I have been over the moon since receiving the Premio Dardos Award. However, one small thing had been bothering me. Barbara Martin, when nominating me, wrote in her blog, 'Raph Neckmann has imagined a wonderful world of giraffes ...'Imagined! My home, our village, Knollshire - my family?! Are they really here? Do I actually exist? What is reality ... ?
I called out to Maureen to help me out of this quasi-existentialist quagmire.
"Of course we are here, dear," she said, "We've just had tea!"
I am reassured - no doubts now.
Our eldest daughter Nexi added, "We don't live in an imaginary world, Dad, but you do most of the time!"
Necky Becky offered to kick me in the shins to prove my reality.
Normality restored to our household, I spent a pleasant evening and retired to bed with a quiet mind.
However, I woke much later in the night aghast. I'd had a dream where all my beloved blogger friends, the humans I've been interacting with in the blogosphere, turned out to be fellow-giraffes! Giraffes, not humans! Have I been hoodwinked?
The thought unsettled me so much, I had to get out of bed. Tiptoeing downstairs, I went out to the garden to look through my new telescope. I turned it towards the galaxy where lies planet Earth. Slowly a great sense of calm fell over me. So very, very far away from our own Camelopardalis constellation, yet I can talk with them ...
The sense of the unfathomable was so strong it brought peace. All was still in the garden and the air smelled good.
