A Boy Named Richard

A long time ago, in a far away town, lived a little boy named Richard. Who is this little boy named Richard and why is he important enough to be writing about? What happened to him? What is it? What did he do? Why are we even talking about him? Stories used to start that way all the time. Curiosity was raised with the mention of a far away place and time and a boy or girl, man or woman no one knew. Some how it helped. Putting yourself into another world, another time. Imagining yourself in another life. We still do this. We still play pretend. Novels are all about pretend. We learned from the old tales. Sometimes they taught a moral understanding. Sometimes they taught about courage and other times how sheer luck or magic might intervene at anytime and end all this suffering. It’s a kind of hope. Stories today tend to go more towards finding your own inner strengths and answers to life’s troubles. Life’s troubles haven’t really changed that much we just dress them up differently. We have guns today instead of swords. We have drugs instead of magic potions, which is all really the same thing except today people poison themselves instead of their unsuspecting victims. Very often the really special stories aren’t that far away and times not as long ago like ‘Little House on the Prairie’. Some times the story is about a mouse or a rabbit and the adventures from their point of view. Some times magical things happening takes one far away, although the story is in the present time. Writers found a way to take the reality of a child’s experience and turn it into something fantastical and far away, yet keep that closeness to it. ‘Stuart Little’ is such a story. Regular, though eccentric, people adopting a little mouse and treating him like a member of the family. Sometimes my daughter sets a tiny place at the table for an imaginary Stuart. He even gets a special spot to relax and watch a movie with her. Usually it’s much too close to the screen. I don’t really have a story about a little boy named Richard, but I might some day. Now that I’ve written that much down, I’d like to find out more about him. I’d like to find out where he lives and what period of time. What were they doing back then. How did they live and what is so interesting about him that we should be writing about it. Other writers have brought to us stories about children long ago, who dealt with monsters, and giants and mean step-mothers and hard work. The same things children today deal with. Well they don’t all have mean step-mothers. Sometimes it’s a mean teacher or a mean neighbor, or kid. Someone is mean and we’ve all got to find a way to deal with this stuff. We do all have some kind of monster, imaginary or not. And giant is just another word for challenge. Anyway little Richard from long ago had all of them. He had so many giants and monsters and mean people to deal with, but he was also very creative. He had a wonderful way of interpreting life and dealing with it. He had important decisions to make, like would he give in to the pressures or stand up tall and proud. Would he be what someone wanted him to be or would he be himself and be really good at it. Would he know what he wanted? Would he know who he was? There are a lot of serious questions woven into the tales told to children. Children love to consider serious questions and come up with really smart solutions. But they aren’t anything like the kind of questions we think they may have. That’s why it’s so difficult to mix adult with child. Really the adult needs to become a child again in order to mix with the child. In order to write for a child one needs to be a child. For example, I love to have the floors and table tops in my home, cleared off and accessible. My youngest daughter is a maker of worlds and uses up every possible square inch with buildings and lego’s, homes made of plastic, homes made of cardboard, rock city etc. I come to find out there are people living in those places. Am I the ogre who demands them all removed? Am I the evil step-mother who demands the floors to be cleaned again? The rock city was fabulous, it was however in the doorway to another useful room in the house and I was the giant who crushed the city with it’s big feet. I’m also the witch who picks up whole homes and moves them to other countries. Or perhaps I’m the cyclone which picked up the house. There is so much to know about all this. The more I investigate it the more I remember about my own childhood. I was the third oldest child in a family with ten children. My usual job in the family was to play with the children. I wasn’t capable enough to have a job in meal preparation. I was too slow at most important jobs which really required some amount of speed in order for a home of this size to function well. The most useful place for me was to play with the children. Later I went on to have children of my own. I have spent many hours as a mother, playing with my children. Building, researching, going on adventures and reading. Housework and the business of mealtimes was also a type of play for me although I had no training in actual usefulness I was able to invent my own methods and draw from memories of what I had observed as a child. I did have other chores sometimes, but can you imagine having the job of playing with the children when you are yet a child? Priceless.

Elizabeth Williams, daily writing exercise, 1,013 words.

