Francemyadoptedcountry

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Monday, 3 December 2018

This months theme for our writing group "TASTE"

Jackie's contribution:

Taste
Lily was doing her maths homework.    The assignment was an algebraic problem and she was finding it hard to concentrate and find a solution.    It was already 7pm and she hadn’t had dinner -   Mom was in the next room getting ready to go out. 

Tonight was her Mom Zelda’s first internet date and Lily had pushed her into going.    Looking at the photo together on the internet website a few nights ago they had agreed that the man in question a certain “Steve” looked quite nice and could be just the type of man her mom needed in her life.   Since her parents had divorced,  Lily worried about her Mom.  Her Dad had found a new partner almost immediately and he seemed happy enough.    It was funny Lily thought that her parents happiness was essential to her well being.     Dad had changed since he had met his new companion - more open about things, gave his opinion whereas before he had held back avoiding conflict in the family and more importantly now he was back to cracking his old jokes and laughed a lot.   

 Lily being an only child was perhaps hyper sensitive and only felt comfortable when  Zelda was in a good mood.  These days it wasn’t that often.   Mom in a bad mood meant nothing in the fridge, cigarettes left in the ashtray to leaving a stale smell in the house, wildly coloured oil paintings half finished and empty wine glasses scattered around and drying up like riverbeds.      When Zelda was in depressed mode Lily  often found her when she got home from school, still in her pyjamas, just as if she had got out of bed    - Lily worried then, her school grades dropped,  she sank to the bottom of the class, she stopped eating properly and her best friend avoided her as she was so pre-occupied with herself and her family.

Her Mother had a lot of qualities but as most artists she was an eccentric and the way she dressed sometimes made Lily  feel embarrassed at school events and even walking into town.
 Her clothes were all over the place and if it wasn’t purple trousers with a tartan shirt and fur lined hat on a hot summers day it was a summer dress in the middle of winter with stiletto heels and striped ankle socks in the ice.       

Listening to her Mother get ready for this important night out Lily thought carefully about how she could approach the subject of her dressing more carefully,  putting  colours together, staying casual but smart so as not to frighten off the man in question.     Although listening through the thin partition that separated her bedroom from her mothers she could hear that the dressing process was already well on the go

Mother was humming a song in the next door bedroom - trying to concentrate on her homework she couldn’t help hearing the psst psst  of perfume, the clunk of shoes as they were thrown out of the closet, the rummaging round for a suitable bag and the clank clank of jewellry and she imagined her mom picking and choosing which pair she would wear so she sat calmly waiting to see the outcome.    Her Mom had style that was for sure and she had learnt in college that style meant individuality and she admired her for that even though it was a bit wacky.

The doorbell rang  -OMG  it was “him” and he was early and she hadn’t had time to check out the way her Mom was dressed ….   It was too late now and she watched helpless as Zelda ran downstairs to greet her new date and horrified she caught a  glimpse of her Mother in pink leggings, high heeled sparkly boots and red leather jacket with fringes, dragging a purse by its rhinestone chain down the stairs.   At  the same moment through the glass front door she glimpsed a shadow of purple shades mellowing in yellow and red stripes
Sizing up the purple coat, red trousers and yellow black spotted scarf this man called Steve was wearing;   she knew instinctively that her Mom had met her match.    They had the same taste in clothes that was for sure.




Annemarie's contribution:


Taste
The first taste for most people will have been mother’s milk. No choice really until you begin solids and at an early age you take control over your own eating habits, when can throw your food about, spit it out or squish it around the plate until , hopefully, you learn a few manners. It is surprising how quickly our tastes make themselves known, some of due to culture, some to individual taste.  
Hindu babies progress to  dahl and lentils, African babies to mashed bananas and in our daughter's case her first solids were liver pâté which was all the fashion and being an ignorant mother I had no idea it was far too strong for a little baby. (She is now a vegetarian- I wonder why?) Our son on the other hand had a predilection for Brussels sprouts; it was his first birthday meal and for each following birthday until one day chez his grandmother, having said he loved them, he was served a plate of muddy green coloured objects cooked for 30 minutes, so bitter he never came back to sprouts again. (He is now a dedicated carnivore). Yes, even in families children have wildly different appreciation of meals which have been slaved over a hot stove by their parent. 
A bitter pill, sour grapes - phrases we use to describe unpleasant tasting experiences.  Bitterness is often an indication in nature of poisonous plants and sourness of rotting food and  our evolution was aided by taste, by which we tested the foods. There are people in malarial infested parts of the world who tend to carry a gene which makes them less sensitive to some bitter compounds such as those containing cyanide. Scientists speculate that cyanide ingested at low levels fights malarial parasites without harming the host.
'More flies are caught with honey than with vinegar' - true for flies and in our human world sugar  and salty foods produce positive sensations and are prevalent additives, together with fats, in manufactured foods, leading to global health problems. In nature there is no natural food that combines both fat and salt. Who doesn't love a cheese-melting slice of pizza or a 'Dunkin Donut' oozing raspberry jam?
Of course taste only fully works if the nose cooperates, which explains why as a child my nose was held whilst swedes were ' choo-choo-ed down the track and into the tunnel' that was my objecting mouth. Generally speaking if it smells bad it tastes bad!
 Test and taste - close sounding words but taste is indeed used to test food. 'Just try it, just a little bit,' says mum or dad and a little pink tongue hesitantly pokes out and just touches the morsel on the end of the fork. “Eurrgh! disgusting!” says junior. Yes 'the proof is in the pudding' - you need to taste it to know if it's good or bad even though your nose may be wrinkling for a 'no'.
 Sometimes it is merely the texture, the feel of the food that is repellent. I mean, how can an entire nation savour 'andouillettes'? Not only do they smell repellent (the andouillettes  not the nation!)  but the tubes and bits of mangled innards resemble the remains of the tasty mouse my cat has crunched her way through. And there are worse foods - eyeballs, tripe, trotters, tête de veau and that's just Europe. Be suspicious of funny names! Ladies fingers - why such a name for these slimy morsels of vegetables and Rocky Mountain oysters have never been near the sea, they’re deep-fried testicles of young bulls. A-ping  sounds jolly enough    well it is  fried tarantula on a stick and that’s candy to a Cambodian. If you can't pronounce the food steer well away -   Surstrumming - fermented herring from Sweden and one of the most putrid-smelling foods in the world…. Paula, are you still with us??
You have to feel sorry for a small number of people who suffer from lexical-gustatory synaesthesia. When they hear certain words they experience random and often unpalatable taste associations. One nineteen year old woman tastes rotten food when she hears the word 'puce' or she tastes cement on hearing the word 'thrills'. Too many words and she suffers sensory overload leading to panic attacks.
But 'tastes bad' is not the same  as 'bad taste'. No, not at all  the same thing. Who is the arbiter of what is good or bad taste? Three flying ducks on one's living room wall is considered bad taste by some but  should you be rich enough to acquire it, would hanging the masterpiece  “L'Origine du Monde” by Gustave Courbet, over your mantelpiece constitue good or bad taste? Personally I would rather Courbet's work of art -  spread legs and female genitalia - remained in the Musée d'Orsay, whilst I sat sipping tea with the vicar gazing at three ducks.
Have you ever tut-tutted over a joke in bad taste? Or did you laugh  hysterically? I suppose it depends where and when it's told.
There are amongst us some who have  a taste for chocolate and champagne but others who have a taste for fast cars (or fast women); you may have a taste for opera and ballet whilst others have a taste for dressing up as women or being chained to bedposts. Who knows? 
As the saying goes 'there’s  no accounting for taste.'



- December 03, 2018 No comments:
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Monday, 5 November 2018

"Crossroads" this months theme for our writing group

Jackie's contribution: 

The blast could be heard for miles around at what was called Dipster Junction located in Americas ' Mid West.    The crossroads so named when two main roads both sloped downwards preventing drivers from seeing each other until the very last minute.  

Located in the middle of the prairie there were no stop signs or traffic lights.       
Hearing the terrible explosion farmers, families and villagers stopped cooking New Years Eve dinner -   hosts pouring out champagne to guests hesitated and then celebrations forgotten as people rushed to  windows of their houses and those who had gone to bed early on that evening of the 31st December, not wanting to celebrate the new year, were roused by a horrendous crash at the crossroads.       
Everyone from miles around stopped what they were doing - looked out of their windows, checked their yards and listened and knew instinctively this was serious.  The villagers prepared for the worst.    
Accidents had happened before but as smoke rose from the scene into tornado like spirals and black fumes billowed into the countryside and orange flames reached up to the sky creating massive Guy Fawkes night displays - they feared grim news.
_____________________________


      Amy crushed  her cigarette on the pavement before catching the elevator to her apartment.    Boyfriend Chris was waiting up for her - arriving late from her weekly yoga class she was happy to get home and pictured her evening with her lover imagining herself relaxing in bubble bath with her last cigarette of the day.    She kissed Chris hello and was surprised at his reaction.   Oh yuk - he exclaimed, I’m so fed up with kissing an ashtray  - this smoking habit of yours is going to ruin our relationship you’ll have to choose between me or your cigarettes.  You probably don’t realise it but your clothes smell of smoke and  mine too.     You should make this your new years resolution Amy - then our relationship can progress .     So vowed to give up she fixed the date of 1st of January  in her mind as this was when she had planned to visit her long lost friend Julie - they were going to spend the evening of the 31st together reminiscing over a bottle of champagne and cheering in the new year.    Her friends home was situated in a remote part of the State,  was the home she had known in her childhood, playmates as children they hadn’t seen each other for  4/5 years.   Chris was to lend her his car - a Golf that had seen better days  but she would drive carefully leaving early to be on time.     He was off to DJ in a club so she was free for the weekend.     Putting all of this to the back of her mind she got on with her holiday preparations.

