All of the previous five...

... starting letters of my posts together spell 'llama'.

It's the little things.

I could have gone to bed, I'll have you know. 100% an option for me, but I'd asked for my computer to be woken up, so it seemed the least I could do to write another of these micro fictions.

I also wanted to share a bit of the process of creation for magic systems. I have zero plan. I generally like to have consequences for magic use, and I always consider the punishment system that would need to be in place to keep magic users contained, how effective they might be, etc.

Beyond that, wherever the spark blooms, my friends.

For example: speaking with a couple of friends the other day and my buddy Ken tells me he's had an idea for years of some kind of 'street magic' that would take you from one street to another with the same name. I pondered on that for a moment and he, Brittney, and I threw around some ideas. That would be super cool! Brittney took it to gravestones, I took it to secret underground systems that no one knows about, and it ultimately resulted in my most recent acquisition of a book on the history of street names.

Go figure.

It'll be up next when I finish my current read, but if you're as curious as I am, look up The Address Book by Deirdre Mask.

Today's Word of the Day:

Velleity: A wish or inclination not strong enough to lead to action. https://www.wordgenius.com/words/velleity?utm_source=daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=1683583732

Incredible. Everyday. Everyday I woke up and stared stared at the pile of clothes in the laundry basket. Something inside me wanted them done - of course I wanted them done - but I acknowledged my velleity and went about the rest of my day. It wasn't executive dysfunction or laziness; I washed the dishes and swept my floor. I took out the trash and brought in the mail, but the laundry...

What was the big deal about clothes? I wore them, I washed them, I... let them sit.

"Why are clothes so important?"

A sound surprised me - I'd spoken aloud to what I thought was an empty room, but I could have sworn someone cleared their throat behind me. I glanced around, froze in place and listened. Nothing. Nothing?

There it was again.

"Hello?"

"Yes, hello..."

My eyes finally focused on the back of the chair where before I was sure there had been nothing, but now stood a diminutive man. He was dressed similarly to me in jeans and a t-shirt but also had a bowler hat and half-cape draped over his shoulders.

We stared at each other for a while before I groped blindly for the back of the unoccupied chair and all but fell into it.

"Is this is? Is this how I know I've lost it?"

The tiny man scuffed his tiny shoes and glared at me. "You asked about the clothes."

"What?"

"The clothes. You asked about them."

"Did I?"

"Yes."

"Oh."

He seemed to want me of an answer and so I nodded and gulped. He rolled his eyes and said, "You asked why they were so important."

"Oh. Right."

"I've come to tell you."

"Oh. Good."

He glowered for a moment and then said, "My people are unseen. We can make ourselves seen, or sometimes fall into your visible spectrum on accident but rarely. The world in which we interact is much the same as yours," he gestured to the back of the chair on which he stood, "but with noticible differences. 

"One main difference is that which we consider to be of the utmost importance. Do you understand what I mean?"

I swallowed hard again and tried to wrap my mind around what he was saying. "Like- ah... religion?"

He nodded slowly. "Something like that, certainly. Look around you. Everything you wear, everywhere you sit, early everything that you touch and see and take so thoroughly for granted - textiles. Fabrics. These are the ruling forces of the world. They are so pervasive that you do not even see them."

I looked down and then around the space and started to realize how much fabric surrounded me. "Huh."

"You ask why clothes are so important, and yet you cannot care for them? Because sometimes they are already in use."

I turned my attention back to him.

"Excuse me?"

"Much of the usable land is taken by your people. And while we primarily occupy a spectrum difficult for your people to see, that does not stop the world from changing around us. I was chosen to step outside the flow of time for my people in order to explain: you cannot touch the laundry. Do not touch the laundry. We do not want you to touch the laundry."

I stared. He was so incredibly intense and firm in his statements. "W- why?"

"I refuse to give so much of my time to explain the minute details, but understand there is far more to my story than I can tell. I will, however, explain this much: when you find yourself unable to perform a task involving these materials of which you are so unaware, there is a reason. A reason that is of vital importance to my people, and which has no bearing on you whatsoever. Our lives move at vastly different paces, understand. A moment for you could be a lifetime for my people. Civilizations come and go in the time it takes for you to spend a single day.

"Besides the rare few of us able to purposefully make ourselves seen, there are some who can sway the minds of the larger race in order that we may thrive for a time before inevitable destruction befalls us again. We are by nature a nomadic people, but sometimes," his eyes grew distant, "sometimes we want to settle, to rest, to nurture and grow. And we cannot do that if you sort and fold and put away your laundry."

"So- so," I squeezed my eyes shut. My head hurt. "So I have to- I should leave it there forever?"

"No! Ugh. Just-," he rubbed his cheek with the palm of his hand. It looked like his head hurt, too. "Just stop fighting your instincts. If you find yourself unable to put away the laundry, then- then don't. And when you can, then fine. Our workings are done and we've vacated the establishments. All right?"

I blinked rapidly. "Um. All right." I looked down and then back at him. "What about the dishes?"

He threw up a hand in disgust. "Who gives a boiled piss about the dishes?"

I blinked and he was gone. "Oh, okay. Um, noted. Dishes don't matter."

A sound turned my head to the counter beside me. A tiny being, about the size of the laundry-person, but piscine in appearance with gills and webbed hands and very long feet. "Where do you get off on calling out the dishes like that?" it snarled in an accent I could only describe as nearly cockney.

"Oh no..."

"Aye, fella, you'd best be thinkin' 'oh no'!"