| As noted here, I’m commenting daily on the WMG Holiday Spectacular—which is a great project that releases a story every day. These might be reviews. Or not. They might be interesting. Or … um … not. They will be fun, though. For me, at least. Here’s the next story. |
“The Lost Gravy Boat”
Meyari McFarland
Collectors are a strange breed, right? We love what we love even if it makes no sense. With this story, Meyari McFarland is doing a lot of heavy lifting with that element of human nature. We are all collectors of some fashion or another—even if that fashion is to not collect anything at all. Or maybe that’s just me bringing my own views into the work. This is a thing with being a creator. We say what we want to say and then it’s up to the reader to fill in the rest.
In this case, though, I’m pretty sure it’s McFarland pulling the strings, then letting me free—setting the table, so to speak, in order that I can break whatever Liberty Staffordshire I’ve got to break.
In other words, I admit to having a hard time with the pairing of two young boys collecting pieces of China, but that maybe says more about me than it does about the idea. Having finished the story (which I certainly suggest you should) I’m tempted, in fact, to suggest that this disjunction is one of the foundational views of the story itself. My so-called problems are self-inflicted. That’s a thing with being a reader. You read what you read, but sometimes you only take in what you want see.
We are who we are, we love what we love. Some of us are young boys. Some of us love gravy boats. If that feels wrong somehow, perhaps I need to look in the mirror and ask myself why.
Likewise, of course, some people are simply some people. They hate who they hate or, maybe better stated, they hate who they fear, and they fear who they don’t understand. Perhaps the world might be just that much better if they, too, were to look into the mirror every now and again and ask themselves why.