Invasion of the Bike Weenies

Eryn and I have been reading a couple of David Lubar's Weenie books, collections of scary stories aimed at children. At the end of "Invasion of the Road Weenies", Eryn asked me what I thought a story about "Invasion of the Bicycle Weenies" would be like, based on Lubar's idea that he might build his next book around that story. I told her this short ad hoc tale while sitting on the couch. If Lubar gives me credit, he's free to steal it. I think it came out sounding very close to one of his stories:

Aaron's mother yelled at him as he walked out the kitchen door leading into the garage, "If you're going to ride your bicycle, remember to put on your helmet!"

"Yeah, Mom," Aaron mumbled.

"I mean it!" she yelled at the closing door. "Helmet!"

Aaron stood in the garage looking at his bicycle and thought about what his mother had said. "Wear your helmet. Wear your helmet! Wear YOUR HELMET!" Always with the helmet. Just once he wanted to go for a ride and feel the breeze on his face. The wind in his hair. The helmet always made him so hot and sweaty. He had no doubt he wouldn't sweat a drop if he went helmetless.

Aaron looked back at the closed door. His mother had been washing dishes and when he had seen her, she'd been only halfway done. If he went now, she wouldn't catch him. Aaron tossed his helmet in the corner and hopped on his bike. He took off, leaving the helmet rattling far behind.

"Your helmet!" his mother yelled from the kitchen window. "Your helmet!" He should have known she'd be watching. But Aaron didn't even look back. He'd had his first taste off the wind and he wasn't turning back.

Faster and faster he biked, flying through town and past his gym coach who was just walking out of the grocery store. "Aaron Teasdale! Where is your helmet?" he yelled as Aaron biked on. "You'll crack your skull!"

But Aaron left Coach Bart in the dust. Flying onward, his hair trailing him like a windsock.

He pedaled past the drugstore and Pastor Janet came running out. "Aaron Teasdale, put on your helmet! You'll get hurt!"

Burt Aaron didn't stop. Pastor Janet would just have to pray for him.

Aaron left town, breaking into the open fields and farmland beyond the buildings and cars. He was exultant. Out here it was so flat he could see for miles. He was safe now. A car couldn't hit him. There were no pedestrians to worry about. A helmet would have been pointless.

Something hit Aaron in the head. Something hard. Aaron saw a pebble fall and bounce off his top tube. He rubbed his head. It must have been kicked up by this tire, he thought, and he surged on. But then there was another knock to his head. And another. Aaron slowed, in case his speed was the reason for the bouncing stones. But the small pebbles kept coming, even when he came to a halt.

Aaron looked around for the tosser, but there was no one. He looked up to find the pebbles were falling from the sky, like hail. One rock hit him in the forehead, and another nearly hit him in the eye. Aaron realized the rocks were coming faster and faster, and the stones were getting larger and larger. There was no where to hide. One particularly large rock nearly knocked him out and, as he spun around, dizzy, a fist-sized boulder fell and dented his down tube. As another large rock hit him just over the eye, Aaron wished he'd worn his safety helmet.

Republic

Christmas is going fine here at the Scooter household. I'll do a run down after the inlaw version of festivities is over. In the meantime, here's a story, because I promised way back in some previous post that I'd put one out here before the end of the year. It's not new - it's from my master's thesis (it feels like something I wrote four years ago) - but that means I can't really sell it or give it to a 'zine for publication because it's first north american serial rights should already be moot (i.e. it's published, you can find it in the thesis searching system at any college), so it's a good candidate for blogging . I include the introduction from my thesis for some context:

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INTRO
It is always possible that one author’s utopia can be another author’s dystopia. There is a fine line between doing what serves the common good and creating a society where perspective on the common good is lost. This dystopia, "Republic", is a literary exercise and a reversal of Plato’s famous utopia, outlined in his The Republic. In addition to showing how a society based on The Republic could easily become a dystopia, the story serves to show how many notions of what constitutes a dystopia and what constitutes a utopia are based upon the time and circumstances in which an author lives. It is highly unlikely that an individual living in 21st century United States of America would ever consider Plato’s ideal social model a realistic alternative to modern society. "Republic" strives to highlight the nature of the dystopia by contrasting it with the formation of what might be a utopia, a truly global government.

In the context of the preceding essay, barriers of physical location, societal rigidity, class differentiation, internal propaganda, and external threat–specifically, constant war–are obvious. None of them necessarily serves as physical barriers to escape, but all of them certainly serve as mental barriers.


REPUBLIC
Even if I was deaf, I could still hear the bombs. Continual vibrations shake my body, shake the world. Piercing whines petrify me, taxing my anticipation with their unremitting barrage. It is a bombardment undreamt of in anyone's imagination, a bombardment so extensive that it stops the imagination—stops it dead. Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! BOOM!

Quiet.

The stillness of the dead.

Isn't that what we are, the dead? Our fate is so certain, that it has already been written down in the history books of our conquerors, like Dresden or Hiroshima. Why then have they stopped their attack? Is this a funeral gift from our vanquishers? They know we are a country of philosophers, and though they fear us greatly, they also seem to respect what we idealize. This brief cessation is a boon, allowing us to die as we have lived, in thoughtful consideration of the divine truth. Our conquerors are a generous lot—they show us more courtesy than I believe we would have ever shown them.

"The ground still rumbles, even though the bombs have stopped," Sparta says to me, her burnished hair littered with plaster and specks of dirt. Indeed, she literally seems to vibrate, so great was the shelling. "Perhaps they've run out of ammunition," she jokes, a wry smile on her face despite her sureness of our impending death.

