Shaun Phillips and The Hat of All Hats

We had stuffed peppers, steamed carrots and mashed potatoes for dinner that night. Believe me, it tasted as bad as it sounds but I had bigger problems to deal with. Mom was all worked up about my hat and everything that had just happened. She would NOT stop talking about it.

“This is dangerous!” Mom cried and blew her nose into a tissue. “Shaun could get hurt wearing this hat! We all could get hurt!”

“Okay, let’s settle down here and think for a minute.” Dad said while scooping carrots on to his plate. “There has to be a reasonable explanation for all of this.” Then he turned to me and the questioning began. “Where in the store did you find this hat, Shaun?”

“I told you, it was on a rack with lots of other hats.” I knew my parents were not going to let this go.

“Were there others like it or was this the only one of its kind?”

“This hat was different from the rest. There was something kind of mysterious about it. That’s why I wanted it.”

“Did the store clerk say anything when you went through the checkout line?”

“Um, actually, yes Dad. She did saying something to me. She said ‘thank you for shopping with us. Enjoy the rest of your day’!”

I thought it was funny but my parents were not laughing.

“There was a dragon in our house!” Mom gasped. “A- real -dragon! The dragon could have eaten us! The house could have burned down! What if this happens again or what if something even worse happens?” Mom went on and on. “I am concerned for the safety of this family! Maybe we should go to the police.

“Honey,” Dad said, trying to comfort her. “What would we even tell the police? Do we say that our son bought a strange hat and when he wears it monsters come out? Do you really think they’d believe us?”

“Good point Dad. Can you pass the potatoes?” I gave him a big grin but he ignored my request and went right on talking.

“Is there anything else you remember about the hat when you saw it at the store, Shaun?”

“Well, there are these strange words written inside it. They almost sound like directions. ”

“Directions,” Dad asked looking very confused. “Maybe you should go get your hat. I want to have a look at this.”

I didn’t need any convincing! I ran up to my room, grabbed the thing and I was back at the table in under a minute. I gave the hat to my dad and he studied the words very carefully.

“Shaun, what were you doing before the dragon appeared?”

“I built a castle with my blocks. Then I pretended that the castle was guarded by a dragon.”

Dad’s eyes lit up. “Were you wearing the hat?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“That’s it!”

Mom raised an eyebrow. “What’s it, Joe?”

“Obviously the hat brings whatever you’re imagining to life!” He grinned like a kid in the candy store.

“That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard! That’s make-believe. That sounds like something right out of a fairytale!” Mom snapped at him. Then she got up and carried the dirty dishes to the kitchen. She came back with a plate of chocolate chip cookies for dessert.

“How else can you explain a dragon in our house?” Dad said bursting at the seams. “They don’t just appear like flies or ants. Shaun wore the hat and imagined a dragon attack. Right then and there a dragon appeared and attacked!”

Mom still wasn’t convinced. “How can we be sure it’s Shaun’s hat that caused this?”

“Well, I guess we’ve got to test the theory.” He bit into his cookie and then turned to me. “You’re up buddy.”

“Wait a minute!” Mom cried. “I don’t want anyone to get hurt! Joe, what you’re asking Shaun to do could be dangerous!”

“Okay. Okay. Shaun, imagine something silly. Keep weapons and vicious creatures out of it, alright?” He turned back to my mom looking for her approval.

“Joe, I’m being serious! Have you already forgotten about the dragon and the smoke detector and our curtains and-”

“Jen, relax! It’s just for a minute and then Shaun can recite the line and make it all go away!”

“Fine.” She said, shaking her head.

With Mom’s approval, I put the hat on. “Silly” I thought to myself as I grabbed a cookie and took a bite. “Hmm…”

The next thing I knew, the chocolate chip cookies had all jumped off the plate and were running around the room. The one in my hand escaped to join its buddies.

“Mommy do you see this? The cookies are running!” Katie laughed so hard. Then she jumped out of her seat and chased after her dessert.

