Author Topic: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings  (Read 2530121 times)

Offline Kelda

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5510 on: January 31, 2012, 05:29:13 am »


Don't know where this came from, and it's not my business either.
I loved to read it. It's a wonderful short story.
You have a way with words, friend. I know I've told you before, but it bears repeating.
 :-*

*nods*
http://www.idbrass.com

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http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/idb

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Offline CellarDweller

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5511 on: January 31, 2012, 06:29:14 am »
damn, I love the way you write.


Tell him when l come up to him and ask to play the record, l'm gonna say: ''Voulez-vous jouer ce disque?''
'Voulez-vous, will you kiss my dick?'
Will you play my record? One-track mind!

Offline Shakesthecoffecan

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5512 on: February 03, 2012, 01:05:53 pm »
The plan had been that on Monday the birthday card would be purchased and put in the mail to make the trip to South Carolina in time for his birthday. That had been the plan.

Now it was Tuesday evening, and it was dark, and the options were reduced to the Walgreens up ahead. They had a good selection he reasoned, he would find something.

There were two rows. He usually gravitated to the 99 cent cards, but this was to be a special birthday, he was going to splurge on an expensive one. There were several with  hunky men on the cover, and he was not worried about picking them up and reading them. The sentiment on the inside was generally a bit more on the juvenile side, or just not appropriate for a gentleman of a certain persuasion.

There were the cards that played music, or the ones you could record a message in, but as the recipient was hard of hearing there was no point sending one of those. There was the Peanuts card, which had individual windows on the inside with various characters wishing the recipient a happy birthday, nah that one wasn’t it.

There was the one with the vintage Mickey Mouse and he carried this one in his hand for a minute until realizing his friend would have been a teenage when Steamboat Willie came on the scene. No, that one too wouldn’t be just right.

Then he came to the monkey section. Someone had told him once you could never go wrong with a monkey card. Still, the one of the monkey smoking a cigarette didn’t stir him. The one with the confused monkey saying he/she/it did not know why they were sending the card wasn’t going anywhere on his stamp. Then, there it was….

A simple, posing chimp with sunglasses on, mirrored ones. The inside said “OK, light the candles!” He flipped to the back to check the price and found a further dialogue balloon saying “And call the fire department!” Yes, he had found it. $3.99.

The next morning in the parking lot of the Post Office he said a little appeal for steady hand and even ink flow. The device quickly delivered the words:

“May this 100th annual observance of your nativity exceed your wildest expectations for it, and may your expectations remain, exceedingly wild.” He took it to the window and requested a special birthday stamp, one with a flowered red heart.

And with all sealed and affixed, he slip the card through the slot, and with it stitched another thread in the long story. A written story, a sacred journey. One that began with a friend of theirs he had never met, and the Christmas gift of a diary he began writing in just weeks before John Zeigler broke his water.

« Last Edit: February 03, 2012, 05:49:38 pm by Shakesthecoffecan »
"It was only you in my life, and it will always be only you, Jack, I swear."

Offline Kelda

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5513 on: February 03, 2012, 04:11:56 pm »
 :D
http://www.idbrass.com

Please use the following links when shopping online -It will help us raise money without costing you a penny.

http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/idb

http://idb.easysearch.org.uk/

Offline Shakesthecoffecan

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5514 on: February 06, 2012, 01:27:18 pm »
This morning while getting ready I had the radio on my local public radio station and heard the following essay courtesy of the "This I Believe" project. The story was so strongly reminiscent of Ennis finding the shirts that I had to find it and repost. This is Opal Ruth Prater of Chilhowie, Virginia:



I found the shirt hanging on the back of a chair in the cook shed when we came home from the funeral. It had been a beautiful day when he last wore it. We had cut the last of the corn, gathered pumpkins, and picked the last of the green beans. Then he took the kids down the ridge to pick apples, and the warmth of the day combined with the heat from his labor forced him to remove it.

There it hung on that old, straight-back chair, mocking me with its emptiness. With a cry, I snatched it up. It smelled of sunshine and fresh air, that wonderful outdoorsy scent of my husband emanating from this final source. I buried my head in it and cried, as I had been unable to cry before.

My children gathered around me, their small hands patting, trying to comfort me. These four beautiful children were now my only reason to go on, and from them I drew the strength to dry my tears.

My husband, Dusty, had had a heart condition, one that could be controlled with medication, the doctors told us. “He should live to be an old man.” When he lay down in the yard that lovely fall day, he was only forty-one years old. Our idyllic mountain home became a lonely, haunted place.

Days passed slowly without Dusty there to laugh with me, read to me while I cooked supper, and rub my back until I fell asleep at night. When things got really rough, I would slip out to the cook shed, bury my face in his shirt, and cry out my sorrow and frustration. That was as close as I could get to the lost half of me.

Then the day came when we had to go out for groceries. It stormed while we were out and delayed our trip home, so we went to bed right after our return.

The next morning, I went out to the cook shed for a few moments of meditation before the children woke up. Some of our goats and sheep had taken shelter in the shed from the previous day’s storm, and they had knocked Dusty’s shirt off the chair and trampled it underfoot. I grabbed it up, but its wonderful, comforting smell was gone.

Fifteen years have passed since my husband’s death. My children are grown, and I have to admit that they turned out pretty well. I still catch myself thinking, “We didn’t do half bad, did we, Honey?”

I heard someone say of a departed husband, “I loved him.” How do you get to the point where you can speak of that love in the past tense? If that love is past, why does the memory still have such power to invoke both happiness and sadness?

