He pressed “Print” and watched the printer disgorge a page. He read it over, screwed it into a ball and threw it at the waste-paper basket in the corner. It missed as had a dozen others; anyway the bin was full. He returned to the keyboard and looked at it blankly as if it might do something on its own. It didn’t. He stabbed half-heartedly at the keys, not quite randomly, that would be silly, but with little enthusiasm.

This was ridiculous: all that was necessary was a short story. Anyway just how much can be described in 500 words? Not all that much. Certainly there was no need for a long complex plot. Just a few minutes of action should do. He typed some more, printed again and screwed up the sheet again after reading only the first line: It was a dark and stormy night … what? No! Starting with a cliché was hardly likely to go anywhere. It shouldn’t be a problem; writers’ block was usually cured by thinking of the mortgage, putting a note of the deadline on a yellow sticky reminder on the computer or, at worst, by a quick burst of plagiarism. What was the old saying?Plagiarism is stealing from one person, research is stealing from many. So actually what was needed was a quick burst of research. Einstein was once reputed to have said “Of course I don’t know what I’m doing, if I did know it wouldn’t be called research”. He didn’t know what he was doing right now, that was for sure.

He needed to select a genre, find a plot, some incidents, a beginning, middle and an end. Even settling on one of these would be a start. Let’s make the main character a man, he thought, then there’s the question of what sort of man, what’s he doing, is there conflict, is there a problem, will the story see it overcome, will the end be happy or sad? The mood he was in it would be sure to be sad. Maybe he could start with the end: a resolution, an enigma… something. Then he could work backwards, not so much “Ready, aim, fire” as fire first and ask questions afterwards. There’s a thought: maybe there should be a gun involved, a crime, a murder. Maybe not, but a problem must certainly feature. Finally he thought he had an idea, well sort of anyway. He resumed typing.

If the main character was a writer, he thought, what could happen then? A deadline looming, imagination flagging, despair pervading all; but then a resolution would be necessary to end. Think, think … wait a minute; he pressed more keys. Now he had something. He typed on, seeing the shape of it at last. He was very near the end now. A panel popped up on his computer screen. It read “Word-count 490”. Phew! The end; with ten words to spare.

Patrick Forsyth has had a number of books published including three books of light hearted travel writing set in South East Asia (e.g “First Class at Last!”) and two novels, set partly in Maldon (the first of which is “Long Overdue”).

28 Saltcote Maltings

Maldon

Essex CM9 4QP

Tel: 01621 859300…

Margaret Galione

What a gorgeous  day it’s been” Liz remarked as she placed a chicken casserole on the table.  “It’s so lovely to be able to swim in our own pool and dry off in the sun followed by a  gin and tonic!”  

“Just think” said Tim laughing, “if you hadn’t married me you wouldn’t have had all this luxury. What do you think, then Dan?”

Dan, their sixteen year old son, took his eyes off his smartphone for a moment, sighed but said nothing. Somehow he managed to help himself to the casserole , all the while still glancing at the phone which was held in his left hand. He held  a fork in his right hand to take  mouthfuls of food, his left used for scrolling and tapping into the small, black machine.  

“Lovely chicken” Tim said cheerfully, “Enjoying it Dan?” 

The boy took his eyes off the phone for a moment and nodded.

Tim gave up. 

Liz already had. She had tried every way possible to have a civilised conversation with their only son. His sister, three years older was at University studying English literature and Dan, now into the summer holiday, attended a private boys school where he was a day boy. Liz could not understand how such a normal chatty youngster, had suddenly turned into an antisocial teenager spending most of the day in his room, though he would slouch downstairs to the table when told that a meal was ready.  Liz often thought he would have been just as well off living in a two roomed flat in a city. Instead, he had everything one could wish for, thanks to his father.  

Tim had worked for a few years in the Far East for a banking company and had received a large bonus which had enabled him to purchase the property, a ‘Hall’ with acres of land, a swimming pool, tennis court and the top storey converted to a games room.  

