Grateful Times

 

Growing up, I had a strange conundrum which my 3- 16 year old self never really understood, and that was my dad's love of a band called the Grateful Dead.   To young me, the sounds coming from my dad's stereo systems in the house sounded like howling coyotes, but to him they were an amalgam of tremendous talent and creative skill.   I remember asking my mother, quite literally, "Why does daddy listen to coyotes?"   She would patiently explain again and again, but I just didn't get it, and quite honestly I hated it.   It was dad's thing though, so Dad did what dad did even if he had no taste for music in my young opinion.

It wasn't until I was much older I began to appreciate the music a bit more.   I began to understand the harmonies, the improvisational style and impressive range of the band.  By that time they'd mostly retired, but Dad remained such a stalwart fan and he had his whole set up to listen to their music or other music in general.   I remember when I was younger I thought it strange that the band was called what it was, since I couldn't understand why anyone would be grateful to die.   They certainly had the look down on their posters, with skeletons and other ghoulish things but they weren't ghoulishly themed like some bands.  Why then did they also have colorfully dancing bears, and why were the colors so weird on everything?   It didn't make much sense til I was a teen and understood the history of rock in the 60's or the drug culture of that time.


My Dad never participated in any of that.  He was a fan of the music, he understood it.  His mathematical brain, ingenious as he is, picked up the harmonies and eccentricities of each member of the band.  He could tell me about the movements of a show, about how there would be a section where the band just broke into a long improvisation and were so in tune with one another that it just worked.  Jerry Garcia and his ilk were like Mozart in a way.   

As I approach the age Dad was when I was young, I have come to recognize and appreciate The Grateful Dead a lot more as I said.   They sound a little less like coyote, though I will never get over that apt explanation of the way their voices sound, and I enjoy their lyrics and songs.  Growing up, they were a part of the music that informed my life, and I am grateful for their influence. 

(Image courtesy of Wikipedia Commons: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/d6/GDDancingBears.jpg)

Travels in Japan - Lost on the Mountain of Foxes

A pathway along the mountainside stretches before you, weaving in and out of trees and groves of bamboo that stand like green sentinels all around.  What little light that shines from above is filtered in shades of green, or sends long shadows along the gravel beneath your feet.  You have taken this route for your own reasons, perhaps for exercise, perhaps for curiosity sake, or perhaps you are simply lost.

Ahead, a line of torii stretches for as far as the eye can see, creating a tunnel of vermilion set in black, like ocher tar against living flame.  Lanterns catch the eye, trickles of movement from spider's webs caught between the many poles that make up this strange path.  It is a highway of faith, a pathway to the gods, and beside it on either side stand the stoic guardians - a pair of foxes.   They regard you as they have the countless generations that came before you, poised on pedestals with ears pert and tails erect.  One holds a key in its jaws, the other a jewel, symbols of their religious power - treasure and sorcery.  Even in stone or bronze, they are fearsome, their eyes pierce the soul.

"Are you lost?"   A voice, a young woman, echoes behind you in broken English.  Turning you see her there, a Japanese girl perhaps about your age.  She wears a traditional shrine maiden's outfit, voluminous crimson trousers and white coat, her hair falling down to the nape of her back.  You might nod sheepishly and admit you got a little bit in over your head, and could she please direct you back to the path.

She will nod, giggling perhaps, hiding her smile behind a hand as the Japanese sometimes do, and gingerly tiptoe her way here and there.   "Where are you from?  Do you speak any Japanese?"  She might ask.  Ah, you do not, but she is perfectly happy to practice her English as many people are.  

Eventually, through hither and high water, you find your way back to civilization, to cars and karaoke, to Modern Japan.  Taking a deep breath, you turn, and thank your guide, but she is gone!   There is no sign, and no search turns her up.  All you find where she had been is a few scattered leaves and the footprints of an animal in the mud of the path.

Later, you tell your Japanese friends or acquaintances about this story and how strange or outlandish it is.   They look at you, dead serious.   That wasn't strange, it wasn't just a trick of the light or your mind playing tricks.  You, stranger from a distant land, you have met a kitsune, one of the very guardians of that forest shrine and a member of the myriad thousands of otherworldly beings that haunt Japan to this day.   What you saw, what you experienced, is as real to the Japanese as anything tangible.  You are either lucky or unlucky, that the fox didn't trick you or do something else, and from that moment on you pass by those statues with a bit more reverence than before.  

