A Fairy Tale

Once upon a time in a land far, far away there lived a lonely princess. Everyday she would stare out her window, wishing, hoping and wondering when her prince would ride up to her castle and carry her off into the sunset. One day her wish came true…or so she thought. A handsome prince arrived to sweep her off her feet. He promised her a life full of love and everything her heart desired. “Marry me, my love, and everything I have shall be yours” he said. Blinded by what she thought was love, she said yes. Their wedding day came and they were married in front of all their family and friends. When it came time to “kiss the bride” her heart leapt with anticipation…”I’m married” she thought dreamily…they kissed… ”to the most wonderful…FROG?” The moment their lips touched in holy matrimony her handsome prince turned into a frog, a little green, ugly frog. “This is all wrong!” she cried. “Princes aren’t supposed to turn into frogs! it’s the other way around! Why did this happen?” The truth is, nothing happened. Her prince had always been a frog, she just couldn’t see it. She never saw him for what he really was. In her eyes he was everything she wanted and needed him to be. She hadn’t been blinded by love, it was desire that had altered her perception. She so wanted all her dreams to come true that she was only able to see what she wanted to see. The reality was she had married a frog and now she was stuck with him. Being as good hearted as she was she decided to give the marriage a shot. After all, he couldn’t help being a frog, it was just who he was. There must have been something about him that made her see him as a prince. Perhaps if she didn’t look so closely at him he would appear more prince-like and less…frog-ish. This worked for a while, but in the end she realized, he is what he is and there was nothing she could do to change that. It took a long time for the princess to do something about her situation. It was hard for her to do what needed to be done because she didn’t want to be alone again. But, because of her husband the frog, she didn’t get to do all the things she used to love to do. His promise of “everything I have shall be yours” turned out to be nothing more than a lie. Her friends and family never really felt comfortable around him because they knew from the start that he was a frog and could never understand why the princess married him. Then one day she realized that she felt more lonely now with her frog, than she did when she was alone. Being alone wasn’t a bad thing to be, being lonely was worse than anything. She no longer could ignore that fact that he was and always would be a slimy, little frog. She knew she didn’t love him and wondered if she ever really did. This was no way for a princess to live. She needed to be free, to go out into the world and find her heart’s desire. The only problem with that was that she spent so many years being someone she was not, she didn’t know what her heart’s desire was anymore. The time had come to move on. She told the frog that she was leaving, forever. The frog didn’t seem to care. He just grunted at her, as frogs usually do, and that was that. She gathered her belongings and went back to the castle she grew up in to be with her family. Everyone, friends and family alike, welcomed her back home. She knew she had done the right thing and knew that even if she were alone, she would never be lonely again. And the princess lived happily ever after.

The End.