Lydia Schoch

Photo by Keagiles.

Just tuning in? Start here.

Daphne was half awake before she felt the stare boring into the back of her skull. It was a vaguely prickly feeling except that all of the pointy places had been worn down to mostly harmless nubs. Still, it was odd to wake up to the intense scrutiny of a being whose criteria for acceptance was unknown.

Unlike his reticent companion, Apple’s curiosity about the strange humans was stronger than his fear of them. After a long night of silently padding past them as he patrolled his tiny house the younger of Mariposa’s two cats had decided the intruders were worthy of further inspection.

Her companions were still sleeping. Daphne smiled at the cat and was just reaching out to stroke his soft head when she heard a brusque whisper from behind her.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. He doesn’t like to be petted.” Mariposa stirred the embers and added some kindling to the fire.

“Thanks for the warning,” Daphne said as she gingerly stood up.  The younger woman began cracking open the shutters and heating up some water for herbal tea or steeped Nosi for those who enjoyed the energy rush from the tiny, red berries. A beam of morning light hit a small, silver object on the kitchen counter. Daphne picked it up for a closer look. It wasn’t much bigger than a fingernail clipping, but it was so shiny against the dark tabletop that Daphne couldn’t miss it.

“Oh, my vaccine fell out almost immediately,” Mariposa said. “I know I should have had it replaced, but it hurt so much having it put it that I never bothered reporting it.”

“Do you know how they work?” Daphne asked. She’d never seen one up close like this before. When she held it up a few inches away from her face she noticed a series of small indentions on the outer side of it. Suddenly one of the indentions sputtered out a pinprick of sickly green light.  Daphne dropped it in surprise and lifted her head to hear Mariposa’s answer.

“No, there wasn’t time to explain. Our epidemic was even worse than yours, they said, and they wanted to make sure it didn’t spread any further. And I was still pretty sick when they gave it to me. If you want to take it with you, be my guest. Maybe it only works on some houses.”

Daphne shrugged and slid the strange object into her pocket just as Sean and her sons grumbled awake. The smell of brewing tea and boiled Nosi was beginning to fill the apartment.

The patrols – if they still existed – happened roughly at dawn and dusk. Mariposa thought that mid-morning was the safest time to cross back over, so for the next few hours the visitors toured her small farm and discussed ways in which their communities could work together.

“What do you think about gathering together all of the ombudsmen once we have more information about the intruders?” Mariposa asked. Sean immediately agreed just as Daphne knew he would. It was ok, though. She thought it was a good idea as well.

After a light lunch Daphne climbed back onto Flapjack and the group headed to Salt River. Their host agreed to walk them to the river’s edge to ensure they’d have safe passage out of Peoria. It was a quiet, leisurely journey even if Daphne wasn’t always able to redirect Flapjack when he found the occasional mouthful of food on the way. The obstinate burrow was slowly warming up to the woman on his back, but he still wasn’t convinced that the group needed to move quite so fast as they wanted to on such a nice day.

Conversation petered off just as they reached the water, but no sooner did Mariposa open her mouth to say goodbye than Ephraim noticed a still, dark figure lying facedown in the mud on the other side of the bank. His mule stood thirty feet away calmly munching on the few leaves that were still available from last spring.

Calling out elicited no response. Daphne’s eyes weren’t as strong as they used to be, but she couldn’t see any signs of other people on the bank. Was it a trap or did a stranger need their help?”

“Stay here,” Isaac said as he took out his hunting knife. Mariposa and his brother soon followed. For a few moments time stopped as Daphne and Sean watched them approach the body, weapons ready to be thrown at a moment’s notice. Mariposa touched the stranger’s neck, shook her head, and slowly turned over the body as Ephraim and Isaac looked on.

Daphne clicked her tongue and gently encouraged Flapjack to cross the river as soon as Mariposa motioned them over.

“He’s gone,” Isaac said in a quiet voice as his brother kept a look out. Daphne climbed off the burro and walked closer to the corpse for a closer look. He was a young man. Brown hair, bearded, the remnants of a bad sunburn still dancing across his forehead. A bulge in his neck and the unnatural position in which his head rested in death gave probable cause to what killed him. Daphne had seen soldiers wear dusty brown, slightly too large outfits before, but she’d also seen similar clothing on people who moved in from other areas. He could have been from almost anywhere.

If not for an accident no one would have ever learned the stranger’s secrets.