______________________________

 Several hundred miles away Jim checked his car and found a black oily patch underneath the bonnet of his old red Masarati.        OMG he had forgotten the appointment at the garage and he’d spent his salary last Friday night on the blonde bombshell who had winked at him in the bar last week.    So he’d have to wait before he could repair this leak.    Jim was crazy about cars - this one was an old model and had 250,000 kilometres on its clock but he loved the way it revved up and especially the looks he got from the pretty girls as he drove down Main street on a Saturday afternoon.  
He drove home conscious that gas was oozing out from under the petrol tank - and resolved to get it fixed by the 1st of January the day after he was due to drive over to his grandfathers house as he had promised him a check of $400 , a belated birthday present.    It was going to be worth driving 200 kms to pick it up.  Then he’d have enough money to pay for the repairs.   
For the moment though he’d just have to put up with the drip of  petrol.
_______________________________


On that fated evening of the 31st   December Amy and Jim arrived at the crossroads at exactly the same time - Amy seeing the clock in her car marked 11:58 pm lit one last cigarette, inhaled slowly but deeply - just one more she thought as in 1 minute I shall be finished with smoking for the rest of my life.     She drew the smoke into her lungs,  inhaling deeply, and enjoyed that relaxed feeling she got when the nicotine hit the spot.   

She swallowed the smoke and threw her still lit cigarette out of the car window and it fell onto the road,  a red glow in the dark night….
________________________


Jim’s car had been leaking badly on the way to his grandfathers house.    He sped towards the crossroads -  he couldn’t see the other car coming from the opposite direction as there seemed to be a dip in the road -  he was late anyway the roads were as straight as an arrow and after all there would be no one out at this time of the night on New Years Eve so he didn’t slow down after all - everyone was partying eating drinking champagne - he hurried towards the crossroads and swerved seeing the oncoming light of Amy’s Golf.   Too late he glimpsed a tiny red glow in the middle of the road and too late wished he had attended to that leak…


The gasoline dripping onto the black asphalt caught Amy’s unfinished cigarette  when they collided,  the two cars exploding and destroying the lives of young people not related in any way except by their inadvertence to avoid details and procrastinate . 


Paula's contribution


Vivian was 53 when she stood behind her husband as he sat at his desk in their den one Sunday afternoon and said, “I can’t live like this anymore.”

Her husband swiveled his chair around slowly until he was facing her. “Like what?” he asked.

She stared at him in wonder, this man she had married 30 years ago, when life was full of promise and possibilities. “Let me ask you something,” she said softly. “Are you happy?” He looked away, then down at his desk, then, finally, at her. “I’m content,” he said. “Content,” she repeated. “Content. Is that enough for you?”

“Yes,” he said.

Two weeks later, Vivian moved into a furnished attic apartment, taking her cat and her clothes and her books.

As she settled into this new space, all hers and hers alone, she told herself sternly that this was a good thing. She needed vowed to spend time alone – at least a year -- to find out who she was, to turn up the stereo loudly when she got home from work, to luxuriate in her own company and that of family and good friends, to make decisions about her life without having to consider or consult others.

She filled the days with her consuming work as an art curator at a local museum, and the nights with a new kind of solitude, of her own choosing, a loneliness that she tried to stave off by reading, and wondering, and dreaming of what might have been and what might come next. At her age, she had no illusions of a grand love affair, of excitement and passion and adventure. But she knew she would no longer settle, for a life of polite indifference, for a marriage of benign neglect.

Here’s what Vivian did know: She had to get away. She needed time, and space, away from work, away from this city, away from this life. She would go to Paris, she thought, or New York, a big city where she could lose herself among the bustle of people who didn’t know or care about her or her problems. Or she would go to an island in the Caribbean, where she could lose herself for days under an umbrella in the sand, watching the ever-changing ocean waves in the soft, salty air.

She confided in an old friend, a writer she had known for ages, a man who seemed to always be there at the edges of her life, always just a phone call away, always a ready lunch or cocktail hour companion, someone with whom she had laughed over the silliest things until their stomachs hurt, and with whom she had cried over life’s cruelties until their eyes were red and stinging. She told him she was feeling bruised, and bewildered, and adrift.

“Look,” he said to her. “This might sound fantastic, but I think it could be exactly what you need.” He was leaving in a few days for a month in Australia, he told her, doing press interviews for his latest book. “When all that stuff is over,” he said, “I’m meeting some dear friends, and we’re going into the Outback for a few weeks of camping and hiking and swimming. You’d like them, and I know they will love you.”

Australia. A land 153 hours away by plane. A land so vast and wide that you could lose yourself in it – and maybe, find yourself, again. A land where even the stars across the night sky were different from the ones she was used to.

She was afraid to think too hard or too long about his offer and all that it might mean. Here was a man she cared about, and who cared about her, offering her a chance to go to the other side of the world, with him, to a place far, far from her troubles. And Yet, there waswhat about the promise she had made to herself to take a year to just … be?. Going off to Australia, with even the smallest hope of romance, seemed to be an explicit break with that promise, a risk of a different kind.

But here’sHere’s what Vivian did know: She laughed when she was with this man. She felt like her best self when she was with him. When she was with him, she felt safe.

She scheduled vacation time at work. She arranged for a cat sitter. She arrived at the airport, with one bag and three books. As she sat at the gate, fighting off all the questions in her head, her flight was called for boarding.

Here’s what Here’s what Vivian could could not possibly know: T: That when she finally arrived in Perth, the writer would be there at the gate, waiting for her, heart in his throat and tears in his eyes as he watched her walk toward him.

What she did know is that she had made a decision, to put aside her reservations and her reasons, to embrace her hope, and carry it across the ocean. She couldn’t know this, but she could hope.

She stood, shouldered her bag, took a deep breath, and walked onto the plane.

Annemarie's story

Crossroads. (Annemarie)
This was her first day back working after a seven year break.  Jo looked at her son as he gulped down some cereals. At fourteen, dark-haired Alex was already taller and leaner than his father and he towered over his mother.  She turned her gaze on six year old Martha , slowly munching on her cornflakes, her corn coloured hair unbrushed and tumbling round her face, she was short and petite in complete  contrast to her big brother.  
Jo had no regrets about having been an at-home mum; Alex and Martha were two happy, well-adjusted children and as a family they enjoyed each other’s company, camping at the weekends or trekking in blustering winds on some coastal path.
All the same  she was looking forward to starting work at the high school, filling in for an absentee art teacher. Who knew where it might lead.
Breakfast finished Alex took himself off to school while Jo hastily loaded the dishwasher and then took Martha to school and waited with her until her school bell went, then she hurried across town to prepare for her first art lesson in seven years.
Taking a deep breath she followed a rowdy group of fourteen-year old boys and girls into the classroom. One boy in particular, caught her attention but why she couldn’t say but somewhere she felt a little niggle. A few days later he was sent to her for a minor misdemeanour and again there was a disconcerting niggle, a 'deja vu', when reprimanding the same  mop-headed lad. Somehow his mannerisms seemed familiar - just the way he picked his school bag up, the way he walked in a rather determined manner, even his expression. Then, as though struck in the stomach she realised it was Peter, her husband he reminded her of - not just his mannerisms but physically as well - short and muscular, unruly fair hair, the slight downturn of his mouth when he smiled.
She dismissed immediately the briefest of fleeting suspicions. She and Peter had always had a strong and loving marriage. It must just be a coincidence. She could not even consider the possibility; after all the boy was the same age as Alex and surely Peter couldn't have been conducting a secret affair when she was pregnant. They had both been so content, excited, in fact deliriously happy about their first baby. 
 Two weeks later the same boy, Josh Baines, skidded on paint on the art room floor and suffered a bad cut above his eye. Jo cleaned it up as best as possible, blood  staining her cardigan in the process.  He would really have to go home so after a quick phone call to his mother she drove the boy there.
The door was opened by a worried Mrs Baines to an even more startled Jo. She could barely  take her eyes off the woman as they led Josh into the sitting room.  Turning hurriedly to leave Jo caught sight of a family photo - a tall, dark-haired father, tall elegant mother and in front of the parents short muscular Josh next to his slender younger brother. The brief thought that he might be adopted was quickly followed by an intensely more frightening realisation. She turned, her hand poised on the door knob.
'Have you always lived in this area?” she asked Mrs Baines.
“Oh no. We only recently returned from overseas. “
Jo visibly relaxed and was about to open the door when Mrs Baines added,
“However, when we were first married my husband's firm was based here. In fact Josh was born here - you could say my son's come home.”
“So was my son. In Westfield Hospital.” said Jo.
“What à coïncidence! That's where Josh was born!”exclaimed Mrs Baines.
With a tremor in her voice Jo stuttered 'goodbye' sped home somewhat erratically, her mind in turmoil, took off the blood-stained sweater, put it carefully in a plastic bag, put on a clean sweater and returned to school, her brain churning with dreadful possibilities. Was Josh their son? And Alex - was he really Alex Baines? Josh who looked so like her husband and Alex the spitting image of Mrs Baines. You heard of hospital mix-ups. She had to know if Josh was her birth son but she said nothing to anybody, not even to Peter.
Friday she called in sick to school.  She raced around the house in a blind panic, hardly knowing what she was doing and with samples of hair carefully bagged and labelled from Peter, herself and Alex and the stained sweater in the plastic bag, she set off first to see Mrs Baines - after all she would be as anxious to know the truth and she would need her cooperation for hair samples and then she would drive to the Alpha laboratories in London.  She was not really sure what she needed or quite how to go about getting a DNA test.
Desperately trying to think what she would say to Mrs Baines she turned into Whiteleafe Road.  There was a long queue at the crossroads; a van broken down and behind it a stream of cars and an inordinate wait. Hands resting on the steering wheel, her mind in a turmoil, she considered the situation; what would happen to both families should a DNA test prove a hospital mix-up? How would effect the other members of the family? Now nobody else had the faintest inkling and she could, after all, be completely wrong. Ten minutes later she, her hands sweaty, her heart pounding she still had no idea how to approach Josh's mother.
A car horn hooting shattered  her thoughts. Quickly she started the engine, indicated to turn right, direction of the Baines' home, but on reaching the crossroads she continued straight on, oblivious of the shaking fists and horns from other motorists. As tears fell down her cheeks she headed home. Tomorrow she would hand in her notice and find another job this side of town. Now she was going home to her family.