"Father?" asks little Santorini, her bright, freckled face looking up at mine, hope in her eyes, "have the bombs stopped for good?"

"I'm afraid not, little one. I think the guns are merely resting—and giving us a chance to rest."

"They must be very tired. They have been shooting for days.” She pauses, lost in contemplation as children are wont. “Why are they shooting at us, father?"

Such a question, a very heavy question. How do I answer it? How do I explain two thousand five hundred years of philosophical history, two hundred years of national history, and a lifetime of personal history, all in the brief moments left to me in this life? Rather, I should be hugging my family—kissing Sparta and telling her how much I love her, telling her how our marriage has made my life worth living. I should be gathering my daughter in my arms and comforting her in this hour of fear. I should be doing all these things, but I will not. Nothing to excess. Even in the face of danger, in the face of death, one must observe proper social restraint. I hate myself for my restraint, for punishing my family because society tells me I must. In Sparta's weary eyes I can see how she hates herself for the very same trait.

"Tell us, Thrace," Sparta bids me, "Tell us why they are shooting at us." In her eyes I can see the real need, the real statement—if you can't hold me, than at least talk to me; use your voice to comfort me as you should be using your arms.

I could not, would not, refuse her if she begged me to hold her. But that will not happen. Neither can I refuse her in this simple, unspoken request. If it is my voice she must hear, then I will give her this wish. Santorini is too young to understand what I will tell her, but my voice will calm her as well as Sparta—and perhaps my words will calm me as well.

"In school, the Guardians have told you how our country was founded, did they not?"

"Yes father," Santi takes on the stiff-backed and attentive look of a child in front of a teacher. "Unlike other nations, Our Republic was brought forth whole from the earth, a gift from the gods to the world, to show the barbarians how they should govern their lives in the name of truth. Our history is the eternal history of the land that created us—we are the people of metal, the children of the philosopher kings, the society of enlightened truth."

"If we are the enlightened, then who are the unenlightened?" I asked, offering her the dialectic method with which she was familiar.

"The barbarians. Those who live outside Our Republic. Where we are the gold, the silver and the bronze, they are baser metals. They are corrupt in their purpose; the mixture of metals in them makes them weaker, less pure than the citizens of Our Republic."

"And why are they weaker?"

"They are unsure of their purpose. Even when they have purpose, it is the wrong purpose, as there is no greater goal in life than to achieve the foundation of the most perfect and most just state possible—a purpose and end already claimed by Our Republic. The barbarians' governments all show how they are confused, unjust and unsure about the common good. Their confused governments are reflections of their confused selves. Society reflects the individual."

These were the same things I had learned a quarter of a century earlier, during my childhood. But unlike Santorini, a bronze by birth, for a brief while I had been cast of a brighter metal. Both Sparta and I had been silver in our hearts—destined to be auxiliaries. Few who are silver are ever found to be misplaced bronze, but occasionally it happens—usually in pairs it seems. Perhaps that is why we developed a love for one another. After nineteen years of auxiliary training: fifteen years studying literature, two years of advanced physical training, and two years of arithmetic, plane geometry, solid geometry, astronomy and harmonics, I now work as a clerk for the silvers to whose company I once belonged, as though to chastise me for what I have forsaken. Sparta works as a trainer in the gymnasium, also surrounded by silvers every day. Truth be told, I find my life more pleasant as a bronze—my own land and animals, my own family, freedom from the duties of war. It is...was...idyllic before the war. But then again, this only proves that I am made of baser metal than originally thought. Yet, my nineteen years as an auxiliary taught me many things, many things that others made of bronze have never been told.

"There is a different truth about the barbarians, Santi. Though if I tell it to you, you must never tell another." If you get the chance, I added to myself.

"Why, father?"

"Because only those who will one day be Guardians or auxiliaries are allowed to know what I am going to tell you."

"Then you should not tell me! We each have our place. If my place is not to know, I do not wish to know, father!"

I listened for the bombs. They were conspicuous in their silence. "I don't believe it will hurt anyone to tell you now. Everything does have its place. And now is the place and time to reveal the truth."

"The barbarians are not a bad people, Santi. They are not a great and uncontrollable rabble, subject to every whim of their leaders, as the Guardians would have us believe. Neither are they entirely unenlightened."

"They have not grasped the truth! I cannot believe it is so!"

"That is true, they have not grasped the truth we reach for—they are the cave dwellers. But they have reached a certain truth even while observing only the shadows of our reality. In school you are taught the names of the many nations of the world and about their many constitutions, are you not?"

"Yes!" Santi exclaimed. "The United States of America is a democracy, an 'agreeable anarchy.' Japan is an empire, with an emperor, and thus is the most unjust form of government, a tyranny. Some other countries are communistic, sharing all their property, much as our Guardians and auxiliaries share their wealth, but sharing for unenlightened reasons. And many of these countries professing communism are in reality oligarchies, where either wealth or power is hoarded by a select few. The United Kingdom is also a democracy, but has a monarch as well, proof of their confusion in searching for the ultimate state, for true justice. This confusion is why they are always fighting amongst one another."

