush off building dreams for their future because Dame Nature has mapped it out for them so they rest content  – but even had I done so you wouldn’t’ve listened because in Man’s wisdom he considers the animals dumb creatures  –  but Man is only a jazzed up animal so answers to the same imperatives, anyway”, his old mate snorted, “runaways never ask, nor would listen if they did, because for them ‘content’ does not live in their equation – my mythic mate’s considerations upon happiness are not the stuff of fools”, he stressed, “because in many guises they have been the staple of troubadours down time for being the abiding which have been around since before Man became the arrogant thing he is  –  so go seek its first element in the cowbyre, you might learn the rest if you allow her  – she is Dame Nature’s answer we animals have honoured always”.

She

“Fran dear I’m back”, he announced gently to the form crouched with her head resting dreamily on the flank of a cow for having seen his advance up the field through the byre door, “I know now I should have never gone away  – but my eyes were dimmed to the truth of things by the dreams of gold the old men wove  – with she who held my hand to dim my doubts  – will you marry me so we can travel together down Life’s journey to build a castle to keep out the slings of outrageous fortune”?, to a little gurgling laugh of release which had the supremely elegant girl rise from behind ‘her loves’ to greet him.  “Where did all the wisdom come from Giles”?, she cooed collapsing into his outstretched arms, “for surely it wasn’t there before”.

“No Fran dear it wasn’t”, he agreed happily snuggling deeply into yesterday made tomorrow, “a Unicorn who called himself Myth came to me in the verisimilitude of a dream while I camped on a mountain-top  who flew me to high-pastures and sylvan glades to show me  – he told me of the 5 needs for happiness – then my old friend Monty told me of The Truth of You who I now have cuddled in my arms to help me build our castle to travel onwards to build the rest  – if you’ll have me”, he separated enough to smile deeply into her sparkling eyes.

“You chump of course I will”, she laughed for the tensions of the years trickling out her feet, “such silly things men always chasing after ‘some new thing’ for supposing they can do it on their own or wanting to lay their new-got fortunes at their lady’s feet to prove their fitness  – forever forgetting Man hunts better hand-in-hand”.   “I thought I had hand-in-hand Fran dear  – but she wasn’t you”, he admitted trying to parse the difference out of his lessons with The Unicorn backed by his old mate Monty, “in any sort of way”, he confirmed clamping his lips on hers, “the gift of me to you The Unicorn & Monty told me which you now have utterly because I know I can not go on without you”  – “well it’s always been here for you Giles”, she snuggled back looking at the eyes she had always wanted to look at her like they did now, “so I think we have the first two of those needs my old Gran used to croon to me when I was a tiny because she knew them  – Gran & Gramps were one indissoluble whole who were the centre of the village doing”, she laughed, “so much doing they stood in the village’s regard, who definitely had a fresh horizon for every day  –  so walk me across to say thank-you to Monty”.

“Glad he listened Miss Fran”, observed The Horse smiling on their approach, “at least he’s placed his foot on the next piece of good-ground because how the blazes he thought he was going to get on without the other half  I can’t imagine  – me’n me Alice were a unity Miss Fran, though that’s not what humans see but I miss her dreadfully’s she would always be giving me the fruits of The Female Mind”  – “that’s men for you Monty”, his inamorata giggled happily, “imagine they can build the world alone but it takes two halves to make a whole so Master Giles, in your wisdom as a man, what next”?

“Well Mistress other-half”, he laughed happier than he could possibly have considered likely, “a wedding seems the proper place for my next step forward  –   then I need to learn from you lot how to run a farm so we can take over when Dad & Mum decide to quit  – but I have a little thank you to one who understood when I was stuck,  whom I want to show the ‘she’ I’ve chosen”.

“There James is she”, he announced enormously proudly to The Landlord of The Red Lion, “waiting for me in the cow-byre where she had been always”, to a burst of hearty laughter, “it’s often the way Sir, The Truth is lying under one’s feet if one considers home before away  –  ‘away’ is always a mystery but home is what makes you what you are which is the best recipe for building castle walls  – me missus only lived a street away in our little village with home lying all around us so we knew it’s commonalities”.