- November 05, 2018 No comments:
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Monday, 24 September 2018

Betrayal September 2018

Paula's story:


Stix and George arrived at the medium-security prison outside Davenport, Iowa, two days apart. After George was processed in to the prison, he was ushered into a cell. Stix was sitting on the top bunk, his long legs dangling over the edge of the mattress. George dropped his prison-issued bundle – towel, sheet, blanket – onto the bottom bunk and sat down with a sigh.

The cell was predictably Spartan: the set of bunk beds, a toilet, a small sink against one wall, a slit of a window high up on the opposite wall. Ten paces from wall to wall.

Stix was in on a charge of manslaughter. He had been the lookout during a liquor store robbery that went horribly wrong when the clerk reached under the counter and Stix’s buddy shot him, right in the face. Stix’s buddy was tried for murder and got a life sentence; Stix pleaded out and pulled 15 years.

George, who supported himself through a string of burglaries in his hometown, got six years after one particular rainy night, when, just outside a house’s gate, with his sack of loot slung low over his shoulder, he slipped in a mud puddle at the edge of the road, fell and broke his wrist, just as a deputy sheriff rounded the corner in a squad car.

The two men settled into the routine of prison life: sleep, eat, walk around the dusty yard for 30 minutes, eat, bed check, sleep. They learned to avoid the more sadistic of the guards, but they both kind of liked Andy, the guard most often assigned to their cellblock. Andy was the warden’s brother-in-law, and he seemed to be a nice guy, not too invested in his job, nor in the plight of the prisoners. He was usually good for a cigarette, and he had a way of treating the convicts with something close to dignity.

Prison life was boring in its day-to-day sameness. Between meals, confined to the small cell, George often paced the floor, from bars to window, although the slit of sunlight was too high on the wall for the shorter man to be able to see out. From his bunk, Stix could watch the sky, and he would tell George every morning if the day was cloudy, or clear, or threatening with rain clouds. Sometimes at night, Styx, who at 6-foot-5 and beanpole-thin, seemed to be unable to keep his feet from hanging off the edge of his bunk. George often bumped his head on them when he got up in the middle of the night to take a leak. At least Stix, in all his leanness, didn’t cause his mattress to sag down into George’s bunk space, but all the same, the worn mattress springs creaked through the night with every turn of Stix’s frame.

An antidote to boredom was the escape game that George invented for the two of them. The men played it endlessly, whispering to each other about how they would do it, where they would do it, when they would do it. After a few months, the game ended and the planning began. Use the bunk beds to disguise a hole in the floor, exposing a shallow tunnel leading out to the yard. Time the run across the yard to the fence against the guards’ routines. Cut a piece of the wire fencing in the yard, not so you could tell, but just enough to bend the wires and squeeze through. Cut through the second fence that was a few feet from the cornfields on two sides of the prison. There would be plenty of good hiding in the cornfields.

Every day through that summer, George hid in his palm a makeshift razor, scored on a trade of a dozen girly magazines, and rocked against one spot of the fence during their allotted 30 minutes out in the yard. Sometimes he rocked slowly; other times he sped up to edge the blade sharply against the wire. The guards took to calling his antics, “George’s rain dance,” and didn’t pay him any more mind than that.

Stix had a small pair of nail clippers, missing the nail file, that he sharpened with George’s blade every night after lights out. That would make the cut at the second fence.

And for several hours every night, they would take turns under George’s bunk, shifting dirt from the hole in the floor into their extra pairs of socks, which they would empty into the dusty yard every noon.

Three nights that summer, in the space of two weeks, the men made practice runs, ending at the first fence, where they tested the flexibility of the cut wire. Their confidence grew each time.

They planned their escape for the night of laundry day. Their freshly cleaned clothes would leave less scent for the dogs to track, they figured. And as soon as they reached the cornfield, they would part ways, so the guards and dogs would have to split up, too.

They went over the plan, 10 times, 20 times, 30 times. They knew there was a risk of a guard varying his routine, but after their practice runs, that didn’t seem likely. Prison routine was prison routine, for the guards as well as the inmates, after all.

After supper on laundry day, George got a stomach ache. It’s just nerves, Stix reassured him. George laid on his bunk, taking deep breaths. Two hours after bed check and lights out, they shook hands, squeezed under George’s bunk and slipped into the shallow tunnel. Stix slid ahead easily, but the going was slower for George. Finally, he could no longer tell how far ahead Stix was.

Stix made good time, not giving a thought to the man behind him in the narrow tunnel. He scurried across the yard, squeezed through the first fence, dashed across the darkened no man’s land, and cut the second fence easily. He dropped to his belly and crawled the few feet to the safety of the cornfield. As he plunged into the tall stalks of corn, he pulled up short. There, standing between Andy and several other armed guards, was George.

As the guards cuffed Stix, shackling his feet for good measure, and led him away to solitary, Stix wailed, “Why did you do it, George? Why’d you turn me in?”

George looked at Stix and a slow smile spread across his face. He said: “I wanted the top bunk.”






Angie's story:

Emma loved her amateur dramatic group and almost all the people in it with the exceptions of a rather opinionated and boorish ex army man , a founder member who was past his sell by date and  Sally, a young and rather  beautiful young lady who was not surprisingly much in demand. Rumour had it that she was in fact seeing someone and not a single someone, hence the secrecy.

Ironic then that they should be about to start rehearsals for the famous Pinter Play ‘Betrayal’ arguably one of his best and inspired by his seven year long affair with Joan Bakewell.

Emma was lying in bed pondering these thoughts with a cup of tea which had been deposited next to her by John on  his way out to work and delivered with the cursory peck and good wishes for the day trotted out each morning with perfunctory ease.

She in turn lifted her cheek,  returned the sentiment and opened her iPad, checking the day’s emails before taking a shower, dressing and downing a yoghurt all in her usual record time of 1O minutes  before grabbing her bag, locking the door, climbing into her car and heading out into the already congested traffic.

As she drove she reflected on how long it had been since she was  consciously aware of her loss of feeling for her husband.
Had it been there before Terry had begun to show more than a passing interest in her school drama productions.
Or had she still thought herself as content in her marriage as any other of her friends of similar age where time children and careers had all taken their toll on what had once been a hot bed of desire and a longing to please the beloved.

This she knew was the stuff of dramas. The pattern of marital fluctuation, waxing and waning recharging and drifting into times of annoyance or loss of respect or frustration or perhaps the worst total apathy.

Had she actually arrived at this point. She supposed so. In the four years she had been with Terry she had found her ideal man.
Not conventionally good looking or wealthy but he made her laugh constantly, made her feel special and was generous to a fault. John by contrast had become more introvert, more business aware and less sociable as the yers had gone by.

From watching her school productions Terry had finally joined Sally’s dramatic group just to see more of her and had discovered an innate talent for acting that he would never have known he possessed.
Before long their clandestine meetings began and they became lovers.

So here they were, Sally and Terry in this latest production cast as the two central characters Emma and Jerry the best friend of Emma’s husband Robert.
Here real life and drama parted company since John had only met Terry fleetingly at the odd end of term do at Sally’s school. Did that make it slightly less bad that she was not betraying John with his best friend (actually did he even have a best friend?)
Terry seemed able to justify their relationship and while not wanting to hurt his own wife who seemed oblivious, continued to enjoy his family,  two children in late teenage whom he was adamant he could not hurt in any way since he felt a breakup was traumatic at any age.This of course stopped Sally harbouring any thoughts of a fuller relationship at the moment.

Sooner than usual, the inner city school gates hove into view and Sally braced herself for a day of non stop stress interspersed with glimpses of Terry, usually in sports kit and heading for the playing fields, with a raffle taggle of semi willing participants trailing behind in various degrees of sports attire.

The day passed in the usual melee of classes, marking and meetings with other heads of departments. Problems with difficult pupils always loomed large and Sally was grateful that her subject was English and drama which meant lots of chances for free expression and letting of steam.
She hadn’t really had a chance to speak to Terry even in the staff room at coffee time.Lunch was always full on for both of them with various clubs and for Terry away games and practises.

So tonight at rehearsal would be a wonderful chance to catch up a little and maybe, as they sometimes did, if it was an early finish, leave separately and drive to a nearby secluded wooded area where they could spend a precious half hour or so alone together.

She got home in time to throw together a pasta salad before John arrived looking distracted.A successful business did not come without many stresses and demands on his time and energy. A weekly game of squash was one way of unwinding and he wandered upstairs to change saying he’d eat later.
Sally ate while catching up on the news and then took a leisurely shower luxuriating in the hot stream of water embracing her body hoping that later Terry might appreciate that smooth warm perfumed skin.

When she arrived at the rehearsal room, people were already milling a bout clutching scripts and chatting animatedly.There was a feeling of expectation in the air as always at the start of a new play.

Sally was there of course, surrounded by various admirers and explaining why, this time she was not taking the lead part since inevitably it must go to a more mature woman.
They were  all finally brought to order by Bruce, the director for this production and a mainstay of the group.
Chairs were pulled noisily into a circle and Emma and  Terry were seated next to each other as the two lead characters.it was infact a very small cast but everyone liked to be involved  from the start, props, lighting, scenery etc.
The read through went quite well and Emma enjoyed the chance to speak lines to Terry that seemed ironically, so familiar to her, as they discussed their secret love, their ongoing affair and the need to be discreet.
In the play, the lovers were actually able to buy a flat for their clandestine meetings and Emma felt a twinge of envy knowing Terry would never be able to afford such a thing on a teacher’s salary.
Afterwards, as people began to chat amongst themselves Emma noticed that Terry was in earnest discussion with Sally. She thought little of it but was a bit surprised that there should be much to discuss with Emma having no part.
She waited for him to come over to her as usual and suggest a rendezvous.
When she finally caught his eye she read something chilling in his expression. It flitted across his face and was gone but she recognised in that split second something she never thought to see, guilt.
He touched Sally’s arm lightly to excuse himself and came across to Emma. The nonchalant posture was back and apparent attentiveness but Emma had seen in those looks and in that touch the thing that she thought was hers had slipped away.Sally might not have a part in the play but her new role would be the prize.
Her secret lover was indeed not single as everyone knew, but only Emma could see who it really was.
Whether or not she could now play the lover would test her acting skills to the limit and her broken heart so much more.
For her, betrayal had become reality.