"Yes, Santi. All that was once true, and those are the facts that they teach you in school. But all of that was true a very long time ago, when Our Republic was originally brought forth. Since then, the world has grown much closer. At first, there were many wars among the cave dwellers. The new democracies at the end of the last century fought within themselves and amongst each other, just as our leaders told us they would. New democracies were always too eager to embrace the slightest bit of propaganda, and those who had once held power before democracy still held a certain amount of authority in many cases, creating democracies ruled by oligarchies of men, and democracies split by violent factions. In the United States similar events occurred, but there it was because wealth was accumulated in the hands of a limited few. The rich became richer, the poor became poorer, and only those with money ruled. All over the world it was such, and for a while Earth was a very violent and very dangerous place.

"In such an environment our country was born of the earth, founded on the mining of metals and precious substances from the earth, much like our legends say. And in such a world, a world of war and a world of power, our training and our belief in the truth made us supreme. Then I was a silver, an auxiliary, and I believed in everything for which Our Republic stood. So did your mother. I was sure that our truth was the only truth and that our way of life would be the model which the world would follow. When we studied our history and our destiny, I embraced my studies and my exercises for the good of Our Republic. I wrote paeans to the gods, odes to the state and strived to fulfill the ideal of just living defined by the Guardians. By the dog! I even volunteered for our 'character-building' wars! As though any war could ever build character!"

"But war does build good character, father! It removes the weak from among us and promotes the strong. War and the Festivals provide us with the best possible Guardians—individuals of gold and silver who lead us in our quest for the truth! Guardian Thrasymachus says that war is like the smithy's bellows—it forges and tempers our souls, building the strongest citizens."

"War never builds, Santi. You need only look about you to learn that truth. War only destroys." When I saw how quiet Santi became, I despaired of stripping her of the armor her teachers had provided. But war strips people of many things, even the innocent. It had long ago stripped me of my convictions.

"I'm not even sure how many battles I fought in the name of Our Republic while I was an auxiliary. I know there were at least ten before I first met your mother. I actually met her on the battlefield, Santi. Although we ate together every day in the halls, such were our numbers that I had never seen her before. Until I met Sparta, I had taken my winning kisses from a young man named Alcamides; but when I saw your mother I wanted kisses from no other.

“Where did you first see her, father?” Santi looked from me to Sparta and back again.

“She caught my eye at Moscow, “ I replied, looking into Sparta’s eyes. “That was the battle they said could not be won. It was the battle upon which the world expected us to break. Yet we were not broken. We were a silver hammer shattering their sickle. The history of others on the steppes of Russia was of no concern to us, for we were not there to take or conquer as those before us had been. We were there to sharpen our skills and to prove our mettle, to show the world what it meant to be the brightest tool of the gods. Yet in that very act, perhaps we were also the hammer tempering the greater weapon lying in the forge. I’ve often thought back on that battle and wondered if it was then that the world saw past the shadows of the cave, if only for a moment.

“Your mother was one of the brightest at Moscow, so bright I’ve never doubted she was a silver, even now. The enemy melted before her prowess. When her wing swept the southern end of the city and rolled into the square where my group had been dropped, a solitary figure standing atop a silver tank, its finish gleaming, even in the Russian gloom, I felt my heart leap from my chest and into her hands.

After Moscow, I pushed myself in future battles to obtain rights to her at the Festival. At the battle of Addaba, I destroyed more than a score of enemy armor, my own plowing through theirs as though they did not exist. The dead littered my trail like a carpet of flesh. At Kabul, when my tank ran out of ammunition, I abandoned it and destroyed as many with my hands as I had with my vehicle. Our enemies were so disunited then that none could stand before us, and we reveled in destroying them, proving our superiority through battle, as if it proved we had fully grasped the forms nature has provided. There were so many dead; so many lives wasted merely to build our character.

"Yet, the death I had caused was of no concern to me at the time. When Festival came, our glorious Philosopher King praised my deeds and gave me my pick of mates at Festival. There were many I chose to mate with that year, but the only one I cared about, and the only one I remember now was your mother. It was at that Festival that we first made love; and it was at that Festival that I realized that I wanted more than to mate, I wanted a mate."

"And when you first touched me, Thrace, I knew that I would never again want another," added Sparta. "All the Festivals of the past, all the battles of the past, became at once dim memories and distant dreams."

"So we fell in love, Santorini. And so we were cast out of the Auxiliaries.”

"Guardian Thrasymachus says you failed to fully apprehend the truth. That like heroes in the banned plays, you showed undue feeling, rather than believing in the true nature of yourselves."

I smiled and sighed. "Perhaps Thrasymachus is correct. But I would not have had it any different even if I could have changed it, Santorini. Your mother and I gave up killing for love, and more importantly, for you.”

“I should have been silver,” Santi moped.

“Silver and alone,” Sparta shook her head, saddened at what little we had taught our daughter, and what little time we lacked to ever teach her more. I too realized that time was running short and that our respite, this silence, would only last so long before the final crescendo. Before that moment came, I wanted Santi to apprehend at least one truth, to pierce at least one shadow our philosopher kings had passed as fact and form.

"If we were truly silvers, Santi, then by birth, you would be one of the only silvers left. There are few left to argue your claim and it matters little now.”

“Where have all the auxiliaries gone, father?”

“To dust,” Sparta whispered. “To dust.” And I knew I must continue before we were afraid to speak.

