Liz Young's Blog, page 12
August 25, 2021
POWER TO THE PEOPLE
POWER TO THE PEOPLE
The architects had tiled the roof with solar panels, the car park had wind turbines instead of trees, and the walls were fully insulated. Theo entered the building on his first day, relieved to be leaving the icy weather outside, but inside wasn’t much warmer.
The receptionist greeted him. “Go straight up – floor four.”
As he exited the lift someone grabbed his arm. “Thank goodness you’re here!”
Theo hadn’t expected such a welcome – then he saw the contraption. They thrust him onto the saddle, put his feet on the pedals. “There’s no sun or wind today, so you’re the dynamo.”
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A bit of silliness for a change! This has been a busy week and looks like continuing that way, so I've posted my story pretty much as it came out - hope it amuses you!
Thanks to Rochelle for hosting us and to Brenda Cox for the photo.
In case you missed it, my latest book CAROUSEL is now on Amazon - you can find it by clicking on the cover on this page.
August 18, 2021
ON HOLIDAY
ON HOLIDAYTwo young men on holiday in Tenerife were seduced by the sight of Harley-Davidsons gleaming in the sun, 'For Hire'.
Their girlfriends wanted the beach, but the temptation was impossible to resist. 'See you later!' and off they went.
A rough empty mountain road on bikes too powerful for them, no barriers, they took a bend too fast and dropped off the edge through bushes that closed behind them.
It took three days to find them. Three days injured in the searing heat with no water. They had no chance.
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I love the sound of a Harley and always turn to look with a smile on my face. I once saw a miniature model in a shop window that a child of eight to ten could ride and imagined my grandchildren's faces if I bought it. (Not at that price!) So I understand the seduction, BUT the above story is true.
My week has been busy with various medical appointments, but what took my mind of those is that my latest novel is available on Amazon.
CAROUSEL, set in southern England in the 50s and 60s, continues Albie Smith's story started in Helter-Skelter. Albie is the father of six children when tragedy hits his family and he has to leave behind the wandering life of a gypsy. Consumed by the dramas of a single parent, Albie is entering old age before he can think of love again.
August 11, 2021
ALIENS
ALIENS
They appeared out of a shimmering heat-wave and overran the town by sheer weight of numbers. The town was powerless to stop them billeting themselves in every house.
The heat-loving creatures took many specimens from the countryside, but when they stole human DNA for an inter-breeding programme, there was talk of killing them despite the risk. Wiser souls said “Wait – Mother Nature will sort them out.”
It snowed unseasonably early that year, and none of them made it back to their ship - the icy blasts froze the oil in their mechanical innards.
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The minute I saw Ted Strutz's photo I thought 'dead robot', and with a tweak here and there I was able to resurrect an old FF story. No time to do more as we are about to Go To The Pub!! Yes, I know, DANGER writ large and all that, but we're double-jabbed and desperate to meet up with the old gang, so sod it, we're going! I may be some time :)
And while I'm here, my latest book is now out on Amazon. CAROUSEL is a sequel to HELTER-SKELTER which I published a couple of years ago. Please buy a copy and leave a glowing review!
August 4, 2021
ICE
ICE
‘Let’s go camping,’ he said.‘In winter?’
‘Warm sleeping bags, a fire under the stars, it’ll be romantic.’
So we went, and it was romantic, with our sleeping bags zipped together.
I woke to the sound of a growl and shook him awake. ‘Bears!’
He peered through the flap. ‘Can’t see anything.’
‘There it is again!’
We rushed outside, shouting and waving the torch to scare them away, then a massive head broke through the ice.
As its huge mouth closed around his body I ran for the car.
True as I’m stood here.
Shame the cops didn’t believe me.
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My Canadian daughter-in-law tells stories of camping ON the ice in her youth - not something I'd feel comfortable doing, but then we don't get ice thick enough in England.
My daughter and friends are taking their children camping next week, which is probably what prompted this week's story, though I doubt there will be ice monsters in Dorset. I hope some of you at least are managing to take a holiday somewhere, even if it's only a tent in a field. I'm a bit past sleeping anywhere but in a bed!
Thanks to Rochelle for hosting FF and to Jennifer Pendergast for this week's photo.
July 29, 2021
FAMILY PHOTOS
FAMILY PHOTOS
My parents only took photographs on special occasions – weddings, baptisms, visits from distant cousins, and holidays.
Each year, somewhere in England that wasn’t home, we posed around our suitcase-piled car: Mum, my brothers, and me, while Dad set the timer before running to his allotted space. Smile, wait-for-it, click.
Until one year he didn’t run fast enough and the photo was only of five. He wouldn't take another.
A month later he left us.
When Mum died I inherited the family albums and went through them. She’d cut him out of every photo. Then I felt he’d really gone.
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Thanks to Roger Bultot's photo - I like your mirror, Roger - you have a here story about an old-fashioned kind of self-portrait, the kind that my grandchildren wouldn't recognise. Neither would my grandparents, whose photographs would have been even rarer, taken in studios in stiff sepia poses. Such is progress. Today I bought a smart TV which my smart grandson had to set up for me!
To read other stories from Friday Fictioneers, follow the link from https://rochellewisoff.com/
And if you'd like to read a longer story, I have a 500 word one on @visual_verse this month.
July 22, 2021
FROM HEAVEN TO HELL
FROM HEAVEN TO HELL
Anita thought she’d landed in Heaven when Gareth proposed.
