little adventures

history can be fun, I guess

Friday came and we found ourselves situated in a field next to the bridge right outside of town. Skies turned dark and Joan Lee figured we maybe ought to get the children in some sort of substantial shelter. We grabbed up our beds and started walking through the field and down the road a little. We got to the inn a little after dark and no matter how much we hollered and yelled none of them soldiers would venture near to help us with our bundles.

One of the officers deposited us inside the little house and finding that beds cost dear. Twelve cents a piece was more than we had in our pockets. The innkeeper felt some sympathy and let us sleep on the floor of the tavern room. Well, we laid on the floor of the tavern but with all of the wind and the rain and so many soldiers about. I don’t imagine I closed my eyes much.

We got out early the next morning and walked back to our camp to see about the damage. We put our few things right and cleaned up a little for the day. The girls got a position feeding and tending chickens and goats and sheep for a local farmer. We fell in with the camp cook for some Western troops. It might not pay much but we'd eat.

Being so new to the place we didn’t have a pass that described our loyalty to the Union cause and so we were stopped and led to camp headquarters to beg for one. The little fella doing the leading caused a mighty ruckus on the street corner, he petted the pony pulling the quartermaster’s wagon full of supplies. The pony didn’t mind so much but the big black horse in the lead took offense and started bucking and rearing and that kindly got the pony out of sorts and she started running circles. I wondered that we weren’t all stomped in the street but we got ourselves a little out of the way. Our escort disappeared and we wondered aloud if we couldn't just sneak off. But we stayed and he came back red-faced and a little out of breath after chasing the pony and wagon.

We were finally brought to the Provost Marshall. That little man abused us mightily. Cast aspersions on our character. He wondered aloud how two women could be so illiterate. Had to make my mark twice. He didn’t like the first one. I told him it was the only mark I knew. He finally sent us on our way still yelling out the door as we walked away.

We were on our way to the market to try and buy some onions and potatoes when we saw that snake oil salesman. The one that came to town with that Wahoo Indian Medicine Show last year. That elixir turned Christine’s hair purple and it didn’t even cure the fever like it was supposed to. . . her daddy was pretty mad.

All the ladies went to visit the embalmer later in the morning when we got a minute free. We inquired how many dollars it would take to bury a cheating scoundrel that sells elixir. The best deal we could get was five dollars for the box and five dollars to carry him to that final resting place. We worried over whether he had a box big enough. Beverly thought it might be a good idea if he’d come along and measure the rogue. But he insisted that boxes was one size fits all.

{I think a good time was definitely had by all. It was good to get out and be with friends this weekend.}

Reviews

[Collect-Eye]

this is skillfully and cleverly written..You have a writing style that is very poised and refined Emily. You take your time w/ the descriptions w/out going overboard w/ flowery language to impress and confuse people. I admire that alot..You sort of give it a Mark Twain feel w/ the humor and the vernacular. I am very impressed. [=

the board says you posted this yesterday, but this morning is the first time I saw it..Definitely worthy of a few more reads. When I'm feeling less out of sorts, I definitely wanna come back to this.

For personal reasons, I thought I was gonna have more trouble reviewing this, but once I started typing, it came pretty easily..but like I said, I wanna read this a few more times. Expect another review or two. I'm interested in bouncing off my thoughts w/ those of other reviewers as well.

[Anthony M Smith Jr]

I was reading your story an felt like I was there,even smelling an also made me hungry. I enjoyed myself an some day I will be able to write my true self instead of looking for words that relate. This is difficult cause I am translating from my tribal language to english which leaves out a lot of feelings.

[Hannah Monttkomepy]

Very nice. I felt like this was some sort of published work that I'd pick up at Borders or something. The way in which you wrote it resembles great authors and I'm awed at your talent.

[DiggeyEleven]

It was a great read Emily, having that classic style to your writing yet not being over the top where I felt it just dragged like those "classic" novels sometimes have. The pacing was perfect for the piece, I actually felt very at ease reading it, imagining ever situation our character walked into perfectly. True the descriptions didn't go overboard and I loved them, how they focused so clearly on the POV of the character and not heavily on the environment as a whole (hope that makes sense). Being that our character was "quite illiterate" it didn't go in depth with these scholarly words, and were simple, yet precise. I hope this is just the beginning of something you are working on, it has a lot of us waiting for more =)

[C. Harter Amos]

You really create atmosphere. Transported to place and time, I was right there on the street with you. Well written, Emily. Is this a glimpse of a work in progress? - Mimi.

[Sel Whiteley]

As a True Gentleman says this is skillful, clever writing. I thought you painted the scene brilliantly. The characterisation was superb. It was the voice though...I could really hear an accent coming out in these words.

[Collect-Eye]

My perception of the timing of this was the polar opposite of C. Boylan's..[=

[Raef C. Boylan]

This is an enjoyable little piece Emily.
At first I was confused, because for some daft reason I assumed it was going to literally be about your weekend adventures and I was thinking - whoa, soldiers? hope they're civil war actors or something - but I realised pretty soon that you'd taken us back in time :-)

Lots of references to small back-stories throughout gives a real sense of character depth and history here.
The humour and tone worked really well.
Overall, a nice write.