When I was a wee elementary school girl, I would make “books” by stapling together folded typing paper. I would compose a story with illustrations to fit the number of pages provided.

I vividly remember this one story I did.

Lisa and the Fairy

by Marie Vibbert, age 8*

Once Upon a Time there was a girl named Lisa. She wanted nothing in the world more than to be a fairy, but she couldn’t be because fairies only have long hair and her hair was short.

Lisa heard a tiny voice. “Little girl, why are you crying?” She looked and it was a fairy! It was a boy fairy. “I want to be a fairy,” Lisa said, “But I can’t be because I have short hair.”

The boy fairy laughed. “I have short hair! Fairies are all different, just like people. You can have short hair and be a fairy, or be a boy, or anyone. I can make you a fairy right now.”

“Oh would you please?” So he did. And they lived happily ever after.

THE END

I still had a blank page in my stapled booklet after my “The End” so I decided to fill in the last page with a big portrait of Lisa, now a fairy.

I realized I’d drawn long hair the second after I did it. SWOOSH big wiggly lines to the edge of the page. It was habit! In pen.

I’d just written my first story with A Message(tm) and I’d invalidated it on the next page.

I drew in two crescents, cutting off the long hair, but of course that didn’t work. I started to scribble the lines out, but that was worse.

There was nothing to do. The stereotype was inside me, and I was never going to be a fairy.

*I’m guessing my age – it was certainly between 7 and 9. Spelling and grammar are, of course, much better in this re-creation from memory. My drawings I’m not sure are any better, save that Photoshop lets you erase things so well. Thank you, Photoshop. Young me would have been a lot less traumatized with an ‘undo’ button.