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The Enough of Biscuits

 At a certain time, in most places, there were women like this woman. She was careful, hard, kind. Laughter was nearly etched in her face, as though it might have had a place there had life been different. But life required care. It was hard. And, perhaps adding to life's hardness, she chose to be kind.

    Kind is not the same as nice.

    She was not a nice woman. She didn't have the time. And people made their own choices, so often at odds with her own. Not a good quality in a person when what she did for them brought them, as often, freedom from pain. Sometimes she even gave them an opportunity to go on living. No, she didn't have time to be nice.

    The woman, she brewed things from other things. Made them up from what she knew. Added what she could, with what she had. Not too much, though. No one needed to much. There wasn't enough of anything to go about having too much.

    There was enough for people to have enough, as she saw it. The trouble was, not a lot of people knew what enough looked like. About the same amount didn't have gratitude to give for the more than enough they had. Take biscuits, for example. No one ever had a clue about biscuits.

    The woman was more than ready to give the people a lecture about the enough of biscuits. She knew exactly when the enough of biscuits was. It was about four biscuits behind the other biscuits. The problem was that the woman had a tendency to land on the four biscuits on the far side of the other biscuits. Not that it gave her teeth any trouble. Nor her figure. Still, she knew about the biscuits. And if she was going to tell anyone when the enough of biscuits was, she had to know enough herself.

    She went to sleep that night and vowed against the biscuits.

    The next day, the biscuits went down all the same.

    She sighed. Then shrugged. We're all, she thought, just people trying to figure out the enough of biscuits.

    She gave no lecture. Which, if you think about it, was kind of her.

Not All the Time

The old wizard took note of the weather. The old witch did not. Both were unusual, for, respective to the persons, the day's interest and disinterest was in opposition to their usual way.       There was no particular reason for their interest and disinterest, save that they were distracted in the day by different events and chaoses. And both noted with a certain air of pleasantness that to break up one's routine in such a way proved intriguing.       They would not make a habit of it. The old wizard liked a day without attention to the elements, the witch depended upon reading the weather.       But for a day, it was nice.       For nothing in life is worth doing all the time. 
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The Witch, the Thoughts, and the Harvest

As the witch laid out the harvest, her mind drifted. There was a satisfaction in her work. A great satisfaction. She was feared, if not loved. This was not always so.      She remembered that time, the time before. When the men would show up at the door and barrage her with insults beyond belief for unsuccessful outcomes courtesy of them calling her too late. When eggs would soak the outside of her cottage, a treat of an insult given the cost of an egg. When small poos were carefully laid out in rude faces on the outside of her door, smoking slightly.      It took a muttering, just a few words. Ones that sounded pointed. Dropped under her voice, but loud enough so the nasty man could hear. From then on, all his misfortunes had a cause. From a knowing of the cause grew respect. Or fear. From a certain point of view, one is much the same as the other. The people in the village couldn't tell the difference. They didn't have the time.      But ma...
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Content

 The woman wondered if this was all there was.      Then nodded.      This was fine, she thought. Just fine. 
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Brambles and Light

 Once upon a time there was a woman who could not bear to carry on, for her path was dark and narrow.      And so, she turned aside and swept into the brambles. There she cut and forged and ambled on where no path could be forged, nothing narrowed, and where darkness only grew like blooms on dark hellebore.      She turned again.      And again.     Until she climbed a tree.      Which is where the light poured in.      Down she came, into the brambles for awhile. Until she needed the light, and then up the tree she'd go.      And so on and so forth.     Where her way was wide and pocketed with light, and she found she could carry on.  
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