Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clark’s scotts and rogers)
This is the Wakefield Doctrine to jenne and ceayr‘s the Unicorn Challenge.
A photo-prompt(ed) story in two hundred and fity words (or less).
The photation:
“Man, what’re we gonna do with all these extra model car parts”?
Two friends sat on the floor of the most kid-friendly of the two’s house. It was Saturday. It was raining. The house was empty of parents and siblings.
Spread out on the bedroom floor was the detritus of countless Aurora™ model car kits, at least to the extent of the spare parts that remained after assembly was complete. The problem of what to do with the extra pieces demanded resolution. That the growing urgency each pre-adolescent boy felt, sitting on a bedroom floor on a Saturday afternoon, foreshadowed choices and demanded-decisions neither boy yet felt.
For one, (whose bedroom it was), the arrival of an initially strange world was one year away; for the other, (whose superfluous collection of parts without use or function constituted, at the moment, their best hope for entertainment), it was an indeterminate number of months in his future. More than the twelve of his best friend, less than thirty-six; with any luck and the intercession of a heartless god. Of course, in matters of boys, girls and puberty, the calendar was more often than not written in chalk. This transition would be the first, (but surely not last), experience with being left at the metaphorical train station.
But for the two friends, the afternoon together with nothing more than: their friendship, more little plastic hood-ornaments than needed and a near-lethal parts-per-thousand count of airplane glue, practiced the better parts of relationships.
*
About clarkscottroger
This story garners an A+Wx2
I enjoyed your tale from the beginning of childhood’s end.
thx
(excellent phrase-borrow from Arthur C
Clever, sensitive, and very different take on the prompt, Clark.
As you so elegantly say, people and relationships develop in different ways and at different and unpredictable rates.
PS Prefer Jim Croce’s version of his song.
Thanks, c.
actual memory including the glue (assume that both sides of the pond encouraged young modelers to use the real thing in airplane glue, at least until the seventies and the spike in death and brain damage in that demographic led to it being banned
An unexpected and unique reaction to this image, Clark. A touching tale of friendships and the courses they travel.
Thank you.
A sensitive telling of two boys on the cusp, Clark.
The energy of the future contained in their friendship that afternoon.
from such simple time/place lives move into an almost unimaginable future
I really enjoyed this, Clark.
Beautiful irretrievable moments in time and place, before all of the messiness of puberty commences. Excellent writing.
Beautiful nostalgia for the times before becoming an adult mucks it all up. I’m almost there with you, a little sister, off to one side and arranging the extra parts & sticking my fingers together with the glue!
Thank you, Liz*
* funny how shared some memories of childhood are among people of like mind