The least magical place on earth?

We returned to civilization last week to spend a little time with family and friends.  I have a friend who lives in a very suburban neighborhood with a rather odd situation.  One side of her house looks out on a street that is all beige houses with six square feet of immaculate lawn and stubby trees.  The other side looks over vast green hills covered in fields and a mysterious little wood.  I much enjoy the latter view than the former, but short of falling off the edge of her backyard, cannot thus explore the green view but must go forth into the wilds of suburbia to find adventure.  I was up early and had another long car ride that day so thought a little exercise might be good.  It was an odd scene, perhaps one never witnessed by these urban refugees, for it seemed either the hicks or the fairies had invaded, and we are not sure which.

The morning was hazy and barely begun yet promising to be another sweltering day.  Even the suburban wastes look lovely in that early golden light.  They were alone (except for the man mowing his immaculate lawn at a rather strange hour).  Two figures could be seen, one taller and one quite short and neither wearing shoes.  Were they human or fey?  In that witching hour of dawn it was hard to say.  The small one, perhaps a sort of pixie, seemed the one in charge, running hither and thither with the taller in resigned pursuit as a weary slave of its small master.  The dwarvish one darted back and forth, defying all the proper rules of suburban society and walking on other men's grass.  Did I mention they were unshod?  But as the day broadened, they vanished back into their fairy realm, unseen save by the man with the lawn mower.

Ok, I admit, it is a rather ridiculous way of describing a quick morning foray outside with a small child, but for a minute there it almost seemed sort of magical, which is amazing, for I never thought one could find magic in a subdivision where everything is predictable, patterned, and the same, but I was happy to be wrong!  There is magic in the world (even in suburbia) if we only know how to look for it.