From Cover To Cover: Gratitude For Once Upon A Time

Leaving Storybrooke

Once upon a time, there premiered a show that would capture the hearts of every fairy tale lover, old and young alike. For seven seasons, it told wonderful, creative stories about an Enchanted Forest, realms, and a forgotten place in Maine called Storybrooke. It told stories about beanstalks, faeries, pirates, and a Saviour who would break the Dark Curse and yet became a villain. There are also stories about villains who became heroes, stories where the Evil and the Wicked help heroes, where known heroes were actually villains. But on a night when the moon smiled over the land, its cover closed, having told the last of its stories.

Seven years, honestly, is too short a time for me but it was truly seven wonderful, fantastical, magical years. I had been there since the beginning and it was one of the best experiences. Who would have known that Snow White is connected with the Wicked Witch of the West and is best friends with Red Riding Hood? Who could have ever imagined that Peter Pan is the father of Rumplestiltskin and is very evil? And who would have thought that true love can actually occur twice and lose it in one realm and be successful in another? It was imagination at its best

This show taught me that hope is the greatest magic that ever existed. Hope that everything will be alright even in the darkest of times. Hope that magic is everywhere, if you truly believe because fairy tales are not just kings and queens, magic and sword fights, true love, but they are stories of hope, of finding hope. It also taught me that every story doesn't have happy endings but happy beginnings. As Once Upon A Time turned its last page, it also taught me that there is light in every darkness and every story has second chances.


Thank you, Once Upon A Time (Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz, creators extraordinaire), for the best lesson about why we have fairy tales. Thank you for making princesses wield swords. Thank you for telling us that princes need the help of their princesses, too. Thank you for giving villains second chances and making them heroes. Thank you for creating a very, very flawed and stubborn and once-orphaned princess who likes red leather jackets instead of ballgowns. Thank you for making a pirate a prince. Thank you for making a powerful and unyielding Dark One teach us how to be unselfish. Most of all, thank you for making us believe. You made our hearts the truest believers.

I also give gratitude to the actors who brought life to our favourite characters, who became the fairy tale denizens who taught us to love, to be unselfish, and to hope.

"And what exactly do you think fairy tales are? They are a reminder that our lives will get better if we just hold on to hope. - Mary Margaret Blanchard / Snow White ('Going Home', S03E11)"


"I refuse to believe that there won't be more adventures, more love, more family, and yes, there will be more loss because they're just a part of life. And in the end, we can get past through it all...with hope. - Regina Mills / The Good Queen ('Leaving Storybrooke', S07E22)"

And they all lived together, full of hope, happily ever after.