Something New

During a time of quiet meditation, a story unexpectedly began to form in my head.  It quickly began to take shape as soon as I started writing, so I decided to post it in segments here.  I’m not sure how it’s going to develop, but you can help be part of the experiment!  I’d love your feedback in the comments section, but please remember, it’s a work in progress.  Herewith:

The Artist:  Introduction

There was once an ancient man in a small town some of us might recognize.  Everyone had heard about him, but very few actually knew him well.  Those who did were the ones who knew that he was caring and listened when they came to him to talk about their troubles and joyful events.  He was kind and had the warmest, deep brown eyes that it seemed you could swim in when you gazed into them.  Those eyes captivated everyone who came to visit.  They beamed bigger than his lips when he smiled and shone brightly when he looked at one of his visitors, intensely focused on them.

The funny thing was that he was always welcoming, so those who knew and loved him always wondered why everyone didn’t want to get to know Him.  But the rest of the town was kind of afraid of him because he seemed to just know too much about them…and they didn’t all lead good, clean lives.  Some were ashamed of things they did and others were just very wounded people who couldn’t see much hope in the road ahead.  Still others didn’t want anyone with whom to discuss their lives because they were living with complete.

abandonment, accountable to no one, running up huge debts they could never hope to repay, not taking life seriously—or the people with whom they shared it. They seemed to care about no one else, not even themselves.  And they certainly weren’t interested in any old artist living at the edge of town—because they didn’t have love in their lives and didn’t believe it even existed; in fact, they thought, “Who cares?”

Sometimes, one of the townspeople who knew him would tell someone they saw struggling that he was really easy to talk to and that he always seemed to have something wise to say after a long period of taking in whatever was being shared.  And he was always home; that in itself was remarkable!

“He’s really smart; not like you and me,” one visitor proclaimed.  “I mean, sometimes I can kind of figure out how to do something as I take one step, but even then I’m not sure.  But HE seems to understand things before they progress and can actually help me to see which step to take next.”

One young woman, Fledgling, visited the artist almost every day, whenever she’d finished school and all of her daily duties at home.  She skipped to his house most of the time, just so happy to have someone who really seemed to understand her and appreciated things about her that she didn’t even know existed until he pointed them out.

For her, it all started one day when she was troubled because someone at school told her she was stupid and an antique.  She wasn’t much of a fighter, but she quickly responded to her accuser, “I am neither of those.  I know much more than you think I do and just because I don’t want to do everything the ‘in’ people do, doesn’t mean I’m old-fashioned.  I simply don’t need to do things just to impress others.”  But internally, the words stung and she didn’t feel at all confident that what she’d just said was even true.  She began to feel stupid and backward.