The Epiphany of Tiffany E. Poh
By Susan Lowery/copyright 2004
Chapter One:
By Susan Lowery/copyright 2004
Chapter One:
Tiffany’s Sleepy Day
After 2 hours of putting together puzzles, redressing her dolls, painting rainbow pudding onto her new dress - and licking it off, Tiffany was bored. She’d already done most of the things that she liked to do and it wasn’t even noon. And even though she was tired, she didn’t want to take a nap, and she was getting crabbier by the minute but didn’t know why. She started to sulk, then to throw herself around. It seemed that she couldn’t control herself at all and worse yet, her horrible behavior felt good! She was having a temper tantrum of the highest order. After doing this for about an hour, she finally became very sleepy, much to her mother’s relief. But before she fell asleep, she dangled herself rather precariously by her knees over the back of the sofa. She looked up and imagined that the floor was the ceiling and that the light fixtures (also hanging down) were her tables. She thought about her feet touching the ceiling and about the ceiling becoming the floor. She always did look at her world a little differently. What a great time it would be to walk around on the ceiling upside down, right side up! She then closed her eyes and began day dreaming. As she did this, she could smell the orange-raspberry cake that Evelyn, her mom, was baking in the kitchen and could hear her whipping up the creamy vanilla frosting with the hand mixer. It was going to be glorious and she could hardly wait to sink her teeth into it tonight for dessert. This made her mouth water in delight.
While day dreaming, she thought how wonderful it would be, to be able to fly. She loved watching the birds outside soaring and then careening straight down from the wires to the ground, and then scooping up at the last second and shooting up to the sun. Oh, how she wanted to be able to do that.
Her mother had left the big windows open in the living room and the wind whipped and tumbled through the room, tousling her hair to and fro. She started to feel a warm, soft breeze against her cheek, and with her eyes closed, she could feel herself start to tumble through soft cotton like clouds, lulling herself to sleep. With this, she also started to experience the cool splash of tiny raindrops gently glazing her skin, and dampening her dress. Have you ever smelled the air after a summer’s rain? To Tiffany the smell was so fresh that it even smelled a little bit like vinegar! Soaring through the clouds, she was ecstatic and care free. She was also very happy to know that since she was flying - although she was daydreaming, she’d remembered to put play shorts on under her dress! Now she could do anything! At this, she turned up her nose to the sky, wrinkled it all up, and smiled toward the heavens.
The next thing she knew, she was doing every kind of loop-de-loop, spin and dive imaginable. As she caught up with the birds that she’d just been watching diving and careening here and there, she matched them with aerial spins and swoops.
"Try and catch me, round robin! Try and catch me blue, blue bird!" She shouted while her belly bubbled with laughter.
After half a day of this, she finally wore herself out and decided to let herself down to the ground.
"Hew!" She sighed. “I never knew flying would make me so tired and hungry."
Instantly, her dress became a brilliantly colored puff parachute filled with air. Slowly, it delivered her to the slate roof of a building. The roof had lots of bumpy places on it, so at first it was hard for her to keep her balance.
"Oh boy, luckily I have lots of bubble gum stuck on the bottoms of my shoes! Hopefully it’ll in turn help me stick to the roof!" She gloated. "And mom said that all my bubble gum did was make me look like a cow chewing her cud..... I sure wish she could see me now!" She had made quite a bit of a habit of talking to herself of late and yet continued on.
After she gave herself a little bit of time and a few deep breaths to gather her composure and balance, she got down on her hands and knees, crawled to the edge of the roof and looked over the side, to the ground. With the gum still sticking to her shoes, it stretched and stretched and yet, kept her securely attached to the shingles.
"I knew that I chewed Double Bubble for a reason!" she said aloud.
As she leaned out over the shingles, she could see earthworms that had been brought up by the rain from underground.
"Oh Grandma, where are you? I wish you were here! They’re wriggling around everywhere and they look just like live spaghetti!" "They're too amazing to be true."
"I, I think I even see one smiling!" "Oh my gosh - man!"....
Tiffany’s grandmother was her best friend. Tiffany didn’t have a lot of kids in her building, and grandma was goofier and more imaginative than most of them anyway.