I tell this story to illustrate what first caught my attention about the foxes of Japan.  A fascination that began as a supplementary branch of my overall fascination with Japanese mythology, history and culture and became the impetus for my first journey there.   On that trip, I went to the mountain of foxes, Inari-san, where the kitsune and their patron deity Inari Okami are worshiped.  To say that it opened my eyes is an understatement. 

Until that point Japan was a very distant place both in terms of physicality and understanding.  What I understood came in bits an pieces, things I read or objects my grandfather collected that lay around his house.   The true aspect of Japan remained a mystery to me, even in college as I sat in Japanese culture classes learning history and ideas I already knew, and sometimes ones I did not.  It was all relative to my ultimate goal, actually setting foot in Japan, seeing - no, experiencing for myself.

Cultural experience trumps any lecture, any token, but an abiding mystery provides endless curiosity, question and intrigue.  Ultimately, it was a particular creature that brought me to visit Japan the first time, and with my second trip I wished to visit this odd and elusive being once again.   To the Japanese, the fox is both enemy and ally, guardian and trickster, messenger and god.   Stories abound of people who wander the empty street at night and have a mysterious encounter with a beautiful woman who then disappears as if she was never there.   Other tales tell of men seduced by wealth, gold and power in a magnificent mansion of a mysterious patron, only to find it turned to forest detritus in a foxes' den. 

To know the Japanese fox was and is to know Japan for me, and it represents the best part of what makes me love the country.  A sly wink beneath an austere demeanor, a beauty and grace of nature surrounded by the capacity of man.  To the Japanese, the kitsune (Japanese fox spirit) are as real as you or I, and to those of my readers who disbelieve me I have first hand experience of an encounter on my second journey.  

I was excited to visit Inari-san again, though disappointed by the crowds.  In the intervening years, Fushimi Inari Taisha had been designated as a place to be and belong, a place to see, and it seemed the world had descended upon it.  Whereas on my first trip, it was easy to get a picture of the long tunnels of torii without anyone around, now it was like trying to photograph the beetles in 1965.  This was made worse by the fact I wanted to visit again because the last time my camera was acting up, and many of my pictures didn't turn out the way I wanted them.  

I wandered along the mountainside, past shrines laid out like little villages of stone where candles shone in the dim light like will-o-wisps, enticing me off the path.   My parents, ever patient, tried their best to keep up as we climbed and found our way back to a small hut.  Here, only two years before, a kind man had carved a symbol of good wishes upon a torii votive, and here once again I continued my tradition by getting another.   This time, I was greeted by a new wrinkle, a little carved fox that sat in the window.  It had a smaller one behind it, and raised its paw as if to greet me.  

Immediately I thought of the characters from my own novel, and bought the little statue before we continued on our way.   Our destination wasn't far, a small fountain in the shape of a leaping fox where water trickles out of a stick of bamboo placed in the thing's mouth.   Something about this shrine always intrigued me.  I don't entirely know its significance, but as with everything kitsune, it is shrouded in many facts.

"You know, its bad luck to touch these,"  I commented, tracing my fingers over the ear of the statue.  "The Japanese think the fox will enter you and possess you."

My parents gave a half laugh as we rounded back to make our way down again.  About halfway there, however, something happened.  The stone steps that wind up and down Inari-san are slippery at the best of times, though I never had much trouble.  That day however, not a half hour after I touched that statue I slipped and tumbled a good few steps.   I lay there in serious pain, and more than a bit of fear.  It felt like I'd twisted or broken something.   

The Japanese people, making their way up, just stared at me as they passed, but no one came to our aid.  Luckily for me, the pain slowly went away, and my foot was all right for the rest of the journey.  The lesson, however, was learned.    I'd had an encounter with one of the spirits, and I'd been flippant.  They did not appreciate my lack of respect, and this was my warning.   Ever since, I have always paid respect at an Inari shrine if I see one, to thank whatever fox is watching me for not tripping me up again.

Sitting at the very front, this guy/gal greets you with a golden bunch of rice.

The main gate to Fushimi Inari, this area is fairly iconic

The two guardians that stand to either side of the main gate have stood here for a long time.