With one awkward, adolescent step backwards Ephraim’s heel brushed against a plain, grey rock that suddenly lit up with a cacophony of bright lights and loud sounds. Sean cursed and jumped back, nearly falling into a cactus. Flapjack took this as an opportunity to run away from the terrifying noise, the mule quickly following him. They probably wouldn’t be able to run very far in such a sticky, muddy environment, but Isaac and Ephraim exchanged an irritated glance and followed them anyways. A mule was a precious commodity these days.

Daphne still felt her heart slamming against her chest when the noise suddenly ended and writing filled the face of the rock. She looked around in suspicion but still couldn’t see anyone else around them.

“I can only read and write my name,” Mariposa said. It was not for lack of trying, but as a girl she had never learned how to make the letters stop swirling around. After many aborted attempts her parents allowed her to practice other life skills instead.

“You used to be a teacher,” Sean said as he handed the stone to the oldest member of their group.

Here is this week’s list of blog posts, comics, and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

Estrangement and Such. I like this author’s attitude when it comes to making tough decisions.

Unshelved via vlb. I read so many books out of my age range and reading level when I was a kid. Honestly I think it’s good for kids to stretch themselves and try something a tad too complex for their current stage in life.  It’s like exercising or learning a new language. Sometimes you have to push yourself a little bit in order to reach the next level.

Inside America’s Great Romance with Norman Rockwell. To be honest, I find Normal Rockwell’s style and choice of subject matter  far too cloying and schmaltzy. Every time I see one of his paintings I assume there is a ravenous pack of vampires, werewolves, or zombies just out of the frame that will leap into the picturesque village and begin wreaking havoc on it at any moment. 😛 With that being said, this is an excellent article about Mr. Rockwell’s life. I may not be a fan of his work, but I think I would have really liked meeting the man who created it.

Those People.  When I donate to food banks I always include a treat or two. Instant hot chocolate mix is one of my favourite things to buy because it was such a huge treat growing up in a family that had a very tight grocery budget and occasionally relied on the generosity of others. Of course healthy food is vital, but I think it’s just as important to make someone’s eyes light up when they’re in a position to receive so-called “charity.” Life is difficult enough when you live in poverty. If I needed to visit a food bank I’d be absolutely thrilled to pick out a treat alongside healthier fare. Sometimes a sip or nibble of something sugary is better medicine than an entire pot of beans, rice, or oatmeal.

Footprints in ’57: Coop, Wendy, Carol and Bea. What life might have been like in 1957. It’s funny to think that my grandmother was a teenager once. She’s always seemed like a fountain of wisdom to me. Someday I’ll have to ask it what it was like to grow up in that era.

Helping People Through Trauma When You Don’t Know What to Say. A fantastic article about how to be a good friend. This link is work-safe, but other posts on the site may not be.

From The Celebrity in Africa:

Celebrity, you care very much about Africa. Is this correct? 

Oh, yes, I Africa all of the time. Like my father before me, I care deeply about having my picture taken while walking purposefully next to someone African in Africa. It means a great deal to me, particularly if we are both wearing sunglasses and gesturing significantly toward the horizon, which is where the future of Africa is. Would you like sunglasses? Have some of mine.

The Other Wes Moore is the true story of two men with the same name who grew up in the same neighbourhood under similarly difficult circumstances. One is now a Rhodes Scholar, author, and decorated veteran. The other is serving a life sentence for murder.

This is a story about understanding why someone might make horribly destructive choices without absolving them from the consequences of their decisions. It’s also a story about luck, compassion, and seeing how easily you or I might have ended up in very different circumstances had a few things in our lives played out differently.

I have to admit that I grew quite angry with the Wes Moore who is incarcerated at various points in this book. But I was also angry with our society for being structured in such a way that so many men (and women) end up in similar situations. Everyone is responsible for his or her own choices, of course, but as a society we are also responsible for all of the damage done by racism, classism, poverty, and hopelessness. Imagine what all of the Wes Moores of the world could accomplish if they had easier access to education, counselling, and good role models.

What have you been reading?

Just tuning in? Start here.

Enough fish were caught to feed everyone who met up at Salt River , but there were no leftovers to take home. Daphne was honestly surprised that they’d snapped up even that many fish, though. Maybe the mountain streams that fed into the river had had an unusually wet, mild winter last year. It had been so long since any news trickled down from them.

With Mariposa’s input a plan was slowly beginning to form.