“He’s addicted to that thing” Tim remarked after Dan had quietly removed himself from the dining table and gone upstairs again. Liz agreed; she had to bear the brunt of it as Tim was in London for most of the day, and at weekends occasionally played golf and was a member of the local village cricket team.

“Mum says he’ll grow out of it”. Liz assured him. “A friend of hers had a son who wouldn’t speak to anyone for a year or two when he was a bit younger than Dan.  That was before the advent of mobile phones.  He went on to University and became a vet ”

 “Oh I forgot to tell you” Liz  continued “Gemma phoned this morning to say she was coming home for a few days and bringing a friend. Gemma their daughter had been staying with a University friend who lived in Sussex and they had both been working in a local café, to pay for a trip to Europe.  “One of the spare rooms is made up ready”.

Gemma arrived in her little Fiat the following morning.  She slammed the car door and ran over to greet her mother, who was sitting in the garden. .  

“Did you have a good journey?  I thought you were bringing a friend?” Liz remarked.   

“The friend’s in the car, here she is” was Gemma’s  reply,  and as she opened the car door a golden Labrador puppy jumped out. Gemma explained that the puppy had belonged to her friend’s aunt who had unfortunately had a serious fall and was unable to keep her. “I thought we could have her, as we have plenty of space” 

Liz called up the stairs for Dan to come down, which he did, still clutching his smartphone and expecting some food. Instead he was greeted by a bounding dog. The puppy grabbed the phone out of the boy’s hand and darted out of the door in the direction of the  swimming pool. The three chased after him, Gemma afraid for the dog, Dan for his phone. Suddenly they heard s splash as the phone was dropped into the water.  

“Look what that bloody animal has done” Dan shouted. It was the first sentence his mother had hear him utter for weeks. However, the dog bounded towards him again, stopped and looked at him with beseeching eyes.  

“Don’t worry” Dan said his mother. “Your father will buy you another phone.”   

Dan looked again at the dog’s eyes “At the moment think I prefer this” and for the first time in months, he smiled.   

Brian Burden

It was breakfast time.  Lofty was tucking into a bowl of sweet, pink blancmange. How he loved the  stuff.

Finished at last, he wiped his mouth with his coat sleeve and washed everything down with a bottle of Guinness.  This brought back more memories of childhood, the advertising image of the colourful toucan balancing a white-collared glass on its big beak and lots of witty copy about what a toucan can do.  What a shame the law no longer allowed the advertisers to claim that Guinness was good for you.  It certainly did him good.  He felt on top form now, and ready for anything.

He had his tasks mapped out for the day.  As a retired man, he found that life didn’t provide him with much variety, but he was happy with his routine.  He would wash up the breakfast things, then take the Dyson round the living room.  But first he must write a letter of commiseration to his friend 

Tommy, whose mother had recently passed on.  He wondered how to phrase it.  Tommy always spoke in glowing terms of his parent and wouldn’t hear a word said against her, yet Lofty knew for a fact that she was a horrible old tyrant who made poor Tom’s life a misery.  Would Tom drop his guard now that he was safe forever from the old witch’s vindictive temper, or would he continue to insist on the fiction?

Lofty pondered this problem, then decided to jump in with both feet:  “Dear Tom,” he wrote, “I heard that the old dragon had popped her clogs, and I don’t see any point in mincing words.  You must be thoroughly delighted at this happy release.  I ought to warn you, however, that your Mum made an awful lot of enemies in her lifetime, some of whom may decide to wreak their frustrated revenge on you.  So I would advise you very strongly to watch your back.  It was exactly like that when my own mother passed on.  You would be amazed at all the vermin who crawled out of the woodwork determined to inflict their resentments on me.”

The rest of the letter consisted of a compendium of crimes committed against various people by Tom’s old mother and speculation as to how the victims might exact retribution from her hapless son.

