Like Puzzel Pieces

 

Like Puzzle Pieces   An excerpt from “My Name is Sam Benton”

By John W. Vander Velden

 

 

Now as Sam Benton lay in the dark he considered it once again.  To many, the lost souls of the street became invisible.  But striving to survive, just to endure, day after day with no hope, could reduce a person’s worth -- even in their own eyes.  These thoughts made the pain in his head grow fierce.  It seemed a small hammer beneath his skull pounded way at his brain.  Sam would push those thoughts aside for now, attempt to take himself to a calmer place.  A place of open meadows beneath crystalline blue sky.  Closing his eyes, remembering a place, a special time.  His parents preparing a picnic lunch as he wandered nearby.  An open expanse in Colorado, of grass and wildflowers of brilliant blues, yellows and reds, a stop along the highway.  One of the many road trips they had taken.  Marsha and Theodore Benton, teachers by profession, wished to teach their son to love this great country, to show young Sam as many wonders as time would allow.  Oh, how he missed them!

 Even in the blackness that now filled his world, he felt a tear escape.  The lid insufficient to seal.  That drop did not come alone.  Soon he found himself sobbing unable to control emotions, long bottled, now free. 

This was not the time.  But when? Sam asked himself.  Later the reply.  When he would be alone -- alone to carefully take out all his thoughts and feelings -- to spread them out like puzzle pieces.  Picking up each examine it, place it among its brothers and sisters and understand.  Not the situation -- the situation was beyond Sam’s comprehension.  But to understand how he felt about each part.  How he felt about that day.  How he felt about his part; what he had done -- but much more, about what he hadn’t.

These thoughts had not lessened the throbbing.  The attempted escape to a more tranquil place had only opened the door to a painful time.  Breathing once more in huffs he pushed those thoughts aside.  A task he had over the years perfected.  Sam Benton allowed his world to grow as dark and empty as the blackness that seemed to engulf him.  There within that escape, somehow sleep came once more.

 

(378 Words)

Up, U.P., and Away

 

Up, U.P., and Away            

 

By John W. Vander Velden

 

I believe that a body needs to get away from…well from the burdens of the ordinary every day.  So we as many others take vacations.  But where a person goes and what a person does on vacation tells a great deal about them.  So what does going to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and walking, and walking, tell about us.

It was not our first trip to the U.P., though our last one was three years ago.  But it was the first time we chose a hotel on the shores of Lake Superior, or Munising Bay to be exact.  We wanted to see Pictured Rocks on our last trip across the Straights of Mackinac, but it was too far from our base of operations, St. Ignace, to make it a day trip.  Munising gave us a new center point and from there we could take the scenic cruise to see the colorful rock cliffs that makeup the shoreline.  But there was so much more to see in this little piece of summer paradise.  But you have to like the outdoors.  We do.

Our first outing was to hike to Sable Falls.  The roar could be heard long before the crashing waters came to view.  There are dozens of waterfalls along the northern edge of the U.P. and over the week we saw several.  And there are lighthouses.  You know we like lighthouses.  Our favorites are the ones that are a bit off the beaten path.  Au Sable Lighthouse is a 1.7 mile hike from the parking lot.  Like I said it’s off the beaten path.  The trail on the top of the cliffs, a broad way for service trucks, was pleasant enough.  But we were coaxed two thirds of the way to go down to the beach.  The sandy beach lapped by gentle waves of a nearly tabletop smooth waters of Lake Superior.  Walking on the sand, looking at the remains of ships wrecked and rotting made the walk interesting.  But when the shore turned to loose stones that were pretty, but shifted and slid beneath each step, walking  became more difficult.

The walk to another set of falls was more than a mile of muddy slippery trail, where we took care not to trip over thousands of roots that crossed our path.  The hike took us off and alone among the trees.  We wondered if we had veered astray while I watched for wildlife…large wildlife.  I slipped and fell on that hike.  Silly us we forgot to pack our hiking boots, which would have made a world of difference. But the view of the falls made up for the careful walking, the slipping, and even the falling.

As you can see one of the common threads of this trip was walking, and climbing.  Climbing stairs, thousands of stairs.  There were stairs on the trails, well most of them anyway.  There were the spiral stairs up lighthouse towers.  There were stairs down to the beach.  Yes, there were stairs at the hotel.

So what does our “away” say about us?  Woods, lighthouses, waterfalls, Great Lakes, hiking, and let’s not forget stairs.  I hope it would say we are in reasonable physical condition.  Well, fairly reasonable.  But what does it say about our mindset?  Hmmmm.  We love the outdoors, always have.  We love stuff that our minds tell us are solid, like old barns and mills and lighthouses.  Especially lighthouses.  Structures that have stood the test of time and just by standing proclaim, here I am…here I will be.  Perhaps it is a bit old fashion to seek comfort from those strong solid things we seek.  Then there is Lake Superior, the rocks, the clear water, the very immense-ness of it, places us in a clearer perspective.  There we recognize our smallness and GOD’s grandness revealed once again in HIS creation.  In truth maybe we seek the things that are absent in our everyday.  But are they absent, or have we just taken the things around us for granted?

