Let’s have more fun

John Clark: Sometime back, I posted a blog with ten story starts and invited readers to tell me which they thought would make good writing projects. Oddly enough, two of them turned into complete books last year, albeit unpublished as of today. I thought I would try it again to see what in might become a piece (or book) in 2024. I invite readers to decide which ones sound most intriguing.

1-Mary-Ellis Gagnon lay quietly, her brain not particularly engaging with a day that began like most others had. She lived in a cold creaky house permeated by the odor of a nearby paper mill. That familiarity was about to be turned upside down in a big way.

2-Everything hurt, but my hands and feet were the worst. Once I was able to get past the pain, I looked around. I wasn’t alone. Everywhere I looked, other people were moaning and hanging from squares that resembled a vertical bingo card.

3-Why couldn’t I die? Nothing I’d ever heard or read came close to this pain. To say that terminal cancer sucked was the understatement of all times. Nathan took a cool wash cloth and bathed my forehead. “There is one thing you have to do before the illness will grant you relief. Do you want to know what that is?”

4-”What do you mean I’m in violation of the dress code? This is a nudist colony.”

5-Lotta folks in Maine think of the Haynesville Woods as the most dangerous place in Maine. It ain’t so. If my cousin Eldrich could speak, he’d for sure tell you the swamp below West Appleton Ridge is a hell of a lot worse, but then, he never made it out of that place.”

6-I sat in a darkened theater, angry, hurt and abandoned. Angry at parents who thought foisting the their tickets onto me would allow them to get hammered at the country club. Hurt when my girlfriend dumped me for some jock, and abandoned by everything and everyone in my life. A half pint of stolen vodka had blurred my edges and I must have dozed off. I awoke, feeling confused, then was overcome by complete numbness when I looked at the Lakewood Theater program In my hand. It looked brand new, but featured a play called Naughty Cinderella and was dated August 13, 1932, ninety years ago.

7-I had no clue who or where I was. When I opened my eyes, it seemed like I was in some sort of tunnel. Then the chilling cold hit and I realized I was semi-submerged in slowly flowing water that was covered with a thin sheet of ice.

8-She had that shade of red-gold hair that always made my heart stutter with a face to match, but the way she was staring at me was extremely unsettling. I’d never seen her before. Then she spoke those words no guy ever wants to hear; ‘We need to talk about last night.”

9-I vaguely remembered reading something about thin spots, but didn’t they exist in exotic places, not decrepit barns in Sclearville, Maine? That didn’t stop me from moving closer to the shimmering rectangle on the back wall of Bessie’s pen. What would happen if I touched it? My hand made the decision for me, extending until it was an inch from something inexplicable.

10-”Where’s Aunt Ruth?” I asked my uncle. Lester gave me one of those dead eye looks that always creeped me out. “She’s out back in that damn garden she loves more than me.” I hustled around the corner, hoping to see her weeding like she usually was, but all I saw was a fresh mound of dirt where her cucumber plants had been a week ago.