This building is a place where people make offerings to Inari Okami

Once again we see the fox, specifically a white fox (sacred kind) with a jewel on its tail

Inari is a god of rice, so its not uncommon to see the foxes with them too

We were lucky to be there in spring with some blossoms

The key represents the grainery, a treasury house and wealth

This is one of the smaller areas of the shrine, foxes flanking a mirror

The Torii create these unusual tunnels of color all over

About halfway up there is a fantastic view of Kyoto

Each torii is a donation from a major company or sponsor.  The bigger torii are bigger sponsers.

This is the strange fox fountain.  I love the dynamic of the pose here

Wooden fox shapped emma (prayer tablets) like these are left by visitors, some with creative drawings of popular anime characters

The above few images are from what I like to call "The Fox Shrine Villages"  These collections of smaller shrines create a sort of town where one can find little wonders such as the fellow above.

This is the shop, and the kind folks who have created prayers upon the small wooden torii I bought.

Giving foxes a humanity, it is uniquely Japanese

These lanterns light the way at night, when spirits dwell within the wooded halls of Inari-san

I Stood Before Giants

With all the trouble in the world, with Covid19 and civil unrest, I find that my mind wanders here and there without much purpose.  Prodigious inspiration eludes me, replaced by melancholy, and it seems as if the world itself has spun beyond much that I want to consider as "sane."   As I lay in bed, thinking on the various things that spiral through my skull on a nightly basis and keep me from sleep I recalled a childhood memory.

It's not uncommon to think of something better, of a better time a better place.  The thought and memory was a specific one in fact, Los Angeles, 1988 or so.   I was about 6 or 7 years old and my parents had signed me up for a science camp at Exhibition Park near the campus of USC in the museum of Science and Industry.  I remember the class in bits and pieces.  A big room, other children, a kindly tutor or teacher that had us paste cotton swabs to a paper or something to allude to clouds.   I remember there were colorful dioramas, wooden shelves with glass fronts filled with rocks and beakers and who knows what else.

I remember meeting my parents on the steps of the museum, of wandering the rose garden, of enjoying the fountain (I was and still am obsessed with fountains).  There was an IMAX or a theater there too which we enjoyed, but my greatest and most favorite thing to do, and that was visit the Museum of Natural Science and Industry.

The museum is deceptive in its design.  On one side, the parking lot sign, its flat gray concrete, polished like glass.  On the other its a rising dome, with red brick and stone structure that has always reminded me of the rise and porticoes of Monticello.  There are many rooms in the museum, filled with fossils and recreations of natural places and creatures.  There are gems, there are displays, but mine is always both a predictable and a unusual mind.

The unusual part of me always remembers the smell of the place.  I don't know how to describe it, but the moment you enter the museum, there is a "cool" smell, like wet stone.  It lingers and makes things feel clean and yet ancient somehow.   I heard once its the smell of wet limestone, but I once smelled wet limestone and it wasn't quite the same.  I don't know what it is, but its one of my favorite smells.

The predictable part of me is much easier to guess.  The main entrance of the museum features a huge coffered ceiling, with marble floors, tall columns that gleam of rose, gold, and white.  In my elder years, I saw this same effect in the Louvre to stunning effect.   For me though, 6 year old me, under four feet tall, one thing and one thing alone held my gaze in that main hall.   That, of course, were the two dinosaurs skeletons.   They stand beside one another, a large T-rex bearing down on a Triceratops.  These are, without a doubt, the most iconic dinosaurs for any 6 year old boy or girl to recognize, but for me, they were especially so.

Now, I know cynical readers will say, "They're not real" or "Those are just recreations" or even "That's not actually a T-rex, there's no complete T-rex skeletons."  I don't care.   I don't care to know at the moment, and I may never know to care unless I get the chance to go back.  Even if I do, to me, they will always be as I described them.  That is what they are, that is what they represent.  They represent the KING of Dinosaurs, and the Horned Helm that stood against it.

The exhibit is glorious, and in the decades since I last visited, it has thankfully not changed.  The T-rex still stands, bearing down on the Triceratops, huge jaws open as the plant eater lifts up a foot and brings its head around to defend itself.   A part of me almost imagines a "Night at the Museum" scenario with these two kicking around a football or soccer ball between one another when the snot-nosed kids like I was aren't around to see it.

