If you look hard enough, even an empty pocket can have something to give… and from the time she was born, Tabitha seemed to have a hundred such pockets. First, she gave with her eyes, and then her laugh, and later with anything she happened to be holding onto at that particular moment. The daughter of Travelers, Tabitha spent her childhood skipping down roads beside her family’s tumble-van, dusting up her shoes and pressing flowers into the hands of strangers. As she grew, surrounded by the countless languages of others , she learned first and foremost to listen to people’s eyes. Those who earned her trust or affection, she would leave with something from the folds of her dress—a coin or clover leaf here, a small bell or torn page there. These she would quietly leave behind—tiny gifts for them to find later.
Even after her parents grew roots and became Trees, Tabitha continued to move forward, one laced boot always in front of the other. On truly auspicious days, she would discover someone whose claims were earnest, and leave them with a totem from her old valise. Those who encountered her in this fashion would often swear that she was a magical creature, sent by the forest to aid them in their time of need. But really, she was simply Tabitha, the girl whose pockets were never empty… even if her myriad gifts most often came from the sky, and the dirt, and the trees.
(music by Jónsi)
