Hmmph.

Hmmph. Ahummph.

Humph.

Hmmph. Ahummph.

Hmmph …

Are you awake?

Hummph.

Hello…are you there?

Hmmph. Ahummph. Wha?

I can’t sleep… Are you awake?

Oh…oh…okay, what?

I can’t sleep… Are you up too?

No. Go back to sleep now dear. Mummy’s had a long da…

 Hmmph.

 Ahummph.

Hummph.

 Mummy… Mummy, are you awake? Mummy?

 Oh what is it dear?!

 Don’t be upset with me mummy…I can’t sleep. Tell me a story…

 Please…

 Okay. Let mummy think…

Do you remember Sadie? Do you remember little Sadie the martin?

 No, no mummy, I don’t. Tell me about Sadie. Tell me about little Sadie the what?

 The martin, the bird.

Okay, pull up here to mummy and settle into the pillow, and let mummy tell you a little tale about Sadie and the first day of Summer…

Okay mummy…

Sadie leaned out her door and stretched. It was a long wonderful kind of stretch, the sort of stretch that starts a day. As she stretched Sadie wondered what this day would bring her. The dew on the grass from the rain last night was just starting to disappear, and already there were many of her neighbours playing about on the ground. Some of them were drinking or bathing in the fountain, while others were eating their morning meal. Sadie cleared her throat and sung her hello to the day. She sung “Good Morning!” and “Hello Sun!” and “Hello Neighbours!” Sadie didn’t always sing this way in the morning, but it was the beginning of summer today. Sadie loved summer. She hoped that this would be the best summer yet.

Sadie went back into the house and straightened up her room. Her mother had taught her that it was much easier to straighten her room in the morning, when she was chipper and alert, than at night, when she was tired and sleepy. When she was young Sadie didn’t always listen to her mother, but as she grew older Sadie saw how wise her mother was. This is why she straightened up her room.

Since it was the first day of summer Sadie wanted to celebrate. She wanted to go to the fountain to have a swim. She looked out to see if her mother or sisters or brothers were there, but she did not see them. “I’ll have to go find Mother and she if she wants to swim too.” Sadie thought to herself, and that’s what she did.

Sadie had a room on the very top of the house, and it was a very big house. There were thirty-six rooms in the house, and in each room was a member of Sadie’s family. Her mother and father, her sisters and brothers, her aunts and uncles, her grandparents and great-grandparents, and even her great-great-grandmother and her great-great-grandfather, all lived in this house. The house was also very very old. No one new for sure just how old it was, because it had been here even longer than Sadie’s great-great-grandfather could remember. He had been born in this house, so it was certainly very old.

Almost everything in the neighbourhood was very very old, for that matter. Around the edges of the grass which surrounds the fountain were large blocks on which many of Sadie’s neighbours lived. Some of these blocks were dark red in colour, and others were all sorts of bright colours. There were even some other houses like Sadie’s in this neighbourhood. And, of course, in the centre of Sadie’s neighbourhood, there was the fountain. And it was very old indeed.

Sadie went down to the bottom of the house, were her great-great-grandfather lived. She expected that her mother would be there, talking to him, as she was most mornings. When Sadie got there she asked her great-great-grandfather, “Who built the fountain, and when?”

“Who and when indeed!” harrumphed Sadie’s great-great-grandfather. “That fountain is so old it must have been put there by the Stars themselves.” he said.

“By the Stars, Great-Great-Grandfather? Did the Stars really put it there?” Sadie asked, her eyes wide.

“Why of course they did, who else could have done such a thing!” he replied. “Haven’t you seen how it lights up at night, its as if pieces of the Stars themselves are laying in the bottom shining up through the water!”

“Tell me more about the Stars,” Sadie said, and tell her he did. He told her how many many summers ago, before the first of their family had sung “Hello!” to the first morning, before the house had been built, before even the fountain had sprayed its first stream of water, before any of that, there was only the Stars.

“The Stars sing and fly and twinkle in the sky, as they have for all the summers there have been.” he said. “They have done that since before there were any summers.”

“What do you mean, Great-Great-Grandfather? When weren’t there any summers?” asked Sadie.

“Let Great-Great-Grandfather tell you his story, and you will understand.” Sadie’s mother said.

“The world hasn’t always been here, little girl, and before the world was here there were no summers, and no winters either.” Sadie’s great-great-grandfather said, continuing his story. “There was only the Stars. And for a long long time, how long it was we don’t really know, the Stars sang and flew and twinkled.

“The Stars loved to sing and fly and twinkle, and they thought that maybe they should let someone else have as much fun as they did. They decided to invent the world, and put us here on it, so that we could sing and fly and twinkle, too. That is when they made the blocks, and that is when they made the fountain. Why little girl, they may even have made this house. Haven’t you noticed that, on a windy night, this house sings as well! That is the song of the Stars, that is the song that is all around us; in the trees, in the grass, in the blocks and the fountain, the song of the Stars is the song of life and all that is good.”

“But Great-Great-Grandfather, how do we twinkle,” said Sadie, “I see the Stars twinkle at night, I see them fly and hear them sing. I have my own song, though it’s not as good as theirs. I even fly. But twinkle, how do I twinkle, Great-Great-Grandfather?” she asked.

Her great-great-grandfather leaned back, and smiled, “Sadie, my dear little girl, you certainly do ask allot of questions.” he said, and, with a twinkle in his eye, he flew off into the distance. Sadie giggled and blushed, for she felt a little foolish that she hadn’t known how birds twinkled.

Hmmphh… ssshhhh.

Hummph… Hmmphh…

Ahummph.

Are you asleep little one?

 zzzzzzzz

 Thank you Sadie. Twinkle on…

hmmmph…