Tiff could hardly take her eyes off of the worms. They were gooey and slimy, but they weren’t brown, like the ones that she was used to. They were all different colors. There were red ones, purple ones, blue ones, neon pink and even bright, bright green ones. Some even had sparkles and polka dots, checkerboards and even maybe some stripes!
She knew that she couldn’t be anywhere near her home because she had never seen anything like this before, and she was quite an adventurer. She wanted to touch the little earthly creatures, hold them in her hands and feel their wet and slimy, cool, ribbed skin slither across her palm in the worst way. She also knew that she couldn’t jump off of the rooftop, it was too high and she’d get hurt. And although she loved her bubble gum and knew that it was strong, she still couldn’t trust it to hold up under her weight as it was stretched to its capacity over the roof edge. After giving up on that idea, she looked a little further, and to her left, she found a big crystal like slide. It was so glittery and shiny. Not to mention it was in just the right place at the right time. It would be able to take her from the roof top, safely to the ground. Wow, as if everything else that had happened this afternoon wasn’t amazing enough, here now was this slide.
"Holy cow!" She exclaimed.
"It's got wacky blinking lights on its' sides, with billions of colors!"
"Well, maybe not billions, but there’s lots! They’re bright yellow, fuchsia, green, purple and red." "Wow! Even pinky-blue lights too?!"
"…And look, there’s fancy gold curly-cues - and powder white clouds covering its surface…"
Tiffany was really having trouble believing her eyes. She’d never seen anything like this, ever - even at the State Fair, let alone near her Seattle home. The slide had white fluffy feathered wings on the sides, at the very top, that fluttered. In fact, they tickled her cheeks and the tops of her hands as she climbed aboard, so much so, that she almost had to let go!
In fact, she thought that she may have heard them coo, too.
She couldn’t wait to test it out. She tore off her shoes but kept on her slippery socks (for more speed!) and jumped on the huge, slick, slide and whew, she was gone!
The lights were blinking, tinker bells were ringing, slide whistles blew, and the whole thing lit up like a giant pinball machine! It was so slippery and fast that it glistened from top to bottom just as proud as it could be. It even seemed to try to puff itself up more, by standing taller and straighter as she flew down its surface.
When she reached the bottom of the slide, she’d landed on a satiny soft, down pillow of emerald green. For a moment she just lay there looking up at the sky - and quietly became one with the bright blue universe. She then burst into laughter, which after awhile subsided into soft, gurgling, giggles. After that, she sat up like she’d been shot out of a cannon. Where was she? She then jumped off of the squishy satin pillow, bent over and knelt down immediately, picking up one of the gooey, brilliantly colored earthworms.
"Oooh, it’s wriggling, and wiggling like crazy, this little guy! He's wet and slimy too - It sure feels good!" "....wonder if they all feel this way or if they have different, lumps, bumps, ribs and stuff!" "They are all so cute!"..... “and ooey, gooey," she hoarsely whispered.
Her eyes trailed off to the many others gathered up together on the sidewalk and grass.
Next she held a couple of the rainbow striped and glittered ones up to her nose. Sure enough, the pair smelled just like rainbow sherbet! Pineapple, raspberry, lime and orange; all of these scents licked and tickled her nose! The worms were really cold like ice cream and left a sparkling rainbow trail on her palm, yum! She felt just a little bit strange licking her lips with these sweet little worms in her midst. Maybe she was actually scaring them. She hoped not. Nevertheless, she continued on and had managed to crawl quite a ways down the sidewalk and grass median. When she stopped and looked up, she was at the front door of the most incredible toy store she had ever seen.
There were dinosaurs, dragons and fairy dolls in the window! These were her favorite creatures (next to frogs, lizards and turtles - oh yes, worms too!) She saw musical instruments that played themselves, play camping tents that magically put themselves up and tore themselves down, hula hoops twirling madly, paint sets with paint brushes painting strokes in the air on invisible canvasses. There were construction kits - cranes and erector sets spinning around - everything. She could hardly believe her eyes – and, she was still only on the outside! What would it be like when she finally entered in?
She wanted to go inside in the worst way and run down every aisle to see what was there.
She was ready to start pulling things down off the shelves, and play madly with everything, all at the same time! So many things, so many possibilities. In fact, there was so much stuff, that it caused confusion. What to play with first? With so many possibilities, what would she choose?