___________________________________________________
Jackie's story


November fog had dumped itself in the apple orchard obscuring the usual fabulous views of rolling hills, rose bushes and marigolds.   Mavis had just returned from the train station after dropping off her sister who’d been on a weekend visit from Paris.    The house still lingered of her signatory perfume.     They had had a fun weekend, but all that talk of the bustling rue Faubourg de St Honoré, the Champs Elysees, Paris cafés and the girly lunches Mavis realised she dearly missed her old life.   Her sister on the other hand seemed preoccupied and stressed and she had caught her once or twice foraging in cupboards and an old chest of drawers.     

  As Mavis adjusted her reading glasses she pinched the tendrils of wiry  grey hair that framed her face.      Oouch  - she felt a drop of blood behind her ear and felt slightly dizzy.    -  Surprised,  she discovered they were not her usual glasses but some she had found in the kitchen drawer.  Absent-mindly she set them aside for her own blue ones. 
  
Her partner of 10 years had died suddenly last year - one minute getting on the metro in Paris for a conference and the next speeding in an ambulance to the Hopital Val de Grace with cardio arrest.     Ten years of bliss and he had left her totally destitute.    As is the custom in France no matter how many years you live with someone you do not automatically inherit from them.  There had been no pacs agreement and no marriage. 

So there she was a few weeks after the accident his two children claiming their beautiful and comfortable apartment and she out on the streets with only a tiny cottage in the deepest part of rural Ardeche to go to.   Luckily she had kept this inherited tiny country property and was now safe in the knowledge that no one could claim it
After a year living in a state of disbelief and shock Mavis was finally  beginning to take control of her life again
Her labrador puppy had been a great help and it was due to his playful behaviour that on this  particular dreary morning she discovered something that sent her emotions into a terrible turbulence and fired her into revenge.

Puppy was scratching at an old desk , the one thing that she had salvaged from her previous home with her partner.   Being too painful to examine it before today she opened the drawers.    Papers, bills and notebooks spilt onto the carpet in a river of past times and one small leather moleskin bound notebook caught her eye.

It was unmistakably a diary,  the red leather cover was crackled, worn and had obviously been manipulated a lot.   The binding so creased, bent and crinkled it created patterns like a Vasarely painting.   A page opened and upon seeing “his” writing a tidal wave of memories flooded her mind and she felt  an undercurrent of emotions;   rivulets of tears poured from her heart.  

  She couldn’t help but read the letter that fell out of the diary with a whiff of perfume that seemed familiar “my darling, I cannot be with you tonight as planned - by the way, did you give Mavis the reading glasses?     You must,  then we can be free to be together     … I’ll see you tomorrow usual time usual place” 

 Flipping back through the pages Mavis discovered other letters, with poems and scribbling.    Familiar handwriting all addressed to “My darling,  my soon to be husband…” and dating back through the ten years Mavis and her partner had been together.
She had been mourning all these time for a man who had cheated on her, never cared for her, or admitted to having another love -all those trips he took to Amsterdam, London and New York time away from her he had been fleeing to someone else. -   her love turned to hate in several minutes.   But the tables had turned for him and it was he who was the victim not her.    Now it was her turn to get even.

Intrigued by the reading glasses she had retrieved that morning and upon examining them found a very small needle on the left branch;  the bit that went over the ear which must have pinched her - Mavis was alerted as she had always thought her partners death was suspicious.  The pharmacy confirmed traces of poison  - deadly enough when fresh to send a shock to the heart and cause death.   So the glasses were meant for her after all but by mistake had been used by her companion.  Pretending medical reasons she ordered some more of the deadly venom.

  … trembling with emotion she went online to buy her train ticket.    

Mme Martin next door was given strict instructions not to feed the dog too many biscuits and she packed a bag.   
;;
Arriving in front of the apartment building she composed herself - was she really prepared to do what she had planned - was betrayal worth all this ?    

“I’ve been waiting for you, you took your time to find out but now you know.” 

“I just came to return these to you Mavis said thrusting the glasses onto her sisters face and pressing them onto her head firmly - 

 “Put them on,  you’ll need them to read your prison sentence”


______________________________________

Annemarie's story:

Betrayal
Tony had been out of work for over well nine months but each morning, he took the train into London dressed in his suit and freshly laundered shirt, just as he used to when he worked.
The family had stopped eating out, there were no more holidays abroad and they had all cut back on personal spending. Tony even suggested Melanie's beloved cat should go (to someone else or cat heaven, she was not sure which he meant). Melanie's salary (self employed aromatherapist) paid for everything. At the weekend she took the boys for walks, foraging and blackberry-picking  and then spent time  making jams and chutneys. The household chores she finished late at night , before falling into bed exhausted.  When her friend asked why Tony could not do some of the chores, particularly ironing his shirts, Melanie closed her eyes and took a deep breath before she replied:
“Well, the poor man, he's already been made redundant and to ask him to iron - well that would be a little demeaning for him. He's never had to do housework, he doesn't even feed the cat, wouldn't have a clue how much to give it let alone cook a meal for us.”
Melanie's friend sighed. It saddened and angered her to see Melanie working her fingers to the bone at home, whilst Tony spent money on daily train fares to avoid their wealthy friends knowing he had no work, then returning home ill tempered and critical.
It was a far cry from the affluent life they had led when he'd worked for a high-end property magnate involved in London’s theatre land. They were the golden couple  - Tony regaling their friends with the latest luvvie scandals and Melanie with her big brown eyes, her glorious  auburn hair, in  her designer dresses,and to quote Germaine Greer, “fuck  me shoes” all chosen by Tony.
'Were' being the operative word. No longer did Melanie get invited to cosy coffee mornings  (after all she had her ironing to do), or join the 'ladies who lunch ' in chic little restaurants and no longer did they go to smart dinner parties (after all her clothes were all last year's models). She did, however, get called upon to make house visits with her aromatherapy table and to give foot massages.
Having decided Melanie needed a day out, away from London and having dropped their children off at school the women drove out to Amersham, its quaint high street lined with black and white timbered buildings jutting over the pavements. They browsed the shops, sometimes trying on clothes but each time Melanie declined buying anything - “ I couldn't. Poor Tony would be devastated if I spent money on myself when we have so little coming in.”
After a leisurely lunch, and several glasses of wine, Melanie was more like the old Melanie her friend remembered from art college.
“Before we go to visit the garden let's look at the gallery across the road - Tony is never interested in anything like that.”
The gallery was empty apart from a bespectacled middle-aged man behind an antique desk, apparently engrossed in a book. They sauntered round, Melanie happy and slightly wobbly after her rather liquid lunch. Then she stopped stock still before a large modern painting, mesmerised.
“Oh!” she exclaimed “just look at those colours. Look at the the way it draws you right in! I would so love to have that, I would never tire of it.”
 The man at the desk quickly roused himself, approached the women and with an obsequious air he said,
“You have great taste. Romane Albers, greatly inspired by Georges Braques and
becoming  internationally recognised. This painting has only recently come onto the market and likely to go very quickly as there is a huge demand for his work.”
Melanie gazed at the painting. She had never wanted anything as much as she wanted this painting. Glowing and content after her meal she imagined, she dreamed of, owning such a painting.
“Why don’t you treat yourself,” said her friend, “you work hard enough and you have your little inheritance tucked away.  You'll never have a chance like this again.”
A little more persuasion from the art dealer, a little more “you deserve. It” from her friend and in no time Melanie was the proud owner of a Romane Albers painting and her bank balance reduced by the sum of £4,575.
When she arrived home with a slightly clearer head, panic set in. How on earth would she explain her new acquisition to Tony. He would be furious. No matter that it cost less than his golf club fees (after all how else was he to network?) She would just have to hide it for the time being, wait for a better time, wait for when Tony had his new job. She would hide it in what should be her art studio but was in fact her ironing room since she had no time to indulge in painting and Tony never, never went near the ironing.
Having hastily stashed it in the room she shut the door and hurried off to pick up the boys, rushed back home and begin the evening meal. Tony arrived home in bad humour and poured himself a whisky and Melanie moved gingerly around fearful of rousing his anger. Meanwhile a feint meowing could be heard; it grew ever louder and demanding and Melanie called:
“Someone please see to the cat. I'm busy at the stove”. Seconds later she heard Tony yell:
“ Melanie, come here! “.
Too late she realised the cat had been shut in her studio. Tony's face was red with fury as he gazed at the painting or rather the price ticket still attached. Trembling she looked first at Tony then at her escaping cat , her cat who had betrayed her.