“At first the world was divided, and our wars succeeded. There were always nations to fight, and in the face of our training and our devotion to ourselves, they were weak. But over the years, the world grew closer and their timidity I coming to the aid of their neighbors became stern resolve. While there are still many individual nations, most are now only a part of larger unions. Several states band together and agree to share everything and deny each other no restrictions. Their areas still reflect their old cultural characteristics, but their borders become soft, to the point that no one still knows they are even there, except on old scraps of paper that only we are likely to keep. In this world there are now several such unions: Pacifica, the EEU, EurAsia, and PanAfrica. Even amongst these great unions, some borders are becoming soft, and soon we may see only three great states, America, Eurasia and PanAfrica; and then perhaps one, a return to the Pangea from which this world emerged.

“We failed to apprehend the ways in which the world was changing. We assumed that our way was the perfect form, heaven-ordained, and that no other society, even one brought into creation as a reaction to Our Republic, could even stand against us. Yet stand against us they did. Our attacks met more and more resistance as our little wars no longer involved single, isolated nations, but dozens of friends allied together in defense. Where we had auxiliaries of silver on the field and in our mess halls, they had auxiliaries of silver in the great political halls of the world. Where we were a tempered state made of individuals, they were a tempered world of nations. In our misapprehension, we allowed ourselves to become wedged between these great nations. Rather than contributing to the peace and unification they were experiencing, to their apprehension of justice for their citizens, we became a violent and troublesome break in their fluid borders. We are a break that has refused to learn that Our Republic, cast in metal, should be malleable like gold and silver we claim to be, not rigid and brittle like iron or stone. The world has changed, yet we still wage our wars and we still build our character, though now we wage defeats, not victories.”

"Is that why they hate us, father?"

"No, Santi. I don't believe they actually hate us. Rather, they have tolerated us and our wars as long as possible. They have tolerated us longer than they should have because they recognize the debt they owe us and they recognize the beauty of Our Republic.

“Santi,” I suddenly asked, “have your ever had a pebble in your shoe?"

"Yes! And I hated it! I couldn't walk, and when we stood to recite our paeans, I was reprimanded for fidgeting!"

"To the great unions, Our Republic is like that pebble, Santi. And soon, we will be like the shadows in the cave, fleeting memories of what once was real. We sought to create a perfect form, an immortal nation based on truth, knowledge and strength. But metal takes many forms, Santi, and in some, a great weakness lies beneath a glittering exterior.”

A thumping began from far away, seeming to come from all directions, converging on our home. “It begins,” murmured Sparta.

“It begins,” I agreed, slipping my arm tightly around her shoulders and tugging a startled Santi into my lap.

I'm back! Vacation and A Line from a Recent Story

What was that, twelve days without blogging? That may be my longest absence since I started. I did better than that while I was on RAGBRAI. I apologize. The family took grandma (or great-grandma, depending on whether you're GenX or Gen...Z+, to Tucson for her annual snowbirding. I looked at my Blackberry a few times just so I could thank the coworker who was covering for me, and otherwise I avoided the internet with the exception of updating my parents' computer (by the way, f-you Realplayer and your shitty "I don't want to upgrade because you had a previous version and you manually uninstalled it without installing a new version and now I won't play nice except to leave hoofprints all over your registry." And no, it's not Microsoft's fault for having the registry in the first place. Real Player 6 footprints and Real Player 9 and 10's refusal to install if there's a manual uninstall of 6 is utter garbage. One of the stupider things I've ever seen in installation, as well as the refusal to offer a fix even though it's obviously a Real-related problem despite that some users have bemoaned the problem for over a year).

Anyway - I have hundreds of pictures. So, so, so many pictures. I shall subject you to only the more interesting and amusing ones, and just a few scenic ones over the next several days. Why not all at once right now? Because I'm too lazy to upload them all at once, let alone comment on them all at once.

On to the story...I've been writing a short story based on the ride Ming, Kyle and I took through Wisconsin. The characters aren't based on us, but I needed a name for a main character I could wrap my head around easily and he shared a few qualities with Ming, so Ming it was. My favorite line so far..."and Ming wondered if strippers biked."

Eryn's Telescope

Another kids' story. I know...where are the stories for adults? I have a notebook full of science fiction and horror stories, I just haven't pushed them into the computer yet. I'm a little slow to do the typing because I know just how much I'm going to modify it during the entry process. So instead, you get things I know don't need a ton of rewrite and that I can get double duty out of because I can read them to Eryn for bedtime.

Eryn's Telescope

On Christmas Day, Eryn ran downstairs from her room and dug through the stocking her parents had pinned to the fireplace mantle, looking for candy. While she found an assortment of chocolates, candy canes and nuts, she also found a small box full of plastic stars. She turned it over in her hands, watching the stars fall against the inside of the box.

“I think they’re for your room,” said her father, walking down the stairs in his housecoat. “If you stick them to your ceiling and let them sit in the light for a while, they’ll glow in the dark.”

Eryn’s eyes lit up and she rushed back upstairs to where she’d just been dreaming of ribbon-wrapped boxes and noisy toys and dumped the stars in a little pile on her bed. Mixed in with the stars was a block of putty for sticking them to the ceiling. So Eryn crawled up on her bed and tried to stick a star on her ceiling. But she couldn’t reach. Being three had its drawbacks. She looked at the ceiling for a while, feeling sad, and then looked at the wall. What was a wall, she thought, if not a ceiling on its side. And she could reach the wall. At least she could reach the parts that weren’t that high off the ground. So she stuck a star to the wall, and then another, and another, until there were a few dozen stars on the wall.

In the meantime, her dad had come upstairs and was watching her from the doorway. “That’s a good job, honey. Would you like some help putting some on the ceiling?”

“Sure, Dad,” Eryn stretched her arms upward as high as she could.

Her dad grabbed her under the arms and lifted her up until she was close to the bumpy white ceiling.

Eryn stuck a star between a few bumps. And then another. “Down, please!” she asked. Dad set her down on the bed and she quickly put putty on the back of a few more stars. “Up, please!” And up went Eryn, and up went two more stars. This continued until her dad was puffing a little and almost all the stars in the box were gone. There were stars all over the ceiling, all over the walls, and all over one or two other things, like the closet doors and the book shelves.

“Want to see them with the lights out, Eryn?” asked her dad.

Eryn thought about that for a moment, torn between seeing all the stars glowing and her new presents under the tree. “No,” she declared. “Tonight. When it’s dark.” And she ran back downstairs to look at her new things.

One of the presents Eryn received for Christmas was a new telescope. It was a black and yellow telescope with a three-legged stand – a tripod, Eryn’s mother called it – and three different lenses. One lens pointed up, so you looked down into it. The other two lenses pointed forward, just like the telescope itself. Eryn’s dad said the different lenses were for making the telescope look closer or further, because sometimes things were not so far away, like the trees behind the house, or the neighbor’s playset. But sometimes things were very far away, like clouds, stars, and planets. Eryn thought airplanes were also far away, and her dad told her that sometimes they were and sometimes they weren’t, and that when they weren’t, they moved too fast to watch with the telescope.

That night, Eryn’s mother took Eryn outside and set up the telescope so they could look at the stars. She said it was best when it was very dark outside, so it was a good night for watching stars because the moon was only a crescent. Dad said, “A croissant moon?”

Mom replied, “No. A croissant is like a French donut. You eat it with breakfast. A crescent is when you can only see a part of the moon, not the whole thing.” And she pointed up where only a part of the moon glowed brightly, but not so bright that it was hard to see the stars.

“I can see stars over our house!” exclaimed Eryn. “And a shooting star!”

“That’s an airplane, honey,” said Eryn’s dad.

“Well, it’s shooting,” insisted Eryn.

“Yes it is,” laughed Dad.

Sandy, Eryn’s dog, wanted to help look at the stars. She sat on the porch, near the chair and table, and wondered when they would get around to looking at the dog star, Sirius, which was in Canis Major. That was Sandy’s favorite group of stars, because it was like a big dog in the sky. Sandy liked to imagine that she was in the sky, chasing all those other stars that looked like birds and cats.



Eryn’s mother pointed the telescope at a bunch of stars in the sky and pointed them out to her, showing her how they twinkled and sparkled. Through the telescope they looked like shiny holiday lights decorating the sky. Without the telescope, they looked like a man with a bow and arrow and a belt. Eryn’s mother said that was because that constellation was Orion, the hunter. A constellation, she said, was a bunch of stars next to each other that looked like something: a man, a swan, a fish, a dog, or even a house. She showed Eryn where Orion’s belt held up his pants, because if he had to hold them up with his hands, then he couldn’t hold his bow and arrow.


After a while, everyone started to get cold and they picked up the telescope and went inside to sit by the fireplace. Eryn thought about the crescent moon and all the stars she had seen.

She thought about the groups of stars that looked like things, the constellations. Like scorpions and crabs and cups and lounging ladies. And she thought about the stars that were so far away and the trees that were not and the airplanes that sometimes were and sometimes were not.

And then she remembered something funny and she ran upstairs to get ready for bed. Mom and Dad came up to tuck her in and asked her why she had such a big smile, a smile so big they could see it in the dark, just by the light from the open door. Eryn snuggled up under her covers and pointed her favorite flashlight at the ceiling where the plastic stars she had glued up glowed in the dark. “Not all stars are far away, Daddy.” She hid the flashlight back under the covers.

“I guess they’re not,” said Eryn’s dad, looking at all the stars she had glued around her room. “Some are very close.”

“But there are still constellations,” Eryn added, pointing to one area of her ceiling. “See that spot? It looks like you and me and Mommy.”

“Why so it does,” said her dad. “So it does.”

“I’m going to call it The Family,” Eryn declared, kissing her parents good night. And with that, she asked them to close the door so that she could watch the stars, now and then, when their light waned, making them glow brighter with her flashlight. She watched them until the flashlight fell out of her hand and she dozed off comfortably under her stars that were under the real stars in the crescent moon sky.

A Bear Named What

A Bear Named What

Once upon a time there was a princess who lived in a faraway land, a cold land, called Eagan. Her name was Princess Eryn. Princess Eryn lived in a big castle made out of wooden blocks, each block having six sides, and each side having a colorful number or letter. While the walls of her castle were great for spelling out messages like, “I SEE YOU” and “I AM 4 TODAY” or even “DID YOU FART”, they did very little to keep her warm and cozy on cold, Eagan nights.

She guessed that perhaps she could burn the blocks to stay warm, after all, there was a fireplace. But then she would have no where to live.

So, day in and day out Princess Eryn sat in her cold, wooden, block castle and rearranged the letters. “IS IT WARMER OVER THERE” one day, and “I AM COLD” the next and “BRRRR” on yet another day, although that time she ran out of enough Rs to show just how cold she was. She was at least eight Rs cold, certainly not just four.

Just when it seemed like she would have to start burning blocks, there came a knock at the front door. Princess Eryn lifted her head off the wood block she used as a pillow, crawled out from under the wood block she used as a blanket, and went to open the wood block that was her front door.

“Who’s there?” asked Princess Eryn.

“A big green and white bear,” was the reply.