In his mind’s eye, Lofty called up his own mother, now departed this life some thirty years.  A radiant image, fresh and beautiful.  In his early childhood, she had been mother, sister and friend, sharing his secrets, helping him to fight his corner against his crusty old father.  Well, not so old.  They had lost him, victim of an industrial accident, just before Lofty’s tenth birthday.  After that, Mum went out to work and Lofty became a latch-key kid.  He would take the key from under the flowerpot when he got back from school, get down to his homework, and be sure to have a cup of tea waiting when Mum got in, an hour or two later.

Those were good days.  Problems arose when he began dating.  The sister and friend turned into a jealous hag, a vindictive critic of all Lofty’s female friends.  None of his romances lasted.  After he left school, jobs were plentiful, and he was earning good money.  He ought to have flown the nest at that point and found digs and a partner, and now, as old age settled upon him, he was alone.  He paused.  Although he had started out to write about the offences of Tom’s mother, he had got carried away and was now summarising his own old mum’s shortcomings.

Never mind.  He felt a lot better for writing the letter, even if he could never send it.  He signed it with a flourish, filed it away in his cabinet under T for Tom, and then, from his store of varied greetings cards, drew something with a black border which looked suitable.  “Dear Tom, so sorry to hear of your tragic loss – Lofty,” he wrote, then slipped it into an envelope and sealed it and stamped it.  He glanced at the clock.  He might just catch the midday collection.

3 June, 2019

Janet Mayes – Travel Writer

We’d had a trial run the evening before,  arriving at an eerily quiet Happy Valley Race Course, on Hong Kong Island – a night too soon, we discovered. At least jet lag, gave our addled brains an excuse this time for getting it wrong!
Not wanting to waste a minute of our holiday we moseyed off on a bus to the Aberdeen Harbour, where we climbed on board a rasping junk, that threw out fumes into the warm  night air. It soon whisked us across the luminous water which changed into ripples of red, green, blue and gold reflections as our junk berthed at the jetty of a floating restaurant. Another night tomorrow for racing we laughed,  as we walked through the traditional golden interior of the restaurant decorated with fiery Dragon’s.
So the next night a repeat performance, as we boarded the ‘Star Ferry’ at Kowloon to convey us across the congested , murky grey water, to Heung Gong, meaning Fragrant Harbour or Hong Kong.
Alighting on the opposite bank, we boarded a narrow Tram, the cheapest form of transport, which smoothly glided past numerous restaurants with Chinese writing like tendrils painted in white wash over the windows, immediately behind stood small crowded fish tanks.
We looked down from a bridge to a street with red banners strung above the road saying heaven knows what, minute figures hurried in a huddled mass to their destinations.
The Tram clanged to an abrupt halt and we alighted into a vibrant pulsating drone of anticipation swept along to the ticket office. It was a case of follow the crowd until reaching the stands of  Happy Valley Racetrack. 
A backdrop scene of streamlined skyscrapers with slit of lit windows, embedded against an ink black sky, over looking the oval rich green race track.
We hadn’t a clue how to put on a bet so asked a man who looked English to explain to us. Normally in England we’d go to the Parade Ring and pretend to survey the sleek horses as they were led around the grassy enclosure. If there was one here in these sterile surroundings, we didn’t see it. It felt as if we were in a race ourselves as we battled against the clock. The business of actually putting on a bet took us so long to sort out which horse from the card and actually place the bet that the race was under starters orders  –  they were off! 
Silky, vibrant, colours flashed past on glossy horses.
‘Come  on God speed.’ Yelled my husband in my ear. ‘Come on – yes, he’s done it.’
And the crowd roared with him, as ‘God Speed’ edged past a tight group and crossed the finishing line.

Aghhh!

It silently swirls around you, filling every nook and cranny, invisible until a mote swipes you in your eye as a sunbeam catches its willy ways.

