WEREWOLF RADAR: Fairies: The Care And Not Pissing Off Of
By Jordan Doll
Published Issue 129, September 2024
Best of Birdy Originally Published Issue 069
Summer is gone. It jammed in on its wind surfer, had its bodacious way with us, and left us sticky and hungover by the swimming pool. It is only now in the percolating days of autumn that we can begin to heal. Here, within a cocoon of outerwear we can grow our strength and a nice layer of winter marbling against the changing of the seasons — for autumn can be a very dangerous time, and I’m not just talking flu shots and mold allergies. It is a time of shifting, a changing of the guard from light to dark, merry to mournful, warm to cold. It is a thin place between one state of existence and another. Simply put, it’s fairy season.
Now you’re probably thinking, Fairies?! Big whoop! They look pretty cute and harmless on TV, and movies, and the Tinkerbell burlesque fan art message board that is tearing my marriage apart. But I assure you, those aren’t the fairies I’m talking about.
A few hundred years ago in medieval Europe, fairies were one of the more terrifying threats a person could encounter while traipsing through the wilderness of Gaul, Brittany or Saxony. Right up there with poison ivy and Romans. Because while some fairies were indeed kind and benevolent, others were cunning and avaricious, and almost all of them were considered incredibly dangerous.
Most traditions agree there are two types of fairies. The nice ones, who are members of the Seelie Court, and the mean ones, who belong to the Unseelie Court. But whether you encounter a beautiful water nymph or a surly hobgoblin, to deal with a fairy is to court disaster.
See, fairies have hundreds of little rules and they are almost always trying to trick you. Forget a piece of fairy etiquette or lose a guessing game to one and you are almost certainly going to be whisked away to the fairy world to dance forever until your feet fall off or some other such twisted fate. Seriously, one of their favorite things is to make people party until they die. Picked the wrong flower from the side of an enchanted stream? Oops! Now you’re doing keg stands for all eternity while a leprechaun spins house music. And that’s honestly just the tip of the pointy hat.
Fairies love to steal babies and replace them with ravenous fairy babies called changelings. Fairies will sour a cow’s milk, make you become hopelessly lost in the forest, cause misfortune to shadow your every step or might just make you disappear altogether. Sometimes a fairy makes a human fall in love with them and then fuck off back to the fairy realm, leaving the person to wither away, pining for their fairy love until they die from that shit. Nobody should ever have to die that thirsty a death.
So what are you supposed to do about them? Well respect is a huge thing with fairies and many people placate them with regular offerings of food and drink. If you do encounter one of the fair folk, be very extra strangely polite. Never break etiquette, never talk down to them, and if you must play them in some sort of game, make sure it’s something you can win: air hockey or Simpsons: Hit & Run.
If you are out walking in a place where fairies are known to appear, make sure to steer clear of fairy circles. Ever been walking through the woods and come across a perfect circle of mushrooms or flowers or trees? Yep, fairy circle, walk around. Fairies can be warded off with talismans of salt, homemade bread or pig iron (though they would likely see this as an insult) and can even be befuddled away if you wear your clothes inside out.
Finally, it is said that fairies began to disappear from the world when humans started to try and make order out of it. As a result, fairies exist mostly in the spaces between these uniquely human demarcations. The border between one property and another for instance, or the stroke of midnight, or perhaps at a crossroads. But the very best time of year to encounter a fairy, is on the day that one season gives way to another, aka the fall equinox, aka September, 22, 2024.
Now just because the equinox is coming up does not mean you should go looking for fairies! I know you probably heard that if you catch a fairy it has to grant you a wish, or if you catch a leprechaun it has to give you its gold, or if you catch 30 to a 100 pixies you can make sweet and tangy pixie preserves that, when eaten on toast, make you able to dunk. But trust me, it’s just not worth it. Unless you are really good at riddles. Like really, really good at riddles. In which case you need to email Werewolf Radar directly then meet me at the crossroads with a tennis racket and a beekeepers mask. Them preserves is as good as ours.
Have questions about the paranormal?
Send them to: werewolfradarpod@gmail.com or on Twitter: @WerewolfRadar.
It’s a big, weird world. Don’t be scared. Be Prepared.
Jordan Doll is a standup comedian, illustrator and actor from Denver, CO currently living in Los Angeles. If he looks familiar it may be because you saw him in a couple of commercials or maybe even doing comedy on Viceland’s Flophouse. Or maybe you saw him performing at Just For Laugh’s Montreal, or the High Plains Comedy Festival, or San Francisco Sketch Fest? Or maybe you saw some of his art someplace and want to get some of your own! That’s not it either? No worries, go ahead and follow his ever depending social media addictions by clicking the little buttons at the end of this bio. Still NOT ENOUGH!?!?!?! Well sorry … That really about it … Website | Instagram | Twitch
Check out Jordan’s last Werewolf Radar Birdy install, The Frogmen Cometh, or head to our Explore section to see more of his past published work.
