Amongst the Moon and Frost: Chapter 6

Fast forward. About an hour and a half, if you will.

It was ending. Could it really be ending? I didn’t want it to. But at the same time, it was a perfect place for it to end. So many emotions were raging through me. Happiness. Wonder. Hope. Awe. Longing. Amazement. And there were still a few precious moments left in the movie. Still a few more words to be spoken.

Play.

“My name is Jack Frost.”

My heart leapt a little. I fell a little deeper in love with the movie. Gotta adore movies that do full loops, referencing the beginning in some way. And the way these final lines were written really amplified the change—for the better—that had happened for my all-time favorite character. I clung to the arms of my seat, feeling a small smile creep onto my face.

“And I’m a Guardian. How do I know that? Because the moon told me so.”

A feeling of congratulations to him. My eyes were glued to the screen even more than they had been throughout the rest of the movie. I suppose it was a combination of wanting to hang onto every word, every second possible so the movie would last and the incredible cinematography and writing.

“So, when the moon tells you something…”

Huh? Oh my gosh. He’s addressing me. Talking to me. Me. When was the last time a movie character spoke directly to you? Not figuratively (although it was on that deeper level, too, but we’ll get into that in a bit). Needless to say, I listened even more closely, my ears perking up at the address. I even kind of spoke back, saying “Hmm?” as if I really was in conversation. In my mind, of course. Because if you talk aloud to a movie character, you tend to get strange looks in return. And on top of all of that, there was no question about the fact that the moon was going to speak to “me.” I mean, just look at the word choice. Not “if” or “maybe when,” but rather, “when.”

And then, the final two words of the movie. Oh, they were just absolutely perfect. Epitome of the theme of the movie. Whispered to you by that character as if they were some sort of top secret, told in confidence, just between you two.

“Believe it.”

Accompanied by nothing else but a precious gift from the winter spirit—a magical snowflake.

My immediate reaction?

I will. I do.

The snowflake “hit” the screen.

I blinked. I could just feel the blue, magical swirls around my eyes, disappearing as I blinked them away. Just as what had happened to Jamie and Bunny in the movie when hit with one of the infamous snowballs or snowflakes. And oh, the feeling accompanied with it. Fun. I wanted to go out and have so much fun. To laugh and play and enjoy life. Exactly as if I had been hit with a magic, fun-inducing snowflake.

The smile on my face grew wider.

My mom and I stayed through the credits. We watched the tooth fairies brush an asleep kid’s teeth before putting him to bed. Eggs and yetis dropping others into large holes that deposited them at home. Phil the yeti sign the Bigfoot page in Jamie’s book. And more.

Once the quirky, funny little vignettes were over, we left. I was practically walking on clouds. Never had I felt so happy. And so ready to be myself, to face life with a spring in my step and lips curled into a mischievous smile. A smile that I hadn’t known for a while, that had once been so customary until it was hidden away long before. One that the personality of my true self never forgot, even as it was forced into the dark depths of my soul.

And it was all thanks to this one movie. This one fantastic, amazing movie that put the magic back into my life. I had never really stopped believing in any of the characters. You know, Santa (who I now always mentally call “North”), the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, the Sandman. And who hadn’t heard of Jack Frost, who was only the spirit of my favorite season, but regretfully I hadn’t given much thought to until after the movie? But I had forgotten about them as darkness, as Pitch, had taken over my life

That night, I didn’t sleep with the light on. Or the fan. Or the stuffed animals. And the music was so turned down that it became nothing more than a soft whisper of a tune.

I haven’t needed to sleep with any of those things since.

Why? What was the change? Well, I’ll tell you this. The movie taught me that, no matter how scared you may be, all you have to do is believe. Believe in the good in life. Believe that you will always be rescued if and when you need to be by your own “Guardians.” Believe in yourself. And then showing your “Pitch” that you aren’t afraid will come all the easier.

So I was no longer afraid of the dark. Telling it, “I’m not afraid of you” whenever I needed to. Knowing that my Guardian—which was and is a combination of my religion and of none other than Jack Frost—was there to protect me. And the sounds, the shadows, would stop. I don’t think sleep so deep had come to me in such a long time.

The only nights when my insomnia would return would be in times when I was overly stressed thanks to work or school.

The movie taught me something else, as well. A phrase never said in the whole 97 minutes, but still there.

It’s not “seeing is believing.”

It’s that “believing is seeing.”

That, if you believed, you would come to see.

I had known this latter motto for almost my entire life. Or, at least, that the first one was not the truth and that you need to believe even if you can’t see what it is you believe in. First rule of religion, I guess. Anyway, after the movie, this latter one became more apparent in my life. Mostly because I still believed in the Guardians with all my heart. Always will. Even though I may not see them. Though I think I may have, once or twice. But there was a bigger reason as to why I took to the whole, “believing is seeing” thing.

It’s because I started to hold such a strong belief in a certain winter spirit, who was the major reason why I loved the film as much as I had. As I do. A spirit that I bear such a huge connection with on so many different levels. A spirit that had gone unseen for so long because nobody believed in him. At least, as told by the film. But I believe that it holds true in real life, especially since nobody really gives a thought to him, just as I hadn’t beforehand. Just a line in a song. Well, needless to say, I believed (once again, still do). So very much. And so I also believed that, as a result, I would someday come to see him, he who had become a massive part of my life. Actually, I believe that I have set my eyes on this particular spirit. But those tales are for another time, perhaps another story.

Have you ever had a friend introduce you to someone who ends up becoming a very important person to you? And so you love that friend even more because they brought the two of you together?

Well, that’s me. And the friend in this situation was Rise of the Guardians. And the person it introduced me to, the very same that I just spend quite a bit talking about?

Why, none other than the spirit of Winter. Jokul Frosti. Old Man Winter. The Guardian of Fun. The only person in this story who gets to keep their real name.

Jack Frost.