Hmmmm---there maybe some truth to that.  Being busy can steal the subtle secrets that surround.  Maybe it takes getting away to notice.  To see truths from a new perspective.  For even here in north central Indiana there are those amazing things.  Woods and hills we drive by as we scurry on our way.  There are things all around, magnificent things, unusual things, and old things.  Things that are as frail as the Monarch Butterfly wings, or as solid as that big rock I had to dig out of my field.  There are white country churches that stand as testament that even here in the open spaces GOD can be found.  There are the old barns that were once sources of pride for families that tended the land.

Yet we need to get “away”, to experience new vistas, or rather to see different examples of what we know.  In doing so we see “life” from a new angle.  And each person chooses the places to accomplish that.  And the choices we make, the places we enjoy, shows just who we are.

(849 Words) 8-22-2017

Writing?

Writing?

By John W. Vander Velden

 

So what is writing exactly?  The question seems silly.  Writing is simply putting words down on a page.  That would be the easiest definition.  But everyone knows writing is more than that.  An example: House  tree,  dog,  climb,  run,  swim,  colorful,  slowly,  hot,  frozen.  These are words put on the page.  Words that have little connection with one another.  But they are words on the page…written words.  No one would call that string of words writing.

So writing is more than just a set of words, it is a means of communication.  Using words to transmit a concept, to persuade perhaps, or teach, or entertain.  Writing is the careful use of words placed in specific order on a page.  And hopefully with correct grammar.

I believe that anyone can be a writer.  Few would agree with that opinion.  Now I didn’t say that anyone could be a good writer.  That takes talent and a willingness to do great deal of hard work.  But every literate person can write something, and most should. 

The computer has changed writing.  More it has changed who believes they are a good writer.  Word Processors are amazing…and auto correct and spellcheckers are very helpful.  The result is that the number of stories written has increased dramatically.  Overall that is a good thing.  But it overwhelms the process of getting a story in print.  Perhaps that doesn’t matter.  The quantity of stories published has grown some, but not nearly to equal the sea of manuscripts that flow off the fingers of uncountable authors.  The readers have more choices…which is good.  Publishers, for the most part, no longer seek new material directly.  Literary agents have become the link between writers and their outlet.  Yet even literary agents, worth their salt, are overwhelmed by the volume. 

None of this should stop the writer from writing!  And publication has no place in the definition of the word writer.

Writers write because they have a need…to write!  They have a need to tell the kind of stories they tell.  To build something using the bricks called words, using the tools they have.  It’s simple.  A writer is a person who writes…he writes because he needs to write.  Circular logic, I know.

So how do I fit into all of this?  From a very young age I created stories.  Most lived only with in my mind.  A few were told to friends.  And on occasion one or another was written down.  But now it is a passion.  The stories are begging to find their life on the page.  Short stories, essays, and novels ooze ever so slowly out of clumsy fingers across the keyboard.  But I write.  My local newspaper prints one of my shorts nearly each month.  So in my bolder moments I can call myself published.  For five and a half years readers have found weekly additions to my blog.  I have a following…small perhaps but real.

You see I am a writer.  I commit time and money to this craft I use to tell my stories.  Now I must push harder at the next step, to find an outlet for Misty Creek.  One way or another Elizabeth Beck’s story will be told.  One way or another Misty Creek will be published.  I am convinced…but need to do the hard work to see it gets done…

Wish me well…

Of Quiet Walks

Of Quiet Walks                       

By John W. Vander Velden

The sun pierced the dense canopy of hardwood leaves, like bright diamonds high overhead, sending shafts of brilliance through the forest’s twilight. They walked silently, hand in hand, for the moment required no words, and no words could express the moment.  Too seldom they came to this place.  Too seldom they separated themselves from the hurried world.  Each time they walked these places, both made a silent vow, deep within their individual hearts, to return soon.  But the magic of this sacred world fades with miles, with days, with work, and worry--with life.  It will be years before they would tear themselves away from all life’s demands and return for the peace found in no other place.

Cooler beneath the trees, than sun soaked open places.  Quiet as they strode the hillside among the great columns of ancient hardwoods.  They moved cautiously, silently, alone, far from busy traveled trails, beyond the reach of other’s voices.  Even the songs of birds high above, a rare interruption to their ears, as they strode here in the quiet primal forest, and breathed the musty scent of last year’s leaves at their feet.

