Emily Hoffman

    The wind is blowing. Blowing so hard I feel a bit like Dorothy at the beginning of the movie, "The Wizard of Oz," and have hopes that if I spend enough time outside, I'll be taken there.
     Spending time in Oz sounds inviting. It's vivid there. They have emerald-colored grass and perky Munchkins. If I go I'll find talking scarecrows, lions and tin men. But it's the ruby slippers that catch my interest. The ruby slippers sound more exciting than flying monkeys, a yellow-brick road or greeting the great Oz himself. I used to think if I had those shoes, I could tap them together, make a wish and see it come true.
     Every Thanksgiving one of the three TV stations in Omaha would show The Wizard of Oz. And every Thanksgiving I would leave the pack of cousins and aunts and uncles to watch it. Following the show, when all the adults were still moaning from Thanksgiving dinner, and the cousins were playing games in the basement, I would sneak upstairs to my parents' room and try on my mother's high heels.
     Mom had boxes and boxes and boxes of beautiful shoes, and I was certain one of those pair were actually The Ruby Slippers. I'd try a pair on and make a wish and tap. Pair after pair turned up nothing. I found no magic in my mother's shoes.
     As a child I'd missed the point of those ruby slippers. When Dorothy finally recognized what good she had in her life, all she had to do was to believe to get the slippers to work. In reality, she didn't need those slippers at all, she simply had to recognize what she wanted, and believe in it enough to make it happen. I've come to realize that's the hardest part.
     Over the years of my life I've had a plethora of wishes; many childish wishes from my under 20 years, then later the grown-up dreams of an adult. I've not lost the desire for an easy fix, what I now know would be taking the Yellow Brick Road to the Emerald City and making a wish of the Great Oz. It's the easy way to have wishes granted, petition someone else to do it for you. I've always been into easy.
     Even though Dorothy and her companions thought a dangerous journey to the witch's castle was the hard way to find her way through her dreams, it was not.
     The hardest thing to do is look inside yourself and see what's missing, what you're not grateful for, what you're relying on someone else to provide for you, what you want out of life, admit it, then take steps to achieve it.
     I realize I have a pair of ruby slippers, in the figurative sense, and I've had them all along, just as Dorothy had the power to do what she wanted even though she didn't realize it. It simply involves a bit more pain and sweat than I originally had bargained for at birth.
     Even though I've got the ruby slippers, I still wouldn't mind a trip to Oz this week. I've always had a thing for the Good Fairy of the North's tiara. And her help along my journey wouldn't hurt either.