Summer Apprentice

I wrote this story many years ago--even before I was a Mom--and entered it into a writing contest in Atlanta for The Oxford Review. I was tickled when it was listed with the "honorable mentions." Here it is for you, dearest blog readers, presented with a few minor modifications. This is a little glimpse into my childhood. While the story IS fiction, the setting is very much like the home where I grew up, and almost all of the activities in the story portray the ways my creativity and imagination were exercised as a child. I do hope you enjoy the story.

Summer Apprentice (Or How Mario Finally Got His)

by

Marjorie Hall

“Find me the wrench.”

“The…?”

“Wrench. The one I showed you yesterday, you know…”

“Oh…” Bare feet on cool concrete. The tools are heavy, fascinating and mysterious. The wrench. Her smile shows satisfaction.

“Good. I told you you’d learn them.”

* * *

Summer was better with Mario. Sliding down dirt hills. The thrill of rolling over and over through bee-covered clover. Running through murky streams, the cold splash of water up to her knees.

Mario could turn a small clearing in the woods into a time portal, sending them to the age of the dinosaurs or propelling them into the future, or even to another planet. He was especially good at making up games, but Clara sometimes suspected him of making up the rules too as he went along, suddenly declaring that his horse could fly or that her sorcery was powerless on Venus.

No matter, the adventures were much too delightful for her to risk spoiling them by a fight. She knew she was no match for Mario’s wits—he’d outsmart her every time. Or nearly so—she would get him if she could just plan it right. Oh, how she wanted to best Mario just once before the brilliance of autumn colors whisked them into school again! She must act soon. Hints of yellow-gold and dots of orange-red already threatened summer’s end.

* * *

“Now the Phillips.”

Clara sighs. She knows this one all too well, no challenge. She moves the tools around in the box, barely catching the shiny glint of the ONE. She ignores it, searching for the screwdriver with the long yellow handle. She squats down; her thighs are strong and brown from the summer’s fun. She spots the faded yellow of the Phillips handle beneath some huge, beat-up wire cutters and yanks. The Phillips is in her hands but the momentum of claiming it lands her hard on her bottom. She wants to cry, but doesn’t. Mario doesn’t like sissies. Besides, she’s really seen it this time. She does not tell Mario.

“Well, are you going to sit there all day?”

“No,” she whispers and rolls to her feet.

* * *

            She raises it carefully toward the window. The ONE glistens in the moon’s glow, looking as promising as a tinsel-covered tree on Christmas Eve. How did it get here? Could it have been brought back from one of Mario’s expeditions to alien worlds unknown to her? Then he knew it was in the box! Bur surely it was forgotten now. He couldn’t risk her finding it there.

            She tiptoes out of the workshop to test her weapon. The grass is moist with dew. Her sneakers are soon soaked through as she searches for…ah—this old antenna should do nicely. The aged metal rests atop a small compost heap in the back of the workshop. It has begun to rust—no one will notice if parts of it are, well, disintegrated come the morning’s light. Yes! She almost shrieks as the ONE emits a thin, blue ray. The antenna is now cleanly dissected in two. Clara grins. She will easily catch Mario off guard this time! The ONE goes back into the tool chest, hidden to all until Clara calls it once again into her service.

* * *

            “What’s with you?” Mario asks.

            She smiles weakly.

            “You don’t look too good, Clara. Maybe you were up when you weren’t supposed to be last night?”

            She nearly falls off the wooden sawhorse upon which she is perching. Does he know? She holds herself, waits.

            “Course, it could be that wicked meat loaf we had last night. Ugh!” Mario grabs his throat and leans over, fakes a retching noise.

            Clara laughs…and lets her smile stay wide. That’s what she is supposed to do. He does not know.

            Mario begins to hammer again on the two-person spacecraft he is repairing. In a moment he says, “Get the other hammer, the one with the larger end…”

            Clara’s heart is pumping so fast and hard she fears she cannot walk. Her balance is off and she stumbles a little as she tries not to run to the tool box. She glances back at Mario—he is intent on wiping a smudge from the nose cone. A little shifting and the ONE is in her hands. Its silvery handle is an icy burn into her right palm.

            “Mario!” she shouts. She does not know if she does this to save him or to make sure he knows it is she firing the blue ray machine.

            Mario’s eyes are huge—his arms thrown back, he falls over.

            Clara runs to him and kneels to touch his forehead. An odd smell, maybe burned hair, fills the workshop. He is motionless; she sees no wound. She rests her weight on the back of her legs. Her eyes close—she has done it.