“I don’t believe it!” Mom said.

“Wow this is really something!” Dad exclaimed, acting like he just got a new toy.

“Shaun!” Katie shouted from the hallway. “Make it stop now! I want to eat my cookie but it’s running too fast!”

“Sure, Katie.” I laughed. “For all that has come to be today in fancy, force, and grace, I tip my cap and send you back unto your rightful place!”

“Ptssssssss….. Pop!”

“That was incredible!” Dad shouted.

“That really was.” Mom agreed. “But what do we do now?”

“Let’s make more things get up and move!” Katie jumped up and down with excitement. “That was fun, Shaun. I want a turn with it now!”

“No. It’s my hat. I’m the one who found it and I’m the one who’s going to use it!”

“Okay, look,” Dad said. “I know this is exciting to you Shaun but until we can find out more about this hat and where it came from, it must stay in this house. Absolutely no bragging to neighbors or friends at school! Am I clear?”

“But Dad,” I moaned. “Kids at school are always showing off and talking about places they go. This hat would give me a chance to be really cool. Please let me bring it to school.”

“No!”

“Please, just one time?”

“No!”

“I want to bring it for Show and Tell!” Katie squealed. “No one else in Kindergarten has something like that.”

“You’re scared of the hat.” I told her.

“No I’m not!”

“You were crying like a baby back when the curtains caught on fire.”

“No I wasn’t!”

“Yes you were.”

“Enough!” Mom snapped. “No one is bringing the hat to school!”

“Please!” I moaned.

“Pretty please, with sprinkles on top?” Katie begged.

“No!” Mom and Dad shouted at once.

Well I guess that was that. Our parents had smashed our dreams. Thanks a lot Mom and Dad!

After the dinner dishes were washed and everything was cleaned up, Dad suggested doing some research to find out anything we could about the hat.

“Do not wear your hat for this Shaun!” Dad said. “We’ve had enough excitement for one day!”

Ah, it would have been great but I listened to Dad and took it off. We all sat down at the computer and looked up anything we could think of. We each had our own ideas as to where it came from.

Katie thought the hat belonged to fairies that lived in the walls of the store. It was definitely not a believable story, but hey, she’s five.

Mom still didn’t want to believe anything that had happened so far but she did suggest that maybe it had something to do with the type of hat that it was and we should find out where it was made.

Dad remembered a magic show he had been to as a kid and thought maybe the hat was part of a magic trick and somehow got separated from the rest of the props and ended up on a rack in the store. He tried to find out everything he could about famous magicians and some of their special illusions.

Dad’s ideas made me think about fortune tellers and other performers who traveled the world with a big circus. Then I remembered that a circus came to our town last summer. Maybe the hat belonged to a circus employee and she was shopping in that store on her lunch break. She looked at her watch, knew she was running late and rushed back to the circus, forgetting her hat.

I thought about witches and wizards. Maybe the hat belonged to a wizard but an evil presence emerged! Maybe there was a battle. Maybe the good wizard hid it in the store for safe keeping.

Maybe the hat came from a different planet in a totally different galaxy. Maybe that planet got too close to its sun and blew up; sending the hat flying through the atmospheres. Maybe it came to a stop on earth, landing in a box that was on a cargo ship headed for the dock. The box was picked up by workers and delivered to the store.

Clearly I had a better imagination than anyone else in my family.

Ideas were zipping out of my head left and right and faster than I could speak them. If Mom hadn’t turned off the computer and told us it was bed time, it’s possible that my brain would have exploded!

For the next few nights we tried to find out anything and everything we could about the hat. We went on the computer and read about magic and supernatural phenomenon. We went to the library and looked at old books about ancient traditions. We even went back to the store to see if any more hats like it had come in. Mom thought that was a silly idea but Dad and I were on a mission and we stopped at nothing to find answers. We searched high and low for information but came up with absolutely nothing!