“A big green and white bear who?”

“Um…just that, no more,” said the voice.

Princess Eryn threw open the block door, and sitting there was a large, green and white bear, just as he had said. “No, no…” chastised Princess Eryn, “Your joke will never do.”

“Sorry,” said the bear.

“Here,” Princess Eryn said, her teeth chattering a little in the cold breeze. “You go inside, shut the door, and I will knock.”

The bear did as he was told, and when Princess Eryn knocked, he opened the door.

“No!” she exclaimed. “You have to say, ‘Who’s there?’”

“But I knew it was you,” said the bear.

”I could have run away.”

“But you live here.”

“Maybe there was a fire!”

“There’s a fire!?” exclaimed the bear, looking around, then running past the princess and out of the castle.

“No. There could have been a fire. And I could have run away. So it could have been someone else at the door.”

“Why would you run away from an imaginary fire?” asked the bear. “Can’t you just put it out with imaginary water? Or call the imaginary fire department?”

“Go inside,” order Princess Eryn through gritted teeth, which at least kept them from chattering. “And when you hear me knock, say ‘Who’s there?’”

“You do understand,” said the bear, “that to hear you knock implies that I know it is you, and puts us right back where we were.”

“Fine. Go inside, and when you hear a stranger knock, say, ‘Who’s there?’”

“How will I know it’s a stranger and not you?”

“You won’t. You will have to ask.”

“What?”

“Who’s there?”

“Cargo.”

“Cargo? What?”

“No it doesn’t. A car goes beep beep!” The green and white bear grinned a goofy grin and looked at the block castle. “Would you happen to have a spot of hot chocolate in there?”

Princess Eryn, still a little irritated about having the knock knock joke turned on her glowered at the bear and said, “If there were hot chocolate in there do you think I would be standing out here chattering my teeth?”

“Probably not,” replied the bear. “But one can never tell.”

“Come in anyway,” said Princess Eryn. “I’m lonely, and maybe you’ll settle for a glass of iced tea.”

The big green and white bear came in and sat down on a wood block bench while Princess Eryn took some iced tea out from behind the wood block refrigerator.

“I noticed your rather unique home while I was visiting your neighbors,” said the bear. “I was hoping perhaps you could help me.”

“How’s that?” asked the princess, handing the bear a glass of iced tea that actually had ice on top.

The bear looked at it dubiously. “I’ve lost something important, and I could really use it back.”

“My blocks are not for sale. Not at any price!”

“I don’t want to buy your blocks,” replied the bear. “I was rather hoping you might help me by using your blocks to find my name.”

“You’ve lost your name?”

“I have.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.”

“It’s not something like ‘Big Green and White Knock Knock Smarty Pants Bear’, is it?”

“It could be, I guess. But I’ve always been of the opinion that I’ll recognize it if I see it, and that doesn’t seem right.”

“Seems right to me. But if you say it doesn’t suit you, you probably know best. So how can my blocks be of use?”

“Well, I thought if you spelled my name, I might recognize it.”

“Wouldn’t I have to know your name to spell it?” asked the princess.

”A bit of a conundrum,” sighed the bear.

“Is it Frank?” asked the princess, spelling out FRANK with some wood blocks.

“No, that’s not it,” replied the bear.

“Bill?” she pushed BILL into place.

“Not Bill,” replied the bear.

“Aloysius?” asked Princess Eryn, mentally kicking herself for picking such as a big name as she pushed ALOYSIUS into place.

“Not that either,” the bear looked relieved.

“Winnie?” she flipped and pulled until WINNIE was showing.

“Sounds familiar….but no.”

“This could take all day,” said the princess, slouching against a block and breathing a bit heavily. “And I don’t have the muscles to push blocks all day. Hey! Maybe your name is DID YOU FART,” she pointed at the side of the castle. “That would sure save us some time and effort.”

“I saw that when I was at your neighbors’ house,” said the bear. “It’s definitely not DID YOU FART. When I said ‘Yes’ they packed me up and shipped me over here.”

“Hmmm….” Pondered the princess, moving a few feet further from the bear. “Perhaps we have to break the task down into its constituent parts.”

The bear looked confused. “You mean, like use all the same letters. As in AAAAAA?”

“No, that’s ‘consistent’ parts.”

“Then you mean when each block is signed by a famous person and guarantees me life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?”

“No, those would be ‘constitution’ parts.”

“When none of them are in the water?”

“Those would be ‘continental’ parts. Constituent parts are just like the blocks. They’re the smallest parts you can identify in something.”

“You mean the font?” asked the bear.

“No!”

“The kerning?”

“No! The letters!”

“Oh, right. Like letters are the smallest parts of a word.” affirmed the bear.

“Exactly.”

“Syllables are small,” opined the bear.

“Not as small as letters,” lectured the princess. “And they don’t fit on wood blocks.”

“Those are very large blocks…”

“Do you want to find your name?” threatened Princess Eryn. The big green and white bear quieted down. Princess Eryn pushed the A from ALOYSIUS out to a spot of its own. “Look familiar?”

“No.”

She pushed it away and replaced it with the B from BRRRR. “How about that?”

“That does tickle the memory bone,” said the bear. “But maybe it’s because bear starts with a B.”

“Could B,” said the Princess. The bear rolled his eyes. “But for right now, let’s go with it.” She pushed the A back over next to the B to spell BA.”

“Ba….” Mouthed the bear. “Good name for a sheep. But not for a bear.”

“Well, BB is right out,” said the princess.