Where We Lived

It’s interesting how a home, a property which we knew as children and young adults can have a grounding effect on us. It can be calming and peaceful to return to a place which we once knew and interacted with. Perhaps it was our home or a friends home or a field where we played. It could be the school, perhaps for some people who’s schooling was a good experience. It could be a town, a type of lifestyle once lived. It is always some place in the past where character was developed and understandings formed. It may not have always been a pleasant situation but it was ours, or it was where we were. I remember the house we lived in in England when I was young. I don’t know very much at all about why we were there or what my parents were doing. I remember being told that my father was a telephone operator for awhile and that my sister would pick up the phone so that she could talk to him. I don’t remember that, I was only told it. I don’t remember the other places we lived before that, I was three when we moved to that house. I remember other things about it, things that mattered to me, things about that house which involved me. There were eight of us children at that time and when any one of us travels back to England we always try to drive by that house and stop to take a look. Something about seeing it, even though it is so changed is healing and peaceful. We take pictures and send them around to the family. The house was called ‘The Laurels’. There are other places in our family but many families had one main childhood home. Usually a family will move from home to home as they work on finding the place best suited to them. Perhaps they will rent at first and move to different rentals trying to find out which home best suits their style. Some day they will buy their home and settle down. It may be difficult for some children to identify with a childhood place if there were too many moves. It may well be a school or a park or a vacation spot which is that place for them. I raised the children in a small house at the edge of a factory town in the heart of a farming community. Later we moved to the place we are now. It was a difficult move for them and they still feel connected to that first house. They have a lot of memories there. I also took them to Canada in the summertime where they most likely have some great memories. Now they are building lives of their own and raising children of their own. Their children will be forming their own ties. They are forming attachments to places and homes. Places which will draw them back when they are older, to discover something about themselves which only their inner child knows. This is what I find happening when I begin to write. I find myself writing about places I once knew. I’m not writing about the home I now have. I write about places my childhood knew and the feelings which arise from that childhood. I am finding out something about myself by reaching down deep into those memories. I feel a grounding, a peace and security in connecting with a place from long ago where I was free. Free from responsibility and care. Free from adulthood. The mind processes everything differently in childhood, being immune yet to the concerns of this world. Money is not more than a toy to a child. A child’s purse may have a coin and a rock and a piece of ribbon and each are equally valuable to the child. If asked to keep only one thing, it very well may be the rock which is kept. Whether the family is rich or poor makes no difference to the child who lives whatever is expected. I had one play dress, one school uniform and one Sunday outfit when I was a child. I had school shoes and play shoes. I didn’t know what other people did because we never owned a television and all the children at school dressed in the same uniform. We didn’t get new clothes every year. I didn’t question this because it didn’t matter. It wasn’t even the actual house which was important to me. The closet at the bottom of the stairs though friendly and large during the day was brimming with monsters at night and the basement was the scariest place of all. Even the rats at the back of the yard didn’t scare me like the basement. It was the business involved in growing up and living with the others in the home which was important. The games we played, the battles we fought. The banister I slid down, only to be greeted by a wooden spoon and my father at the bottom. The short flight and thrill were worth every stripe. There were other homes that hold the same and maybe more for me, since that home. I don’t really think consciously about these places, but when I write I find myself digging around in the memories of the walls of these places. Pulling out the feelings and convictions of my childhood soul. A place where hopes and dreams were bountiful. Where the whole future is ahead and yet unknown and possibilities soared. A place and time in which I had not yet been crushed and broken. A time where I was me completely. A time when I was proud to be me. A beginning not yet governed by the voices of culture and religious views, where everything I wanted to be was possible. That’s where I keep finding myself when I write. Perhaps I’m looking for something there. Perhaps I’m looking for the me I was meant to be.

Elizabeth Williams, writing exercise, 1,003 words.

The Farm

It was a place of freedom in my childhood. In my mind I’m drawn to this place. I’m drawn to the memories it holds for me. A time and a place where imaginations ran free and creativity blossomed. There holds for me a kind of magic at the farm, in my memory. In my soul. It is a grounding by which all other standards must give way, be measured to. The memory of this place balances me. It was a time in my life where children were free to roam. There was a safety in this place. Not like the safety of today. Todays children must always be watched by adults. There is no freedom in that. There was a swing set up on the hill in front of the barn. Not like today’s tiny swings, but a real swing, as tall as the sky, which swung over the heavens if you persisted. There was only one swing and a person could exit this place for a moment just by sitting on that swing and be far far away in other lands, either gliding gracefully across the fields or flying high above the trees.

