A modern fairy tale based on a true story…

Once upon a time there was a little girl call Silver Hair. She lived a hilly village of half-timber houses set on the banks of the Neckar River.

Silver Hair had just bought a new bed and needed to buy bedding to put on it. She was from a place far, far away from that little town on the Neckar River. Where she was from, she would always put a fitted sheet on the mattress; a flat sheet on the top of that, with corners that were properly tucked in at the two ends; and then a soft, warm cover on top of that. Plus, where Silver Hair was from people in her home town used pillows that were rectangular: not too small, not too big, but just the right size to fit under her head at the top of the bed.

But things were different here in the pretty town by the Neckar. For one thing, people here, throughout the land, used only a fitted sheet and a warm downey comforter. No flat sheet on top. Plus, people used huge square pillows: too big, and too square,  for little Silver Hair.

Confused, Silver Hair decided to go consult the friendly old wizard. He lived in a place that looked like a regular department store in town. But SIlver Hair soon discovered it was much, much, more. There, the wizard showed her all the different types of fitted sheets, and why some were better than others to put on her mattress, and so she carefully selected ones to buy.

He then showed her the amazing world of down comforters, a world she had never known existed, coming as she did from a place where she only had ever seen one type of feather quilt before. The kindly wizard patiently explained all the types available in this new land, from the differences in the stitching, to the difference in the thickness of the stuffing, to the difference in the feathers that are put into each quilt. The wizard even took Silver Hair into his secret workroom to show her the bins of all the kinds and colors of feathers there are that can be used to make a quilt. The feathers were arranged in big bins, sorted by weight and price.

The wizard also had a magic machine to unstuff/clean/sort/re-stuff a down comforter. Just when she was thinking there were no more amazing things to see in the workshop, the wizard pulled down a box from a top shelf. From the box he took a small bundle of eiderdown, the most precious substance on the planet. It would cost a king’s ransom to have a full-size comforter made of eiderdown, and the wizard knew that Silver Hair couldn’t afford that. However, the wizard placed the eiderdown in Silver Hair’s hand so she could hold it and see why it was so precious. It wasn’t just as light as a feather – it was lighter. It felt like she was holding nothing at all!

Anyway, after Silver Hair had chosen a down quilt to buy, she still needed a pillow. She explained her problem about the big local square pillows to the wizard. They were pretty to display on top of the bed during the day, but she needed one that would be able to support her neck when she was sleeping. The big pillows everyone used here would both too big and the wrong shape to be comfortable for little Silver Hair.

Not to worry, said the wizard, and he produced 3 pillows for her to try, which looked much more like the pillows Silver Hair had used in that the land far, far away.

The wizard’s shop had a bed, and so he asked her to lie down and try each of the pillows. So, Silver Hair lay down on the bed and tried Pillow #1….

… and it was too hard.

She tried Pillow #2….

… and it was too soft.

She then tried Pillow #3 …

… and it was just right.

Silver Hair was so happy. She bought her bedding, went home and made her bed.

And she has slept happily ever after ever since.

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Notes:
– There really is a kindly old gentleman who works in the department store here in town, who spent well over an hour showing Chris and me everything we ever wanted to know about feather quilts, sheets, pillows, etc. so that we could buy bedding for our new bed. I really had never before known anything about the differences in down comforters, but here that’s a major component to the bedding, so it’s not surprising they have many, many different types and styles to choose from.

The guy really does have a workshop in the store; it’s one of the few places where you can take your comforter to be cleaned periodically (every few years, think). They take the stuffing out of it, clean the feathers, and then put it back together, all with that magic machine.

– I really did hold a bundle of eiderdown, which does cost a king’s ransom, give or take a thousand euros or so. It was amazingly light.

– I really did feel a bit like Goldilocks when I tested those 3 pillows. Chris and I joked about it, and then explained the children’s story of Goldilocks and the 3 Bears to the wizard — er — salesguy.

It turns out that he’d never heard it, though. The only children’s story that bedding salesmen here know is the Princess and the Pea.

That got me curious about the Goldilocks and the 3 Bears story, since I would have assumed it was from The Brother’s Grimm or Hans Christen Andersen, the big-name European fairy tale story collectors way back when. However, as you can read in the Wikipedia entry, it was actually written by a British author. Interesting.

Also interesting to note was the fact that the original story was not about a little girl with blonde hair, but rather about a woman named “Silver Hair.” Since my two-toned hair will never be thought of as “golden”, but one of the tones is decidedly silver, that gave me just the right name for the protagonist of my reality-based tale today.

– I really have slept well on our new bed, with our lovely warm comforter and my “just perfect” pillow.

I guess it just proves that shopping expeditions can have a happy ending.