            “Force shield,” he says.

            “What?”

            “Force shield. You cannot penetrate my reinforced force shield even with the blue ray.”

            She argues this time—this was the ONE, “Mario! You know good and well I can! Besides, you didn’t even have the force shield activated when I fired!”

            “Did so!”

            “Did not!”

            “Did so!”

            DID NOT…DID SO…NOT…SO…NOT…

            Clara stops and laughs. Mario can argue all day if he wants, but Clara knows that he knows…he has finally got his.

END

Write What You Know?

Most writers are told "write what you know". This is generally good wisdom. What it means is that the best stories, even ones entirely made up (like my fantasy fiction with little Periwiggles) seem more true-to-life (real) if I write scenes that I understand. When Wiggleton leaps and soars among the trees, which is something I have never done, he does so in a forest of trees that I DO know something about. As a child I wandered for hours near my home through woods very much like the ones Wiggleton knows so well. And the scenes of him playing with his friends are also familiar to me. I played outdoor games with my friends very much like Wiggleton does.

But...there comes a time when I need to write about things I DON'T know. Like, for instance, gems and crystals. That's when it's time to RESEARCH. Research is something every writer must do from time to time in order to know enough facts about a subject to make it seem real in a fiction story.

Yesterday I needed to know more about gems and crystals not only for my Talismon Tales books, but also for another series for adults that I am writing. I don't know much about either gems or crystals. But I can find out! And I did. I drove to the library and checked out some books and learned some really neat things. One of the most interesting to me was that gems ARE crystals--usually these are polished to become shiny. You know gems as clear diamonds, red rubies, green jades, blue sapphires. Cool. But sometimes diamonds can be pink or red. It depends on how and where they were formed.

Other ways to do research are to use the internet or to ask an "expert" person questions. Research can be loads of fun because you often discover wonderful new knowledge you had no clue about before. It is very much like being a detective, and it's one of the many terrific things about being a writer.

Next time I post, I promise another story...one based on my very own childhood. Something I don't need to research since I'm already an "expert" on it. See you soon!

Blue Star Gem

A little something extra...that's what often needs to be done when writing or drawing. When I first drew the illustration for Chapter 1 of Wiggleton's Wrong Way Home, Windy the Outer Banks wild horse, is featured carrying our hero, Wiggleton, atop her head along the sandy beach. You can view that drawing below. But when I went to color the drawing and finalize it for the cover art of the book I realized I was missing something! That something was the blue star gem which becomes important later on in the story.

Wiggleton has been idly holding this gem while he contemplates how to get off the island and make his way back home. But...he drops the sparkling blue gem in the sand when Windy offers him a ride. So...the cover now includes the colorful gem. By the way, this gem is the first of several that Wiggleton will encounter in his travels in Talismon. One by one they will solve an ancient mystery of his world. So, having the gem on the cover is more important than just looks...it foreshadows (gives a hint) to a future part of the tale.

But first, he has to find his way home. Hope you like the cover and the story.

The Story of Joey Sludgedirt

In my last post I promised a story about a boy named Joey Sludgedirt. Well, almost as soon as I posted that I realized a better story would be about a KANGAROO named Joey Sludgedirt. It would be better because of at least two reasons 1) all baby kangaroos are called "joeys" and 2) it would be more fun! So...here it is.

THE STORY OF JOEY SLUDGEDIRT

Joey was a Kangaroo. He lived in Australia but he never considered what country or continent he lived in the way people do. His first home was Mom’s pouch. In fact, he thought he was somehow part of Mom. But he soon learned he was separate from Mom and that sometimes, when something called “safe” happened, he was allowed to crawl outside Mom onto the ground. His Mom always called him, “my darling Joey Jumper.” And she did this a lot when he wasn’t jumping. In fact, it was mostly while she licked a spot on his right ear.


Joey didn’t know it, but there was a whiter spot on his brown fur on his right ear. It had little brown dots inside it. His mother adored the spot but Joey would soon discover a different reaction from others.

It wasn’t long before Joey grew larger and rarely was in Mom’s pouch. He was strong enough to bound about on his own and he soon made friends with other young roos. This was fun because Joey loved to jump and bound. It was his most favorite thing to do, and he thought it was especially fun to share bounding games with other roos. But on the third day of his newfound freedom this changed. Joey's playmates started calling him “Joey Sludgedirt.” They said there was a spot on his ear that looked like a mud smear (this is what roos call sludgedirt).