“I hope you’ll come to our wedding James”, smiled his lady Frances engagingly, “then you can tell me a little of the pilgrimage, we’ve already asked his old friend Monty The Horse who is going to ask his mate Sir Myth The Unicorn with his lady The Mermaid”, to more laughter, “meeting Sir Myth who has brought you to The Truth Sir will be a real treat while The Mermaid is Myth multiplied  – two pints”?   “Indeed James”, he thanked, “Fran’s a proper mate, milk a cow, drive a tractor, plough a field, drink pints and”, he gurgled wrapping an arm around her, “the most gorgeous piece of goods into the bargain who is mine  – bloody stupid I ever walked away from such enfolding Truth – sod the Myths of Vanity Fair”, to uproarious laughter as the pints foamed into the glasses.

Dear Reader, we need press no further for we have the ‘happily-ever-after’ so necessary to Man’s estate  – I can’t be doing with the manufactured ‘I’ focused angst which is so highly praised today for why spend time examining the horrors when we could be ‘galloping across the hills’n far away’  –  neither have a number of those great ‘tellers of stories’ who have raised their fellows above The Slough of Despond.  It’s essence is the discovery that ‘she’ is no particular but the eternal, with  whom we can build a marriage of all the virtues Man has always sought to travel with since He began  – whose sign is ‘The-Holding-of Hands ‘gainst all adversity’.  He had discovered the positives out of disaster or ‘The Blessings of a Curse’ by finding an eternal out of the demise of a temporal  – in order to truly hold you must let-go to have the measure of its lack, also;

He would discover Man’s innate desire to make things – following Carlyle’s understanding ‘Man is a toolmaker’, which he had escaped to the city to learn  – is not solely restricted to Manufacture or The Arts but to anything which he can grow under his endeavour  – even ideas which I have so fulsomely found  – so grow new skills to ‘earn his place in society so have society recognise that place’ through his creation for it.  A fine farm feeding the nation while embellishing the countryside for his fellow is by no means the least of Man’s creations.  Every ‘engineer’ (a ‘maker of things’ OED) is a metaphysician who conjures something out of nothing to be his ‘gift of himself to others’  – in which business Love is the engine whose visible form is irrelevant.

Having been a design and manufacturing engineer all my life I now have the privilege of living and writing amongst Virginia Woolf’s ‘peasants’ in the deepest country, who have farmed these lands for countless, mutually interrelated, generations, so know absolutely the truth of the denouement of my story  – that ‘when they disappear there will be no hope for the race’.  When the politicians’ stupidities have finally brought Britain to its knees they will still be playing crib in The Red Lion unconcerned by the mayhem wreaked about them because for them Truth is the welfare of their beasts through their care of the land being their gift of themselves for others  – not for them the Insidious, Invidious Inanities of Instagram but the safe delivery of the next generation’s ‘babies’.

The final spur for the internals of this story was discovering The Myth part of the puzzle,  the Unicorn & The Mermaid, was relatively easy being so clear cut, but The Truth,  the horse being addressed by the girl, was far more difficult to do for, being a reflection in the water –  like Narcissus discovered  –  was hazy edged with mussy colours.  When I finally struggled the last four pieces in, this wonderful understanding leapt upon me for being a true reflection of real life, that Truth really is a hazy lady indeed whose achievement requires tireless effort with a very clear eye  – and the puzzle showed me it is the lady who is duality’s energy because it is The Mermaid who is commanding The Unicorn upon his rescue venture  – my mate is a great deal more than my ‘other half’ for she rescues me from myself.  Being an innovator, I have spent my whole life telling myself Fairy-Stories  – I still do for being the animus from which springs my writing,  specially The Golden Pathwhich is a Myth which spends its whole life seeking to brave The Truth.  Thank you Jim Warren (Ace Disney cartoonist) for this one.