Yes, 6 year old me always stood before the titans in awe.   They were giants, the exuded power, imagined thoughts of soggy jungles bathed in red light.  Of swamps and huge flowering plants, enormous insects and ever-present heat.  This primeval world was different from what I knew.  These creatures, now bone, had flesh.  They lived and breathed.  I could imagine the texture of their skin, like leather meeting scale, or the hot puffs of their breath.  I could hear the sounds of roar or bellow, and I could think about their lives.

Such things lived long before I was born, and existed long eons beyond the frail extent of our humanity.  My father once told me that compared to the span of Dinosaurs humankind's history is a fingernail on an extended arm.   So, as the world falls down, as we linger with masks on our faces and tear things apart.   As civil discourse becomes civil unrest, I think back on this simpler time.  I think about when things made sense.  When I stood before giants.

(Image courtesy of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles: https://nhm.org/sites/default/files/styles/wysiwyg_full/public/2019-03/160225_5o1a9257_architecture_mp.jpg)

Emerging From the Vault into the Post Coronavirus Wasteland

The Fallout series of games is one of the most unusual series of games out there, featuring the idea of survivors of a nuclear apocalypse emerging out into the wastelands of the post-nuclear apocalyptic world.   The series mixes dark humor, violence, survival, and often brilliant writing along with the best graphics (of the current release dates) to place players in the scenario.  Most Fallout games start with the player living in a "Vault" which is a massive underground bunker made by an enormous corporation before the bombs dropped.   The premise of these vaults was sold as "survival underground" but most often these vaults turn out to be horrible experiments.  

Most players will cite the emergence of the vault itself as a seminal moment of the game.  The great door opens with a grinding of machinery, there's a blinding flash of sunlight, a rush of air.  Eyes so used to false, phosphorescent light see the sun for the first time and view a land once beautiful rendered naught by the follies of man

Youtuber Gopher called it a "second birth" or "the emergence from the hobbit hole."   Given that the Vault Doors resemble giant gears with a circular portal, its not hard to see that comparison as fair.   Once out in the world, these vault survivors encounter fascinating situations and stories, they make moral decisions that determine the outcome of the game.  The post-apocalyptic world is starkly beautiful, haunting, and a single small moment can capture the real world possibilities of such outcomes even in a game.  Another youtuber, Oxhorn, covers such stories in his series. 

The reason I cite Fallout, vaults and the post-apocalyptic world with Coronavirus is a bit tongue-in-cheek, and yet it is not so far from what is about to occur.   Many people all over the world have lived at home, rarely going outside, interacting or doing much of anything that was "normal."  Now with restrictions slowly being lifted, many of us will be leaving our vaults to venture out into the world.  The question is, what will we find?   Certainly we are not ignorant to the outside world, we haven't been underground for generations like the vault dwellers.  Indeed, we have windows, tv's and we -do- get out.

All the same, as we leave what has become the new normal, we may discover that the society beyond our four walls with windows has changed.  Part of the Fallout premise is how those from underground change society for better or worse.   For the most part the outside world has been in a state of limbo and will continue to be.    As we step out, as we try to gain normalcy, will some things carry over? 

Will we no longer shake hands?  Will we take cleanliness more seriously?   Consider that 100 years ago no one in Edwardian society ate with their hands because it was considered filthy!  That changed as society did, but after a pandemic like this  we may see a return to that way of thinking.   I'm not saying bye to my local sandwich place, but I cannot help but wonder how things might evolve  in the decade/s after coronavirus.

We certainly will see new vaccinations.   In schools, hopefully, I might see more emphasis on cleanliness and thoughtfulness about cleanliness on the part of my fellow co-workers.  Perhaps when I sit down for interviews my urgency about the cleanliness of a school may ring more true to principals who dealt with the real-world ramifications of coronavirus on their school sites.   To be fair, it already has.

For me, life beyond the vault would be a welcome return.   I haven't had to deal with Mad Max style bandits or  mutated cockroaches the size of minivans, and the small inconveniences I face PALE by comparison to the possibilities Fallout presents.  All the same I want to go back to the movies, go to restaurants and sit down, interact with more people, take a walk without a face mask.  I can safely say I am looking forward to that vault door opening, and stepping out and away, making the post-coronavirus world better than it currently is or was before.

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Fallout is copyright Bethesda Softworks.  Any images are copyright to their respective owners and their use and the commentary around them are meant for fair use.