There was an orchard full of apple trees, a tractor and a wagon loaded with bushel baskets. The orchards were mystical places indeed, guarded by rows of poplar sentries. There was an apple room with a long machine which rolled the apples and sorted them by size. The room smelled deliciously sweet. It was usually closed and off limits to wandering children unless they were helping. There was a breezeway where many a game was played. Then there was the barn. The barn held a myriad of options for growing children. There was the bottom part, with animals and stalls. Small rooms for storage or hens. I had a few hens when I grew older. The upper level which you enter from the top of the hill was full of hay. Sweet, aromatic hay. It was baled and stacked and the the room was huge. We created kingdoms and domains. We tunneled and made caves and hid and camped and played. Beside the hay loft was a drop to the lower level. A long rope hung ready and we would fly over the opening and come back to the loft. It was dangerous, but danger was what made it fun. Danger was what drew us in.

Behind the barn and the houses the hill dropped down to a creek, which wound it’s way across the back border of the property. The creek was intriguing for sure. In the early winter it became a skating rink. We sat on a log at the edge and tied on our skates. We had snow shovels which we pushed along to clear the snow. We skated until our feet were numb and our noses and fingers frozen. We would go inside to warm chocolate milk and gently rub our feet and hands and endure the pain of frostbite. But we would do the same thing again the next day. As the winter grew longer the ice split from the weight of the snow, we turned to snowshoe adventures and skis. There was never a boring day on the farm.

In the Spring we turned our attention to the melting snow and stayed away from the creek. The ever changing landscape as the snow melted gave opportunity for parades and acting games when I was usually a witch. Not the good witch. I was always the evil witch. I terrorized my younger siblings during these games. We tapped the maples lining the driveway and boiled down the sap over a fire. When the water subsided and the ground was free again we climbed the tallest pines and built homes with hammers and nails and pieces of wood we could lift up the trunks. The plan was to build ourselves a fort as high as possible and sit up there gazing over the land. We weren’t actually allowed to do any of this. This is what we did because we were free. We didn’t climb trees in front of our parents. But our parents weren’t playing outdoors with us. We went outdoors to play because that’s what children did. That was how parents took ‘time out’. That was how a mother could get anything done. As the spring turned into summer the creek drew us back and we fished on the bank and swam in the muddy waters careful to avoid the leeches. We built a bridge which actually worked and a raft which we took downstream and had to abandon because we couldn’t get it to go upstream. We were actually thrilled that we were escaping down river and planning our lives ahead and then we bumped into a fence put by the neighbor farm to keep unwanted riff from floating across his part of the world.

We weren’t the only family living on the farm. There were ten of us in one family, twelve if you count our parents. There was another family with a lot of children and the farmer and his wife had a few of their own. We were our own community. There were enough children living there that we could have a pretty good game of baseball. We called it something else and everyone moves up a spot throughout the game so that everyone gets a turn at every post. Nobody wins but everyone tries to get a home run. The lawn in front of the main farm house was plenty large enough for a game of baseball. The driveway was made of gravel and had a large parking area at the top of the hill. We played marbles, and games where you throw a stick at the nearest person, if you hit them then they are it. We played a game called war, where you take over the driveway by drawing lines and throwing stones. I don’t remember all the games but it took hours of time and so much enjoyment. There was magic on the farm. The memory draws me in at times. It’s not the same when you go back to visit. The farm has changed, or perhaps it’s me that’s changed. I’m older now, everything feels smaller and less intriguing. Everyone else has grown up as well. The magic of it was there for us for a moment. It has moved on, but in my memory it will always be a magical place.

Elizabeth Williams - daily writing exercise, 1,081 words

Childhood Imagination

I missed two days writing. Saturday and Sunday. I went back to bed both days. I had an allergy which kept me sneezing violently for a whole day and part of the next, even with medicine. I was tired. The days were busy as weekends always are, especially Saturday. We picked beans and processed harvested corn and weeded and mulched the cucumber patch. There was laundry and cleaning to do. I feel as though I’m fighting a cold in my sinuses. The summer weather is not at all like summer weather but more like fall. Cool nights and some days then hot days as well with really high humidity. It’s hard on the sinuses, I suppose. Anyway I went back to bed two days and didn’t write. I missed it though. Stephan our grandson spent the long weekend with us. I loved having him, so did Chloe. Writing first thing in the morning when the sky is gray and the house is quiet is something I’m really coming to enjoy. It makes a huge difference to my day. I start off not having anything to write about and struggle through the first half, but once I get to the end I’m energized and in creative mode. I feel as though I can take on anything. I’ve even been better at cleaning. It’s like the most challenging thing is out of the way so anything else is possible. Once I’ve been doing this for three or four weeks it will be habit. I remember when I lived in town, I ran everyday, or walked briskly. It energized me as well. This is the same kind of thing. After we moved to the country to the outskirts of a new town I was at a loss as to where to run. I didn’t know the neighborhoods nor where the tracks are. I stopped running and walking. It was not a good feeling. I tried to do indoor exercises on indoor machines, but we all know how that turns out. I may try something like that with Chloe when she gets older. We could walk to the nearby housing development where her grandparents live. That could work. But for now I’m developing this habit of writing first thing. The brain is an amazing part of our bodies and is capable of so much if only pushed beyond our comfort level. Inspiration comes with use. You hear of people not being inspired, but now I feel that perhaps it’s because of stagnation. Like a pond with water but no where to go. Oh, what a concept. When a body of water has somewhere to go it freshens itself along the way. It is seeing different things and feeling different things and turning a corner it surprises itself. It has races down hillsides and bounces and splashes and sprays over and around boulders and ripples gracefully over smooth stones. It is happy, alive and full of energy. Always discovering something new. It is even sustaining other beings and giving energy all along it’s way. But a pond with no outlet like our little fish pond, it becomes stagnant and dark. Yes it is mysterious, but not in a lively refreshing way. It grows a thickness and becomes a poison. But water which flows, that water cleans itself and is clear. Our brains are like that. We need to be flowing. Moving along and letting the words flow. Following the contour of the land. Discovery and surprise keeping us alert and the ideas coming simply from the journey. I missed that this weekend. It wasn’t so long that I had to start again. Having Stephan and Chloe, two keenly creative souls whose childishness is still deeply ingrained in their senses. Spending time with them is like an exercise in itself. Have you ever noticed how grownups tend to move toward really, super boring and uncomfortable material. Making art static and uninspired. Children have the ability to twist and turn the ordinary into fantastical memorable events which have no end and no beginning and which include all the emotions in such a way as can be quickly put away and a different one emerges just like that. You are kept on your toes. Wondering what will be next. Enjoying one fantasy after another all while doing absolutely ordinary tasks. Children see the world in a completely different way than we as adults do. Spending time with children can if you have the right understanding about them, give you access into their timeless world. I know that their are adults who want children to become adult as soon as possible. To take on responsibilities and feel the heavy burdens of the life created for them, with no creativity in it. A boring world which adults feel safe in. One in which those adults believe will provide happiness and security for themselves and their children. A world in which children are uncomfortable and in trouble. Or a world in which the child is kept so busy there is very little time for imaginative discovery. A world full of man-made props. Then their are other adults who long to be given passports to the world of childhood fantasy. Who long to be able to open the door in their own minds to enter childhoods paradise. Spending time discovering and blending with free children, who have time to themselves. Time to explore and discover. Begging to be let in and see what’s there. Where will we go today? Who will we meet? What challenges shall we face? Will we borrow time with a strangers imagination or will we be creators of our own worlds. It is not all fun and games in the world of imagination. Sometimes it is very serious and highly unlikely and tragic things happen and it involves all of us in someway or another. Spending time with children is something like a daily writing exercise, where the imagination is encouraged to flow and meant to be taken seriously. If you have the energy and can let go of the reasonable and proper, you just may be allowed to enter.

Elizabeth Williams, daily writing exercise, 1,023 words.