Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)
This is the Doctrine’s contribution to ‘the Unicorn Challenge‘.
Hosted by jenne and ceayr, the only strict rule is: a story may not exceed 250 words. how much time, or license or psycho-emotional careening around in one’s reaction to the prompt photo? Unlimited.
“…and I get to be immortal.”
“A couple of simple tasks, that’s it?”
“”Minor challenges, easy-peasy and then I get the permanent status of…”
“Weak opponents. pretty much symbolic in their presence… exactly how weak?”
“”Picked from a handful of candidates in a process extended down from the Bronze Age, sure anyone would feel honored…”
“Human candidates, no, that does make me feel even more special…”
“Opportunity to save Mankind, well, of course I’ll step up…”
“‘No, I don’t, no one would, given the situation…”
“Next of kin?”
“No, no one left…. oh, a standard question. No, I’m not aware of any family history of suspicious deaths.”
“No, I wasn’t lonely. Sure, but what kid doesn’t? But that’s not anything exceptional and …besides, that was all the nuns talking they way they did with grade-school kids.”
“Who believes that stuff anymore, Satan and the Bargain, sure makes for great blues music but pretty much every kid outgrows that.”
“Hey! Look! My Uber’s here. Been great talking to you, we’ll have to do it again….”
“What the hell, man? Quit pushin!”
About clarkscottroger
Well, Clark, I can’t see the video, I can’t even see what it is, and it might have helped me here.
My take is that this is a standard ‘sell your soul for immortality’ deal, and well done too, until the last line, which I didn’t understand.
Or was the other party just getting to the Uber first?
ceayr
Dogeza (土下座) sensei!*
the easy one first: a music video (kinda metal, nothing special one of those, ‘Hey I like that song’ things)
the next is a bit more roundabout. It’s a style I really enjoy that I refer to as a ‘Bob Newhart’ conversation**. I have used it quite effectively in Six Sentence Stories1, and, with the alchemy of constructive criticism, I realize even as I type what I did wrong in my Unicorn story! I did not do a proper set up! aiyyee
I’m not discouraged as I can’t blame anyone for not getting this is half a conversation… as we don’t know who (or what) the other half is… and, I suspect I compounded that deficiency by not keeping the ‘temptation/transaction’ limited to sell your soul…
and the penultimate line was meant to set up the humorous punchline
* total sincerity as you are my preferred bellwether for learning to write an engaging, simple and enjoyable story (which in the past you have indicated when such an occurrence….er occurs in these pages… apparently this is not one of them lol and, again, the difference between constructive and vindictive criticism is entirely in how the writer feels (about such assessment)… in this case: the above explanation and the determination to try again (not too soon! come on! totally-subjective story prompt!! lol)
** Bob Newhart started as a standup comedian and his signature bit was the one-half of a phone conversation example:
1) a Six Sentence Story utilizing the Bob Newhart thing but with a proper sense of context:
Ah, my good friend, Doktor Faustus – the roads I walked with him when I was a student! (Although in my case it was Goethe’s version)
I really like your piece which I read as one side of the conversation with ‘Auld Nick’ (Scotland reference)
The clear, conversational style brings it right into the 21st century.
It took me a while to get the last sentence – I finally went for him wanting to back off, but Satan not letting him go, trying to push him into the bargain?
It’s a great piece of writing.
thank you, j.
(As I mentioned in my… characteristically long, detailed and perhaps overly foot-noted Reply to ceayr, I could have done better in the ‘set up’)
that you ‘got it’, comes, Doctrinistically-speaking, as no surprise whatsoever.
fun, this writing.
(more about the Wakefield Doctrine? Who said that?! lol.)
Well, if’n you insist.
As has often been stated, the whole Wakefield Doctrine came pretty much on the serendipitous express… arrived (after twenty or thirty years of consideration, observation and not-a-small-amount-of-time in reflection (aka ‘hey! that’s pretty cool’) with a directive to create a blog and bring it to the world (nah, nothing as cool as a burning bush or ‘Dude… Look what I invented! Carved out stone tablets!). but our point is this: despite being a clark, when it comes to writing (about the Doctrine specifically) there was a) no work involved (as I have come to recognize as a part of the creative process) and 2) not the slightest level of self-consciousness that is axiomatic in my people…. damn.
you wanna hear another example of the (potential) of this here theory in self-improving ourselfs? At a certain point in the early years, say around Year three, I realized that my writing tended to go into a certain sameness (commonly referred to as a ‘comfort rut’) where my new friends (online) all enjoyed what I was doing. So, as you might identify with, I thought to myself, I thought, ‘Come on, clark, lets strike out into the weirdness, try shit out that you know you could never pull off’
And the thought came to me (as it comes to all clarks) ‘Yeah but you have a stable group of friends, other people online who let you hang out and don’t seem to mind. You don’t want to risk alienating everyone, do you?’
and my response was, “Well, if I do something everyone gets offended by, I guess I will just have to get another set of everyone’
and the thing about that is (as I suspect you know) is that that wasn’t a defiance based in fear, it was an embracing of the potential of the virtual world and, more importantly, an acceptance of the distinction between myself and (any) readers…
holy smoke! that is so not what I would do with the other ‘X’ percent of my reality (as an Outsider)
Thanks for listening
Well, I enjoyed all of that.
thank you, Chris
I can hear the voice of your ‘chosen one’, and as your story develops, I can also hear the shifts in his thinking about what he’s actually getting into, but I must admit I needed the explanation in your reply to ceayr. Once I realised the ‘one half of a conversation’ approach I was off and running. As is your chosen one by the end, I believe. Pats on the back to you for going out on a limb, as you say above to Jenne (yes, I’m a stickybeak and read other people’s comments).
Margaret
no, please do not feel it is rude to be a ‘stickybeak’*
And, in terms of thread-jumping, reading the comments (and replys) to others is, imo, the height of a virtual conversation and, despite being somewhat hypo-social (my predominant worldview according to the Wakefield Doctrine is that of ‘the Outsider’) by the seemingly clunky and redundant linking-out of people in a comment/reply, further engenders ‘the conversation’ (about writing and technique and ‘no way! where the heck did that come from?!?!’)
plus, and here I suspect I am stuck in the past, links-out to people like our hosts jenne and ceayr are, hopefully, healthy in terms of search engine algorithms (plus it’s like being at a party and mentioning a person’s name out of nowhere, just loud enough for the person, say Doug or Nancy to cause them to turn and say, “What, what was that?”
Well, speaking of fun idioms, there I go ‘jumping the shark‘ with my well-intentioned response to a very nice comment!
thank you
*excellent …whatever the term in rhetoric for a word unfamiliar on it’s surface yet in context totally understandable
I agree. The back and forth of conversation about the stories, and whatever else comes up in the comments, is vey satisfying. I’ll keep on with my stickybeaking ways.😊
;]
And now I’m reading it hearing Bob’s voice, with Jerry the dentist pushing him into the Uber…
Helloo
(all in the delivery)