Sherlock Holmes and the Curious Case of the Paranoid Pandemic

Perhaps it is just me, working in schools for 14 years now, but I have become used to the comings and goings of the flu season.  In all my years, however, I have never seen anything quite like the Coronavirus 19 flu.  Coronavirus has been around for years, and many of the chemicals I use at work list it as a priority target.  It wasn't until now, however, that this little bug has gotten a lot of attention, and subsequently, people have lost their minds over it.

I am sure by now many people know the stories, about shoppers hoarding toilet paper and other paper goods.  This run on product confuses me because what good is toilet paper against a virus like this?   Next, is the touching aspect.  People are afraid to handshake or do anything close.  In reality, we deal with flu that is far more deadly every year than this one is and yet it doesn't provoke nearly this response.

That is not to diminish it, this is a very contagious disease, and like all things it should be treated seriously.   On a personal level I have noticed some of my own habits change, but I'm not buying a Costco truck sized van full of toilet paper over this.  My worries come from deep cleaning a school site, keeping fellow co-workers safe and happy (not easy when teachers immediately freak out and start eyeing our own stock of toilet paper).   I've had several conversations, remaining calm and explaining the facts, but its like some people want to expect he worst.

Whatever the case, this is going to be a flu season for the ages, and what I hope is that it highlights the importance of cleanliness in schools and common everyday activities.  Then again, chances are people will go right back to normal as if this never happened until the next scare.

Delving Dungeons (and Dragons)

"The tattered stones are a patchwork pattern beneath your feet as you slowly creep along the narrow hall.  Mildew stings the nose, the only sound the errant and occasional drip of water from the cracked ceiling above.   Just ahead, the hallway splits into a three way path.  To the north you hear soft, moaning groans and the shuffling of slow, plodding feet.   To the west, a shimmering portal glows, its radiance offset by images of what seems to be a floating city.   To the East you see nothing but inky darkness, a yawning emptiness of promise and peril in equal potential.    What do you do?"

To the uninitiated, the above may be the premise of a choose your own adventure, but it is my very basic attempt as a description of a character exploring a space in the game of Dungeons and Dragons.  Created in the 1970's by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, among others, D&D has evolved over the many decades from a niche "Geek" and "Nerd" hobby into something of a cultural phenomenon.

To describe D&D, it is one part Lord of the Rings, one part theater play, one part math and statistics and one part patience.  You as the player create a character from a vast array of races, classes, backgrounds, ideals, flaws, personality traits and bonds.  This character is formed from your own imagination, but their attributes and everything they do are determined by rolling various sided dice to determine how well you succeed or how spectacularly you fail.

You  as a character do not just stride up to someone to smooze your way through the door, you do so and then roll to persuade, deceptive or something similar.  Depending how you roll, maybe that doorman lets you through, maybe they stop you cold and punch you in the gut, or maybe they lift their brows and say "come up and see me sometime" because you were so unbelievably charming.

At the other end of this game is the person known as the Dungeon Master.   The DM as they are often called is part god part referee.  They play all the non player characters, the monsters, they create the dungeons and they stipulate rules and act as arbitrator for things that happen.   The DM is both best friend and mortal enemy all rolled into one.

If we want to use the Lord of the Rings as an example, the riddling with Gollum would be a set of rolls to determine the success or failure of riddles, but the true beauty would be the interaction between the player of Bilbo and the DM as Gollum creating the riddles themselves.  It's imagination meets statistical probability and a great deal of luck, and its glorious to watch.

Back in the day, groups of people would gather around a table with dice and sheets of stats and roleplay characters they would create in worlds of fantasy, science fiction and perhaps more than a little pop culture reference thrown in for good measure.   Nowadays you can go online and see shows like Critical Role which have exploded with popularity and become entities unto their own, inspiring new content for the game based on the adventures of a group of voice actors in D&D.

For me, the adventure began almost 13 years ago working nights in my job.  Back then D&D was still very niche, but I had a group of people I enjoyed watching on Youtube, and I would download podcasts to keep my mind occupied with my work.  One of the things that I discovered in this time was their D&D game which was one of the most crazy, off the cuff but remarkable stories I listened to.  It was silly most times, but there were serious beats of a fantastic story just as epic as anything Tolkien could write.  I sometimes joke that the only way I kept sane for so long was because of their insanity.

