Three Wishes

A fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm.

Once upon a time a woodcutter lived happily with his wife in a pretty little log cabin in the middle of a thick forest. Each morning he set off singing to work, and when he came home in the evening, a plate of hot steaming soup was always waiting for him.

One day, however, he had a strange surprise. He came upon a big fir tree with strange open holes on the trunk. It looked somehow different from the other trees, and just as he was about to chop it down, the alarmed face of an elf popped out of a hole.

"What's all this banging?" asked the elf. "You're not thinking of cutting down this tree, are you? It's my home. I live here!" The woodcutter dropped his axe in astonishment.

"Well, I.. ." he stammered.

"With all the other trees there are in this forest, you have to pick this one. Lucky I was in, or I would have found myself homeless."

Taken aback at these words, the woodcutter quickly recovered, for after all the elf was quite tiny, while he himself was a big hefty chap, and he boldly replied: "I'll cut down any tree I like, so..."

"All right! All right!" broke in the elf. "Shall we put it this way: if you don't cut down this tree, I grant you three wishes. Agreed?" The woodcutter scratched his head.

"Three wishes, you say? Yes, I agree." And he began to hack at another tree. As he worked and sweated at his task, the woodcutter kept thinking about the magic wishes.

"I'll see what my wife thinks..."

The woodcutter's wife was busily cleaning a pot outside the house when her husband arrived. Grabbing her round the waist, he twirled her in delight.

"Hooray! Hooray! Our luck is in!"

The woman could not understand why her husband was so pleased with himself and she shrugged herself free. Later, however, over a glass of fine wine at the table, the woodcutter told his wife of his meeting with the elf, and she too began to picture the wonderful things that the elf's three wishes might give them. The woodcutter's wife took a first sip of wine from her husband's glass.

"Nice," she said, smacking her lips. "I wish I had a string of sausages to go with it, though..."

Instantly she bit her tongue, but too late. Out of the air appeared the sausages while the woodcutter stuttered with rage.

"...what have you done! Sausages...What a stupid waste of a wish! You foolish woman. I wish they would stick up your nose!" No sooner said than done. For the sausages leapt up and stuck fast to the end of the woman's nose. This time, the woodcutter's wife flew into a rage.

"You idiot, what have you done? With all the things we could have wished for..." The mortified woodcutter, who had just repeated his wife's own mistake, exclaimed: "I'd chop..." Luckily he stopped himself in time, realizing with horror that he'd been on the point of having his tongue chopped off. As his wife complained and blamed him, the poor man burst out laughing.

"If only you knew how funny you look with those sausages on the end of your nose!" Now that really upset the woodcutter's wife. She hadn't thought of her looks. She tried to tug away the sausages but they would not budge. She pulled again and again, but in vain. The sausages were firmly attached to her nose. Terrified, she exclaimed: "They'll be there for the rest of my life!"

Feeling sorry for his wife and wondering how he could ever put up with a woman with such an awkward nose, the woodcutter said: "I'll try." Grasping the string of sausages, he tugged with all his might. But he simply pulled his wife over on top of him. The pair sat on the floor, gazing sadly at each other.

"What shall we do now?" they said, each thinking the same thought.

"There's only one thing we can do ..." ventured the woodcutter's wife timidly.

"Yes, I'm afraid so..." her husband sighed, remembering their dreams of riches, and he bravely wished the third and last wish "I wish the sausages would leave my wife's nose."

And they did. Instantly, husband and wife hugged each other tearfully, saying "Maybe we'll be poor, but we'll be happy again!"

That evening, the only reminder of the woodcutter's meeting with the elf was the string of sausages. So the couple fried them, gloomily thinking of what that meal had cost them.

This is the answer I give to the popular speculative:

If you had three wishes..?

First:
For a very long time now, my first has been the Wolverine Val-U-Pak. Takes more damage than
Bruce Willis in a Die-Hard movie and is fifteenthousand times the badass. If your only knowledge of our
pal Logan is the recent film X-Men, you have NO idea how much hell on earth this feller
can dish.

