Fairy Tales

THE DARNING NEEDLE

ONCE UPON A TIME there was a darning needle that was so refined and stuck-up that she was under the illusion that she was a sewing needle.

“Just tend to what you are doing,” said the darning needle to the fingers who picked it up. “Don’t drop me! If I fall on the floor, I won’t be found again because I’m so fine.”

“Only moderately so,” said the fingers and squeezed her around the waist.

“Do you see that I’m coming with my retinue?” said the darning needle, and she pulled a long thread behind her, but there wasn’t a knot in it.

The fingers pointed the needle straight towards the cook’s slipper, where the leather upper had split and was now going to be sewed together again.

“This is lowly work!” said the darning needle. “I’ll never make it through. I’ll break! I’ll break!” And then she broke. “I told you so!” said the darning needle. “I’m too fine.”

Now she’s not good for anything, the fingers thought, but they held on to her, and the cook dripped sealing wax on her and stuck her in the front of her scarf.

“See, now I’m a brooch!” said the darning needle. “I guess I knew that I would come into my own. When you are something, you always become something.” And she laughed inwardly, because you can never tell from the outside that a darning needle is laughing. There she sat so proudly now as if she were riding in a coach and looking about in all directions.

“May I take the liberty of asking if you are made of gold?” she asked the pin who was stuck nearby. “You have a lovely appearance and your own head, even if it’s a pinhead. You must try to grow it out a bit, since not everyone can be waxed on the end.” And then the darning needle rose up so proudly in the air that she fell out of the scarf and into the wash, just as the cook was rinsing it out.

“Now we’re traveling!” said the darning needle. “Just so I don’t get lost,” but that’s what she did.

“I’m too fine for this world,” she said as she sat in the gutter. “But I’m still good and sharp, and I can take pleasure in that.” And the darning needle stayed straight as a pin and didn’t lose her good humor.

All kind of things went sailing over her: sticks, straw, and pieces of newspaper. “Look how they’re sailing!” said the darning needle. “They don’t know what’s stuck down here under them! I am sticking and I stick! See, there goes a twig. It doesn’t think about anything in the world except ‘twig’ and that’s what it is. There goes a straw floating by. Look how it’s swaying and promenading. Don’t think so much about yourself—you could bruise yourself on the cobblestones! There goes a newspaper! Everything written in it is forgotten and yet it spreads itself literally. I sit patiently and quietly. I know what I am and will continue to be.”

One day something shone so beautifully close by the darning needle, and she thought it was a diamond. Actually it was a glass shard from a broken bottle, and when the darning needle saw it shining she spoke to it and introduced herself as a brooch. “I presume you are a diamond?” “Well yes, I am something of the sort.” And they both believed that the other was very precious, and so they talked about how stuck up the world was.

“Well, I used to live in a box belonging to a young lady,” said the darning needle, “and that young lady was a cook. She had five fingers on each hand, but anything more conceited than those fingers I have never known in my life. And yet they only existed to hold me, take me out of the box, and put me back again!”

“Was there any brilliance to them?” asked the bottle shard.

“Brilliance!” said the darning needle, “Oh no, they were so stuck-up! They were five brothers, all five of the “Finger” family. They all stuck proudly together, although they were of different sizes. At the end of the row was Tom Thumb. He was short and fat, and walked outside the ranks and only had one joint in his back. He could only bow once, but he said that if he was cut out of the ranks then the whole person would be spoiled for military service. Next to him was Slick-pot. He gets into everything, both sweet and sour, and points at the sun and the moon. It was he who squeezed whenever they wrote something. Then there was Middleman, who looked over the heads of the others. Ring Finger had a golden ring around his tummy, and the little guy on the end didn’t do anything and was proud of it. Nothing but boasting and bragging all day long, so I went down the drain—washed up.”

“And now we’re sitting here sparkling,” said the bottle shard. Just then more water flushed through the gutter. It ran over the edges and took the bottle shard along.

“Well, he has advanced!” said the darning needle, “I remain here. I am too fine, but that is my pride and worthy of respect,” and she sat stiffly and continued thinking.

“I could almost believe that I’m born of a sunbeam, as fine as I am. It seems to me too that the sun is always searching me out under the water. Oh, I’m so fine that my own mother can’t find me! If I had my old eye, the one that broke, I think I would cry! But I wouldn’t do it anyway. Fine ladies don’t cry!”

One day some street urchins were digging around in the gutters, where they found old nails, coins, and things like that. It was messy, but they enjoyed it.

“Ouch,” said one. He had been pricked by the darning needle. “What kind of a fellow is this?”

“I’m not a fellow; I’m a young lady,” said the darning needle, but no one heard her. The sealing wax had worn off, and she had turned black. But since black makes you look thinner, she thought she was even finer than before.

“There comes an egg shell floating,” said the boys, and they stuck the darning needle into the shell.

“White walls and black myself,” said the darning needle. “That’s very becoming, and at least now I can be seen!—just so I don’t get seasick because then I would throw up or get the bends and break. But she didn’t get seasick, and she didn’t get the bends and break.

“A good defense against seasickness is having an iron stomach, like me, and also always remembering that you are a little bit more than human! I’m feeling better. The finer you are, the more you can stand.”

“Crunch!” said the eggshell. A wagon wheel rolled over it. “Oh, what pressure!” said the darning needle, “Now I’ll get seasick after all! I’ve got the bends! I’ve got the bends and I’m breaking!” But she didn’t break, even though a wagon wheel went over her. She was lying lengthwise—and there she can stay.