“They might have better machines and more advanced medicine, ” she said as the group huddled around the campfire and ate their supper with a side of bean soup that one of Mariposa’s fellow ombudsmen had brought with him in case no one caught anything. “But they also need outside supplies to keep themselves going. We’ve grown or traded for everything we needed here for generations. We know which plants and animals are safe to eat, where to find water, and how to survive in the desert when both of those things are hard to find. If we work together we can figure out the rest of their weak spots, especially now that they seem to be more vulnerable than usual.”

Nearly everyone would eat meagre portions until the next harvest came in, but any day now life would get marginally better with the first autumn monsoon thunderstorm. The much-needed rain would bring life to the desert, and many of the plants that bloomed were edible in a pinch. It wouldn’t be easy, especially for children and the elderly, but surviving until the end of the summer was always a good sign.

“How do you feel about climbing back onto Flapjack?” Mariposa asked as she bundled her long, black hair into a messy bun. The burro lifted his ears in curiosity at the mention of his name. After a quick roll in the dirt he’d been content to trot up and down the banks of the river as the humans talked, and when they sat down to eat what they caught he stood patiently at the edge of the group. It made him feel better to be surrounded by friendly humans now that evening was approaching.

“I’m up for it if he is,” Daphne replied. She still would have preferred to walk alongside the rest of her companions, but riding was better than being left behind or being hobbled by an excruciatingly stiff, swollen knee in a few hours.

“I think you’d be less likely to be caught under surveillance if you spent the night in Peoria. The soldiers aren’t patrolling the river as much as they used to, but some of them still show up a few days a week. And I know my house is a shorter distance from the river than yours is, Daphne.”

Daphne had only met Mariposa once before and knew very little about the young woman. She wondered what else Sean had told his cousin about the council members of Mingus Valley. He wasn’t known as a gossip, but his tendency to agree with whomever he spoke with made Daphne a little nervous. She nodded and hoped she wouldn’t regret saying yes to this invitation.

“I think that’s a great idea,” Sean said. “If we’re going to work together we should show both communities that there’s nothing to fear from visiting one another.”

Gerald regretfully declined the invitation and collected his fishing poles.  His family had been hard hit by the sickness earlier on in the summer, and he didn’t feel comfortable leaving a house full of half-grown children and young grandchildren alone overnight. It felt better for him to risk being caught than to take the chance something would go wrong at home. The rest of the Mingus group soldiered on to Mariposa’s house, Peoria residents slowly trickling back to their own homes as they moved more deeply into the community on the other side of Salt River.

What surprised Daphne the most about Mariposa’s dwelling – other than how small and tidy it was –  was its age. Virtually no houses had survived from the time before they began keeping track of the years again. Most of them had been so poorly designed that they were dismantled for their materials, and others were so far away from reliable water supplies that they were unusable as well.

The homes that remained tended to be so old they didn’t resemble anything from the world that was. No one knew who once lived in them or how many times they’d been abandoned and reclaimed, only that these homes were still good places to live if their water supplies hadn’t dried out.

Curiously enough the roads survived, even the ones that buckled under the hot sun and stretched so far through the middle of nowhere that no one knew where they ended or why they were built.  Daphne had always wondered where the road-makers intended them to go, and why they spent so much more energy on paving over the land than making homes that would last. None of the handful of books she studied as a girl had ever explained why that was so or what happened to the people who must have somehow disappeared long before the road-makers met their fate. A few legends had survived from that time, but oddly enough no one knew exactly what happened to make the world the way it was today.

“I have an extra bedroom upstairs, but I only have a few blankets to share with you,” Mariposa said as Daphne, Sean, Ephraim, and Isaac dumped their robes and water bottles in the corner of the main room.

Mariposa was one of those rare women who lived alone in these troubled times. Daphne winced when she first heard her new neighbour admit this. There were so many ways in which someone could get hurt or sick, and if you lived alone in such a remote area there was no guarantee that anyone would find you in time. Even though Daphne had spent most of her adult life relishing the freedom she found in it, somehow the act seemed dangerous when someone else bucked social norms.

“It’s really not dangerous at all,” the younger woman said as she pushed an orange tabby out of her chair and sat down. “Apple and Ambrosia are up half the night chasing mice, and anyone who steps into my yard will scare them into my bed. I wake up before any stranger reaches my front door. Even when I had that awful sickness a few months ago no one who came to check up on me was able to surprise my guard-cats.” The displaced cat glared at her before finding a new spot in front of the fireplace and resuming his grooming.