I believe that as long as I am alive, Dusty’s memory will live in me. I see his eyes peeking out at me from my grandson’s face. I find something of his spirit in each of our children.

My husband’s death affected our family greatly, but his life impacted it more. He will live as long as one of us is alive to remember and to love him.

And sometimes on a warm fall day, I catch that outdoorsy scent of fresh air and sunshine, and my face is buried in Dusty’s shirt once more. Although I know he sleeps, I hear his shout of laughter somewhere just ahead, and I think he waits for me.

I believe that love is stronger than death.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Opal Ruth Prater and her late husband, Dusty, raised their four children on several hundred acres of land about three miles from the nearest blacktop, with no electricity or running water. Ms. Prater still lives among her beautiful southwest Virginia mountains, with her children and grandchildren close by.


http://thisibelieve.org/essay/25233/




"It was only you in my life, and it will always be only you, Jack, I swear."

Offline Shakesthecoffecan

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5515 on: February 06, 2012, 01:48:42 pm »


Don't know where this came from, and it's not my business either.
I loved to read it. It's a wonderful short story.
You have a way with words, friend. I know I've told you before, but it bears repeating.
 :-*

That actually is a true story as it was related to me, I only added a few details I remember from visiting David myself.
"It was only you in my life, and it will always be only you, Jack, I swear."

Offline Kelda

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5516 on: February 06, 2012, 01:52:08 pm »
Wow yep definitely very Brokeback esque
http://www.idbrass.com

Please use the following links when shopping online -It will help us raise money without costing you a penny.

http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/idb

http://idb.easysearch.org.uk/

Offline Monika

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5517 on: February 06, 2012, 02:28:55 pm »
This morning while getting ready I had the radio on my local public radio station and heard the following essay courtesy of the "This I Believe" project. The story was so strongly reminiscent of Ennis finding the shirts that I had to find it and repost. This is Opal Ruth Prater of Chilhowie, Virginia:



I found the shirt hanging on the back of a chair in the cook shed when we came home from the funeral. It had been a beautiful day when he last wore it. We had cut the last of the corn, gathered pumpkins, and picked the last of the green beans. Then he took the kids down the ridge to pick apples, and the warmth of the day combined with the heat from his labor forced him to remove it.

There it hung on that old, straight-back chair, mocking me with its emptiness. With a cry, I snatched it up. It smelled of sunshine and fresh air, that wonderful outdoorsy scent of my husband emanating from this final source. I buried my head in it and cried, as I had been unable to cry before.

My children gathered around me, their small hands patting, trying to comfort me. These four beautiful children were now my only reason to go on, and from them I drew the strength to dry my tears.

My husband, Dusty, had had a heart condition, one that could be controlled with medication, the doctors told us. “He should live to be an old man.” When he lay down in the yard that lovely fall day, he was only forty-one years old. Our idyllic mountain home became a lonely, haunted place.

Days passed slowly without Dusty there to laugh with me, read to me while I cooked supper, and rub my back until I fell asleep at night. When things got really rough, I would slip out to the cook shed, bury my face in his shirt, and cry out my sorrow and frustration. That was as close as I could get to the lost half of me.

Then the day came when we had to go out for groceries. It stormed while we were out and delayed our trip home, so we went to bed right after our return.

The next morning, I went out to the cook shed for a few moments of meditation before the children woke up. Some of our goats and sheep had taken shelter in the shed from the previous day’s storm, and they had knocked Dusty’s shirt off the chair and trampled it underfoot. I grabbed it up, but its wonderful, comforting smell was gone.

Fifteen years have passed since my husband’s death. My children are grown, and I have to admit that they turned out pretty well. I still catch myself thinking, “We didn’t do half bad, did we, Honey?”

I heard someone say of a departed husband, “I loved him.” How do you get to the point where you can speak of that love in the past tense? If that love is past, why does the memory still have such power to invoke both happiness and sadness?

I believe that as long as I am alive, Dusty’s memory will live in me. I see his eyes peeking out at me from my grandson’s face. I find something of his spirit in each of our children.

My husband’s death affected our family greatly, but his life impacted it more. He will live as long as one of us is alive to remember and to love him.

And sometimes on a warm fall day, I catch that outdoorsy scent of fresh air and sunshine, and my face is buried in Dusty’s shirt once more. Although I know he sleeps, I hear his shout of laughter somewhere just ahead, and I think he waits for me.

I believe that love is stronger than death.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Opal Ruth Prater and her late husband, Dusty, raised their four children on several hundred acres of land about three miles from the nearest blacktop, with no electricity or running water. Ms. Prater still lives among her beautiful southwest Virginia mountains, with her children and grandchildren close by.


http://thisibelieve.org/essay/25233/





Oh....

Offline Penthesilea

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5518 on: February 07, 2012, 03:22:15 am »
That actually is a true story as it was related to me, I only added a few details I remember from visiting David myself.

Yeah, it had that feel to it, as if there were a personal connection.

Offline Penthesilea

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Re: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings
« Reply #5519 on: February 07, 2012, 03:30:00 am »
This morning while getting ready I had the radio on my local public radio station and heard the following essay courtesy of the "This I Believe" project. The story was so strongly reminiscent of Ennis finding the shirts that I had to find it and repost. This is Opal Ruth Prater of Chilhowie, Virginia:


A bittersweet story, and reminiscent of Ennis indeed.

Loved this:
Quote
My husband’s death affected our family greatly, but his life impacted it more.