- September 24, 2018 No comments:
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Tuesday, 24 July 2018

Theme for July 2018 write a story using the words "Thank you"



Jackie's contribution
This is a story about an accessory that I owned, and how this fashion item changed my life.  
When I was 21 living in Paris I bought some winter gloves in a sale from a grand couturiers house just off the Champs Elysees.
Stylish, smart and very expensive they were my pride possession.  A pair of gloves made of blue suede, a rich royal blue like spilt petrol on a dirt road shining in the sun .   They had 6 suede fringes of 20cms long on either side of the cuff and were lined with white rabbit fur.    Sewn with co ordinating blue linen thread around each finger the stitches perfectly aligned and matching blue linen embroidery on the backs of the glove.  The suede was as soft as silk.   Lightweight and pliable they fit perfectly and most importantly kept my hands warm as toast even on the coldest of days.  When I wore them I felt like a million dollars with the fringes of the cuffs swinging back and forth adding a personal expression to any outfit I was wearing.
I wore them on special occasions - going to dinner in Paris, to an evening at the Opera or on a very cold winters night and once very exceptionally to walk the dog in the early morning.  I  had adopted a beautiful old labrador from a lady who had moved back to the UK .    It was my routine to walk the dog round the block before going to work.
It was on one of these morning walks in the January fog and  that I stopped  to have a coffee in the local café - I was young and pretty at that time and a young man flirted with me at the bar.   He was charming - as tall as myself, wearing a camel cashmere overcoat with buttons made of bone and handmade shoes.   (I always look at a man’s shoes don’t you as they say so much) I could see he appreciated quality and as I took off my gloves and laid them on the counter to drink my coffee, he admired them pointing to his own leather ones on the counter and we compared notes on how best to protect  hands on a cold day.    He was reading the newspaper and we chatted for a while about current events -  More importantly he patted the dog on the head and told me how much he loved animals.  I man after my own heart.    He asked me for my phone number but I shied away to a complete stranger so I declined and  hurried on my way.    The next day I discovered that I had lost one of my precious gloves.    Looking everywhere I overturned tables, looked under carpets - emptied the fridge -  down the throat of the dog in case he had swallowed a large blue suede glove with rabbit fur on the inside  …mistaking it for a rabbit.  To no avail.  I felt a sense of nostalgia remembering the places I had worn those gloves  - the compliments I had received and most of all the feeling that I had when I wore them.  At the risk of being very late for my job I re-walked the path I had done a few days before and scoured each bush, checked under cars and examined people as they walked by to see if the lost glove wasn’t on someone else’s hand ……well quite unlikely but possible.   I pondered wistfully on who could have found this glove,  after all, what use was it to someone else - perhaps a one handed person pleased to find just the right glove to fit his disability or someone who just liked the colour blue

In a fit a fury and exasperation I threw the remaining glove in the rubbish bin !

When you loose something dear to you it’s first of all very upsetting, then  frustrating, infuriating, mixed with feelings of disgust for oneself and one’s brainlessness.    I would never ever find another pair of gloves like these and was doomed forever to have cold hands.

It wasn’t until another month had passed that I was on my morning “dog walk”  trying to go a little faster as I was again late for work;  that I passed the local café and just as I was passing by I heard “Mademoiselle” “Mademoiselle” - attendez svp …. And there was Prince charming handing me my lost glove.    I could of kissed him so excited I was to see it again.   Then, I remembered the other glove deep in the depths of the Parisian poubelle system …. Oh dear,  my smile turned to tears and seeing this, hearing my story,  I was whisked off to Christian Dior in the Avenue Montaigne and very quickly “my Prince charming” bought me a new beautiful pair of gloves.
    
As I got to know him better it turned out that he had deliberately hidden one of my gloves in his newspaper that day at the café as an excuse to meet me again never realising how much I would be upset at loosing them.
We were married two years later and  from then on every birthday I received a wonderful pair of gloves for summer or winter either with rabbit fur or silk linings.   You can imagine how many “thanks you’s” have passed my lips since then.
Jackie's contribution:
____________________________________________
2nd story:

When I was growing up and about 13 years old other girls started to bud breasts - I begged my mother to buy me a bra even though my chest only had two  fried eggs on a plate.  The lady in the Californian department store called it a brassière which made me feel foreign, French and grown up.    I wore it for a while and I was proud to pretend its use but in the end as it remained uninhabited for quite a while I found myself forgetting to wear it.    Then followed a period of no bra,  just a vest - It wasn’t until I was about 35 years old that I started to wear pretty lacy bras and panties bought by my charming husband.     Never would I believe that later in life I would advise other women on their lingerie needs .

 Getting into the lingerie world was a fluke!        I bought a small business trading in haberdashery and lingerie in my local medieval town.  I bought from a girl who sold a bit of everything - threads, buttons, ribbons, a few clothes and a few boxes of bras.        I had never even seen another woman’s boobs before I opened my shop.   As my first passion is embroidery  I had the naive idea that I would be able to make a living in a town of 4500 habitants selling silk threads, buttons and tapestry kits.   Really ?
Early on I realised that the only way to survive was by helping women of any shape and size get the bra they needed and have fun doing it.

 When I first opened the shop I stacked up the lingerie boxes by size and thought this is going to be easy - the customer tells me her size then I hand her the box and cash in.    Wow! not so facile.    First of all a lingerie boutique  is a woman to woman’s business and all day is about women - women’s talk, bodies, identity, issues and secrets.  Listening is the key.     I started to write in the local magazine each month about different size issues and did interviews for the area radio.    It was such a satisfaction to have a woman arrive with a problem for example;  weight loss, childbirth, weight gain or a medical reason and see her go out of the shop content.     Determining the size and shape for each type of woman was challenging  …help chose a bra for different moods  - seduction, dressing up, sports, everyday - and even workday uniforms was routine.      Lingerie is not just about bras and breast size and shape.   Tummies are there in a big way.     Of course 90 % of lingerie boutique shop talk is about these flabby, too white, too loose, flaccid, slack, bits of flesh and I could go on all day.   In other words women are never happy about the way they look.    My motto : The three P’s :  Patience, Persuasion Perseverance.  Perhaps though not always in that order.
 In my shop, at least one woman a day swore, “ I have been a 34 b my whole life”  “Why are you giving me two sizes more? “  Well guess what, nine out of ten woman are not wearing the right bra size.  It’s called denial!  Gravity is a bummer (excuse the pun) and takes its toll even with the slimmest of women.  
 When clients would say - “Oh this feels so perfect, snip off the price tag will you I’ll wear it now”.     Or  “I felt so self conscious before I came into your shop - now I’ve got the right size bra it is such a relief.  I’ll be able to wear that dress I bought now and it’ll look great and I will feel more confident.”
These were my best “thank you” moments
______________________________________________________
- July 24, 2018 No comments:
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Sunday, 24 June 2018

A day out in Paris

Café à la Gare de Lyon
Lunch on the Ile de la Cité

CHEERS !

Paris is beautiful

A few calories for the road ...

- June 24, 2018 No comments:
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Monday, 7 May 2018

The Secret Life of my Teddy Bear

"The life of a teddy bear"
Paula's contribution:     The three little girls were taught by their mother from a very early age to make their beds almost as soon as they got up in the morning, and certainly before they went downstairs for breakfast.




The oldest, who had a room all to herself, would plump the two pillows at the head of her white wooden four-poster bed, and place her Raggedy Ann doll lovingly in the center of the pillows. A place of pride for her cherished childhood toy.

The second-oldest, who had to share a room with the youngest girl, did not have a cherished toy, so to speak. Instead, she carried with her everywhere a tattered blanket, worn and torn but well-loved nonetheless, the corner of which she would curl beneath her nose, or her chin, for comfort, as the situation warranted.

The youngest had no doll, nor blanket. What she had was her thumb. Two of them, in fact! She sucked her thumb incessantly. She sucked her thumb while she was reading. She sucked her thumb while watching television. She sucked her thumb in bed at night. She sucked her thumb on long drives, where she sat wedged between her two older sisters in the back seat of the family station wagon.  

Her mother thought she would grow out of this. But, when the youngest was 6 and still sucking her thumb, her mother decided to take action.

She coated the child’s thumb with nasty-tasting medicine. The youngest sucked, or washed, it off. She tied her thumb to her forefinger. The youngest sucked the string along with her thumb. She put mittens on the child. The youngest sucked her thumb through the wool. She sucked her own thumb in front of the child, to demonstrate how silly it looked. The youngest asked to taste her mother’s thumb. She cajoled, she bribed, she pleaded, she scolded. The youngest just stared at her mother with her huge blue eyes, and with her thumb in her mouth.

The oldest suggested cutting off the youngest girl’s thumbs. The mother was horrified at this notion. The second-oldest casually added that probably only one thumb would need to be cut off for the idea to work.

The mother turned to a psychologist, who said the youngest obviously had an oral fixation that she would carry with her all her life. When the thumb is no longer a respectable comfort as she ages, the doctor said, she will drink by sucking on straws. She will eat with her hands so she can suck her fingers clean. Either that, the psychologist said, or she will just stop one day. The mother was unsatisfied with this answer.

In time, the three little girls grew, as girls do, and became adults. The Raggedy Ann doll, dusty and missing an apron string, was forgotten by the oldest, and was eventually boxed away and stored in the attic. The blanket, in pieces from repeated washings over the years, was thrown away one day and was not missed by the second-oldest.

But the thumb. Ah, the thumb. The youngest kept her thumbs but no longer needed one in her mouth. Because she found something even better. Much better, in fact.

And now, the man the youngest chose to love and honor all the days of their lives is a very happy man, indeed.

Jackie's contribution:

Health Benefits of Teddy Bears
By Snuffles and Mika Kim
For the past century, teddy bears have enjoyed immense popularity among the young at heart. What many people underestimate is the positive effect these bears have on your health. Not only do teddy bears make wonderful sleep time companions, they are also effective in alleviating many chronic health conditions such as anxiety, depression, insomnia, obesity, flatulence, and ear wax build-up.
Contrary to popular belief, teddy bears do not only come in the colour brown. There exist black, white, red, pink, and even blue bears. However, brown is the traditional colour and is what people seem to be most familiar with. No matter what the colour, teddy bears are beneficial for your health. It is the bear itself that is the effective component, not the colour.
Studies have shown that it is the cuteness and apparent attentiveness of the bear that affects change in a person'?s health status. Cuteness depends on how well-loved a bear appears, roundness of features, and amount of fat the bear possesses. Bears that look too new (e.g. like they have never been touched) or too worn (e.g. they have bits and pieces missing) are not considered as cute as bears that look like they've been slept on for a few years, and still have all of their vital organs (e.g. nose and eyeballs). Round and chubby features are best, but if the bear is too round it can be mistaken for a ball which then renders its health effect nil.
Apparent attentiveness is an important feature, because human owners (also known as parents) of the bears tend to find comfort in the fact that their bears are listening to them. That is what helps the human to feel like their health is improving - the attention factor. Thus, if you have a bear that can't sit up or is always looking at something else when you'?re talking to them, you should find a new bear. The best teddy bears are modeled after wild bears, with the same shape and perky ears. These teddy bears can sit on their bums and look you straight in the eye while you complain about how life sucks, and their round, chubby faces deliver compassion and empathy. However, as these types of teddy bears are quite small compared to wild bears, they are sometimes mistaken for pigs, especially if they are pink in colour. One should be careful to shield these bears from hearing such comments, as they then become angry and resentful, which decreases their ability to improve your health condition.
Teddy bears are the best companions to have because they provide help in a wide range of areas. They aren't only good for sleeping and cuddling, which is what most people think. They have also been known to help students prepare for speeches, throw surprise birthday celebrations, provide therapy, and dispose of leftover honey. And, despite working so hard, teddy bears don'?t need regular baths. Actually, they don't need baths at all! You should never wash your teddy bear, as washing also decreases their healing potential. This is a fact.
In recent years, imposters such as teddy ducks, teddy dogs, teddy cats, and even teddy cows have made an appearance. Don'?t be fooled, as these charlatans cannot heal the way teddy bears can. If you want to improve your health, teddy bears are the genuine article. If you REALLY want to improve your health, you should leave some cookies out for your teddy bears. Scientists are not sure how or why this works, but it does.

____________________________________________________________________

Monica's contribution

March 2018.
The secret iii'e of my Teddies.
i wouiri iike to introduce you to the magicai and secret ii{b of Bo Bear and Bruno.
Bo Bear is about 55 years oid anti Bruno about 30 years old , Bo bear is quite a iarge
tedciy bear rounci , wirh beiis in his ears and a growl sadiy over the years he seems to
have iost his growi he has a ioveiy smiiey face. And he has hati four quite serious
operations aii four pads repiace twice he was very brave especiaiiy the second time
when he was suddeniy wirisked of his iarge piiiows were he resides on the bed anci
with out a word oilvarning a huge needie was siuck inio his pacis.
iviy eariiest memory is si*ing on a sheif in a depanment store in Sutton High Street
Surrey In rhe toy departmeni. , as young as i rn'as i reaiiseri it must be Ciuisimas by tire
decorations and the music- piaying i was hoping someone wouiti buy me quickiy and i
wouiri go to a nice home be ioved anri treasured ior years , iots of te<idy's toys and
rioiis were disappearing of the sheives and my heart was begging to sink as i tiidt want
to be stuffed in a box and pui in a dark store room ior a year, these thoughts w'ere very
irighiening,
-fhe store was quire for the time of ,v-ear, anci the horrifying thoughts becoming more
reai when a nice taii man came in anci was giving my sheif a lot of attention the
assistant reached up and took a coupie of soft toys down for him to hoid and iook at
aiso a cioii very extravagately dressed i didt iike her much i haci tried to speak to her
just after midnight when we roys aii come aiive but she was so haughty she wouiti't
even answer me, no thank you i cant have the doii because I am buying something ior
our first baby that hast been born yet and in those far away rjays you di<it know w'har tcr
except , the nice man looked again aiong the sheive how did i miss that ioveiy bear
with his ioveiy smiiey iace, the assisted reached me ciow"n gave me a hug i iove him
she said to the nice man me too he saici i wiil take him, I w'as put in io a large box rviih
pienty of room , the box beauiiful wrappeci anci there i ha<i to stay untii Christmas tiay.
The excitemenr that greeted me on Christmas moming was woncierfui every one ioveci
me ihe mummy to be *-as tieiighieri with a present for thef'e unborn baby and the
grandparents to be w'ere equaily deiighted :;-u-
Cirristmas night i was raken up to the nursery a very posh worci for the iitiie box room
but is was'oeautiiuiiy decorated with a iemon and white crib aw-aiting this baby so
there i sat for a fbw w'eeks untii great joy the baby and mummy iraci arriveri home
from hospitai, anci Jane anti I became great friends she ioved me anci when she crie<i i
aiways reassured her mummy wouid be her.in a moment she i<now's you are hungry '
One day Jane anri I moved ro another room anti the Nursery was spnlced up for
another baby, this iime a boy, boih chiidren piayeci r.vith me but i dici beiong io Jane
and she was quite posiiive ab€at I was her tedtiy .
The years rglled by and I silent watcheri the joys the sorrows the iarniiy dramas iire
rows the heari breaks and suddenly jane was married , I didt move with her i stayed
with the parents and moved to their room. Anci suddeniy iife changed my worse
nightmare happened i was pui in io a box and stored for months. noi knowing whar
was happing.
AIier many monihs I was unpackeci anci put on a big bed, anci i reaiise<i iheir was no
husbanei just Jane's mum anci myseif Jane and Cari boih had their own piaces to
live how-i misseei the chiidren because i useri to taik to them at night sometimes
chastening them aboui their siii cluarrels .
However i siowiy began ro reaiise we in a very pretty iittie cottage in Keni wiiir a
iovely big garden i could see from the beci were i sat , the tears tirat were sheti at nighi
were distressing io say the iest, i missed the chiidren very much anci was very ionely,
"then one riay a iriend arrived for me whai excitement wiren were induceri to one
another and we chaned way in to rhe night he ha<i had quite an adventure zurd hati
traveiled ali the way from Canada with Jane's Liother iike me he was on a shelf for a
iirtie whiie insirie a big piastic bag can you beiier.e he toiti me he was terrified of
suiiocation aithough there lvas a tiny tear in tire bag much to Bruno reiief iane's
mother and iane had come in io the airpon shop i.o cio some souvenir shopping
because iane haci been snow skiing they hadn"t had an opportuniry beiore io shop
rogether it was mother thai saw me first Bnto u'as teliing me and she iilied me ciown
huggeri me and was saying to.iane i iove him they she put me back on the sheiino i
wanted ro scream, why Have you pur him back iane asked weii how ridicuious is thai
said her mother a women of over fiiry iaiiing in iove with a bear, bttt mum he is
beauiiiui he rvouid iook iovely iaying on your beci no perhaps a chiid wiii buy irim,
he his suoh a repiica of a biack bear and ire is so big how wiii i get him home he w'iii
go in the over head iocker Jane said looking arounri and buying gifts me holciing my
breathe please buy me and suddeniy they had paici for the gifts and waikeci out the
shop no i aimost cried out loud they joined the iine to board ihe plane suddeniy Jane
saici mum i meant ro get us a botiie of water anci she ran back in to the shop grabbeci
me off the shelve paid ior me ran back tiuough me in to her mothers arms and yeiied
so the whoie worlcl couici hear Fiappy Nelv year ivium. NIum cried i w"as indeeci
stuffed in rhe over head hoici but noi before a kind hostess took ihe bag oimy hearj
and said we don't wont your trear io suffocare up there .
So iiie joggeci on for many years and Bruno and i have become the best of frieniis soui
mates in fact we have seen many changes in this ioveiy cotiage a ielv iovers come anci
go and then suddeniy great excitement a weci<iing wili Jane's mother find happiness
again bur first we haci to go through the saddest year of Bruno and my iife"s i hari
aireariy experienced death but not Bruno , we reaiiseci something \e'as wrong as mother
was aw'ay a iot it is amazing rn'hat we bears pick up irom you humans .we
found out iane hari iiieci i was devastated how-couid this strong heaithy young w'oillen
oi 37 die the unborn baby i w-as bought for Bruno was a tou'er of strerrgth to nte over
that difticult year and once again ihe tears at night were distressing, Bruno was aiso
cievasiateci as Jane haci bought him for her mother .
Bruno comioned her as in his iaying ciown position.iane's moiher couiti cuddie him ai
nighi .and for many months our worids stood stiii .
zrncl then came the wedciing great excitemeni and much love anci happiness that
speciai day in our iives, after ihe excitemenr oithe wedding peopie coming and going
lrienrjs anci reiations from aii round the wori<i , we experienceti another period of
unsettiement where upon w.e were both stuiibd into packing cases thank goociness we
rvere together , Bruno is a bit more inteiiigent then me and he pick ihings up quickiy
he reaiiseri we were moving that's why we *ere in the packing case moving , moving
where i exc.iaimeci Bruno was quite excited w.hen he was expiaining ro me \&'ere
moving ro France irrance i exciaimed again i cant go to Franoe I have never been
sutsicie Engianti and i don't speak the ianguage Coming from Canada Bruno ciid speak
French i wiii heip you he said reassuring me .
I{e took ciays befure we Saw'our new home anci when we ciici we were noi
disappoini.ed we iove ihe house as much as the newiy weds, we have been irere in
France fourteen years now and r,l,e are still witness our rnistress joys and somows and
the circle ol'lifb we love her and w'e know she loves us.



- May 07, 2018 No comments:
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IN the middle of nowhere - story writing on the 7th May 2018




The Middle of Nowhere
Annemarie's contribution:
 It was the day after my sixth birthday. I had been outside all day playing cricket on the beach with my friends. I heard my mother call 'Garfield, Garfield, come in for supper. It's your favourite - fried chicken and calalloo."
I was home as quick as my legs would run. But this time family supper was different; there was a seriousness, but also a hint of excitement, fluttering between my mother and father. They had a big piece of paper on the table and explained that our Mother Country, Great Britain, we're offering free passage to England. Of course I knew nothing of our mother country other than her history, which we learnt about in school but Dad had volunteered to fight in their RAF during the terrible war which had devastated so many countries. He was eager to get back into the RAF  and told Mum and me that we would be helping our mother country as they had lost so many young men in the war. It would be an opportunity for her to enjoy all the modern things over there and I would go to school . What an opportunity for us all, said Dad! And Aunt Taniyah , mum's youngest sister would come with us.
I remember  so well the journey over on a ship called The Empire  Windrush. It was crammed with returning soldiers and about 300 of us Jamaicans. Our anticipation was somewhat dulled when we docked early in the morning, all grey, dreary and misty, each of us hanging onto a small suitcase with all our worldly possessions. The people in Britain were mostly in dark clothes and I already missed the sun, beach and the island's brightly coloured, patterned clothes and of course my grandparents whose house was next door to ours, but as Dad said, this was a land of promise and we would soon earn enough to travel back to see them.
Well, it was not quite as easy as that! First Dad was not accepted back into the RAF so he eventually got a job on one of the big red London buses, clipping the travellers' tickets - and Mum? Well though she had not had a job in Jamaica since she had looked after the family, two sisters and my grandparents. She had cultivated a wonderfully productive vegetable garden which she couldn't do here in south London as we had to live in three very cramped rented rooms.
Mum started work in the hospital and started her training to be a nurse.
'But things would get better,' Dad said, 'after all our Mother  Country needs us.'
Dad never did get to join the RAF but Mum did get her nursing qualifications and we did manage to buy a small terraced house in a street where most of our Jamaican friends lived. I hardly knew a white Briton except the teachers at school and in the shops. Contrary to what we were expecting when we were invited we didn't find our white Britons very welcoming, in fact they seemed resentful and as soon as one or two of us bought a house in the same street the white Britons put their houses up for sale and moved to pastures new.
'Well we have the house now and soon we will have enough to visit Jamaica and the family.' said Dad, ever optimistic.
We never did earn enough money to go back and see my grandparents before they died. In the seventies new laws were brought in and we soon discovered that life would change considerably for us and by us I don,t mean just my family. Weston, two doors down from us, was not allowed back into the country after a hasty visit to see his dying mother and then attend her funeral. Weston had lived in Britain for thirty-six years, paid his taxes, paid his rent and raised a family. It is now thirteen years since he has seen his daughter.
The first hint of our problems regarding our British citizenship came when Aunt Taniyah had to go for an operation. She had already had one operation under the NHS and now was to have a second with chemo treatment to follow. As she had no proof of landing papar, passport etc. she was denied the treatment under NHS and told she would have to pay the cost herself. Where were we to find money like that? Why had we been paying our taxes? Then the government brought in new laws as the white population raged against the 'immigrants taking over their country'.
The hospitable invitation in times of need had become a hostile environment.
My turn came when I applied for a job teaching history in a local school but I had no papers and no passport as I had come with my parents at the invitation of Britain with the promise of everlasting citizenship. We did not know that in deep the Home Office vaults  someone had shredded all our landing cards which proved when we had come into this country.
'It will be alright, 'my father said, this has been our home for the last forty years.;
So much for his conviction - the next thing I knew I, his only son, was about to be deported back to Jamaica, a place I did not even know and have not seen for thirty-six years. The home office was even so good as to give me a leaflet which offered  a list of dos and don’ts for people being deported to Jamaica, including the tip: “Try to be ‘Jamaican’ – use local accents and dialect”. It advised deportees that “overseas accents can attract unwanted attention”.
“How exactly can someone pretend to ‘be Jamaican’ when they are British and have lived here all their lives?” 
'I'm sure things will turn out right in the end,' says my ever trustful father.
 So here I am in a foreign place, no passport for Jamaica and no wish to live there and not wanted in Britain. And I wait month after month  in this crowded land for Mrs. May and her government to sort things out but in reality I'm in the middle of nowhere.     

Paula's contribution:

In the middle of nowhere, I found everything that I had been looking for.

My journey to the middle of nowhere was literal. It required a 17-hour flight, then a five-hour flight, then a two-hour flight, then a three-hour ride in a four-wheel drive vehicle built to navigate rocky strip mines.

When I left New Orleans, I could point to where I was going on the map. But I was lost. I felt like I needed to take a leap of faith. Traveling to the other side of the planet seemed like as good an idea as any.

The invitation came unexpectedly, from a close friend whom I had known for more than 20 years. I adored him – but with the care and distance that men and women do when they are married to other people. Which is to say, I knew him well, and not at all.

One morning the phone rang, and I smiled when I saw his name on the screen. “I have to go to Australia and do some work, but then my friends and I are going into the Outback for a week .... Why don’t you come down and meet me?”

Come down, like he was just downstairs waiting. Not “come down to the other side of the world, to a place you’ve never been before.”

Yet his timing was impeccable. I was unmoored in my life, and he knew it. My marriage had failed, and I wasn’t sure why. I was alone for the first time since college, and unsure where my life was headed. He was divorced, too, but had been on his own for longer, had seen other people, seemed contented.

We knew each other well enough for me to believe that when his invitation came, he wasn’t necessarily asking as a friend. I was surprised to find myself happy about that. I only took a moment to decide.

“OK,” I said. “How do I get there?”

As I walked off the plane in Perth after 22 hours in the air, he was waiting at the gate. When I saw him, I could see that he had tears in his eyes. So did I. He reached out to hug me, and for the first time in months, I could feel oxygen in my lungs. Finally, he pulled away, looked down at me, smiled, and said: “Come meet my friends.”

Bill and Sean were waiting at the top of the concourse. I did not know then that his friends would become mine, so important and dear to me. But they greeted me like I already was, to them. That said something important about the kinds of friends he had.

After a night’s sleep, I was still jet-lagged. But we were up at dawn for another two-hour flight, to an airstrip that served one of the largest open-pit mines in the world. Paraburdoo was a mining town through and through. But it was also the gateway to Karijini National Park. That’s how we ended up in a rented Toyota Land Cruiser with flashing yellow lights and a tall orange flag on the back, streaking through the red clay roads of the Western Australian outback.

Our destination was an “eco-resort” in the middle of the park. It was a step up from camping, but at least one down from a comfy hotel room. Which is to say, it had a real bed, but in a wood-floored tent. Running water, but a bathroom open to the sky. A flush toilet, but one that you needed to keep closed, lest the frogs get to know you intimately, from below, in the middle of the night. If you know what I mean.

Sean couldn’t make the trip, but three more new friends, Michael and Amy and Greer, joined us. They welcomed me with the same openness: You are a friend here. You are accepted. You are safe.

That first day in Karijini, Bill had arranged a small bus tour with Baz, a garrulous and friendly Australian who had lived in the area his whole life. Baz showed us several of the beautiful red sandstone canyons and gorges, the waterfalls leading into them, the cold, deep lagoons at the head of each cleft. Fortified with this lay-of-the-land overview, we retired to Bill’s veranda for cocktails and sunset amid the stark beauty of the landscape.

As the shadows lengthened and the vodka started going to my head, I said goodnight and retired to my cabin. As I drifted to sleep, I was thinking about how amazing the day had been, about how much I had enjoyed his closeness to me all day. And I couldn’t wait to see what the next day would bring.

I awoke in the dark, disoriented in that way you are when you’re far from home. I did not know how long I’d been asleep, and I was unsure what had awakened me. Then I heard his voice: “Are you awake? Come outside. I have something to show you.”

I could see a small circle of light just outside my tent cabin, where he was shining his flashlight on the porch. I dressed quickly against the night chill, and came out to find a blanket stretched out on the ground, in the open a little way from the porch of my cabin. I was a little nervous.

“I want to show you the sky,” he said as he led me to the blanket. We lay down next to each other, not touching, and I looked up.

What greeted me was a field of stars like nothing I’ve seen before or since. The sky was brilliant, full, unfamiliar. But the thing that took my breath away cut right through the center of the blinking black, from the horizon all the way past the zenith. It was like a giant sideways mouth, filled with stars, but also clouds of light, and streaks of color, glowing red and blue.

It was one of the most stunning things I’d ever seen. “My God, it’s beautiful,” I said.

“That’s what the Milky Way looks like,” he said, “when you go somewhere where you can really see it.”

We lay in silent wonder for what seemed like a long time. The only sounds were the light rustle of the breeze in the trees, our breathing, and my heart pounding in my ears.

Then with a small catch in his voice, he whispered, “I can’t tell you how happy I am that you decided to come.”       

I reached for his hand at the same moment he reached for mine, finally crossing the boundary we had held between us for so long. Here in the dark, 10,000 miles from New Orleans, lying in the middle of nowhere, I knew that I was finally home.
__________________________________________________________________________

Jackie's contribution:
Three men blocked the path of Miss Mary Hay who was on her way to start a  missionary station in East Griqaland an area of South Africa.   One man was extremely tall  and the other two stood stocky with bulging muscles shining, melting in the scorching heat. They stood like trees swaying gently in rhythm to the heat waves,  shimmering and radiating like a hazy mirage.
 All three were black as coal their bodies glowing and glistening with sweat the white of their eyes like stars on midsummers night.   Faces scarred and marked by tribal traditions.   Feathers, beads and necklaces, bracelets adorned their heads, ankles and wrists like turkeys trussed for Thanksgiving - the middle man held a  sharpened spearhead which reminded Mary Hay  briefly of the ones she had studied in a Glasgow museum a few months before coming to SA as a young 23 year old missionary girl -  he pointed the spear towards her  as if she,  a slight Scottish lass on her quest could be a threat.   They advanced together gesticulating, intimidating, pointing - menacing    -  she must have wandered onto forbidden territory. 
Alone in the what seemed like the middle of nowhere Mary Hay had arrived to spread the word of her God through the United Free Church of Scotland by holding  classes for native women.    Most of whom had never seen a white person before.     Sent to help spread her faith but most of all set up missionary schools and chapels  to spread the light of her faith.   

