Myths to Live by
Welcome to another adventure from the Thousand Acre Woods deep within Trollheim of the NJ Pine Belt! Tales Chronicled by Jonathan Hulton... That's me! In today’s tale, Karl, of all people, teaches Gramps the importance of myths and how they have guided people for centuries.
"Why do you keep going on about all those tales about the Ashlad?" Gramps went on. "Who cares about a kid who pokes his stick in the fire all day?"
"Well I hear since Grams got back, all you're doing is poking your stick in the fire…" chided Karl.
"Hey—well, all these tales about saving princesses and all, why keep telling them?"
"In some ways, humans can be complex—real screwups, but the variety of the multitudes of ways of how and why someone grows up to be a screwup has never changed."
"So!"
"Every screwup has its own fairy tale."
"What!"
"Every screwup has its own fairy tale—take your Ashlad stories."
"OK, I hate it when you just have me saying so, what, OK—"
"Your Ashlad tale is about the smallest of three brothers. All kids will feel small and useless at sometime in their life. Plus, children need to be empowered to know when they are right and their parents are wrong."
"Bjorn always lets me know when I'm wrong; I hate it when he is right…"
"So Ashlad tales wouldn't be for him."
"Why—here I go again…"
"The older brothers who fail the challenge represent the parents."
"That makes no sense."
"Neither does it make sense at first for the kid who needs the story; in fact, it should only simmer in the back of his mind and be realized as he grows through life.
"Children have a hard time seeing themselves as equal or better than their parents, so the first step is for them to associate themselves as the Cinder Ella or the ash lad.
"So, no matter how small they are, they feel more important than them. Then for them to grow and feel equal to their older siblings. In time, this allows them to journey with Ashlad to defeat a monster, find a bride, and inherit a kingdom."
"So they will recognize themselves in the character once he starts conquering the obstacles?"
"Yes, the princess is the girl next door, the monster is succeeding in an occupation, and the castle is the home they build to foster a kingdom's worth of heirs through time."
"So there is a language hidden in these tales?"
"Yes. Water is the subconscious represented by the moat, the bridge is the crossing of the water barrier between your skull and brain, and your brain is the castle or dungeon depending on your emotional health. The maze within is the complexity of your self. The princess is your emotional or feminine side."
"What is with the fire?"
"The creative potential of a child, which he is poking at till he stirs something up, becomes his calling."
"Oh, quite tricky, sis…"
"So if you have a confused father after his wife died, his child reads Pinnochio. A girl on the brink of womanhood, Little Red Riding Hood."
"Riding Hood!"
"If she strays from the trail in a dangerous forest, she can ruin her grandmother's lineage by having a woodsman cut them out of a belly."
"You're strange…"
"It's the wolf's seed that is emerging within the genes of Riding Hood and her grandmother's, he can wolf them down. Red symbolizes the young girl's wanton ways. His lineage could erase the fine line of happy people."
"Coitus should never be conservative, nor without consideration, but Red scampers off the trail willy-nilly."
"If you have a clueless father after his wife died, the child should read Pinnochio"
"So there are stories for every screwup."
"Yes—"
"So what is mine?"
If you like this tale, hit the share button below or just even tell your friend the old fashion way, with your mouth. Come back next week for our next tale.
We just released our first collection of Trollheim stories in print. It is available on this website at www.salemhousepress.com and Barnes & Noble. Pick up your copy today, pretty please with sugar on top...
Fiction/ Illustrated Fantasy/ Mythology / Scandinavian Myth/ Norse Sagas / Scandinavian Folk Lore / Coffee Table Book
Paperback: $45 | Hardcover: $65 | PDF eBook $5
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Following the Harry N. Abrams, Inc. tradition of the series that created Brian Froud's and Alan Lee's Faeries and Gnomes by Wil Huygen and Rien Poortvliet, we present you with what would have been the next book in the series: Trolls: A Compendium. Trolls—do you think you know what they are? Could you be wrong?
Trolls within Scandinavian lore, myth, saga, fantasy, and folktales are actually anything magical within our northern neighbor's culture. Richly illustrated in this volume are the tales of faeries, dwarves, nissen, huldras, gods, Jotuns, draugar, ghosts, and more. Also, this book introduces our readers to the world of Trollheim, populated by Nattrolls that escaped the 17th-century Swedish colony within the New Jersey Pine Barrens. Narrated by Christopher Jonathan Hulton, who lives in the Thousand Acre Woods just after the Civil War, their tales are filled with Native American lore and tales of their neighbor, the Jersey Devil.
Preview: Google Books
Hardcover: $65.00
PDF (non-flowable, best on tablet, desktop, or laptop) eBook: Download a copy onto your device today! Only $5.00
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