I hate dust, I hate dusting, it is a loathsome chore that never ends. A hell on earth, an earth full of tiny motes of dust everywhere you look. I mean, what use is it? Can you make something with it, I don’t think so. If you shake your duster out of the window it doesn’t disappear in a flash of green light never to be seen again. Oh no, it is much too crafty for that. Silently, it creeps back into your house through open doors, windows or anywhere it can sneak through.

Dust isn’t even pretty, it is grey, depressing, makes you sneeze and just looks untidy. When you think about what it is made up from, even that is disgusting. Old dead skin cells, cat fur and bits of flaky cat or dog skin. In fact dust in homes, offices, and other human environments contains small amounts of plant pollen, human and animal hairs, textile fibres, paper fibres, minerals from outdoor soil, human skin cells, burnt meteorite particles, and many other materials which may be found in the local environment. All that crap coating every surface in your house, however often you try to remove it.

That is the depressing thing about dust, it never goes away. You can spend hours with a duster and polish, cleaning every surface of your home and what happens? You get up the next morning and, overnight, it has all crept back again. Even if you stay up all night keeping watch, trying to catch it sneaking onto your prized possessions, you will never catch it. It just appears, it is magic, a mystical gift sent from hell to never give you respite from its continuous presence. 

I try to ignore it, turn my back on it, refuse to look at it, then a beam of sunlight strikes a surface and there it is, pile upon pile of dust. I sigh, get out the duster and start to clean. An advert on the internet, showed a natty tool that dusted as you hoovered. Clever, I thought, a lot less effort that duster and polish, so onto Amazon I went and, yippee, there it was. It was a nozzle that fitted on your Hoover and when you turned the power on it spun and you could dust without removing everything from a shelf. I got quite excited, my hand hovered over the ‘buy me now’ button and then, crash down to earth.

I quickly checked, and as I feared it did not fit on my Gtech machine, in fact when I read the reviews it did not seem to work very well on any machine. Back to duster once again.

Quentin Crisp said that dust reaches its own levels, which is why he never bothered to clean. You know he is right because even in death it is ‘dust to dust’ ashes to ashes’ so remember, next time you dust it could be a loved one who has died!

Susan Ager 5/2019

524 words

Seaside Excursion (in the 1950s)

The engine has built up a head of steam,

A green flag waves; we hear the whistle scream,

And, gathering speed, the whole train pulls away

To take us to the seaside for a day.

The journey drags, the children fight,

We smack their heads and tell them “Be polite’,

And then the youngest child starts to spew

And Mother has to take him to the ll.

Our destination reached, we disembark,

Make for the beach via the Public Park,

And, on the sand, to drive us all away

The Silver Band begins to play

There’s sand and Punch and Judy on the shore

And donkey rides, a million pleasures more –

And from a small arcade upon the pier

The sound of fruit machines insults the ear.

There’s rock, and hats inviting “Kiss me Quick”’

There are con artists up to every trick,

We sit upon the front and watch the ships,

Punish our guts with gritty fish and chips.

There’s sand and jellied eels and candy floss,

The kids have run away, but they’re no loss

And there’s a huge and gloomy public house –

What better place to suffer and carouse?

There’s jellied eels and fish and chips:

We lean upon the rail and watch the ships.

Our challenged stomachs churn in angry motion

Like fragile barques upon a storm-swept ocean.

With spinning heads and innards racked with pain,

We stagger to the station and the train.

In spite of all, we’ve enjoyed the sport,

And never mind that now we’re one kid short.

Brian Burden.

Today we are choosing a picture or painting we like to write a story about. You are welcome to join us at 10am ‘The White Hart Hotel’ Witham Essex. Stories will be posted during the week for you to read.

Our very first post! On this blog you will find stories and poems written by the members of ‘Witham Writing Group’. We meet every Tuesday at the ‘White Hart’ in Witham Essex from 10am to 12 noon. We have a weekly title to write a story or poem and once a month the meeting is a poetry session led by one of our members. Gradually, as we add stories or poems, we will give a profile of each member of the group. Your comments are welcomed and everything will be read.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton