writing and fun

I was 9 years old when I decided that my time walking the block to elementary school could be productive if I wrote poetry on my way to and from school. The problem was that I knew little to nothing about poetry. My daddy wrote light verse for Mom and us kids before he went to work each morning so that's what I thought poetry was all about. With my school-walking poem though, I never got beyond the first couplet because rhyming wasn't a strength of mine back then. I was stuck and didn't know how to get unstuck! Even as a child, I knew that creatively writing could be wonderful and satisfying though I couldn't yet get the hang of it myself.

Fifty years later, enter my wildly enthusiastic granddaughter who loves just about everything! She'd do it! I knew she would! I told Summer if she'd write a story, I'd post it on my blog for all my friends and our family to see--and she did it. She wrote a story for me and ultimately, for you all. The only changes I made were to add a couple of commas and quotation marks for clarity. Here it is in its entirety for your reading enjoyment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Candy

by

Summer Loftin

(age 10)

I know for a fact that everyone LOVES candy! But has anyone ever been scared of it or at least think it's creepy in any way shape or form? Your probably thinking, "What the heck? This girl is crazy! I love candy and nothing will ever change that!"

Well, think again! After you read this story, you will say, "WOW! candy can be creepy after all." And I'll be the one doin' the runnin' man, sayin, "Oh yeah, suckers, I was right! WOOP! WOOP!"

So, once upon a time there was a girl named Penelopea. She loved candy so much she actually wanted to change her name to Sweet Tart Sally! Just Kidding! But she did love candy a whole lot! One day she was casually walking on a yellow brick rode when she spotted a huge lollipop with a hole just her size. So she climbed in and hoped for the best! She was surprised that when she fell it didn't hurt at all. When she realised where she was and what was fluffy and apparently she was sitting on cotton candy! And best of all she was in Candy Wonderland!

So she wandered and wandered all around until she saw that all of the candy around her had really mean, scary faces on! She was really scared and super upset! The only thing she could think of was, "Why are all these pieces of candy so mad at her?"

Apparently, she forgot to sign in at the front desk and they said they were not mad, just scared. They said they were sorry to frighten her and they lived happily ever after!!

So, you see, candy can be sort of scary.

I guess that wraps it up.

The End

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I love my little Summer, her story, and the Lord, The original Creator, for blessing me with three wonderful grandkids who are creative in their own unique ways.

Suz

walking in the dark

I was watching Intervention tonight with my pups when the power went out. It's the first time we've lost power here in Alabama so I wasn't exactly sure what to do or who to call. Would it be a long time? What's the power outage phone number? Did burglars cut our lines? I had lots of questions as I sat in the darkness.

After about a minute I decided to check out the burglar thing by looking out the window. After all, it's a full moon tonight. I should be able to see them if they are messing around our house, right? I went to the door and opened the shade. Nope. Nobody there--and the power pole light was out too. Then, I decided I'd walk to the front windows to see if our neighbors had power.

Now, I knew the pups water bowl was behind the recliner and close to the futon...I KNEW it was there--but I hit it with my foot anyway and it spilled all over the floor and got the carpeting wet. Shoot! It figures. My next mission was to feel my way the short distance to the kitchen to get a kitchen towel to sop up the mess. That's what I get for meandering around in the dark--even though I thought there was enough moonlight was seeping through the slits in our blinds to do it safely. One can never have too much light for safety's sake. No power next door, but also no strange cars in our long driveway, either. Seems as though all was well on the western front--or whichever direction we're in.

Next mission. Find my IPhone for its light and look up the power company's phone number to report the outage since we didn't have a flashlight in the house. I didn't want to go hours on end waiting for it to come back on just because I didn't report it. I keep it in my purse and I usually drop my purse on the floor by my nightstand so I felt my way in there to find it. OK, found the table with no problem. Then, I bent down to grab my purse and when I did I whapped my mouth flatly on the corner of the nightstand. OUCH! Of course, I hollered and woke up Byron. It hurt like crazy! I could just see myself now, big honkin' swollen lip, bleeding all over the place, big blue ugly thing...

So, of course, by then Byron got up and found a type flashlight in his hunting backpack that shows blood trails when he's hunting. No regular flashlights in this house. I'm holding my mouth and shedding a couple tears heading for the kitchen table where I remembered setting my purse after we'd come in tonight. I'm digging in my purse, still holding my mouth, and he's chasing me with his light saying, "Hold still. Let me look at it. HOLD STILL!" But I've already left the table and made my way to my notebook with all my Alabama documents to find the outage line number.

"Come here! Let me look at it! Will you just stand still for a minute!"

"OK, here. Look! But be careful. It hurts so bad."

"I'm not gonna hurt you. Just let me see it."

"OK. Ow Ow Ow."

He looked at my lip and pronounced it "not bad at all." No blood. No cut. A little puffy on the inside but otherwise I'm in good shape. I'm torn. I'm glad I'm not an ugly mess, but after all, I've already endured the pain and now I don't even have a battle scar, a trophy, for this little adventure. While we're assessing the tiny bit of damage to my lip, the power comes back on and we have light and air conditioning once again. Yay!

Byron kept saying, "You just can't go wandering around the house in the dark like this." He doesn't know that I often move around the house with no lights on. Every night, when I get up to get some water, or inevitably go to the bathroom, I have no light. I know where I'm going and I never have a problem...at least I'd never HAD a problem until tonight. Light would have been the very thing I needed so I wouldn't have hurt myself.

His words got me thinking about my spiritual life. How many times have I thought I knew better about spiritual matters when what I really needed was Jesus' light on the issue? How often could I have had His wisdom and light in giving advice to someone but I decided I was OK without it? How many times have I fallen in my own strength when, if I'd only asked, I could have had His strength?

The Lord is light and in Him there is no darkness at all. Tonight's slightly bruised lip helped me remember something vitally important about the Lord in my life--I need His light everywhere, all the time.

Sometimes it's the smallest thing that brings to light the biggest truth.

Suz

my walk in the woods

"C'mon. Let's go for a walk. I want to find the surveyor's pins on the corner of our property."

"I don't wanna go for a walk."

"C'mon. It's not a hard walk...the grade isn't too steep. It'll be an easy path."

"OK. I don't really want to, but I'll come."

So we walked. Up the hill. Over to the side of the hill. Up a little higher. It was, just as Byron said, an easy walk. As we moved northward I could see a huge valley between the two hills. Then I heard the creek down at the bottom of the valley. As small as it is, it sounded refreshing and inviting. I had never been this far down the creek before and I wanted to see it. I told Byron I was going down to the creek.

"It's a long way down there and pretty steep to climb back up."

"I know. But it's clear walking and I have lots of little hangy-on trees to help me come back up."

"You're gonna think "little hangy-on trees" when you start back up that hill."

"I'll be back!"

I worked my way down the steep hill. There was about a foot or so of leaf litter all over the ground and I had my Keds on--which aren't known for their gripping ability--so it was an adventure all the way down. Finally, I reached the bottom and it was beautiful. The creek is only about 6 ft across at the widest point and there were a couple of little falls that were very pretty. It's nothing spectacular, just a little creek in the middle of nowhere, but the music of the rushing water coupled with the sunshiney day and the cool breeze between the two high hills made it amazing.

I walked along the creek for a little bit and looked around enjoying the solitude. I felt safe because I knew at the top of the hill was my husband listening out for me if I should need help and I also felt fairly safe because despite being in the woods down a steep hill in a part of the woods I've never been before, I knew the way home. Home was just over the hill. It might take a little bit to get there, but I wasn't at all lost.

After a little while, I decided to make my return up the hill. It sure looked higher going up than I thought it would but I started up, and sure enough, I used the "hangy-on" trees occasionally as I walked. I had just about reached the top and Byron was only feet from me. As I stepped toward a clump of trees, I grabbed onto a skinny trunk. Just then, my right leg slid clean as a whistle, completely and totally into a hole! My right leg disappeared into the ground up to my thigh. There was nothing around my leg and my shoe wasn't touching anything inside the hole!

I didn't feel hurt so I didn't panick, but I yelled to Byron, "My leg's in a hole!"

That's when my protector-husband calmly yelled back, "Well, pull it out!"

Byron is an experienced woodsman so I figured if he wasn't alarmed, then I wouldn't be alarmed either. I pulled it out.

I checked myself out. My pants leg was a little dirty. My shoe was still on my foot. No ant bites. No bees nest in the hole. No water. No bugs. No worms. No scrapes. No bumps. No bruises. No nothing. I pulled myself up and walked up the rest of the way to Byron.

"There was NOTHING in the hole! Nothing! My foot touched nothing at all!"

"When trees die and rot out, they leave holes in the ground." Such a matter of fact kinda guy!

I was relieved that I hadn't been hurt and that I wasn't alone out there when it had happened. Byron and I laughed about it all the way back to the house--and every time I think about my adventure today, I laugh--mostly, because I'm relieved and so very grateful that I wasn't hurt in some freak mountain-woods accident. What if I'd broken my leg? Or, what if that hole had been big enough for BOTH my legs? I might have discovered another Ruby Falls--or disappeared into an abyss, forever gone. Can't you just see Byron trying to explain my disappearance to the police? HA!

When we've imagined all the possibilities of what might have happened, the "what-ifs" don't really matter. Although I will probably remember this day as the day my leg fell into the mountain hole, I will also remember the rushing water and solitude of the creek as that icy water ran freely over the little falls to who knows where. Most of all, when life is hard and I struggle with people, circumstances, finances, emotions and situations, I will remember that I am still never alone and home is just over the hill.

Suz