Seeing the Wizard’s Feet

There’s a moment in The Wizard of Oz that stuck with me. Not the colours. Not the songs. Not even the reveal. It’s the feet.

The ordinary, very human feet of the wizard, sticking out behind the curtain.

Once you see them, you can’t unsee them. And that’s strangely… comforting.

The comfort of seeing the mechanism 🧵🔧

Most people prefer the front of the tapestry. The clean picture. The version that makes sense at a glance. I’ve always been more interested in the back.

The knots.
The crossed threads.
The awkward joins holding everything together.

How something is built matters more to me than how it looks finished.

It doesn’t ruin the magic.
It just changes what the magic is.

Nonsense as a coping strategy ♠️🌀

This is where Alice in Wonderland comes in. Lewis Carroll wasn’t being random.
He was showing that normal logic isn’t enough.

In Wonderland:

• rules exist because someone says they do
• authority is arbitrary
• logic loops back on itself
• contradictions are allowed

That isn’t chaos. It’s a different structure. Not straight lines.
More like something curved. For me, nonsense is useful.

Some ideas don’t survive clean logic.
They need a bit of distortion to come through intact.

Paradox and comedic logic 🤹‍♂️⚖️

Some situations don’t resolve properly. They’re not fair, but they’re not exactly unfair either. They just are.

Trying to force a clean answer onto them usually makes things worse. Paradox works better. Comedy helps too.

Not because things are funny, but because humour lets two conflicting things exist at the same time without forcing a decision.

You don’t have to pick a side.
You just see it for what it is.

Looking behind the curtain 🎭🧠

Seeing the wizard’s feet isn’t cynicism. It’s just noticing how things are put together. Once you see the strings and seams, you stop expecting things to be perfect.

You start preferring things to be honest. Messy honesty is easier to deal with than polished illusion.

Why this is comforting 🛠️😌

When you accept that:

• rules are often arbitrary
• fairness is sometimes performative
• meaning is put together, not discovered

things get quieter.

You stop waiting for everything to make sense. You stop needing it to.

Final thought 🔚✨

Some people want the illusion to hold. I want to see how it’s built. Not to tear it down, just to understand it.