“Why?” asked the bear.

“You just don’t see that,” she said. “Not unless your parents were really mean. Some letters just don’t show up together too often, especially at the beginning or end of a name.”

“What about Dafydd?”

“Are you from Wales?”

“I think I’d remember that.”

“Then we’ll ignore that one. I doubt we’d see BC or BD either.” She pushed over the E from WINNIE. “Maybe BE-N?”

“No,” said the bear, “Not BE.”

“And not BF, BG, or BH…” she rolled over a block so that the I from DID YOU FART was available. “Could your name be Bill? Or Binky?”

“No,” said the bear. “Not BI.”

The princess sighed. “Nor BJ, BK, BL…wait.” She pushed over the L from COLD. “Blake? Blair?”

“Nope,” said the bear. “Not Blake. Not Blair. No BL.”

The princess stretched and cracked her back. “Not BM or BN…” She grabbed the O from DID YOU FART. “BO…Bonkers!”

“Maybe I am, but it’s not my name. That O looks really nice, though.”

“Excellent!” Princess Eryn stared at the letters and pushed over the A again. “BOA?”

The bear thought long and hard about BOA. He hissed a little, just to try it on for size, then dismissed it. “No. I would have to slither a lot if my name was Boa. I really don’t like to slither. It gets the white fur all dingy.”

The princess found another B and pushed it over. “Hey!” she exclaimed. “Say ‘knock knock’.”

“Knock knock,” said the big green and white bear.

“Who’s there?” asked the princess, presenting the letters on the three wood blocks with a big flourish.

“B…O…B.”

The princess flourished much faster.

“Oh, Bob! Yes, Bob! Bob’s here!” exclaimed the bear, jumping up and down. “Bob’s here!”

Once she knew his name, and the bear was no longer a stranger, or a big green and white smarty pants bear – at least not often – Bob and the Princess Eryn became the best of friends. Bob was pleased to have his name and a place to live where your friends didn’t turn you out on your ear just for a little farting. The princess was happy to have a friend, and a big furry one at that, with lots of excess warmth. He was a much better blanket and pillow than any wood block had ever been. And when Bob and the Princess Eryn found you could get a cup of hot chocolate at the local coffee shop, to go no less, they lived as happily ever after as a princess and a big green and white bear named Bob in a wood block castle ever could.

Jelly's Donut

You may be wondering about the kid's stories. Hopper, and now this one. I decided a few months ago that it was sort of stupid that I hadn't written Eryn any stories she could call her own, considering I had a Master's in writing. I hadn't given any thought to publishing any of them, and I have a Creative Commons license on the site, and no story will ever make it into a book without illustrations, and I'm a seriously bad artist, so I don't see any harm in putting them out here for anyone to read to their kid(s). Eryn's particularly fond of this one. That's a picture of her on National Donut Day. Note that the author of Arnie the Doughnut is in no way associated with, or gave blessing to, my story.

Jelly's Donut

When Jill was young, really just a baby, her favorite food in the whole world was a big jar of grape jelly. Her parents would feed her squashed peas, squashed carrots, and sometimes squashed squash, and like the good little girl that she was, she would eat every bite. But as soon as she was done, she would point at the refrigerator with a tiny finger and grunt, “elly, elly, elly…” Even before she could say “dessert”, she knew what dessert was and what she wanted for dessert.

Her parents would sigh and ask her if she wouldn’t rather have something else. Maybe an ookie, or a piece of ake. But Jill would just keep pointing at the refrigerator, insisting, “elly, elly, elly!” until they gave in.

Jill wanted grape jelly so much and so often that after a while her parents quit calling her “Jilly”, as some parents are wont to do with a little girl named Jill, and took to calling her “Jelly” instead.

Jelly’s mother and father thought she might outgrow her jelly phase. But over the years she only learned to love it more. When she was two, she discovered it was great on crackers. At three, she embraced peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. At four, she went back to eating it straight out of the jar.

Whenever Jelly’s father went to leave the recycling at the end of the driveway, he would watch for neighbors first, just so they couldn’t see him carrying a big bag full of empty jelly jars, each of them licked cleaner than if they’d been run through the dishwasher.

“This has got to stop!” said Jelly’s mom. “Jelly can’t start kindergarten eating nothing buy grape jelly. They don’t serve jars of jelly at the school cafeteria.”

“She doesn’t eat just jelly,” said Jelly’s dad. “She eats her vegetables and her fruits and her meats and dairy. She just likes to finish off with a spot of jelly.”

“A jar is not a spot!” exclaimed Jelly’s mom. “And they won’t have even that much at school. We need to find her another dessert.”

“I’ll try something new tomorrow,” said Jelly’s dad.

So the next day, Jelly’s father took her out for dinner. When dinner was over, a bunch of people came out in funny hats and sang her a birthday song, which confused Jelly, because it wasn’t even her birthday. But they left behind a huge bowl full of twenty-one scoops of ice cream in all the colors of the rainbow. Jelly carefully stuck one finger in a large scoop of chocolate, and then stuck the finger in her mouth. Then she made a face. And not a good face, like the kind you would normally see on a kid with a finger covered in chocolate ice cream, but a squinchy face, like a kid who just drank lemonade without any sugar.

Dad bought Jelly a jar of grape jelly at the supermarket on the way home.

“I’ll try,” sighed Jelly’s mom.

So the next day Jelly’s mom took Jelly out for dinner. But instead of going to a restaurant, they went to a bright store full of long, white dresses, which was attached to a bakery full of large white cakes, each cake topped with two little people.