“But how would you protect yourself?” Daphne asked. True, Lemon was a gentle soul, but most folks interpreted his desire to jump up on them and give them a courtesy sniff as aggressive. She at least had the illusion of an aggressive pet to protect her as she lived alone.

“I keep a knife under my pillow,” Mariposa said with a wry grin. “And in the morning I strap it to my leg. I’ve only had to use it once so far. Most folks know better these days.”

As evening fell the little group huddled around the fire and drew their cloaks around them for warmth.

“Did your parents ever tell you the story of Johnny Appleseed?” Mariposa asked when the silence grew thicker than the starless sky pressing down on the tiny home. The others shook their heads. In all honesty Daphne had never heard of the term before.

“Well, apples used to be a kind of fruit that people grew…”

Here is this week’s list of blog posts and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

From The History and Psychology of Clowns Being Scary:

But most clowns aren’t trying to be odd. They’re trying to be silly and sweet, fun personified. So the question is, when did the clown, supposedly a jolly figure of innocuous, kid-friendly entertainment, become so weighed down by fear and sadness? When did clowns become so dark?

Maybe they always have been.

Highly Sensitive People and Depression: Overstimulation May Lead to Depression. This is a fascinating article about how an overwhelming environment can trigger depression for some people. One of the things I really appreciated as a child was how responsive my parents were to my tendency to get overwhelmed by spending a lot of time in big crowds. As the preacher’s family we were expected to attend certain events (and I definitely agree that there’s value in stretching yourself in new experiences sometimes), but we also had time to decompress afterwards.

Love Heals Everything via CarolineSkanne. The difference between hearing and listening.

Fruit of Labor. This piece is about a family farm in Georgia. The owners hire Mexican immigrants to pick peaches every year, and most of their temporary employees have worked with them for a long time. A recent influx of harsh immigration laws is threatening the balance of their arrangement. I’ve picked strawberries for personal use, and even that small amount of stooping is really hard on your knees and back. I can’t imagine doing it full time for 6+ months.

Dear Cryptically Sad Friend on Facebook via PatheosAtheist. I couldn’t agree with this more.

Zombies vs. Animals? The Living Dead Wouldn’t Stand a Chance. Zombies are scarier than werewolves, vampires, and ghosts combined. Luckily humans would only be in danger from them for a short period of time if they actually existed. This link includes a very long list of animals that can be very dangerous to humans, living or undead.

Ordeal of the Bitter Waters via Virtuseveritas. A six-part series about how this blogger changed her mind about abortion. Most adults don’t change their minds about hot-button issues like these, so it was really interesting to see what lead Samantha to her new opinion on the topic.

Imagine being to married to man so desperate for a son that he’s willing to let you die in the process. Imagine being summoned to consult with a family who coats every word that comes out of their mouths with a thick layer of metaphor and superstition.

Angelica is about a Spiritualist trying to help a family that is being haunted by a malevolent presence. Or maybe it’s a metaphor for the heavy shroud of silence that accompanies certain secrets. Or perhaps there’s a different explanation for what happened entirely.

Sometimes the scariest things in life are the most ordinary ones: the fear of death, how certain social conventions smother the truth, and what happens when a parent feels his or her child is in terrible danger but can’t convince anyone else of their suspicions.

Horror isn’t always about blood and gore. I hesitate to even use that label for this book because I know it will scare some of my readers away, but if you’re in the mood for something that transcends the typical plot for a ghost story this is an excellent place to start.

What have you been reading?

Our own economy tells us to take as much as we can get, right? Our own economy says, you’re going to be the most successful graduate if you go into the business world and take as much you can get. That’s not how nature works. Nature has a much simpler economy. Everything in nature takes what it needs. That’s it. You don’t see an oak tree gathering up all the resources. An oak tree takes what it needs to be the authentic oak tree it is.

– Tom Shadyac

While there is competition in nature, there are also limits to how much any one individual plant or animal can consume.

I have a few different endings in mind for After the Storm, but to be honest I’m running low on ideas on how to get there from here.  What’s interesting is that I’m not having the same issue with my other writing projects!

Readers, what have you liked the most about this serial so far? What haven’t you liked? Do you have any suggestions at to where the plot should go next?

Here is this week’s list of blog posts, satirical works, speeches, and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

Interpretation. A comic strip about gender and communication that I couldn’t agree with more.

