Some stories don’t arrive with a bang. They just… move in.
That’s how Mary Poppins lives in my memory. I don’t remember the first time I saw it. It feels like it was always playing somewhere in the background of my childhood. VHS tapes. Songs half-sung around the house. Chimneys, chalk drawings, carpet bags that held more than they should. It felt normal. Familiar. Part of the air.
But even when I was small, I knew there was something else in it. Something slightly sad beneath the colour. A kind of longing tucked inside the wonder.
Mary doesn’t stay. That part always stayed with me. As I got older, the film didn’t shrink. It expanded.
I started noticing the craft. The restraint. The way it lets silence do some of the emotional work. Julie Andrews’ precision. Mr Banks’ quiet ache. The way joy and grief sit in the same frame without cancelling each other out. It’s not loud magic. It’s careful magic.
I’ve seen the stage show more times than I can reasonably justify. And every time, certain moments still catch me off guard. A line. A harmony. A staging choice that makes my chest tighten for reasons I can’t fully explain. I think it taught me something before I had the words for it.
That imagination isn’t frivolous. That softness can carry weight. That you can hold melancholy and wonder at the same time.
That particular blend feels very familiar to me now. The instinct to wrap sadness in melody. To make something beautiful that still knows the world isn’t simple.
I don’t want to be Mary Poppins. But I recognise something in her energy. The calm. The mystery. The sense that you can enter someone’s life, shift something gently, and not need applause on the way out.
To leave a space lighter than you found it. That kind of magic feels practical to me. And still worth believing in.