As part of The Habit Membership this month, we’ve been participating in an online class, reading The Magician’s Nephew, discussing writing techniques, and practicing with writing exercises. Last week, the writing exercise was to focus on the subjective experience of characters in a story about which the readers would already know the objective “facts”. Enjoy a little whimsy!
“Mama! Elias hit me!”
“Did not!”
Margery heard a thumping sound behind her. She did not turn around. She tucked a few stray gray hairs back under her cap as she stirred the broth soup. “Elias, don’t hit your brother. Timothy, don’t complain.”
Margery had her nose right over the soup, but all she could smell was feet. Ugh! It wasn’t helping her nausea. She quickly stepped over to a small hole in the leather to stick her face outside and get a breath of fresh air. When she did, she yelled at the four or five children climbing the tree outside. “Careful! If you fall, you’ll break your crown like Jack! I don’t want to hear you crying about it.”
She drew her head back in. Old Richard was a fool. She didn’t know what she’d been thinking when she married him. Of all his hair-brained schemes, this was by far the worst. He had let that crooked solicitor convince him to move the whole family into this shoe, accidentally left behind by a giant when he was driven out of the kingdom. Though the space was ample, the shoe was impractical on many counts as a home. She could hear the littlest baby crying down in the heel.
“Martha! Mind the baby, will you? And find Elizabeth and Anne and tell them they are supposed to be sweeping the shoe, but I haven’t seen them for hours.”
She’d been telling her neighbor Mary about it the other day. Leaning on the fence while Mary was working in a garden bed of silver bells. She’d explained how drafty the holes for the laces were, even when she put all twelve of the boys to work once a month tightening the laces. And the layout was inconvenient to divide up into rooms because they always had to come in at the ankle and walk all the way down to the heel and then turn left down to the toe where the kitchen was. The stove pipe stuck out of a hole there for proper ventilation. And the leather not only smelled, it had the worst habit of unexpectedly giving way and sagging if Margery tried to steady herself on the wall or hang a picture or shelf on it. Mary had said it didn’t sound that bad and some people should be grateful for their houses. Of course, Mary always did like to be contrary.
“Mama, mama! Simon stuck his tongue out at me.” One of the 6-year-old twins looked up at Margery with a tear-stained face.
Margery removed Marianne’s arms from around her bulging belly. “I’m sorry, dear. Simon, I sent you to get something from the pie man nearly an hour ago. You get out of here now. Marianne, go find Henrietta to play with.”
Of course, Margery knew other people had troubles too. She’d sat with Peter’s wife while she cried about how the walls of the pumpkin shell got so sticky in the summer and there were beginning to be soft spots in the walls. Margery had patted her hand and told her Peter was a fool for not trusting her.
Of course, privately, she was certain Richard was the greater fool. Another wave of nausea hit her and this time, she hobbled as quickly as she could to the door. This was old Richard’s fault too. He should pay more attention in church and a little less attention to her. If he gave her that look one more time, well, she just wouldn’t know what to do!
Photo by Peter Hall on Unsplash
Welcome To The Carriage House 