S3 E25 Alice Returns in Through The Looking Glass

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Good evening and welcome to the Comforting Voice Podcast. I'm your host, Shasta Ray, and I'm joined in the studio by Emmy the Minimica, who thinks she's gonna get behind my laptop, and uh I don't know what she thinks she's up to. Come here. Come on, eat your pellets. I was gonna have the cockatiels down here, but they have decided in the past couple weeks that they are not only bored, but also adventurous, and they are just getting into everything. I had them down here with me in the studio on Tuesday when I was editing the podcast, and they were diving into boxes, they were tearing up cardboard, they were running around under tables. It was out of control, totally out of control. So I've got to try to find stuff for them. I've got tons of bird toys, and none of my birds are interested in the bird toys. Of course, they just want to eat stuff like my computer equipment and my hobbies and my paperwork. So there's always something going on in my house, I'm telling ya. But hey, let's get you off to a good weekend, starting off with your sleep prep, settle in, kick back, get comfortable, squish up your pillow in that perfect position, get the volume on your listening device set at that perfect spot, make sure you've got everything you need at your fingertips, and then when you're ready, give it a really good stretch. Reach through your arms, your legs, into your fingers and toes, wiggle your fingers and toes, and then release that stretch. And then just take a moment to appreciate how good that feels, that whole sequence, and follow up your stretch with a good deep breath of air. Let's try that new technique. Inhale to about the count of four, hold it for about three seconds, take another quick little inhale to top it off, and then exhale to about the count of six. That extra little tiny inhale at the top of your inhale does so much to kind of reset everything in the moment and offload any kind of tension, negativity, stress in the moment. It helps prep you to wind down and relax and fall asleep. Awesome stuff. Do you want to say hello? Can you tell everyone hello? That's not hello. Say hello. Good bird. Alright. Okie dokie, so we just went through several edits. We're having technical difficulties in the studio tonight. First, the giant dog blasted through the door with his giant head. It's kind of like a big rock. And he stomped around in here all proud of himself. I got him settled down in the hallway, and he's out there doing old dog noises and breathing loudly, but I think he's good, and he'll come in and help with the editing process when you can't hear him anymore. Meanwhile, little Miss Emmy, the mini macaw, is stomping around on the keyboard raising heck, so we had to get her settled down, and I think after that we got the record button going again. Here we are. Wow. Anyway, I think really before we go ahead with this episode, I should take just a second, remind you to check out comfortingvoice.com. All of the episodes can be heard there. It's a very easy link to share with your friends and your family if you feel like you know someone else who would like to join the fun with us. And really, lots of good stuff on the website, and I finally figured out how to do the upgrade I was wanting to do on it. I might be able to get to that before Tuesday's episode, not sure. I'll try to have that reveal at least by next Friday. So anyway, check back often, and I do have some other links there, so go check those out. Okie dokie, so let's get into our new book. Oh my gosh. I hope you all enjoyed Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. I had so much fun reading that, and that's how I decided we just needed to hang out with Alice a little bit more. She seems like such a cool kid. I needed to see what she was up to this time. So we're gonna get started. Tonight is our first chapter. This one's gonna roll along rapidly, and while we read it, I'll make a decision on what our next book is. What do you think? Okie dokie. And speaking of which, when you're over at the website, like I mentioned a minute ago, comfortingvoice.com, there's a little microphone icon there. So if you go there from your listening device, your phone, a tablet that has a microphone on it, you can leave a voicemail. You can suggest a book, you can uh suggest content, you can leave a question, whatever you want, just be nice. There's also a contact link. So if you prefer to type a message out, you can do that too. Here again, suggestions, questions, comments. We would love to hear from you. Okay, let's get started on tonight's episode. So we've completed Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, and tonight is our first night of Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll. This is chapter one, and it's titled Looking Glass House. One thing was certain that the white kitten had had nothing to do with it. It was the black kitten's fault entirely, for the white kitten had been having its face washed by the old cat for the last quarter of an hour, and bearing it pretty well, considering so you see, it couldn't have had any hand in the mischief. The way Dinah washed her children's faces was this. First she held the poor thing down by its ear with one paw, and then with the other paw she rubbed its face all over the wrong way, beginning at the nose, and just now, as I said, she was hard at work on the white kitten, which was laying quite still and trying to purr, no