Joey didn’t like the name and he couldn’t see the spot. At first he didn’t believe the other roos and he was angry with them for calling him sludgedirt. But a strange thing happened. Because the roos kept calling him the name day after day, Joey started to accept that his real name was Joey Sludgedirt. He felt…like he was worth less than the other roos. Like he wasn’t as good as them and he never would be.

His mother noticed the difference in Joey. He wasn’t the happy young roo he used to be, always carefree and ready to jump. She said, “My darling Joey Jumper, what has trapped your feet? You don’t find joy in bounding?”

“Mom,” said Joey, looking down at his large roo feet, “there’s nothing wrong with my feet. It’s…my name.”

“Your name? How can a name stop anyone from jumping?”

“Mine is…because I’m not…because I’m mud.”

“Nonsense, Joey. Your name is Joey Jumper…it has nothing to do with mud!”

Joey was puzzled. You see, he didn’t remember the time when he wasn’t called Joey Sludgedirt. But when he heard that he was Joey Jumper instead, a memory of his mother whispering the name and licking the back of his ear came into his small roo head.

Seeing Joey’s puzzled face, his mother hopped along saying, “Follow me. There’s something I need to show you.”

When they reached the river bank Joey’s mom stopped bounding and asked, “What is flowing here?”

Joey shrugged and said, “Water, of course.”

“Hmm. So you can drink it?”

“Yeah.”

“Do so.”

So Joey bent over and began lapping up the clear, cool liquid. His mother asked, “What if I said this water was sludgedirt?”

Joey smiled and said, “You could say that, but I wouldn’t believe you.”

“Why?”

“Because…” said Joey, “you can’t drink sludgedirt. It doesn’t flow like this!”

“Does sludgedirt bound?”

Joey flicked his ears and said, “No, of course not…” and he saw the spot on his ear in the reflection of the water. “Hey, it’s the spot! So that’s what they meant.”

Joey studied the spot a long time. His mother waited patiently. He turned to her and said, “You know, it doesn’t even look like sludgedirt.”

“No, it doesn’t. It’s just a silly nickname.”

“Of course!" shouted Joey. "It’s just a made-up name. From now on no matter what the other roos call me I know the truth!”

And the truth about who he really was set Joey free. Now he didn’t care what name he was called…he knew it didn’t change his true self.

Words...or Labels?

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.

This is the amazing announcement of the writer John in the New Testament. Can you believe such a thing--the WORD was a person and this person always existed with God? John goes on to tell us that the Word co-created everything with God. Well...that's a powerful Word.

As a writer, words are important to me. I use them to create a story. Selecting just the right group of words to describe an object, or a mood, or a setting adds spice to a story. Spice is good--it changes a dull and tasteless food to a lively and enjoyable one. Sometimes words are so powerful people want to memorize them--like in a song or a poem. Sometimes you don't want to remember them but they get stuck in your head like gum sticks to your shoe. And try as you might to rid yourself of it, it follows you around step by step.

That's often the way it is when someone tries to use words to bully you. Then the words are meant to put a label on you...and its usually a false one that they want to convince you is true. Like someone picking up a jar of crunchy peanut butter and instead of pasting the label that reads "Crunchy Peanut Butter" on it, they smear the label on that says "Mashed Peas." But do the words "Mashed Peas" turn the jar of crunchy peanut butter into green slimy mush? Of course not. The peanut butter is still peanut butter no matter what the label says.

The Word is powerful. Labels...not so much. In my next post I'll write a little story about a boy who got confused because of his name...Joey Sludgedirt.

Morning Word

I've always been a "morning person." That's not to say I'm ready to jump right out of bed when the alarm clock cackles before 6 am. Still...I cherish the morning, more so than any other part of the day. The morning is fresh, life made new...a clean start. That's what this blog represents for me and my writing...a fresh start.

The first Wiggleton book appeared in 2003. Although I wrote and mostly illustrated the second Wiggleton book that same year, I never published it. Seven years later...Wiggleton's Wrong Way Home, the second book of The Talismon Tales series, is available on Amazon Kindle as an ebook. Welcome to a new day.

MORNING HAS BROKEN

Morning has broken
Like the first morning,
Black bird has spoken
Like the first bird.

Praise the singing!
Praise for the morning!
Praise for them springing
Fresh from the Word!


Words: Eleanor Farjeon

More about words in my next post.