Could she divide up her time and play a little with this, then a little with that? She was concerned that it could all evaporate at once so she’d better take advantage of a tremendous opportunity. All of this left her a bit bewildered, although this had only taken place in a period of moments, maybe even seconds.
Tiffany wasn’t used to so many things going so incredibly right, so she didn’t know what to think or what to do.
"So many choices..." She thought to herself.
For a moment she became pensive and bit her lip - and she hadn’t even found her way inside the store yet. Never mind, she knew that she had to be welcome there and that it must be open.
“I have to be able to go in." She forcefully stated and started to steam forward, head and shoulders first. She could fathom nothing else.
But, to add just one more element to all of the over stimulation, there was a splendiferous smell of vanilla and raspberry and it seemed to be emanating from absolutely everywhere. The same smell that came from her kitchen at home.
"There must be a kitchen around here somewhere," she thought out loud, with hundreds of raspberry-filled scones mounded on top of one another. Probably all topped with creamy vanilla icing, too.
"Oh boy!" She wondered if she thought this thought too loudly.
She could picture and taste them already --- mountains of them! These swell smells were making her terribly hungry. After all, she’d left on her adventure without having had her lunch and with the scent memory of her mother’s cake baking away in the kitchen. Now her stomach was starting to growl. The vanilla and raspberry smelled so good and so yummy that she thought she could taste it, which made her tummy rumble even more.
"Could anybody could hear it.... Was there anybody around?"
“Hello!!” She gruffly whispered, looking all around.
"Uh oh, I don't have any money... oh no.... hmmmm, will I need it? Well, maybe not. “Her growl and belly rumbles were so loud!
"Garb, garb, glub, glub, grrrrrrrrrr........" "Oh boy." If anybody was anywhere near, they would surely have heard that. But so far, she’d seen not one soul.
Tiffany looked all around the outside of the toy store as if on a magnificent Easter egg hunt. And in spite of not knowing where she was, it was very important for her to find out where the bakery was. It had to be nearby. She simply knew it.
She thought to herself,
"How strange that I can smell the smell, and almost taste the precious dessert, but I have no idea where it is!" "How can that be?"
There was truly no indication as to the scents place origin, its place of creation.
She was perplexed. She looked and looked, but she didn’t see anything around the back or the sides of the building that looked anything like a bakery. So, she very gingerly opened the door to the Toy Store, and poked her head inside.
"Oh my," she found herself saying in astonishment, talking to herself more and more as the moments wore on. Here, the wonderful scents were stronger yet! It all had to be here.
Aside from the swell smells, her senses had now gone completely into overdrive by the Jack in the Boxes that were opening and springing, cascading their wares off of the shelves, not to mention the Pixie mobiles that were dangling and spinning frantically from the ceiling.
Toys were everywhere - in every corner and on every shelf, and each one was more glorious than the last. She really couldn't believe her own eyes!
While gazing at the ceiling and all of its occupants, somehow, above it all, she could now hear beautiful bell like music around. Sort of like the raspberry scent that she’d been smelling, it managed to permeate everything, everywhere - but once again, she couldn’t tell where this sound was coming from either.
The music was clear and its tone round. It was as soft, warm and inviting as pink flannel sheets on a cool spring morning, twice as peaceful too. As crazy as it all seemed, she now felt really, really protected and safe. This really helped since she didn’t know where she was. While hearing the sweet sounds, she could feel herself becoming more and more calm and happy. The more music she heard, the happier and more content she became. In fact, she wasn’t in the least bit crabby, or tired now. She also began to feel more directed and connected to life’s good energy, her earlier chaotic and distracted feelings had perished.
Tiffany knew that she had entered a very special place and was ready now to experience anything that came her way. After all, had she not already flown here, and drifted down to the roof top by parachute dress, only to be welcomed by a magical slide that lit up and fluttered its wings as an invitation to her, begging her to careen down its face from the rooftop to the store front? What a grand and exquisite entrance!
"Fairy tale princesses could easily envy me now," she humored herself.
The music seemed to be pulling her, slightly tugging her from aisle to aisle, and directing her to look here and to look there. Finally, she stepped back outside to the big storefront window, the very place from which she’d started.