doubt feeling that it was all meant for its own good. But the black kitten had been finished with earlier in the afternoon, and so while Alice was sitting curled up in a corner of the great armchair, half talking to herself and half asleep, the kitten had been having a grand game of romps with the ball of worsted Alice had been trying to wind up, and had been rolling it up and down until it had all come undone again, and there it was, spread over the hearth rug, all knots and tangles with the kitten running after its own tail in the middle. Oh you wicked little thing, cried Alice, catching up the kitten and giving it a little kiss to make it understand that it was in disgrace. Really, Dina ought to have taught you better manners. You ought, Dina, you know you ought, she added, looking reproachfully at the old cat, and speaking in as cross a voice as she could manage. And then she scrambled back into the armchair, taking the kitten and the worsted with her, and began winding up the ball again. But she didn't get on very fast, as she was talking all the time, sometimes to the kitten and sometimes to herself. Kitty sat very demurely on her knee, pretending to watch the progress of the winding, and now and then putting out one paw and gently touching the ball, as if it would be glad to help if it might. Do you know what tomorrow is, Kitty? Alice began. You'd have guessed if you'd been up in the window with me, only Dinah was making you tidy so you couldn't. I was watching the boys getting in sticks for the bonfire, and it wants plenty of sticks, Kitty, only it got so cold and it snowed so that they had to leave off. Never mind, Kitty, we'll go and see the bonfire tomorrow. Here Alice wound two or three turns of the worsted around the kitten's neck just to see how it would look. This led to a scramble in which the ball rolled down upon the floor, and yards and yards of it got unwound again. Do you know I was so angry, Kitty? Alice went on as soon as they were comfortably settled again. When I saw all the mischief you'd been doing, I was very nearly opening the window and putting you out in the snow. And you'd have deserved it, you little mischievous darling. What have you got to say for yourself? Now don't interrupt me, she went on, holding up one finger. I'm going to tell you all your faults. Number one, you squeaked twice while Dinah was washing your face this morning. Now you can't deny it, Kitty. I heard you what's that you say? Pretending that the kitty was speaking. Her paw went into your eye? Well that's your fault for keeping your eyes open. If you'd shut them tied up, it wouldn't have happened. Now don't make any more excuses, but listen, number two, you pulled Snowdrop away by the tail just as I had put down the saucer of milk before her. What? You were thirsty, were you? How do you know she wasn't thirsty too? And now for number three, you unwound every bit of the worsted while I wasn't looking. That's three faults, Kitty, and you've not been punished for any of them yet. You know I'm saving up all your punishments for Wednesday week. Suppose they'd saved up all my punishments. She went on, talking more to herself than the kitten. What would they do at the end of the year? I should be sent to prison, I suppose, when the day came. Or let me see, suppose each punishment was to be going without a dinner. Then when the miserable day came, I should have to go without fifty dinners at once. Well I shouldn't mind that much. I'd far rather go without them than eat them. Do you hear the snow against the window panes, Kitty? How nice and soft it sounds, just as if someone was kissing the window all over outside. I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields that it kisses them so gently, and then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt. And perhaps it says Go to sleep, darlings till the summer comes again. And when they wake up in the summer, Kitty, they dress themselves all in green and dance about whenever the wind blows. Oh it's very pretty, cried Alice, dropping the ball of worsted clapper hands, and I do so wish it was true. I'm sure the woods look sleepy in the autumn when the leaves are getting brown. Kitty, can you play chess? Now don't smile, my dear, I'm asking it seriously because when we were playing just now, you watched as if you understood it, and when I said check, you purred. Well it was a nice check, Kitty, and I really might have won if it hadn't been for that nasty knight that came wiggling down on my pieces. Kitty, dear, let's pretend. And here I wish I could tell you half the things Alice used to say, beginning with her favourite phrase let's pretend. She had had quite a long argument with her sister only the day before, all because Alice had begun with let's pretend we're kings and queens, and her sister, who liked being very exact, had argued that they couldn't, because there were only two of them, and Alice had been reduced at last to say Well, you can be one of them then, and I'll be all the rest. And once she had really frightened her old nurse by shouting suddenly in her ear Nurse, do let's pretend I'm a hungry hyena and you're a bone. But this is taking us away from Alice's speech to the kitten. Let's pretend that you're the red queen, Kitty. Do you know that if you sat up and folded your arms, you'd look exactly like her? Now do try, that's a deer. And Alice got the red queen off the table and set it up before the kitten as a model for it to imitate. However, the thing didn't succeed, principally, Alice