Once Upon A Time

Let's talk about fairy tales for a minute.

Everytime I hear someone say: "And it was just like a fairy tale" about life/a relationship/ whatever, I have to make a concentrated effort to keep my eyebrows in a neutral position. (This, by the way, is the ONLY reason I would think about getting botox. Lady Gaga may have a p-p-p-poker face, but I most decidedly do NOT. My eyebrows always want to give me away, and I think Botox might be the only way to stun them into submission.)

But ... REALLY? It was a "fairy tale"? So you gave up all of your autonomy and power and let things happen to you while you watched passively until a moment came where someone of "authority" magically rescued you so you could live happily ever after?

That's ... greaaaaat. (And there goes the left eyebrow, raised in disbelief.)

What I think might be worse, though, are the people who say they "want a fairy tale". They want to be swept off of their feet by a handsome prince (or princess, whatevs) and then magically live happily ever after.

The thing about fairy tales, though, is that they are mostly passive. They're about waiting and longing and hoping and wishing. I read somewhere, "You have a wishbone where your backbone oughta be" and that's what I think when I think fairy tales.

This is what I want to say when someone tells me that they are waiting for the fairy tale: The trick is not in hoping for a fairy tale. The trick is to live like you're the hero of the story. Like no one is going to rescue you, so you have to rescue yourself. Like no one is going to sweep you off of your feet, so you have to sweep yourself off of your feet. You have to ride in on the white charger, slay the dragon, defeat the evil wizard. You are the one who pulls the sword from the stone and leads the kingdom. It's just you. And when you get that, when you understand -- you're the star, you're the hero, you're the one this story is about -- that's when the magic really happens. It doesn't happen through hoping and wishing on a star, it happens through doing and fighting your way through it, whatever it might be.

Understand, I'm not talking about living selfishly or inconsiderately. What I'm talking about is taking charge of your life, instead of waiting for it to happen to you. Cinderella needed to hand her stepsisters the broom and dustpan, shake herself off, and march out of the house long before she ever let a fairy godmother -- who took her sweet time showing up, by the way -- jam her foot into a pointy glass shoe. So ask yourself -- do you want to keep sweeping out that hearth, or do you want an adventure?

Want the adventure. Let go of the fairy tale. In the end, the adventure will make for a better story -- and who knows? It will probably still end with "and she still fought some ogres, and had the occasional bad hair day, and sometimes she fought with people she cared about, but you know what? She still lived happily ever after." Which is a much more interesting ending, after all.