It descended upon her while she was walking through the woods. A giant web of some sort, but it didn’t seem to be finished. She heard something weaving.
She was frightened. It felt like it was grabbing at her and she tried to swipe it away.
She was coming to what seemed to be the end of it. The web had gotten smaller. The sound of weaving had gotten louder.
She fought it and tried to pull it off her. It seemed to tighten and then wrapped around her.
Welcome to my #weekendcoffeeshare #167! Please join us and pour yourself a cup of coffee or tea. There are lots of varieties on the bar.
If we were having coffee, the first thing I would share with you is that I have revamped my contact page. If any of you would like to contact me, please feel free. Just click on the link!
It’s been a busy week, both on the blog and in other parts of my life! Summer has begun here in Kentucky, U.S.A! The temperatures are heating up and the vegetation here in Daniel Boone National Forest, where I live, is lush. We had so much rain in the spring that the forest responded and the vegetation is especially lush this year. It’s like living in the rain forest!
Early in the week, my husband was doing some yard work and came across a timber rattlesnake. He was far enough away from it so it couldn’t strike, but it tried. They are quite poisonous. He took care of that problem. Here is an image of a timber rattler in case you need to know.
Timber Rattlesnake
If you see one of these guys, be calm, back away slowly, and either leave it alone or end its life as this snake is very poisonous. It’s also very common in this part of the U.S.
This week, we also attended a Celebration of Life for a friend who just passed away. She was one of my best friends and it’s been a sad time. We met when we were 6 years old and have stayed close our entire lives. I will miss her always. The Celebration of her Life was so nice with a huge turnout. It was nice because I got to see a lot of friends who I seldom see. Carol would have enjoyed it.
The cupboard was bare here at the beginning of the week so we made a trip to a couple of places we shop for groceries. One place was the local vegetable market, only open in the warm months. They have wonderful fresh vegetables and fruit. Since we try to eat healthy, we frequent this old-fashioned market often.
Fannin’s Vegetable Market, West Liberty, KY, USA
We’ve had good and healthy food to eat this week!
I’ve spent a lot of time with my two dogs this week, engaging in some dog training. Sophie, my German Shepherd dog, is already trained in obedience and protection, so I spent some time teaching her to play fly ball, which she loves. The next task is to teach her to play frisbee! Sophie likes to play fly ball with her squeaky chicken!
Sophie and her squeaky chicken
Hazel, a Pembroke Welsh Corgi, is my other dog. She will be two years old soon, but she got a rocky start in life. We rescued her and she has some health challenges, so she is a little behind the curve. We love her and have to protect her from too much activity. I’ve started taking her on short walks, getting a bit longer each day. She loves her walks!
Hazel
We went out to dinner this week which we don’t often do. There is a wonderful restaurant in a little town about 40 miles away that is right on the Ohio River. We had dinner with our friends there and we really enjoyed seeing them.
If we were having coffee today, I would very much enjoy seeing you and sharing my week!I look forward to reading your #weekendcoffeeshare.
Once upon a time, there were two children who lived in the country. The girl, Mary, was 12 and the boy, Eddie, was 10. They were neighbors and became the best of childhood friends.
Mary and Eddie lived in the forest with their families. One day, their adventures led them to some steps that went up from the forest into a small clearing with the forest on either side.
Every day, they would sneak up the stairs to the clearing and play one of their imaginary games. They usually played a game they called Explorer. They would pretend to camp at the clearing and explore the forest.
One day, they discovered the remains of a campfire. They ran off into the woods to see if they could find the campers. The children stumbled across two hunters who warned them that it was hunting season and they should stay out of the woods.
They were disappointed but there were always other games to play.
Many years later, Eddie was ill. He sat in his recliner at his home and his wife tried to get him to go to the hospital. Instead of answering her, he fell into sleep or perhaps a meditative state.
He told her this story, but in bits and starts. She thought he was hallucinating and called the paramedics. Before they arrived, Eddie finished the story, fell into sleep, and then he was gone. He left with the memory of his Glory Days on his mind.
Thanks to Ayr/Gray for hosting the #unicornchallenge.
She walked away from her home because she needed to think. Depression and anxiety were plaguing her. She felt like she was losing her mind. Her heart was sick.
She arrived at the path that led to the ocean. She started to walk toward the ocean. She wanted it to swallow her. Maybe then she could forget.
When she got to the sculptures, she stopped and admired them. A feeling of hope washed over her. She wanted to live, really live. After standing there, she turned to walk home.
She knew what she had to do.
Thanks to Rochelle for hosting #friday Fictioneers!
“Isn’t this the way you wanted it,” Emil asked Portia as she lamented her small social circle.
“I wanted to escape my previous life. Not my present life,” Portia responded to Emil.
“Portia,” Emil responded, “I’m not sure that you can be certain you have yet escaped your previous life. How can you possibly take the chance of putting yourself out there socially?”
As Portia contemplated Emil’s question, Emil thought about how he met Portia soon after she arrived in the small Portuguese town and they became fast friends.
