Toby plunged his paddle into the murky white-capped river and pulled it toward the back of his canoe with all his might. His arms and shoulders burned and ached with the effort. But he quickly switched his paddle to the other side of the boat and repeated the motion. The braying hounds were close enough that he could hear them over the sloshing of water. He heard a shout of “There!” immediately followed by the explosion of a shotgun. Toby paddled harder.
His most recent host had woken him before sunrise with news that hunters from the compound were on their way. He’d urged Toby out, with the girl cradled in his arms, pointing them to a pine bluff and whispering instructions for how to find the canoe and the next safe house. He’d passed the girl to Toby once they were hidden behind the big brown barn. “Now, y’all go as quick as you can, and good luck. I’ve got a cow to milk.” He’d winked as he spoke the last bit.
So Toby had run. Of course, the girl had slowed him down, small as she was. She had stared around with wide wet eyes until she’d fainted in Toby’s arms, no doubt from the pain in her splinted arm. More than once before they reached the bluff Toby was tempted to curse his principles. “This girl’s gonna get me caught and dragged back and beaten to within an inch of my life!” he’d thought every time he’d stumbled along the way.
This scene takes place in my mind and kitchen before every family gathering I host, to the happy tune of chatter and laughter:
Ok. Twenty minutes til dinner. What’s left to do?
Place mats. Flower arrangement.
Arrange buffet.
Bread goes in the oven to warm. Roast comes out to rest. Oh and it’ll need slicing - there’s the knife for that.
Ok, everything else has a spoon for serving…yes.
Oh and here are are the cups, plates, utensils, napkins. Everyone can come through this way and go out that way.
Let’s shift this over here. Now that can go there.
Phew, it’s hot in here!
Ah! The time!
Bread in basket. To the table. Place mats. Flowers here - no, flowers there.
Turn on the coffee pot!
Oh, no, the butter! And a knife for it.
There.
<Beeeeeep>Dessert’s ready! Oh, boy. Where am I gonna put this? There we go.
“No no, River, that’s hot hot!”
“Ok, everyone, now we can eat!”
Breathe. Sip of wine.
I love this!
“Please remember first, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the constitution of our dear country. Why was it written but to establish a home and government that allowed freedom? Freedom of speech, so that none would fear to speak up for their rights or explain their beliefs. Freedom of employment, so that anyone might earn wealth and move up in the world. Freedom of religion, so that people from all over the world could live peaceably side-by-side.
“These freedoms, enjoyed and cherished by the majority, have been perennially and unjustly withheld from various minorities over the centuries. I submit to you that Christians like myself have now joined the ranks of those minorities in our country.
“Consider, please, the consequences of applying freedom in the way the prosecution is here asking you. They have argued that my speech and actions have violated the defendant‘s freedom to live as she sees fit. However, my actions and words toward her were simply an expression of my freedom to live as I see fit. The sole difference is in the fact that I see fit to live according to the Christian scriptures.
“Now if you will bear with me for just a few minutes longer, I’ll explain why I believe I have neither slandered nor hated the defendant - Mrs. Tetzel, as I have known her for the last 10 years.
“Mrs. Tetzel was an exemplary member of our local church. (To be clear, I have also been a member of that church, and remain one.) About two years ago I noticed that she was developing a habit that the Christian Bible defines as sin. (Again to be clear, this habit is the content of the slander I have been accused of. You are familiar with it from the accounts of other witnesses, so I don’t need to repeat it here.)
“When I first noticed this sin in Mrs. Tetzel, I waited and prayed for approximately six months. I kept to myself about it; I told neither my husband nor my best friends nor our pastors. I did not approach Mrs. Tetzel until the sin was obviously a habit, and one which she seemed not to be resisting.
“When I approached her, I did so privately as the Bible instructs. I invited her to coffee at my house while my husband and children were not at home - just she and I. I expressed regret that what I had to say would not be easy to hear. I assured her of my affection for her as a Christian and a personal friend. I showed her in the Bible where her habit is prohibited and cited three specific instances I’d observed over the past month. I reminded her of the warnings in the Bible against such sin. We looked together at the dire consequences of unaddressed sinful habits, from ruined interpersonal relationships to exclusion from Christian fellowship. She was quiet and seemed receptive. When she left my house I was hopeful that I had won her over.
“However, a few months later Mrs. Tetzel’s habit seemed to still have an unchallenged hold on her. The next time I approached her, I had her and two of our closest friends over to my house when no one else was home. This is also according to biblical instruction. We followed the same procedure as my first confrontation.
“Over the next nine months, those two close friends and I confronted Mrs. Tetzel about her sinful habit three times. Each time she became more and more agitated. She seemed to be trying to avoid us at church services and functions. As a last resort, these two ladies and I requested help from our pastors, again on biblical instruction. Only when Mrs. Tetzel continued in denial and reluctance to resist her sin, did the pastors call her before our whole local church to be excommunicated from our fellowship.