Twelve years and two children later, with a nice home, a lovely group of friends, and a fulfilling job that paid for an au pair, she was still happy.
Until she saw Gareth’s hand on Caroline’s bum at a barbecue. The familiarity of that touch screamed ‘affair!’ like a foghorn.
Thinking back, the clues had been there – phone calls taken outside, late office hours.
Confronted, Gareth denied everything, but his eyes were guilty.
“Hell will freeze over before I believe your lies again,” Anita yelled, and filed for divorce.
........................................................................Looking at Na'ama Yehuda's photograph, my first thought was, 'I wish I was there.' It is too hot today in England - we are looking forward to the cooler weather that's on its way. Though we shouldn't grumble - Germany and China are suffering far worse than we are from the effects of climate change.
It isn't the weather to be sitting at a computer either, but my writing head has been buzzing and it's impossible to ignore. Except, that is, when engaging in minor spats on Facebook - my own fault for making contentious observations!
July 14, 2021
BACKS
BACKS
No-one designs the backs of buildings to be seen
a child with wooden blocks could do better
yet every day
a million eyes see them from train windows.
Ageing Victorian terraces
trailing listless grey washing,
yards full of junk,
and sagging curtains
revealing glimpses of other people’s lives.
Flat brick rows of suburbia,
double glazed windows looking onto manicured gardens
and a crying child under a climbing frame.
The train goes by so fast, do they know we see them?
Perhaps it doesn’t matter
as long as the eyes that watch a moment of your life
are those of strangers.
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Thanks to J Hardy Carroll for the photo and Rochelle for hosting FF on her blog
https://rochellewisoff.com/Another poem, and again a rewrite of one I wrote earlier - this has been a hectic week. I am in the throes of the final ( I think!) edit of my latest novel, which is a sequel to Helter-Skelter published in 2018. Yes, it's been a long time coming, but my excuse is that I published four other books in the intervening period. They are all, of course, available on Amazon.
My LIVING ROCK series - A Volcanic Race: Wolf Clan: Landslide: Rock Festival.
AND a little book of poems which you can buy by clicking on the image at the top of this page.
July 8, 2021
WHEN A TREE FALLS
WHEN A TREE FALLS
,A tree is always there,
immovable,
a living, solid friend -
backrest to the solitary reader,
a shelter from sudden rain,
the hollows of its roots
a bed for summer lovers -
perhaps a hundred years
of memories.
You don't expect
to wake one morning
and find its height reduced to length,
the secret places in its roots
indecently exposed,
and the unreachable branches
sad and defeated
under your caressing hand.
When a tree falls
your whole world rocks
and the child in you
trembles.
It's like coming downstairs
in the dark night
seeking comfort
and hearing your father cry.
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I wrote this poem after the hurricane in England - a rare event that toppled thousands of trees across the country. The trees that affected me the most were a row of chestnuts on our village green, where I went with my young son to survey the damage. He was thrilled to collect a whole shopping bag of conkers - I was heart-broken by the sight of root balls bigger than a bus exposed to the air, and the vast holes slowly filling with water.Thanks to Sandra Crook for the photo, and to Rochelle for hosting Friday Fictioneers.
June 30, 2021
PINK PIG
PINK PIG
She was rusty and filthy from her life as a chicken shed, but she was only £200. They got her engine going, fitted a small cooker, storage, and a mattress, and painted her bright pink.
Pink Pig took them through France, picking grapes, down into Spain, then a ferry across to Tenerife. Thirty years of printing tee-shirts, selling ice-cream, building houses, before the lure of his native Ireland was too strong to resist.
What became of Pink Pig? They sold her to an Italian couple they met on the beach – for all they know, she may still be travelling.
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My daughter and her husband did just as described above - Pink Pig even had eyelashes! After visiting them in Tenerife many times, we went to join them, though we flew rather than driving down in a pink van. Fifteen years later we returned to England, a year before they moved to Ireland.
So I can't see a battered old van without thinking of the adventures they had in Pink Pig - the people they met, the places they've been, their solar-powered showers (a plastic water container left on the roof while they picked grapes, and a gravity-fed hose with shower head attached!) their meals shared with passing tramps.
Thanks to Russell Gayer for the trip down memory lane, and to Rochelle for hosting Friday Fictioneers, which starts when the image comes out on Wednesdays, and if you leave writing your story till Friday, you've pretty much missed the boat and not many people read it!
June 16, 2021
PERCEPTIONS
PERCEPTIONS
Is this a dear little cottage or a spooky one?
It depends on your point of view.
Another resident at Mum’s nursing home told me today that once, when she was sitting outside, her feet were so cold she couldn’t feel them.
But then they began to warm up, and she looked down to see two moles lying across her feet. They stayed there until her feet were toasty warm, then got up and walked away.
She said every time she remembers that day she feels the love.
“That’s lovely,” I said - it’s all down to perceptions, after all.
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I have strayed today from the Friday Fictioneers' guidelines, as every word of the above is true. I have some experience of dealing with people who have dementia, and I know that logic ceases to exist for them. OF course, what the old lady told me could have been true, couldn't it?!
Thanks to Rochelle as ever for hosting FF, and to Alicia Jamtaas for the photo of that lovely wood and cottage. You can read other stories by following the frog link from https://rochellewisoff.com/ - after you've commented on my blog first, naturally!