Shielding her eyes from the glare with her hand, her eyes landed on a most gallant and colorful creature, a dragon. He wasn’t just any dragon, he was green and yellow with three elegantly striped horns, on which sat a most elaborately plume adorned hat.
He was outfitted with a pair of swash-buckling pirate boots of forest green and a thoroughly dramatic striped silk scarf. A male Isadora Duncan - if you please. He was quite a sight to behold. Not only was he dressed like he was in the middle of a pirate movie, but he also wore extremely thick, coke-bottle-lens, glasses. After carefully observing his eccentric attire, and briefly looking away, Tiffany thought that she saw him from the corner of her eyes, actually point his talon at her and beckon her closer.
While day dreaming, she thought how wonderful it would be, to be able to fly. She loved watching the birds outside soaring and then careening straight down from the wires to the ground, and then scooping up at the last second and shooting up to the sun. Oh, how she wanted to be able to do that.
Her mother had left the big windows open in the living room and the wind whipped and tumbled through the room, tousling her hair to and fro. She started to feel a warm, soft breeze against her cheek, and with her eyes closed, she could feel herself start to tumble through soft cotton like clouds, lulling herself to sleep. With this, she also started to experience the cool splash of tiny raindrops gently glazing her skin, and dampening her dress. Have you ever smelled the air after a summer’s rain? To Tiffany the smell was so fresh that it even smelled a little bit like vinegar! Soaring through the clouds, she was ecstatic and care free. She was also very happy to know that since she was flying - although she was daydreaming, she’d remembered to put play shorts on under her dress! Now she could do anything! At this, she turned up her nose to the sky, wrinkled it all up, and smiled toward the heavens.
The next thing she knew, she was doing every kind of loop-de-loop, spin and dive imaginable. As she caught up with the birds that she’d just been watching diving and careening here and there, she matched them with aerial spins and swoops.
"Try and catch me, round robin! Try and catch me blue, blue bird!" She shouted while her belly bubbled with laughter.
After half a day of this, she finally wore herself out and decided to let herself down to the ground.
"Hew!" She sighed. “I never knew flying would make me so tired and hungry."
Instantly, her dress became a brilliantly colored puff parachute filled with air. Slowly, it delivered her to the slate roof of a building. The roof had lots of bumpy places on it, so at first it was hard for her to keep her balance.
"Oh boy, luckily I have lots of bubble gum stuck on the bottoms of my shoes! Hopefully it’ll in turn help me stick to the roof!" She gloated. "And mom said that all my bubble gum did was make me look like a cow chewing her cud..... I sure wish she could see me now!" She had made quite a bit of a habit of talking to herself of late and yet continued on.
After she gave herself a little bit of time and a few deep breaths to gather her composure and balance, she got down on her hands and knees, crawled to the edge of the roof and looked over the side, to the ground. With the gum still sticking to her shoes, it stretched and stretched and yet, kept her securely attached to the shingles.
"I knew that I chewed Double Bubble for a reason!" she said aloud.
As she leaned out over the shingles, she could see earthworms that had been brought up by the rain from underground.
"Oh Grandma, where are you? I wish you were here! They’re wriggling around everywhere and they look just like live spaghetti!" "They're too amazing to be true."
"I, I think I even see one smiling!" "Oh my gosh - man!"....
Tiffany’s grandmother was her best friend. Tiffany didn’t have a lot of kids in her building, and grandma was goofier and more imaginative than most of them anyway.
Tiff could hardly take her eyes off of the worms. They were gooey and slimy, but they weren’t brown, like the ones that she was used to. They were all different colors. There were red ones, purple ones, blue ones, neon pink and even bright, bright green ones. Some even had sparkles and polka dots, checkerboards and even maybe some stripes!
She knew that she couldn’t be anywhere near her home because she had never seen anything like this before, and she was quite an adventurer. She wanted to touch the little earthly creatures, hold them in her hands and feel their wet and slimy, cool, ribbed skin slither across her palm in the worst way. She also knew that she couldn’t jump off of the rooftop, it was too high and she’d get hurt. And although she loved her bubble gum and knew that it was strong, she still couldn’t trust it to hold up under her weight as it was stretched to its capacity over the roof edge. After giving up on that idea, she looked a little further, and to her left, she found a big crystal like slide. It was so glittery and shiny. Not to mention it was in just the right place at the right time. It would be able to take her from the roof top, safely to the ground. Wow, as if everything else that had happened this afternoon wasn’t amazing enough, here now was this slide.