Second
The Mantle of the Celestian is a hood and shoulder piece somewhat drab and black in appearance.
Once donned, the mantle conveys these wondrous things: The wearer finds three pockets on the
inside of the garment. Pocket one contains food (with high nutrient content) enough for one day,
every day. The second pocket has the same ration of fresh water. The third pocket acts as a Bag
of Holding. While wearing this aforementioned mantle, one is always in a cool, well-ventilated
place despite the surroundings…Bottom of the ocean, vacuum of space, walking on the sun, or
on the polar cap. The wearer is also impervious to poison, fire, and cold attacks….(which one
would not run into these days unless they started handing these powers out). This is a Magic Item
from a supplement to the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons role playing game. I believe it was
Unearthed Arcaina but I am not positive…

Third:
I believe the name of the Marvel Universe dweller is the “TaskMaster”. His superpower is
the ability to see any task preformed once and mimic it to perfection.
Cooking shows, martial arts demonstrations, sports, musical instruments, auto repair, equation, porno flick, or OS.

Anything…

…if I get them,

I PROMISE NOT TO KILL YOU.*

*…unless, of course, you stand in my way.

The common title of the following joke, I am not sure of the origin:

A man is walking down the beach and comes across an old bottle. Picking it up, he pulls out the cork...

Sure enough, out pops a huge blue genie. The genie says, "Thank you for freeing me from my prison. In return I will grant you three wishes."

The man says "Perfect.... I always dreamed of this and I know exactly what I want. First, I want 1 Billion dollars in a Swiss bank account."

Suddenly, there is a flash of light and a detailed list with Swiss Bank account numbers appears in his hand.

He continues, "Next, I want a brand new red Ferrari right here."

There is another flash of light and a bright red Ferrari appears right next to him.

He continues, "Finally, I want to be irrestible to women."

A final blaze of light and he turns into a box of chocolates!

I have been working recently with the psychological evaluations of children. A favorite technique of child psychologists in attempting to ascertain the problem area of the child is to inquire of the child, "If you had 3 wishes, what would you wish for?" How appropriate is the child's response, in relation to the child's age and background? What would this child change?

If a pre-pubescent child wishes for a relationship, something may be awry. If a child wishes for his parents to get back together, then the culprit is uncovered. If a child wishes for a bicycle, a playstation2, and a monkey, then everything is probably fine.

One child wished for $70,000, a car, and, after a moment of careful consideration, $70,000 again. One child wished for a boyfriend, a car, and a driver's license.

One child wished to be a grownup, to be "old, really really old." This boy's mother had been neglecting him and his 3 little sisters, and he had assumed the responsibility of feeding them and making sure they went to school, and all of this at the age of 10. This boy was overwhelmed. When asked how old he'd become, he answered 60 or 70,000 years old, "So I'd be really grownup. Then maybe I could play with the dinosaurs, if I were that old." His desire for maturity clashed openly with his reveling in the playfulness of childhood, clashed irresolvably. He wanted to play, but this impulse was overcome at times by the desire to meet the challenges with which he was faced in his daily life. The hyperactive state of childhood was not amenable to the responsibility required of him by the circumstances of his world.

When pressed for the other two wishes, he offers: "To be rich, and to set the genie free." Of course, there has been no mention of any genie up to that point. But the theme of bondage, of servitude, had already been well established. What a touching gesture of this overworked, weary child, to project an unhappy, enslaved genie onto the question, that he might free him as he himself would be freed.

Three Wishes

1

I only ask'd to love thee, 'twas a boon
I deem'd the haughtiest would scarcely spurn;
I only ask'd to give thee all my heart,
And pray'd for nothing in return!

2

I loved thee then, and with no common love,
But with that love another wish there grew,
And fervently I pray'd both day and night
That thou might'st some day love me too!

3

That time is past; but in these many days
Since the bright summer-time when last we met,
Another wish, another pray'r I raise---
That wish, that pray'r is---to forget!

Violet Fane, From Dawn to Noon, 1872