Paeter

Let me tell you a story about a little leprechaun named Paeter. Now Paeter was a young leprechaun still inexperienced in little leprechaun ways. He was also not quite as lucky as the other leprechauns, mind you he was still a thousand times luckier than you or I, but for a leprechaun he was a little low on his luck. It just so happens that one day, the day after his 58th birthday that his luck ran out for good. Now in case you didn't know, on a leprechauns birthday their luck increases ten fold, anything is possible, flight, double rainbows, super speed pretty much whatever a leprechaun dreams up has a way of happening, however, the day after ones birthday their luck decreases ten fold to make up for the day before. Most leprechauns are very, very careful the day after, most call out for work, stay home in bed, trying not to move even an inch out of place. The most that ever happens to these careful cautious little fellas is a few bruises and maybe a bad headache. If only Paeter had remembered this fact and stayed home on the 21,171 st day of his life he would still be ok and this story would not have to be told. As it was with any seemingly regular day, Paeter woke up early had a simple breakfast of mushrooms and dewdrops and headed off to work, a storm had blown through his sleepy valley that morning and there were rainbows that needed maintenance. All was going well till Paeter, at the top of a particularly large rainbow, neglected to properly tie his little shoe laces and tripped over them, sending him flying off the side. Paeter plummeted to what he thought would be his untimely demise, spinning end over end for what seemed like an eternity he realized what day it was and where he had made his mistake. Accepting death as punishment for his folly he spread his arms wide, closed his eyes and waited for the end. Oh but if only it had been that easy, if only he had remembered its not that easy to kill a leprechaun, everyone knows there are only three true ways to kill one and falling is not one of them. Not thinking of this Paeter smacked into the ground with a loud thud, bounced once and came to rest a broken and bloodied mess. The pain was blinding and only started to subside once he started to regenerate, Oh Happy Day, he thought, I am not dead, in a few hours I will be well enough to walk home. If only that were true little Paeter, how I wish that were true. You see since Paeter had landed face down he had no use of his eyes, and his eardrums were ruptured, these things together made it impossible for little Paeter to know he had landed smack dab in the middle of a busy interstate that ran through his valley. It was only a few seconds before the first car speeding down the highway plowed over little Paeter, flattening him out a little more, causing more damage for his little body to try and regenerate. As his luck would have it, this interstate was one of the busiest in the state and as long as there was traffic, which there always was, little Paeter would never be able to get well enough to get out of harms way. So there he is, to this day, all day and night for the last 150 years little bits of him being ground into the roads surface. Now at some point in the past they resurfaced the road and unknowingly locked his little body parts between layers of tar and asphalt, forever locked in a hellish type of suspended animation. Aware of the pain he is in, and knowing there is nothing he can do about it. So the next time you are driving down the freeway, and you notice an uncharacteristically nice patch of clovers growing wild by the side of the road, say a silent prayer to Paeter, who's body you surely just ran over reminding him of the agony he is in.




(This story came to me today while I lay half asleep in my boss's car on the 10 coming home from a company meeting)