I became fascinated, looking up other Youtubers about Dungeons and Dragons stories, rules, settings etc.   Over time the want and need to play practical D&D grew in me like dragon fire until I could contain it no longer.   I had no practical experience in the game but I tried to go to a local game store to inquire a few times.  Unfortunately the in person experience wasn't quite what I wanted, and the store was not a fit for my style, so I went back and tried to find other means to play the game.  To that end I found a site called Roll20.

Roll20 is a "virtual" tabletop endorsed by the creators of D&D where one can easily play any tabletop games with people all over the world at any time.  It's really a remarkable system and I have had the incredible luck to find a fantastic group to start learning the game.  Now, almost two years later I am still very much a novice, but I've found I feel far more confident and creative as a player of the practical game.

Our adventure, known as "Of Long Lost Heroes" takes place on the Sword Coast of Faerun, a popular D&D adventure setting.  I play as a bard, which is a very social class that acts as a supporter, slinging spells that affect enemy creatures, heal my allies, and inspire them through story and song.   Of course, I am a sucker for strange things, and being the avid bird lover, I honed in on an unusual D&D race known as the Aarakocra.

The Aarakocra are bird people from another plane of existence, and while not a powerful race graced with fantastic stats or awesome magic, they can fly.   The thought of me as this bird, flying through the air and singing inspirations or flinging awesome spells from afar was awesome enough in my book. Thus, "Cyrano Starshadow" was born, or "Jay" in short since I based him off a bluejay that visits my garden. 

Cyrano is not like other Aarakocra, he was raised by elves who found his egg in the wilds and became inspired to seek his own destiny after hearing tales of great adventure.   Thus he traveled to Waterdeep, an enormous city on the Sword Coast and became a part of the Bard's College of New Olamn.  Cyrano would have been content to just be "that blue jay" at the college, if not for a strange invitation inviting him to join a guild called "Sword's Edge."

Cyrano is joined by a vast cast of nonplayer characters, allies and enemies played by our DM, Justin Acala, who writes science fiction/fantasy.   Then we have the other players:

 

• DC, who plays Nazir, our stalwart Paladin of Joy, a ladies and gent's man who rides a horse that is literally made of the night sky.
• Lewis, who plays Naivara, a snarky and often sardonic sorceress of the elemental arts, who seems to have a habit of running into assassins that want to kill her.
• Jadon, who plays Korax, a great beast of a man based on Maori warriors, the last of his people in another plane and who wears a mask to conceal his face.
• Kristi, our archer of keen eye.  Her character Selitae is quiet and reserved, but she yearns to break free of that and come into her own.
• Cyrano (Myself), an Aarakocra Bard initially only yearned to entertain others and explore, but he has found himself as a secret James Bond style agent with an Ancient Green Dragon vying for a particular musical instrument he now holds.

Over the course of many sessions we have all changed a great deal, learned a lot about each other's dreams and fears, and we've become pretty good friends in and out of character.  Sometimes we clash just as friends do, and we've seen other players come and go.  Ultimately though, this is our story, and we all look forward to playing each week.

My part in all this?  Well I am the resident Bard, so being the writer struggling a bit with proverbial block, I have taken talon to paper as the group's storyteller.  Cyrano has detailed his adventures in a set of journals that has over a thousand views on our game forums.  I don't know all of who is reading these journals, letters home as I have written them, but its fun to look back and see the various pitfalls and triumphs we all had.  I've had to wrestle with moral quandries, sieges of fortifications, eyeballs that shoot death, and a vast underground dungeon built by a crazy mage just for the amusement of seeing people get lost in it.

We are closing in on the last parts of the game, and while our adventure might be coming to a close, it is my hope that we will continue to play together.   D&D groups can be flippant and fluid, but a good group like this hopefully can find other adventures.  Until then, there are dungeons to delve, dragons to slay and Cyrano's story to unfold.   There are many questions he still seeks answers to, and much that even the freedom of flight cannot help him to escape.

How will his story end?  Only the dice, our DM and a bit of luck will know for certain.   Until then, dear traveler, safe travails.  And should you find yourself in Waterdeep, seek out the Songbird of Sword's Edge.  Who knows.  Perhaps we can share a meal and song before plunging into the world together as allies.

(If you would like to see Cyrano's Journals you can click either of the above links in this post or look here:  https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/6689112/the-letters-of-cyrano-starshadow)

(Image Courtesy of:  https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2017/08/31/04/01/d20-2699387_960_720.png)