A Mushroom Tale.

There was a knock at my door earlier. I looked at the clock and saw that it was 9pm. Hardly anybody ever knocks on my door at any time, and nobody ever knocks on my door at 9pm. I wondered whether it might be some local kids practicing for Halloween and opened the door tentatively. My old friend the llama was standing there large as life, his head cocked slightly to one side as is his wont.

‘Do you have any mushrooms?’ he asked without offering any sort of preliminary greeting.

‘Mushrooms?’

‘Mushrooms,’ he repeated.

‘I do actually. Why, do you want some?’

‘Certainly not. Can’t stand the horrid little things.’

‘So why did you come all this way to ask whether I have any?’

‘I didn’t come all this way, as you put it. I was in the vicinity and it occurred to me to wonder whether you have any mushrooms.’

‘Why would it occur to you to wonder such a thing if you don’t want any?’

‘Questions come and questions go, dear boy. Why would I waste my time deliberating over the value or origin of them?’

‘But that’s absurd.’

‘Maybe so, but it’s no more absurd than asking what time it is, or whether the train to Plymouth stops at Bristol on the way.’

‘That’s rubbish. Those questions are bound up with some form of rationale. They’re part of a wider issue to which they are pertinent.’

‘Oh dear, oh dear; what a lot you do have to learn about the nature of reality,’ he said with a sad and dismissive air. And then he turned and walked away, as he always does.

The night was cold and so I shut the door. There’s never any point in trying to follow a llama. It seemed natural in the circumstances to make a cup of tea, although I have no idea why.

*  *  *

Ten minutes later there was another knock on my door. I opened it again to find a young Chinese woman standing on the doorstep. I deduced with remarkable speed - not to mention alacrity - that it was the priestess come all the way from Stockholm to visit me. I've never met the priestess, but being possessed of all gentlemanly virtues I invited her in.

‘Would you like a mushroom?’ I asked.

‘A mushroom?’

‘A mushroom,’ I repeated.

‘You mean a magic mushroom?’

‘No, an ordinary mushroom.’

‘Why on earth would I want an ordinary mushroom?’

‘Yes or no?’

Have you ever seen a young Chinese woman frown deeply and cock her head to one side in the manner of a llama?