Garden of the Black Roses

A few days ago, a person… i wouldn’t say friend, perhaps more a friend of a friend… got on my nerves. At first glance, i thought she’d be competent in english language and at least have a brief grasp of history.

Anyway, i was wearing a cross with a rose entwined around it. It wasn’t a christian cross but a symbol of a 17th century Alchemy brotherhood. I traced the symbol to a modern day organisation called the Rosicrucian Order. While the symbol itself has religious connections, the fact that it is also connected to Alchemy contradicts those connections.

Anyway, once i explained that to this person she asked me if it was bad magic. After my uncertain reply… uncertain because i wasn’t expecting her to ask that… she started to ramble about different teachers at uni and their connections to ‘bad and evil’ things.

I kept silent because i wasn’t about to waste my breath on someone who appears to set in their beliefs. It’s like trying to get a devout christian to become atheist, it’s just that difficult.

She annoyed me further that same day by saying that fantasy writers shouldn’t exist because they fill children’s heads with false things. One of my close friends could tell i was annoyed and attempted to explain to her that fantasy helps envoke creativeness in children. I could tell that it wasn’t going to work with her.

I was alright over this encounter until i saw her yesterday. I felt like hitting her. She knew i was writer and then proceeded to ask me if i was writing a romance. When i told her i wrote fantasy, she said ‘it’s the same thing’. I was bristling by this point and tried to explain the difference between fantasy and romance but she was stubborn in her thought that they were the same thing.

I decided to just leave and sit as far away from her as i could. I’m sensitive when people abuse language and the meanings of words. But i keep my mouth shut most of the time because i know that not everyone knows the old meanings and would get angry at me if i ‘lecture’ them on it.

On a lighter note: before i went to uni yesterday to do my test, i found a baby bird next to my car. It was a very brown bird. Like a sparrow or something. But definately not a native bird. Anyway, after i backed out of the garage and by sister went to pull down the roller door two more fell from the roof.

Mum’s looking after them now. One has died because it hit the driveway head first and possibly broke its neck in the process. But the other two are so noisy whenever Mum goes out to feed them.

She doesn’t want to call the RSPCA because they aren’t native birds and so young that it’ll be a miracle if they survive. She’s put them in a box lined with old polar fleece material and placed it where the baby’s parents can see them. You see the parents duck into the garage from time to time. We assume it is to feed them.

It’s a good thing because normally birds would abandon babies that have been touched by humans. We’ve found abandoned baby birds dead in the garden on occasion or so close to death that they die after the first night.

These ones still have their parents and are still alive from yesterday so i hope they survive.