Do Trolls Have Big Feet?

 

             You probably wonder why they didn’t have the troll set up the Stone on Calling day. Well, there is a reason for that.

            The answer may have to go back to an existential question.  What is the nature of a troll. Does he remind you of anyone else? The answer may be predicated on your own personal beliefs.
            At some times, and in some places a troll is considered a bad neighbor. He’s selfish, destructive, weird looking and smells untidy!
            But then, there is the question of how big a troll might be.  Do you see? Some frightened farmer’s wife might say that he is like if a horse stood up on its back hooves. Her farmer might laugh and say, “oh no Margo.”  Smiling like he knows more, he might say, “he’s no bigger than my lunk of a nephew by my oldest sister.” This would be meant to calm her fears.  But the trouble with that is that Margo has seen and smelled him.
            Trolls love to steal a lady’s cooking, if they can. It has been done. Ring any bells? People on this side of the big water say the same thing about another wild fellow, that we know relatively well.
            Of course Zaar asked Snul to come and be with everyone at the Calling and Stone placement. He had to make a trip to the troll’s cave behind the mountain to have a little chat with him. First Snul refused to come out when called, and Zaar wasn’t interested in going into the cave himself. He had made that mistake before.
            When Snul stuck his head out to see what Zaar wanted, he was astounded to be asked to come and be with the population. But when he found out that a large stone was going to need to be set in place he figured that’s why he was being invited and he wanted nothing to do with it.
            So Zaar went on home to Tinka, had dinner and went to bed.  In the morning he got up and did all as in the previous bit of his story. After the Calling and Stone placement he came home again, just like the previous day, had dinner and went to bed.
            In the morning of the second day, there was a loud knocking on the little blue wooden door at the entrance to the tidy burrow. The knocker was a flustered red-headed bare footed goat herding boy.
            “Zaar!” And he took a minute to catch his breath. “Somebody has pulled the new stone out of the ground.  I took my goats up there this morning and it was clear down at the bottom of the hill! I thought I better tell you! What will you do?”
            Tinka got the boy a glass of milk and a slice of seedy cake and when he was done they sent him back to his goats.
            “Thanks, Been, I’ll be deciding,” said Zaar.
            So, Zaar went back to Snul’s cave and made him come out and follow him to the hill and he made him plant the stone again. Snul wasn’t that much of a tough guy, he had just gotten his nose out of joint.  It’s a thing trolls are prone to.
            I guess the point, if there is a point, is that you wouldn’t catch Ralph shoving your outdoor fridge off the deck or rolling your car over just for nasty kicks. Maybe some of those guys from further out in the wilderness might, but I’m not sure they would go out of their way to mess with people’s gardens or whatever.
            On the other hand, we have heard of stolen fish, purloined chickens, bits of mischief here and there in the great forests. So, maybe there is something a little trollish about at least some of our arboreal brethren?
            You must judge for yourself.

            Another open thread of course!