said, because the kitten wouldn't fold its arms properly. So to punish it, she held it up to the looking glass, that it might see how sulky it was. And if you're not good directly, she added, I'll put you through into looking glass house. How would you like that? Now if you'll only attend, Kitty, and not talk so much, I'll tell you all my ideas about looking glass house. First there's the room that you can see through the glass. That's just the same as our drawing room, only the things go the other way. I can see all of it when I get up on a chair, all but the bit behind the fireplace. Oh, I do wish I could see that bit. I want so much to know whether they've a fire in winter. You never can tell, you know, unless our fire smokes, and then the smoke comes up in that room too. But that may be only a pretense just to make it look as if they had a fire. Then the books are something like our books, but the words go all the wrong way. I know that 'cause I've held one of our books up to the glass, and then they hold one up in the other room. How would you like to live in looking glass house, Kitty? I wonder if they'd give you milk in there. Perhaps looking glass milk isn't good to drink. But oh Kitty, now we come to the passage. You can just see a little peep of the passage in looking glass house if you leave the door of our drawing room wide open, and it's very much like our passage as far as you can see. Only you know it may be quite different beyond. Oh Kitty, how nice it would be if we could only get through to looking glass house. I'm sure it's got oh such beautiful things in it. Let's pretend there's a way of getting through into it somehow, Kitty. Let's pretend the glass has got all soft like gauze so that we can get through. Why, it's turning into a sort of mist now, I declare. It'll be easy enough to get through. She was standing up on the chimney piece while she said this, though she hardly knew how she had got there. And certainly the glass was beginning to melt away just like a bright silvery mist. In another moment Alice was through the glass and had jumped lightly down into the looking glass room. The very first thing she did was to look whether there was a fire in the fireplace, and she was quite pleased to find that there was a real one blazing away as brightly as the one she had left behind. So I shall be as warm here as I was in the old room, thought Alice. Warmer, in fact, because there'll be no one here to scald me away from the fire. Oh, what fun it'll be when they see me through the glass in here and can't get to me. Then she began looking about and noticed that what could be seen from the old room was quite common and uninteresting, but that all the rest was as different as possible. For instance, the pictures on the wall next to the fire seemed to be all alive, and the very clock on the chimney piece, you know you can only see the back of it in the looking glass, had got the face of a little old man, and it grinned at her. They don't keep this room so tidy as the other, Alice thought to herself, as she noticed several of the chessmen down on the hearth among the cenders, but in another moment, with a little oh of surprise, she was down on her hands and knees watching them. The chessmen were walking about two and two. Here are the Red King and the Red Queen, Alice said in a whisper for fear of frightening them, and there are the white king and the white queen sitting on the edge of the shovel. And here are two castles walking arm in arm. I don't think they can hear me, she went on as she put her head closer down, and I'm nearly sure they can't see me. I feel somehow as if I were invisible. Here something began squeaking on the table behind Alice, and made her turn her head just in time to see one of the white pawns roll over and begin kicking. She watched it with great curiosity to see what would happen next. It is the voice of my child, the white queen cried as she rushed past the king, so violently that she knocked him over among the cinders. My precious lily, my imperial kitten and she began scrambling wildly up the side of the fender. Imperial fiddlestick, said the king, rubbing his nose, which had been hurt by the fall. He had a right to be a little annoyed with the queen, for he was covered with ashes from head to foot. Alice was very anxious to be of use, and as the poor little lily was nearly screaming herself into a fit, she hastily picked up the queen and set her on the table by the side of her noisy little daughter. The queen gasped and sat down. The rapid journey through the air had quite taken away her breath, and for a minute or two she could do nothing but hug the little lily in silence. As soon as she had recovered her breath a little, she called out to the white king, who was sitting sulkily among the ashes. Mind the volcano What volcano? said the king, looking anxiously into the fire as if he thought that was the most likely place to find one. Blew me up panted the queen, who was still a little out of breath. Mind you come up the regular way, don't get blown up. Alice watched the white king as he slowly struggled up from bar to bar, till at last she said Why, you'll be hours and hours getting to the table at that rate. I'd far better help you, hadn't I? But the king took no notice of the question. It was quite clear that neither could hear her nor see her. So Alice picked him up very gently and lifted him across more slowly than she had lifted the queen, that she might not take his breath away, but before she put