…she shuddered and shifted slightly in her saddle, her horse sensing discomfort  stepped back two or three paces flaring his nostrils with a scent of the unknown but the men advanced slowly,  one of them pointed to the ground and mumbled in a language she couldn’t understand.    Her horse reared and she fell,  bruised and shaken  - looking up she saw a dark face staring down at her with spear raised - she watched as he lifted his arm and she could feel the rush of air as it  hit target - was this to be the end of her journey before she had really started?   She felt herself being rolled into the dirt and then a cry of triumph from all three men as one of them lifted up with his spear a 5 meter long snake still writhing in his grip.  
In a split second he beheaded it split it’s belly down the middle with his blade and turned it inside out - scraping and cleaning it with nearby cottonwood branches …There were broad smiles and laughter all round as Mary Hay brushed herself off and the three men came over to shake her hand .   Welcome to our village Miss Mary Hay.
The villagers were lined up on either side of the dirt road    Singing and dancing, colourful clothes, drums beating, children running up to meet her. Hands outstretched in greeting -   Mary Hay was met with excitement.    It was an honour for a village to receive a missionary;   a prestigious gift and everyone was so proud to be the first to see a white woman among them.
My great great Aunt -  Her very first African adventure.

______________________________________________________________________
Monica's contribution:   Typed on another typewriter so some of the words are mixed.

In the Micidle of Know where
Rebecca iiever tii.ed of watcliiiig botli tiie Set tiiig air,i tiie i'isiiig or"ilie
suii eveil after aii ihese Jvears uf iiviiig in her littie Croft in tire iiii,i,iic of
Know-wlere , SLre was an oid iady now and tende,i to relive heriifb
sitting watching the Suii Sipping irer= \'vhiskey if it was evetring time.
Liie at'rlie beggirg wasn't eas) or-r this croft she was a Lontiorrer wiih a
iit'r.le money it took a long tiine for'her to'oecotne excepted in to tiris hard
brutai way of iife, to go back'ro London woul'i have l:een a faial faiier'
fbr Rebecca eveii itio\ iltg io a Towtt in Scotlan,J, wlricir slie had
corrsi,Jered at orre poini in her time here -would also ltavc been a faiier in
her eyes , Rebecca rtevel' faiieti at anytliing slie sct ltei' iitiiid too .
Aftei her iiusbarrd irad ,iie,i in a ,irurtketr Accideut aiong witir flcur of iris
Ri;gby ivfates Ret-recca took a long irar=d iook ai iift irerself and her job
ihe ilrree other widows had remarrie,j ovet'the yeal's exchanging orre ricli
irusband ior a richer one , because her husbands deatir couirJ have beert
avoide,i iithey all w=eren't so ,irunk it took her a loiig tiine to con-re io
tenns noi only her grief but this catastropire iiie charrging event '
Charles arli Rebecca were one of 'uhese dreanr couples aird wet'e a soiid
togetlier-on the sarne wave iength an,i woul,i have beeii the sort of couple
iii tlieir oid age as soul niates .
The iuxurl flat became soulless and i'r was quickiy ren'red out atl,i herjoi:
ai a sinall finance cotrlpaily slnall by 'r.;,3ay's stanriarris becaure fileaii
less so after movirrg oui in to ihe coutriiy sire left lier jo'o, fbr' ihe nex'i
fb-w non'rhs slie ina,ie soil1e quiie serious iinprovemenis to the coitage
she ira,J bougirt when corrrpieted sire iei it out aud wetrt traveliing not
abroa,i btii tire irigir larrds an,i lowlatiris of Scotiand an,i iiris is wtrere slie
siumble,i across tiris iittie croft . i'r wasn'i love at fir"st sigirt she triade
enquires and rented a rooni a few iriiles away w-ltere she walke,i to it nros'r
l^_-_ uaJvs
Clofting is a srnall scale Sustainabie agricuiiure some oithe crofter kepi
Goais or sheep or cows but Rebecca di,iii'i watrt to keep atlitnals she
warrte$ to Carden on a small scale herbs planis that would grow in'uiris
Hais[ etivirorriiieiii and clo Toui'isnr iioi on a lai'ge scale, the cr:oft was in
e1
tl.re remoie nor*rlr westerly islar.rd of Sco.ularr.j two 'u*, "*',l'
,-,.0
before yor,i evell irrrJ ir1. place how Rebecca s-rut-nLr1ed upon tiris she
doest reai reaily;.;*] p..r*pr I i;rt *"t the road less tt'aveile'. sire says
AcrossthewhoieofScotiancithereareiTthousaniiscroftsmost
abandoned ihese rlay sorne ,tot *o'ittcr at ail o'uhels jtrst have'oeen
bougirt by rich tu"io*"tr and iurtre'J in to holiday reutals'
CroftinglrasasetofRulesan.Jreguiatiotrlthat,JatebacktotiieiS
hundre,is an'J you have 'r'o be app'"outd Rel:ecca trow day dreairring
re1-reillbers'rhe nightrrrare oijur-nping tiuougir all tirese hoops ' t-ru'r
;orrrP.,J througir thetri sire did '
Her croft is beautiful an,J stili so well *rai*taine'J 'uhe ou'r b-tiiidirrg which
s'e co*ver*red trto a iuxur-,v studio it att.actetJ l'ore irrteres'ting peopie
ihan just ti,- urout ianriiy iroli,iayl *uk.., +li:,, ivri'uei:s an,i loneli soul's
looking ior trea-uty irr t#".. qldr-oi course f,ild rr atcher's she -was iir arr
i,Jeai spot witir a goo,J pair of binoculars -uo,i hei iittie irili she could see
the migr-ating Vvtales '
Rebecca iea,rt the mc,orjs an,j'rhe w-eather chatrges artrj e\ eil iila'ie
fi'ien,Js, rniles aw-ay of course it sadden her io think the lLeii Coiite IS itt
ihe crofting ,Jor;,rrrity are ali ove.65 weaitfuy retire to irre peace arrd
qui-re arid spen,J ihe wirrters irr w-ar-rner clinraies, atrother tiiirg iiLa:
*d,r"r. hei is the rise in Alcohoiisil it is a huge problern irr the crc'ltLrrg
cointnutrity
Rebecca ,jeatli rr,as repofted ir-r'r.he locai llewspapers the L,ltrdorr croft
lIa u1y url'c s a_B--s.u9:.
_______________________________________________________________________________














____________________________________________________________
Angela's contribution:


Well, they had wanted to be in the middle of nowhere Laura thought, as she stared at the rain falling steadily and heavily and augmenting the quagmire that had already formed outside the shelter. The glutinous liquid made  going anywhere treacherous in the extreme. It sat in the trough already formed by numerous exits in the two months she and Will had been living in this temporary and very basic accommodation honed mainly from wood and tarpaulin.

Actually, had she really wanted to be so isolated, or had she been carried along by Will’s enthusiasm to create a hidden home amongst the wildlife which he photographed so beautifully and entranced the many who saw his exhibitions, often buying a print to hang in their warm civilised domesticity. An antithesis to the environment that very bird, insect or creature inhabited.

Laura knew how talented Will was and how much it meant to him to try this venture into the unknown.Her own artistic skills meant that often she could use his photos to recreate the creature in embroidery, taking pleasure in searching for the skeins of silk in colours which almost accentuated those of the feathers or fur or scales of the creature she was working on.

Now, more of their time was taken up with building a retreat in which they might live but also perhaps later with accommodation for paying guests to share this ‘back to nature’ experience for just a short while.

Selling their suburban house to fund all this had been a giant leap of faith or maybe madness Laura was wondering at that moment.
She could hear Will hammering away and knew she should  be out there but for the moment her limbs refused to move.
She wondered how much their basic provisions had gone down in the last week. Such was the isolation of this place that Will had arranged for stuff to be airdropped by a friend until he was able to cut back and flatten an area suitable for a helicopter to land.
She and Will had travelled here the long way by road, then boat and lastly just trekking through the lush undergrowth, in which they were now ensconced.
As she sat, lost in thought, she heard the distant familiar thud of helicopter blades. It was too early for the food drop  but as the drumming became deafening she looked out to see a small package parachuting it’s way to earth . At the same time the helicopter was already starting to recede into the distance. As she saw the package land Laura scrambled to retrieve it from the mud. She saw it was in-fact a well sealed bulky brown envelope. She grabbed a knife and cut along the top seal removing if from its wet and muddy plastic outer coating. From the envelope within she drew out a formal looking letter with a world wildlife  preservation heading.
Mystified she scanned the contents and with disbelief,began to realise that this was a formal document of accusation against Will. They were talking about dishonest photography.. Of cruelty to insects and the possible use of stuffed animals or trickery in a photograph. They could not be talking about the man she knew who had such a passion for creatures and the capture of a moment in their lives preserved for ever in film.
As she pondered  how and if she should tell Will he came head bent into the shelter.  He’d heard the helicopter and was curious.
Laura acted from instinct and handed the letter to him with a questioning look of disbelief.
He scanned the contents and his face told her at once what she had refused to believe.
He did not deny anything exactly but assured her that he did not feel he had done anything illegal.
Laura, too stunned to think clearly could only wonder how this might impact on their whole project, in-fact their future life together.
Her instinct was to retreat into her own head and not to listen to Will’s protestations of innocence and self justification.
As far as she was concerned she had been living a lie. Embroidering images based on deception and dishonesty, not to mention animal cruelty.
Then, through the haze of Will’s protestations she began to realise just exactly why Will had been so keen to retreat into anonymity.
He actually knew that his  work had been noticed and scrutinised and found in some cases to be untrue and impure in terms of honesty.
She felt as if she was falling from a cliff, leaving the solidarity beneath her feet and heading downward through the rushing air.
Then she was aware of Will taking her by the shoulders and shaking her as he spoke, the words not registering just his roughness. She was still holding the knife she had used to open the parcel and as she brought her arm up to shove him away the knife sliced across his throat. Suddenly it seemed that he was smiling ,a big red smile, but blood was coming from it as he crumpled lifeless to the floor.
What was she to do there in the middle of nowhere.



- May 07, 2018 No comments:
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