2.1

A chill wind sweeps across the flat landscape, tossing the snow through the stubble of the harvested wheat field like scattering dust. A little girl with dirty blonde hair chases a boy through the field, giggling as he tosses a handful of dry snow in the air, raining it down on her bright pink jacket. They’ve rarely gone this far out into the field, but the flat ground of Regina, Saskatchewan means that their house is always within sight. The boy is about to step further when a moulting rabbit darts out from under the path of his foot and takes off across the open field. The two children are amazed they got so close without even noticing the skittish creature. Smiling with excitement for their encounter they decide to head home to tell their mother about their adventure.

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The children take turns jumping across the narrow stream at the base of the steep ravine. One of the boys reaches his hand out, helping his sister across. They are almost to the tree house. The handmade structure, built across two trees almost a storey up, is hidden deep within the forest. When the group arrives, one shimmies up the smaller of the two trees then reaches down to help the others up. As the boys set to work, the girl sits on the edge of the platform, inspecting the beautiful green plants and trees. She calls out as she sees two raccoons following along the stream – a mother with a small baby raccoon following behind. The boys all gather to watch the raccoons as they pass before returning to improving the structure of their fort.

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A girl is roused from her sleep early on a summer morning by her mother. Their brand new puppy has chewed through the rope keeping her in the backyard and has run away. She frantically pulls on some clothes so that she can venture out into the neighbourhood to find the little blonde puppy. Before she makes it downstairs, her mother calls up that the dog has been found. From the kitchen window, all that had been visible was the chewed rope on the peg. But the puppy had been sitting at the back door all along, just wanting to be let in.

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Commentary:
I decided to do this blog post in the style of a Ottawa, ON. In a completely new town with two long months until school and swimming started and a neighbourhood full of kids much younger than my brother and I, we had little but each other to pass the time with. Unfortunately, many of my friends have come and gone purely because of physical distance. But my family has never been far away. They have been with me all across the country, from Vancouver, to Regina, to Ottawa. As much as my brother and I argue and annoy each other, I know that whenever I am with him I will always be home. I think when I start my own family, my home will be with them as well. No matter how far I wander, I will always have a home with my family.

References:

Snowshoe Hare. Wikipedia. Wiki.

Nepean, Ontario. Wikipedia. Wiki.

Lesson 1.3

Let me tell you the story of how evil came into the world.

Long ago, there was a warren of rabbits who were held below ground by a pack of wolves at the entrance to their tunnels for many weeks. The wolves were very hungry, and the rabbits were very weary. The wolves growled down the tunnels, telling the rabbits it was better to emerge than to starve in the tunnels.

Instead of giving up, one of the younger rabbits thought up a grand idea. He gathered all the rabbits from all the dens and asked them to think up the scariest thing they could in order to frighten the wolves away.

One of the rabbits began stomping on the ground, shaking the tunnels and creating a great noise. But the wolves were brave and were not scared away. One of the rabbits kicked rocks out of the tunnels at the canines using his great hind legs. But the wolves were swift and were not scared away. One of the rabbits scraped his claws along a rock creating a sharp noise. But the wolves tucked in their ears and were not scared away.

Finally, the young rabbit who had suggested scaring the wolves called through the tunnels. He began telling a story to the wolves. The story contained such fury and fear and bloodshed that the wolves fled immediately. Finally, the rabbits were able to emerge. But when they did they found the world was much darker than before. Realizing what had happened, the warren begged the young rabbit to take back his words. But it was too late, as what had been spoken could not be taken back. The rabbits had been freed, but at a grave price.

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This assignment is so very different from anything I have ever done before. In our academic lives, it is constantly stressed that we should not copy someone else’s work in any manner. But for this assignment, we had to copy the moral of King‘s story, and so a few elements of the story ended up the same as well. I think it’s cool because, even though my story is very different from King’s, you can still see his telling at the roots of what I have created. I wanted to have some parallels between my story and King’s, but at the same time I wanted the words to be mine. I think I achieved this.

I think it will be especially interesting to see the influence individual experiences have on the stories we tell. My story in particular is heavily influenced by my favourite book, Watership Down. Throughout the novel, one of the rabbits, Dandelion, tells stories about the clever rabbit prince, El-Ahrairah. These are my favourite parts of the novel. The story that I’m most partial to is that of the sun God Frith blessing all of the animals with special gifts. Rabbits were given their strong back legs because El-hrairah was half-way into a hole so that he would not be recognized and Frith was forced to bless the only thing sticking out of the hole – his behind. I love stories like this and King’s which tell how something came to be in a clever way. I imagined my story to be in the same vein as those stories, except that it paints rabbits in a more negative light as, though they were clever enough to make the wolves flee, they were not wise enough to see the effects of their actions until it was too late.

References:

Adams, Richard. The Story of the Blessing of El-ahrairah 8m.

Watership Down. Google Books. Google.

Thomas King. Wikipedia. Wikimedia.