There once was a woman that went by the name Jan. Jan loved to be outside and wanted to explore everything the world had to offer. Jan loved doing adventurous things such as hiking up tall mountains, she also liked to relax and tend to her garden. Her favorite hobby, though, was fishing.
Jan always felt disconnected from other people and found that she connected with the earth and animals more. She never had many friends, definitely never a boyfriend of any sort. But she was happy like this. She found joy most in just being outside and connecting to nature.
One day on her normal fishing outings Jan caught a beautiful fish. She always ate what she caught, or she would just let the fish back into the water. Jan couldn’t seem to let this beautiful fish go, so she kept it. Once she was back home she debated on cutting this beautiful fish up for dinner, but could not bear to mess up its beauty. At a loss of what to do, she placed the fish in a big tub of water out in her garden and decided to deal with her dilemma in the morning. The beautiful fish was still swimming around in this tub, looking just as radiant as ever.
When Jan woke up, she followed through with her normal routine of cooking breakfast and tidying up the house. Jan went outside to her garden in hopes of finding a ripe tomato for her breakfast. To her surprise, her garden was flourishing with perfectly grown veggies and plants of all kinds. Jan had no idea how this had all appeared overnight. She was so excited, though, that she didn’t think to much about how it happened.
Jan went along with her day as usually. She made many delicious recipes with the plants in her garden. She made homemade muffins and fed them to the birds at the end of her day. Once she got back home she realized she still hadn’t done anything with her beautiful fish. The fish looked just as radiant as it had the day before and was still in perfect condition. So Jan once again went to sleep and decided to leave the fish to deal with till the next morning.
(Jan's Overgrown Garden - Flickr)
That next morning Jan woke up and headed to the kitchen to prepare breakfast. Once again when she went to her garden she was in utter shock. All the vegetables she had used the day before were regrown and doubled! Her planters were no longer big enough to hold the amount of vegetation that was growing in them. Jan was now becoming more suspicious, but had no idea what could have caused this to happen. Jan then saw the beautiful fish and remembered that she needed to decide what to do with it today. So she put off her garden mystery for now and tended to her fish.
Jan took the fish into her house and rinsed it off in her kitchen sink to rid it of dirt. When she was rinsing the fish it began to grow and transform in front of her eyes! Startled, Jan dropped the fish into the sink and ran to the other side of the kitchen. Within seconds there was a stunning man in her kitchen where the fish had once been.
The man proceeded to explain to Jan what was going on so that she was no longer frightened. The beautiful fish had changed into a man during the night and tended to Jan's garden. He had healing powers and strong connections to the earth. This allowed him to grow any type of plant he wanted.
The man proceeded to explain to Jan what was going on so that she was no longer frightened. The beautiful fish had changed into a man during the night and tended to Jan's garden. He had healing powers and strong connections to the earth. This allowed him to grow any type of plant he wanted.
As days passed, Jan and the fish man began to grow fond of each other because of their deep connection to the earth. Jan found that it was nice to have someone to share her love of nature with. In the end, the fish man decided that he wanted to live out the rest of his life as a man and spend it with Jan. They then both lived happily ever after.
Author's Note: I based this story off of the story "The Fish-Peri." In this story the fish turns into a woman, and the woman cleans the man's house every night while he is sleeping. In my story I instead had the fish man tending to the garden and causing it to grow with his magical connection to earth each night. It is a man's job to provide for his family and place food on the table, so I thought this was a fitting comparison to the original story. I also thought it was an interesting concept to have a fish turn into a person's future spouse. I kept with this theme for my story, but the fish changes into a man instead. My story also has the theme of nature, which is different form the original. Since this person changes from a fish into a human I like the idea of them being connected to nature. I think that this fish man is the perfect husband for Jan and is maybe the only person on this earth that she would be able to and want to connect with. I used the same general theme of the original story but changed it up to make it my own.
Bibliography: The Fish-Peri, A Turkish Fairy Tale, By Ignacz Kunos, 1913.
Very creative story! I wish I had more background information on "The Fish-Peri" thought. Was there a man in the house that the fish women tended? Also you said your story is very close to nature, what was the other story like? It is also a little challenging to read because all of it is highlighted in white. Im sure its not supposed to be that way. This has happened to my blog as well sometimes.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed your story and how it was close to nature. It was a nice twist that the fish tended to the garden. I am a huge fan of nature myself so it was nice to read your story.
It wonder how the story would change if the fish man ever asked Jan why she didn't eat him?
What a great story! I thought it was cool to see a woman so passionate about fishing and being in nature because I feel like men are usually given that character. I don't know why but recently I have met a couple of girls that really love fly fishing so it was just sort of ironic to see that again in your story. Overall, your story was very creative. It would be cool to hear another story with the couple from about ten years after they met and fell in love.
ReplyDeleteThis was a very interesting story. I figured that the garden's sudden growth had to do with the fish, but I didn't think that it was turning into a man. I did not see that coming. I didn't read the original story and would like to know more about it. I am curious as to whether there was a pond in her garden that she had placed the fish into or if she just left laying on the ground.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed this story! I liked the forethought that you put in with Jan and the fish-man both being very connected to nature--too often there are couples in stories that supposedly "fall in love" but they don't really have anything in common and it's all very hard to believe. The fact that you had the fish change into a man, too was pretty original--especially since you had the fish tend to Jan's garden. It seems like Jan can fend for herself pretty well, but it's always sweet when people go out of their way to make sure you're fed. The only thing I can think of off the top of my head when it comes to things I wondered about when I was reading was that I really would have enjoyed having more information about the original story in the Author's Note--I really like seeing all the original changes that people make, and it's always fun to find new stories that would be interesting to read...
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