From Permission To Play Devil’s Advocate Denied:

It is our hope that future holders of the devil’s advocate position will be able to carry on your legacy: smiling as they argue for positions they only half-believe themselves with people who are attempting to discuss something sincerely and in good faith.

Tim Michin’s Amazing Graduation Speech. Take 20 minutes and listen to this. Most graduation speeches are far too sentimental and cloying for my tastes, but this one hits the nail on the head. I especially agree with points 7 and 8: “Define yourself by what you love” and “Respect people with less power than you.”

I Want to Be a Jello-Like Feminist via Crutch4. I love this philosophy.

Truthers or Liars? This blogger has noticed that his liberal friends are more likely to post easily-verifable stories on Facebook. He has a much harder time verifying stories and rumours from his conservative friends and he wonders why this is the case. For those of you who enjoy U.S. politics…what trends have you noticed? I’m wondering if this is confirmation bias!?

Do You Know How to Kiss a Girl? Who else wishes this gum was still for sale? Edit: Tumblr seems to be down as of 9:53 am today. I’ll leave this link up, but definitely check it again once Tumblr is back.

5 Scary Fairy Tales to Never Tell Your Children via Willowbecker. I read a ton of fairy tales as a kid, but I only recognized three of these stories. Fair warning: some of them are gruesome.

Lost Cat: A True Story of Love, Desperation, and GPS Technology is the goofiest thing I’ve read in years. My husband gave me a series of quizzical looks when I read this book because I kept bursting out in laughter.

The author’s cat, Tibby, disappears for five weeks shortly after the author is in a terrible accident. No one has any clue where the cat went, so when he returns the author decides to track him with a GPS device and camera to find out where Tibby goes when he wanders away from home. The resulting investigation is obsessive, informative, geeky, and absolutely hilarious.

I don’t normally share spoilers, but I think I should let my readers know that there is a sudden death of a minor (non-human) character not named Tibby in this book. This is an otherwise extremely lighthearted tale, so I feel ethically obligated to mention it.

What have you been reading?

I’ve been thinking about myths and legends lately. It’s easy to point out the mythology of other times and places: Zeus and his many consorts and offspring; Romulus and Remus; Coyote; King Arthur; Rostam; The Yaksha; Paul Bunyan; Prince Ōkuninushi.

Some people would include the stories in the holy books of the major religions in this category as well, of course. I tried to pick examples of religions that are either no longer followed or not taken to be literally true or infallible by the people who believe in them. While I don’t consider the term myth to be a slur by any stretch of the imagination, I know a lot of theists do when it’s applied to their beliefs and my intention here is not at all antagonistic.

What I would like to do today is to make projections about the future. 200, 500, 1000 years from now, what will schoolchildren (or bored college freshmen, or obsessive grad students) study when they take a course on the mythology of our time period?

Few people sit around campfires and tell legends these days, but as long as our species exists there will be stories that speak to us so much they are passed down from one generation to the next.

I can’t say for sure if all of these legends will survive long enough to be picked apart as examples of what our culture values, but I think they have a decent shot at it.

• Superheroes.  Superman and Batman have been part of pop culture for well over 70 years. Spiderman has been with us for a little over 50. Their stories are reshuffled for each generation to better reflect current trends, but their core identities remain the same.
• Zombies. They fade in and out of popularity, but war and economic depressions bring them back with a vengeance. With climate change predicted to have severe consequences for the environment and human society over the next few generations I strongly suspect the story of the dead coming back to life is here to stay.
• Urban Legends. What’s interesting about this category is how often they’re taken to be literally true. Everyone has a friend of a friend of a friend who claims to have dissolved a tooth in coke overnight, believes that roasted fetus is a delicacy in Taiwan, or narrowly escaped being bitten by venomous snakes in the ball pit of a local restaurant.
• Bigfoot. Mothman. Aliens. Some people believe these entities actually exist, but everyone know their basic stories. It would be nearly impossible to exist in modern day, western society without ever having heard of encounters with creatures like these.
• Slender Man. He’s the newest example of 21st century mythology I could find. Even though he’s completely made up (and from what I’ve read was actually intended to be a hoax from the beginning), rumours about him are swirling faster than they can be stamped out. If I end up getting another lifetime or if time travel is invented I half-expect him to become firmly entrenched in 22nd century culture.

What examples of 20th and 21st century mythology can you think of?