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Goblin's Gold

Goblin's Gold

Mother's garage is her treasure cellar and weapons store. Artefacts from a life of careful thriftiness and interest in the natural world - and a paradoxical liking for toxic chemical concoctions. A legacy from her career as one of the first female biochemists? Her real passion was botany - and mosses in particular. She dreamed of  discovering new species in far-away places, like Joseph Banks. As an amateur botanist she explored Manchester’s abandoned industrial sites, cataloguing the plant world’s resilient re-pioneers. 

 Sifting through her life's treasures is a delight and challenge. Now becoming more frail, she is considering a move to a care home. Mine is the job of organising what to keep, to rehome, and which exhibits are consigned to landfill - adding to humanity's entropic legacy? 

On a dusty shelf, I found a shoe box full of tiny hand-folded envelopes of pale green paper. Each one with a scribbly, hand written inscription in blue biro. What was in these tiny parcels? I brought them upstairs into the house for closer examination in the warmth and light. 

Upstairs, Mother gazed trance-like at the Autumnal splendour of the trees across the valley. I set down the box next to her, along with a cup of tea, and went off to attend to something in the kitchen. 

"Goblin's Gold" she loudly exclaimed, excitedly waving a small envelope. 

"What are you on about Mother?" I said taking the small envelope, wondering if its tiny hand scribed message would reveal. 

A package of Goblin's Gold!
"Alderley Edge, behind the wizard, in a cave, Goblins Gold, 23 June 2001", said the inscription. [8.]

"That's definitely inspiration for a story," I said, still buzzing from my recent Spanish storytelling workshop.  

"I don't see why," said Mother, "how could that be a story? it's just a moss sample."

The envelope contained a tiny fragment of Goblin's Gold moss. The date and location were significant. 23 June is Mother's Birthday just two days after the Northern hemisphere's longest day and midsummer solstice. A traditional time of celebrations and stories of Druids and magical happenings. Alderley Edge's is an important pagan site for druids and wizardry. Were the cave and wizard my Mother's humorous embellishments? One of her favourite authors is fantasy writer and fellow natural history enthusiast, Terry Pratchett.   12.] 
The Edge is a wide red sandstone escarpment situated above the village of Alderley. An edge is a name used as a descriptive term for high land in Cheshire and adjacent counties, such as in Wenlock Edge and Blackstone Edge. The Edge at Alderley is a ridge of land separating a narrow and short valley from the higher ground of southeast Cheshire and Derbyshire. It rises gradually from the town of Macclesfield, until, at a distance of 7 or 8 kilometres, it terminates abruptly, having reached a height of nearly 215 metres above sea level, and 110 metres above the Cheshire Plain below it. Source: Wikipedia


"What a birthday gift - Goblin's Gold for.... A 2001 Space Odyssey! Found in a cave behind the wizard - sounds like a Fairy Tale to me!"   [9.]

"I don't see why" said Mother again "that's just the description of where I found it.  It's very rare you know, Goblin's Gold! I found it in a cave, behind The Wizard pub at Alderley Edge.  I'll look it up in the moss book and show you. It's really interesting under the microscope." She stood up and started searching in the bookcase, full of works botanical and natural. 

Mother's Moss Book with the parcel of Goblin's Gold and tweezers
"Yes..... I could tell the story from the perspective of a microscopic creature that lives in the moss", my imagination firing. 

Mother continued, "I did see some small creatures under the microscope. They're called Tardigrades it think, rather transparent things that live in the moss. Ahh, here is the moss book."

That triggered a memory in the back of my mind..... Water Bears? Moss bears? They'd been a  topic in the Heads and Tails game at Wednesday night Trivia at the Gladstone Pub back  in Sydney. Each week the host from Trivia Magic has a series of questions on an obscure topic, each with two possible answers - heads for one, tails for the other. Trivia participants stand up and put their hands on heads or tails to show the answer they're choosing.  Those who are wrong sit down. The winner is the last one standing.  Could it be that Trivia Magic's Water Bears and microscopically transparent Tardigrades were the same thing? A quick internet search confirmed they are. 

The Wizard (of Edge) Inn, Alderley Edge
Water Bears are a very fascinating creature. They can withstand temperatures of -200 deg C, that's 200 degrees colder than the freezing point of water. And temperatures of up to 150 degrees C. Hot enough to cook a cake in the oven. And they can survive being dried or frozen for 30 years. Scientists think they will be perhaps one of very few creatures to survive a cosmic catastrophe. They can even survive in the vacuum of Space.  As long as the sun shines, water Bears will live. They certainly could survive climate change. [6.]

What if, in that in that tiny envelope, in a shoe box, stored in Mother's garage dwelt a tiny dried up Water Bear, a tun, as scientists call them when in their cryobiotic state? Maybe it's the real-life gold hungry Goblin trapped in a box that Merlin accidentally unleashed? "The mischievous creature then possesses Gaius, leading the once-wise physician to develop a taste for gold, ale and magical jokes." [2]

Or is that just our Trivia Team?

In a dark damp cave, in a luminescent clump of Goblin's Gold, guarded by a wizard lives one of Planet Earth's most tenacious of creatures. A creature likely to outlive all of humanity and our anthropogenic catastrophes. Life's last stand. A true Space Oddessey. The Water Bear. The essence of Gaia. 

#ThriveStory

1. Goblin's Gold luminous moss, Schistostega pennata in species atlas https://species.nbnatlas.org/species/NHMSYS0000310606#overview
2. Goblin's Gold, is an episode in the series, Merlin. Merlin accidentally lets it out of a box and it causes all sorts of chaos and trouble. He tries to lure it, exploiting its penchant for gold, as a bait. http://merlin.wikia.com/wiki/Goblin%27su_Gold
3. Everything you need to know about the summer solstice https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/06/summer-solstice-first-day/
4. The legend of the Wizard Inn, Alderley Edge http://thewizardofedge.co.uk/the-legend
6. Facts about Tardigrades a.k.a. Water Bears https://www.livescience.com/57985-tardigrade-facts.html
7. Tardigrades last survivors on Earth? http://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2017-07-13-last-survivors-earth
9. The Space Oddessey is the only element of artistic licence in this story. I didn't actually say that at the time. But it fits with the date and article, Tardigrades last survivors, which says they could survive in Space.  
10. Film, 2001 A Space Oddessey http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062622/
11. Alan Garner, author of folk tales of Alderley Edge. Described by some as "better than Tolkien" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Garner
12. Terry Pratchett https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Pratchett. He uses footnotes too!



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