"Holy cow!" She exclaimed.
"It's got wacky blinking lights on its' sides, with billions of colors!"
"Well, maybe not billions, but there’s lots! They’re bright yellow, fuchsia, green, purple and red." "Wow! Even pinky-blue lights too?!"
"…And look, there’s fancy gold curly-cues - and powder white clouds covering its surface…"
Tiffany was really having trouble believing her eyes. She’d never seen anything like this, ever - even at the State Fair, let alone near her Seattle home. The slide had white fluffy feathered wings on the sides, at the very top, that fluttered. In fact, they tickled her cheeks and the tops of her hands as she climbed aboard, so much so, that she almost had to let go!
In fact, she thought that she may have heard them coo, too.
She couldn’t wait to test it out. She tore off her shoes but kept on her slippery socks (for more speed!) and jumped on the huge, slick, slide and whew, she was gone!
The lights were blinking, tinker bells were ringing, slide whistles blew, and the whole thing lit up like a giant pinball machine! It was so slippery and fast that it glistened from top to bottom just as proud as it could be. It even seemed to try to puff itself up more, by standing taller and straighter as she flew down its surface.
When she reached the bottom of the slide, she’d landed on a satiny soft, down pillow of emerald green. For a moment she just lay there looking up at the sky - and quietly became one with the bright blue universe. She then burst into laughter, which after awhile subsided into soft, gurgling, giggles. After that, she sat up like she’d been shot out of a cannon. Where was she? She then jumped off of the squishy satin pillow, bent over and knelt down immediately, picking up one of the gooey, brilliantly colored earthworms.
"Oooh, it’s wriggling, and wiggling like crazy, this little guy! He's wet and slimy too - It sure feels good!" "....wonder if they all feel this way or if they have different, lumps, bumps, ribs and stuff!" "They are all so cute!"..... “and ooey, gooey," she hoarsely whispered.
Her eyes trailed off to the many others gathered up together on the sidewalk and grass.
Next she held a couple of the rainbow striped and glittered ones up to her nose. Sure enough, the pair smelled just like rainbow sherbet! Pineapple, raspberry, lime and orange; all of these scents licked and tickled her nose! The worms were really cold like ice cream and left a sparkling rainbow trail on her palm, yum! She felt just a little bit strange licking her lips with these sweet little worms in her midst. Maybe she was actually scaring them. She hoped not. Nevertheless, she continued on and had managed to crawl quite a ways down the sidewalk and grass median. When she stopped and looked up, she was at the front door of the most incredible toy store she had ever seen.
There were dinosaurs, dragons and fairy dolls in the window! These were her favorite creatures (next to frogs, lizards and turtles - oh yes, worms too!) She saw musical instruments that played themselves, play camping tents that magically put themselves up and tore themselves down, hula hoops twirling madly, paint sets with paint brushes painting strokes in the air on invisible canvasses. There were construction kits - cranes and erector sets spinning around - everything. She could hardly believe her eyes – and, she was still only on the outside! What would it be like when she finally entered in?
She wanted to go inside in the worst way and run down every aisle to see what was there.
She was ready to start pulling things down off the shelves, and play madly with everything, all at the same time! So many things, so many possibilities. In fact, there was so much stuff, that it caused confusion. What to play with first? With so many possibilities, what would she choose?
Could she divide up her time and play a little with this, then a little with that? She was concerned that it could all evaporate at once so she’d better take advantage of a tremendous opportunity. All of this left her a bit bewildered, although this had only taken place in a period of moments, maybe even seconds.
Tiffany wasn’t used to so many things going so incredibly right, so she didn’t know what to think or what to do.
"So many choices..." She thought to herself.
For a moment she became pensive and bit her lip - and she hadn’t even found her way inside the store yet. Never mind, she knew that she had to be welcome there and that it must be open.
“I have to be able to go in." She forcefully stated and started to steam forward, head and shoulders first. She could fathom nothing else.