“Isn’t she a bit young…” began the woman behind the counter.

“It’s arranged,” interrupted Jelly’s mother. “Just give her some cake.”

The woman gave Jelly a big slice of marbled cake, simply oozing white frosting in all manner of swirls and whorls. Jelly ran a finger through the frosting, leaving behind a little furrow. She popped the frosting in her mouth. Then spit it in her hand.

Mom bought Jelly a jar of grape jelly at the supermarket on the way home.

Jelly’s grandfather was visiting that night when Jelly and her mother came home and understood the seriousness of the situation. “I’ll try,” Jelly’s grandfather volunteered.

So the next day, Jelly’s grandfather took Jelly out for dinner. Later, he and Jelly came home. Jelly looked as happy as a clam, while grandpa quickly made excuses and headed up the stairs to the guest bedroom.

“I’m old,” he said. “And tired,” he added. “And I should be in bed,” he finished. Then he ran upstairs like a man much younger than 74.

Jelly’s parents sighed.

“So did you have a good dinner?” Jelly’s father asked.

“Yes I did,” replied Jelly.

“And did you clean your plate?” asked Jelly’s mother.

“Yes I did,” replied Jelly.

“And did you have dessert?” asked Jelly’s mother and father together.

Instead of replying, Jelly pulled a big white box out from behind her back and opened it. Inside were a dozen delicious looking donuts.

Jelly’s mother clapped her hands. Jelly’s father did a little danced and shed a few tears of happiness. Jelly handed them each a donut as they looked in the mood to celebrate. They all got very serious and touched their donuts together, as if to wish good cheer, good luck, and many more donuts in the future. All three of them took a big bite.

Jelly’s mother’s face fell.

Jelly’s father’s face teared up again, but not as happy as a moment ago.

Jelly’s face broke into a great, big grin. Through a mouth stuffed with donut she exclaimed, “Elly-filled!”

Hopper

Once there was a little boy named Lincoln. Lincoln was three years old and his favorite thing to do in the whole world was to write stories. He didn’t know how to write the letters himself, so he had to ask his mother or father to write the letters for him while he told them the story to write. Then Lincoln could read it back to himself whenever he wanted.

“Mom,” Lincoln asked. “Can you write down a story for me?”

“Sure, Lincoln,” Lincoln’s mother replied. She dug around in a kitchen drawer for a notebook and a pen.

“Are you ready, Mom?” asked Lincoln.

“I’m ready, Lincoln,” Lincoln’s mother put the pen to the paper to show that she was ready to write.

“Here’s my story, Mom,” said Lincoln.

“I’m waiting, Honey.”

“O.k. It needs a picture first, Mom.”

“What kind of picture, Lincoln?”

“A frog.”

“I’m not sure I can draw a very good frog, Lincoln.”

“I’ll draw the frog, Mom. You can write the words for the story.”

So Lincoln took his markers and drew a big green frog so his mother would know where to start writing his story.

“That’s a very good frog, Lincoln.”

“Thanks, Mom. Are you ready to write?”

“I am, Lincoln.”

And Lincoln began his story while his mother wrote down the words.

Once, when I was two, Mom and Dad told me I was going to have a birthday. After my birthday, they said, I would be three. I would not be two any more. They told me that when I turned three, I could have a party and get presents. I told them I wanted a pet. Maybe a puppy. And a cake. With six layers. Two chocolate. Two vanilla. And two strawberry.

Dad said maybe I could have a fish. And a cake with one layer. But it could be both chocolate and vanilla. He said that was called marbled.

I was excited. I couldn’t wait for my birthday. But I wasn’t sure I wanted a fish.

On my birthday, when I quit being two and started being three, I had a big party with lots of my friends, a cake with one layer that was chocolate and vanilla, and strawberry ice cream. My friends gave me neat presents like games and puzzles and toy cars. Then just one present was left; the present from Mom and Dad.

“I don’t want a fish,” I told them.

“We know,” said my dad. “Open it and see what it is.”

I opened it, and inside the wrapping paper was a plastic jar. I read it, “Frog Food.”

“What’s it for?” I asked.

"Your new pet,” said Mom. “He’s in your room.”

My friends and I ran into my room and there, on my bookshelf, was a new aquarium. It was full of rocks and weeds and a big branch to hide under and a small dish full of water…and a great big, green frog.

“Cool!” said my friend, Bill.

“Sweet!” said my other friend, Squeak.

“Excellent!” said my other friend, Eryn.

“Are you going to give him a name?” asked Mom. She and Dad were standing in the doorway, watching me.

“I’m going to name him Hopper,” I told her. “I hope he likes to hop.”

“I’m sure he does,” said my dad. “It’s the nature of frogs to hop.”

The End

“That’s a good story,” said Lincoln’s mother. “I remember when you got Hopper. Does he hop a lot like you hoped?”

“He does,” Lincoln replied. “Hopper is a great frog.”

Lincoln’s mother handed him the story, and he practiced reading it for the rest of the day so that when his father came home from work, he could read him the story about the day he got Hopper.

“That’s a great story, Lincoln,” Lincoln’s father said after he heard the story. “I’m glad you wrote it for your mother and me.”

Oh, I didn’t write it for you or Mom,” said Lincoln. “But I wanted you both to hear it anyway.”
“Then who did you write it for?” Lincoln’s father asked.

“Hopper!” Lincoln yelled, running to his bedroom as his mother and father laughed.