Portia was a fun-loving, social person who had sought a way to rid herself of baggage in her life in the U.S. A drastic way, yes. Probably not a reasonable way. Portia had been desperate and had simply walked off and left her old life behind.
Emil said, “Portia, it isn’t easy to vanish in today’s world. Even though you have a fake passport and you don’t use your credit cards, he will probably find a way to trace you if he wants to.”
Portia would never go back to him or work for him again.
Ten days passed and Portia stayed in seclusion other than having Emil with her. One night, there was a knock at the door. She opened the door to find several law enforcement officers standing there. They announced that she was under arrest and would be extradited back to the U.S.
She went with the officers, crying and screaming, with Emil following. When they got to the jail, there he stood.
“Portia,” he said, “You can stay in Portugal. I don’t want you back. I do want the million dollars you embezzled from my company back. You almost bankrupted us.”
“I don’t have it now,” she said as she cried and begged for his mercy.
“Captain,” the detective said, “we know that women are not often grab and go thieves.”
“In the past, that was true, but in the present time, I’d believe anything. How do you explain what Mrs. Johnson saw? What about the shoe in the gutter?”
Across town, Gracie was making her way home on the side streets and alleyways. She had taken off the hat and wig she had worn and ditched them. It had been slow going. She was walking with just one shoe.
“There is another mystery,” the Captain commented. “I find it really coincidental that the thief grabbed Mrs. Johnson’s purse. No one could have believed she would have $10,000 U.S. dollars in cash in that handbag.”
“Hmm…why didn’t the thief pick a rich-looking woman?” asked the detective.
Gracie was finally home. There it was, all $10,000 of it. She thought back at the conversation she had overheard between her boss and a friend. The friend had a debt to pay, and she was musing on when and where she had to go to get the money.
Little Eddie ran into the room and Gracie bent to hug him.
“Mommy,” he said, “where’s your other shoe?”
“Don’t worry, Eddie. We can afford to buy shoes now.”
The Captain started looking at the pictures a bystander had taken of the robbery. The face of the thief was clear and familiar to him. Even though the hair was different, that was Gracie’s face. Gracie, his housekeeper.
She sat on a bench across the street from the museum, studying the sculpture in front. It was a man, seemingly sculpted from wood, reading. He reminded her of a book she once read, “A Man of Two Faces.”
If you looked closely at the man, you could see his skeletal-like face. Above it, between his forehead and the crown of his head, another face appeared to her. You could distinguish two eyes and a nose that would be looking skyward if the sculpture could have looked up. He captured her imagination particularly given the times she was living in.
The outward looking face of the man was bowed, reading a book. The book he was reading, she imagined, was a book on American culture in these unsettled current times. There were bitter political rivalries, hundreds of conspiracy theories, religious involvement, misinformation and disinformation. Neighbors turned against neighbors and family against family. Long-time friendships were forever destroyed. The American dream to her seemed to be gone and she had no understanding of half the American population and its thinking.
She looked at the other face of the sculpture. That face wasn’t as clear, the expression was more off-kilter, perhaps confused, and a little dreamy. Maybe that face was dreaming of what could be, but wasn’t, in America. The American Dream, but this time an inclusive American Dream that was available to everyone. Was it now lost forever? Destroyed by greed and the lust for power? The sculpture had no answers.
Mollie scurried around her kitchen, cooking for the festival in her town. Food from the southern US is often prepared differently than food from anywhere else.
Mollie couldn’t decide between entering her stack cake or a cushaw pie in the competition. Her neighbor was going to enter cushaw pie, but Mollie’s pie was her specialty dish.
The day of the competition came and Mollie’s pie won the blue ribbon. Her neighbor was angry and threw Mollie’s pie to the ground screaming.
Mollie learned that real friendship is hard to find and should be cherished and nurtured.
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Note: Cushaw pie is not common outside the southern U.S. A cushaw is a gourd and the filling is used to make pie. Many think it is tastier than pumpkin pie.
I awakened with a start. What had I heard? Oh, it was only Sophie, my German Shepherd dog who sleeps beside my bed. Wait! Sophie! Why was she whining? I leaped out of bed realizing my clock said 6:45 a.m. I usually took her for a walk on the beach by 5 a.m.
We walked outside. She pushed open the garden gate and started for the beach. I followed trying to stop her. Since one of her strides is equal to three of mine, there was no hope of catching her.
I jumped in my car. What else could I do? My dog was taking herself for a walk to the beach.
I pulled up in a parking space watching Sophie run gleefully around on the beach. As soon as I stepped on the beach calling her, a police car pulled up beside me. Sophie immediately ran to me, fearing I was in danger.
Ma’am, get your dog off the beach.”
Sophie barked at the officer. Her bad dog bark.
“Get off the beach with that dog,” he said in a loud, aggressive voice.
“Officer, if you would just give me a………”
What happened next wasn’t very pleasant. Sophie and I ended up looking through the bars of the backseat of a police car.
I was unhappy. The officer was unhappy. But Sophie? She had gotten to defend me from the bad police officer. Now if she can only figure out how to charm us out of jail.
The Write Scribe 