But, to add just one more element to all of the over stimulation, there was a splendiferous smell of vanilla and raspberry and it seemed to be emanating from absolutely everywhere. The same smell that came from her kitchen at home.
"There must be a kitchen around here somewhere," she thought out loud, with hundreds of raspberry-filled scones mounded on top of one another. Probably all topped with creamy vanilla icing, too.
"Oh boy!" She wondered if she thought this thought too loudly.
She could picture and taste them already --- mountains of them! These swell smells were making her terribly hungry. After all, she’d left on her adventure without having had her lunch and with the scent memory of her mother’s cake baking away in the kitchen. Now her stomach was starting to growl. The vanilla and raspberry smelled so good and so yummy that she thought she could taste it, which made her tummy rumble even more.
"Could anybody could hear it.... Was there anybody around?"
“Hello!!” She gruffly whispered, looking all around.
"Uh oh, I don't have any money... oh no.... hmmmm, will I need it? Well, maybe not. “Her growl and belly rumbles were so loud!
"Garb, garb, glub, glub, grrrrrrrrrr........" "Oh boy." If anybody was anywhere near, they would surely have heard that. But so far, she’d seen not one soul.
Tiffany looked all around the outside of the toy store as if on a magnificent Easter egg hunt. And in spite of not knowing where she was, it was very important for her to find out where the bakery was. It had to be nearby. She simply knew it.
She thought to herself,
"How strange that I can smell the smell, and almost taste the precious dessert, but I have no idea where it is!" "How can that be?"
There was truly no indication as to the scents place origin, its place of creation.
She was perplexed. She looked and looked, but she didn’t see anything around the back or the sides of the building that looked anything like a bakery. So, she very gingerly opened the door to the Toy Store, and poked her head inside.
"Oh my," she found herself saying in astonishment, talking to herself more and more as the moments wore on. Here, the wonderful scents were stronger yet! It all had to be here.
Aside from the swell smells, her senses had now gone completely into overdrive by the Jack in the Boxes that were opening and springing, cascading their wares off of the shelves, not to mention the Pixie mobiles that were dangling and spinning frantically from the ceiling.
Toys were everywhere - in every corner and on every shelf, and each one was more glorious than the last. She really couldn't believe her own eyes!
While gazing at the ceiling and all of its occupants, somehow, above it all, she could now hear beautiful bell like music around. Sort of like the raspberry scent that she’d been smelling, it managed to permeate everything, everywhere - but once again, she couldn’t tell where this sound was coming from either.
The music was clear and its tone round. It was as soft, warm and inviting as pink flannel sheets on a cool spring morning, twice as peaceful too. As crazy as it all seemed, she now felt really, really protected and safe. This really helped since she didn’t know where she was. While hearing the sweet sounds, she could feel herself becoming more and more calm and happy. The more music she heard, the happier and more content she became. In fact, she wasn’t in the least bit crabby, or tired now. She also began to feel more directed and connected to life’s good energy, her earlier chaotic and distracted feelings had perished.
Tiffany knew that she had entered a very special place and was ready now to experience anything that came her way. After all, had she not already flown here, and drifted down to the roof top by parachute dress, only to be welcomed by a magical slide that lit up and fluttered its wings as an invitation to her, begging her to careen down its face from the rooftop to the store front? What a grand and exquisite entrance!
"Fairy tale princesses could easily envy me now," she humored herself.
The music seemed to be pulling her, slightly tugging her from aisle to aisle, and directing her to look here and to look there. Finally, she stepped back outside to the big storefront window, the very place from which she’d started.
Shielding her eyes from the glare with her hand, her eyes landed on a most gallant and colorful creature, a dragon. He wasn’t just any dragon, he was green and yellow with three elegantly striped horns, on which sat a most elaborately plume adorned hat.
He was outfitted with a pair of swash-buckling pirate boots of forest green and a thoroughly dramatic striped silk scarf. A male Isadora Duncan - if you please. He was quite a sight to behold. Not only was he dressed like he was in the middle of a pirate movie, but he also wore extremely thick, coke-bottle-lens, glasses. After carefully observing his eccentric attire, and briefly looking away, Tiffany thought that she saw him from the corner of her eyes, actually point his talon at her and beckon her closer.
