She wasn't connected to the earth the way the rest of us are. She would walk into rooms and seem to make the ceiling switch places with the floor. When she talked to you, in her sunshine notes of voice, your head went sideways and your feet seemed lighter than before.

Perhaps she worked in the employ of some strange gravity: masses pulling masses not in a linear design, but in fits and starts and sinusoids. Perhaps she was a changeling, a faery-child sent to break the laws of physics for not being entertaining enough.

When I walked into her garage, she was sitting in a lawn chair sucking on a noodle. She made the longest noodles of anyone I knew, with her pasta machine and her super-rubbery dough recipe. Her lunch was always the same: a single curled skein of starch that filled an entire bowl. Sprinkled with salt, pepper, and parmesan cheese. For dinner, she ate lush red and green vegetables from her garden. Tomatoes and basil, red pepper and cucumber.

She was older than me, thinner, but far more agile. She knew real kung fu and could jump from rooftop to rooftop. When I asked her how she did it, she pulled my ear close to her wine-red lips (that day she had been eating cherries) and whispered, "I use wires."

Her garage was all done up in daisies and Astroturf. She had her own submarine, and a pet shark who lived in her giant bathtub. She had every building permit imaginable, an amateur radio license, and was a ULC Minister. She sat there sucking her noodle in the summer afternoon, laughing at squirrels and beetles. "Who are you?" I finally asked her.

"I'm a goddess." was her answer, and I believed her.

The old world had its deities prompted by need: aggression brought forth Mars, the need for ultimate authority prompted Zeus and Yahweh to coalesce. There were lords of love and ladies of light. There were supernatural personages assigned to the soothing of birth and the hastening of affection. There were tiny pixies sent to tangle the manes of horses and the locks of maidens. Later, there were gnomes that hid tools and banished dust with a whisper.

The modern world shrugs off charms and incantations, and stares at the gods of yore as they languish in white marble. Zeus wields solid lightning that can never reach the ground, and Diana's bow is eternally taut; her prey long vanished.

Nevertheless, we have gnomes that steal car keys, viruses that befuddle our computers, and malicious washing machines that eat our socks. Mischief has not left the world. We have kittens who chew string and children who ring doorbells and run away. We adhere to logic, denying that the world is absurd, and denying further still that absurdity can be delightful. If something bizarre happens, like a tiny old woman landing lightly on your chimney on one toe, you might be afraid when in fact you ought to be laughing.

We don't need to believe in the supernatural. Nature itself is mingled with supernature; we just need to experience life in all its shadow and sparkle, all its depth and taste and symphony. The goddess down the street is not looking for worship or sacrifice: she is simply waiting for the people to put down the weights of depression and preconception. She is waiting for them to dance in the sky, in the rain.