I have shed many tears and lost much sleep in prayer for Mrs. Tetzel. I have attempted to protect her reputation in every way I could. If she had not been a member of our local church I would have done no more than pray for her and advise her to live wisely according to what I am convinced is wisdom.
“I am free to do all that I did under the constitution of our nation. And in all that i did i simply tried to be a good Christian friend. Please don’t punish me for that.”
A trio of young teens are visiting on the east coast over spring break. After a picnic on the beach, a pirate ship sails through a portal near the horizon. When the pirates reach the beach they snatch one of the teens and make off with her back through the portal.
The others follow, led by the magical ruler of the pirates’ realm, the manifestation of the realm’s second Sun. He instructs them on the course they must take to rescue their friend and set in motion the redemption of the land of the Two Suns.
As Enid Gamma walked home from school on the first day of summer break, she chatted happily with her two best friends about upcoming adventures.
“I’ve always imagined how exciting it would be to be embroiled in a whopping great mystery!” Enid enthused.
“How could anything mysterious happen here?” harrumphed Harley Harryson. “Everyone knows everything within minutes in a little village like this.”
“Can you give up being a wet blanket for one minute, Harley?” snapped Susie Spekes. Harley made an ugly face at her.
“Girls,” Enid interjected, “don’t be cross! It’s too beautiful a day! Anyway, I was only daydreaming. Our first adventure can be searching out fairies in the pastures and convincing them to grant us wishes.”
Susie giggled. Harley crossed her arms over her front and shook her curly head disapprovingly, but failed to hide an affectionate smile. The girls then turned their attention to plans for berrying and weaving wildflower wreaths and what they would each bring to their hide-out in the Hollow for afternoon teas.
The afternoon sweltered as the three friends strolled through the filtered sunlight of Cypress Road, where the fields of cane and cotton and rice were hidden behind the towering curtained wall of cypress trees flanking the wide, hard-packed clay path. Not until Enid turned from the road to the footpath that led to her home, Mossy Eaves, was she able to see the large gathering of crows squabbling in her family’s cow pasture. The wonder and thrill she’d basked in with her friends wavered. Which of their cows had died to bring so many scavenging birds to one place? What if it wasn’t a cow at all but dear Uncle Francis, whose heart had been weak of late? Now overcome with dread, Enid clasped her lunch pail in one white hand, hitched up her skirt with the other, and galumphed as fast as she could to where the crows were congregating. There she found neither a cow nor a family member, but the whole Lincoln family - Mr., Mrs., and even baby Harriet - dead, arranged neatly in a circle among the grazing grasses and wildflowers…
The long dress today. Nothing fancy But fanciful and bold, To compel me to Act as I’m called, Embrace the adventure Of womanhood.
The bread must be Made today, And the garden wants Weeding. Wait - The teething baby Begs consoling As I return to Planning and inventing.
The long dress fits For all today’s action; Inspires contentment, Allows modesty, Eases burdens of Self-pity and fatigue Because I feel as I am: Beautiful.
Sometimes the only way to really forget everything is to go to sleep. Except that for me, sleeping is guaranteed to make me forget everything since the accident. So I can’t sleep just yet. I have a message to deliver to the International Council, one I must remember at all costs. The message I carry will turn the world upside-down in the best way possible. And it just might kill me to deliver it.
For centuries the world has looked, on the surface, like it’s going to Hell; while every philosopher has tried to figure out how to bring Heaven down, and every politician has tried to accomplish the feat. Their messages echo throughout history, as do the dismal and disgusting repercussions of those messages. Now I know why all their machinations, well-intentioned or ill, have so dramatically failed. It’s a high claim, I know. It sounds like arrogance or insanity, but - well, let me start at the beginning. Then you can judge for yourself.
When I was a young boy, green plants still grew outside of the domes. The air was still breathable, though sometimes heavily polluted. Many animals were still wild. Rain would not burn your skin. And the sect known as the King’s Men were unpopular in the West but burgeoning again in the East. My upbringing prejudiced me against the King’s Men, but the domes were their brain child, though others took credit. I joined the ranks of the philosophers as a teenager, and of the politicians a few years later, looking to halt the world’s descent into Hell and to bring Heaven at least within reach.
When I married as a young man, construction had begun on the first domes. They were originally used as shelters and farmland for urbanites, who were exposed to the most toxicity. Some called them arks, safe havens in which to ride out the “judgement we’ve brought on ourselves.” Many railed at the “exclusion” of country dwellers from much-needed protection. I and my community were railers, but when my first child was born I found myself relieved to have food and shelter in one of those big hybrid-glass bubbles.
By the time my first great-grandchild was born, the landscape was recognizable for a youngster of these days. Having spent most of my life in a reduced-toxin environment, my physical and mental abilities were largely still intact. (Granted, I wouldn’t have run any marathons, but I could get around just fine.) I had been retired from political office and working for the FDA for nearly 30 years. That’s when the accident happened.
((How long can a person function, live without sleep? What are side effects of extreme sleep deprivation? What kind of accident caused this abnormality? What must he remember? What part of the brain handles memory retention?))