They shared more than the common love of this special realm.  They shared a life.  Years built with each other, home and family.  A slow evolving of one plus one becoming greater than two, as time’s binding one to the other.  Many years of shared living, building a combined past.  The melding of two people bonded in ways neither expected. Of finishing each other’s sentences.  Of sharing common thoughts. Of children now grown. Of together finding courage, to face an unknown future.  Of long quiet walks--together.

These things fill their minds as they wander the cathedral made by God himself.  They do not understand the whole of it--for the whole of it too complex for mere mortal minds. They understand that they are part of something larger, but do not see exactly how they fit.  For them it is enough to accept.  Accept the moment, accept the life they shared, accept each other--as imperfect as they are.  Comforted knowing that they have found acceptance, in each other--in their God.

Clarity comes here in the virgin wood, as they wander within the shadows of ancient trees.  The daily hectic world is pushed aside.  Bills and bosses do not exist--here.  They share these moments with only themselves and the God that they know is everywhere.  They will add this day to their fondest memories of quiet walks. 

(418 Words)     10-1-2016

7-1-2023

Summer, Sand, and Flowing Water

Summer, Sand, and Flowing Water

By John W. Vander Velden

 

On summer’s hottest day, as sweat covered I trudge under ordinary obligations, I consider the season.    Some find summer unpleasant, but like each time of year it has its moments.  For there are those days when the air feels thick the moment I step out on a morning that is more than warm and a haze hangs in the air, proof of the intense humidity.  But summer is summer should we expect less.

On those intense days I remember the summers of my youth.  And when I think of hot days of the past, my years in central Florida stand out.  Sweltering heat and humidity the watch words of that country.  Often our escape to the cool creek enough to make the time pass as we splashed in the shallow water.  We learned quickly about rattlesnakes and cotton mouths, where they could be likely found and avoided those places.  The sandy space, that, with a bit of my older brother’s engineering became our island, was the center of our games and imagination’s adventures.

Even so we had to cross a marsh to get there, and dangerous things lived in the marsh.  A few scrounged cement blocks and some long boards strategically placed along a woven wire fence formed a makeshift bridge separating us from the ooze and the slithering critters.  Eyes open, always.  Pay attention to everything around you.  We often saw the gaping snow white mouth of the moccasin but never nearby.  Strange it was not the snakes that drove us away from that small piece of paradise.  In our play, we thumped a bee tree.  And as “Poo Bear” will tell you, “you can never tell about bees”.  Whether it was anger or a desire to protect their hoard, I could not say, but they drove us out, most impolitely.

It was weeks before we gathered enough courage to venture back.  Though we discovered our folly the island had lost its appeal, and we found other places, safer places, easier to reach places, at that.  But it is that small bit of an island a sandy place that I remember best.  And when I long to escape the hottest days of summer, sometimes my heart returns there.

(369 Words)  7-27-2017

Storms

Storms                            7-9-2017

By John W. Vander Velden

 

For each must face storms, and it is then they reveal their true selves.

 

“Life is not just a bowl of cherries.”  Providing you like cherries in the first place.  OK, what’s not to like about cherries? But the point of the quote, we have heard hundreds of times is, things do not always go the way we would like.  For each must face storms.

Finding my large barn door in the neighbor’s, field reminded me of other times and other storms.  Yes, there were several weather conditions that have shook my life to one degree or another, but they were not the only storms I have faced.  It’s life.  My world, like anyone’s, has endured storms.  Meteorological, physical, emotional, and all other traumatic times which are part of living.  There are times when I would have wished to escape the difficulties thrust into my life, but I caught my breath and did what needed to be done.  Sometimes just pushing through it, I have found myself so engaged I really didn’t think about the storm’s aftermath until later.

But there are storms that haunt me to this day.  Their memory lurks in the recess of my mind, jumping out from their hiding at inopportune moments.  Those times I remind myself that everyone faces those types of storms…it helps knowing that I am a survivor, as are you.  Storms sometimes leave scars.  But not all those marks are visible.

It is how we deal with the storms we face that show the material from which we are made.  Do we stand and whine, or roll up our sleeves and deal with the aftermath.  There are times when fatigue and frustration stand in my way of cleaning up yet another mess.  But I take a moment…or a day perhaps…to gather my breath so I can charge forward once again.

Each storm takes a little out of me.  But the effort demanded to “deal with it” adds something I did not have before.  Life is filled with storms…no two the same.  Storms provide the nexus to part of my growth as a man. 

I have endured another storm, and know that it will not be the last.  I will take the safeguards I can to minimize the damage that will occur, knowing full well I can not prevent it all.  As for today, I will tend to the cleanup and repair of last week’s wind.  I will give my best…and that will be enough.  Perhaps, just perhaps, I will be strong enough, when I face my next storm.