him on the table, she thought she might as well dust him a little, he was so covered with ashes. She said afterwards that she had never seen in all her life such a face as the king made when he found himself held in the air by an invisible hand and being dusted. He was far too much astonished to cry out, but his eyes and mouth went on getting larger and larger and rounder and rounder till her hand shook with so much laughing that she nearly let him drop upon the floor. Oh please don't make such faces, my dear, she cried out, quite forgetting that the king couldn't hear her. You make me laugh so that I can hardly hold you, and don't keep your mouth so wide open. All the ashes will get into it. There, now I think you're tidy enough, she added as she smoothed his hair and set him upon the table near the queen. The king immediately fell flat on his back and lay perfectly still, and Alice was alarmed at what she had done and went around the room to see if she could find any water to throw over him. However, she could find nothing but a bottle of ink, and when she got back with it she found he'd recovered, and he and the queen were talking together in a frightened whisper, so low that Alice could hardly hear what they said. The king was saying I assure you, my dear, I turned cold to the very ends of my whiskers. To which the queen replied, You haven't got any whiskers. The horror of that moment, the king went on, I shall never, never forget. You will, though, the queen said, if you don't make a memorandum of it. Alice looked on with great interest as the king took an enormous memorandum book out of his pocket and began writing. A sudden thought struck her, and she took hold of the end of the pencil which came some way over his shoulder, and began writing for him. The poor king looked puzzled and unhappy and struggled with the pencil for some time without saying anything, but Alice was too strong for him, and at last he panted out My dear, I really must get a thinner pencil. I can't manage this one a bit. It writes all manner of things I don't intend. What manner of things? said the Queen, looking over the book, in which Alice had put The White Knight is sliding down the poker. He balances very badly. That's not a memorandum of your feelings. There was a book lying near Alice on the table, and while she sat watching the white king, for she was still a little bit anxious about him and had the ink all ready to throw over him in case he fainted again, she turned over the pages to find some part that she could read. It's in some language I don't know, she said to herself. And it was like this. And here in the book it shows a whole bunch of lettering that makes no sense. She puzzled over this for some time, but at last a bright thought struck her. Why, it's a looking glass book, of course, and if I hold it up to a looking glass, the words will all go the right way again. And this was the poem that Alice read Jabberwocky 'Twas Brillig and the Slythy Toves Did Gyre and the Gimbal and the Wabe All Memsy were the Boroughs, and the Momrath's outgrabe Beware the Jabberwalk, my son, the jaws that bite, the claws that catch, beware the jub jub bird and the shun, the frumius bandersnatch. He took his vorpal sword in hand, long time the manksome foe he sought, so rested he by the tumtum tree and stood awhile in thought, and as in a fish thought he stood, the jabber walk with eyes of flame, came whiffing through the tugly wood, and burbled as it came. One two, one two, and through and through the vorbal blade went snicker snack, he left it dead with its head, he went galumphing back. And hast thou slain the jabber walk? Come to my arms, my beamish boy, and O frabis day Caloo Calais he chortled in his joy. 'Twas brillig and the slithy toaves, did gyre and gimbal in the wabe, all mimsy were the Boro Goves, and the Moamraths outgrabe. It seems very pretty, she said when she'd finished it, but it's rather hard to understand. You see, she didn't like to confess even to herself that she couldn't make it out at all. Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas, only I don't exactly know what they are. However, somebody killed something, that's clear, at any rate. But oh, thought Alice, suddenly jumping up, if I don't make haste, I shall have to go back through the looking glass before I've seen what the rest of the house is like. Let's have a look at the garden first. She was out of the room in a moment and ran down the stairs, or at least it wasn't exactly running, but a new invention of hers for getting downstairs quickly and easily, as Alice said to herself. She just kept the tips of her fingers on the handrail and floated gently down without even touching the stairs their feet. Then she floated on through the hall and would have gone straight out the door the same way if she hadn't caught hold of the doorpost. She was getting a little giddy with so much floating in the air, and was rather glad to find herself walking again in the natural way. And that's the end of chapter one. It seems we are on with our new adventure. Oh my goodness. Well make sure, whatever you do, that you subscribe on your favorite listening device so you get notifications when I publish a new episode. You don't want to forget to be back here next week for chapter two. And that's all I've got for tonight, so I'm gonna let you sleep peacefully and have a wonderful weekend. I'll see you on Tuesday for our regular mishmash of Rample Chat Goodness. And until then, sleep tight, good night, and bye bye.