Story Idea Phase Two

Okay, so phase one was a mild success. Thank you to those of you who commented on the previous story. Over 50 people looked at the blog and I received only a small handfull of feedback, which was a slight bummer because feedback is super de duper de helpful. This is why I am doing this! So please please please feel free to tell me what each piece makes you think of, whether you like it or not, what you might change, any corrections etc.

I am not entirely sure how I feel about this second piece. The assignment was to create mood through tone and setting. Let me know what you think!

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Everyone has an interesting life story. Everyone has some cataclysmic event that defines who they are. When I was eighteen like so many other eighteen years olds my life changed forever.  I suspect though my story is a little different than your typical coming of age individual.  I know no one else who can spend a week adrift at sea in a fishing boat with no supplies and live to tell the story. Well no one…except for me. The morning I woke up in Alister’s bed, confused and overflowing with hatred for this world was a tuning point in my life. I was expecting to be dead. Clearly I wasn’t or else I would not be sitting here writing to you today. Now I know what you may be thinking and it is not the way it seems. Alister is at least forty years my senior and at the time I woke up in his bed I didn’t know who’s bed it was. All I knew is that it smelled like the sea and I could have stayed in it forever.

I woke up that morning in a world so unlike the desolate warzone I had left. Never before in my life had I ever seen or dreamed of a place like my beloved Paros. Fields of sweet grass blanket whole hillsides, the sun making them glow with inner light. I would wander through the fields, fingers brushing the soft tops and lose myself in the clouds of butterflies that rose from the earth. A sweet scent puffed from the blades at every delicate touch enshrouding me in a wave of sweet air. Ravens. There were always ravens – cawing, playing, stealing, and haunting my every movement. The sea lapped at the shores of the Island. Most days it was a deep blue. The sort of blue you might expect nestled as a precious jewel in the crown of a queen. Sometimes though it grew angry and boiled as if hell itself was present. Gray and raging it would beat upon the little island. I was always afraid when this happened. Eyes flickering nervously towards the sturdy green shutters expecting them to give into the lashing rain at any moment. Alister would shake his head and hand me a cup of strong tea assuring me that we were safe. The shutters never broke and the house never caved into the mighty storms. If I walked out to the fields of sweet grass the day after I would find half of them lying limp and beaten on the sodden earth. And yet somehow they looked lovelier than ever.

The island was mysterious to me back then and remains mysterious to me now. Springs of water hot enough to bathe in gurgled from the earth in the deep valleys, the water an unusual purple and fragrant like rosemary. Nearby rocks hung with moss so long I would wear it as a dress and waltz through the forest. The old woman who used to bring me the first pick of olives from her trees swore that if I were to just submerge myself in the water my past would be forgotten and I could start a life with a clean canvas. I often thought about what she said but I never could bring myself to do more than admire them and occasionally wiggle my toes in the shallows. I think that maybe it wasn’t just the color of the water I found haunting but I wasn’t yet ready to let go of my fear. It defined me.

Maybe a month after I arrived on the island I found a cave low on a cliff band above the sea, its entrance worn smooth by the tides. I had scampered into its murky interior to avoid a storm that rose from the sea without warning. When the clouds cleared a thin stream of light danced its way along the rocks to where I was sitting. There was something strange in the light though that caught my eye. I could just make out paintings on the walls. A history left by the ancients. I swear every time I pressed my fingers to the cold rocks I could hear them still whispering their fears and hopes to the island, who bore theirs dreams. I too would cry my fears into the depths of the cave giving my burden to the island. Alister always thought I was silly to whisper to the cave but I swear to you, it helped. I stopped going as the years went by, when the memories became less raw and painful. That’s when I learned to paint.  Canvas and paint can take a surprising amount of abuse and still turn out beautiful. I could never have learned to express thoughts in color though had it not been for the help of the cave and the sweet grass, the sea and the purple springs. They taught me that there is more to life than a memory and so I kept on living.

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