Writing Bits I

I'm having a blah day, most recent in a succession of blah days. I don't have much to say. But, this morning, I pulled out the long-dormant manila folder labelled "Writing Bits". These are ancient bits of short stories not yet written, and even smaller bits of novels not yet written. The first one turned out to be quite apropos to follow my last mountain-climb post. More to follow, unless I get inspired to write something new.

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'In New Hampshire, Desolation is a real place. Found between the dappled cascades of Zealand and the dragon-spined ridges of Carrigain Mountain, blocked by wild notches on north, east, and south, Desolation lies nearly inaccessible to the civilized world. Thus isolated, the region might have remained Paradise, rather, had not men with spike and steam forced their way in, driving steel rails from the west along the Pemigeswasset River, hurtling engines on down the gullet of steel into the soft belly of the valley. Then quickly came saws, tearing at the flesh of the trees, crashing them down by the thousands and hauling the life of the land away, away, until, in a few years, nothing was left but mile on mile of smoldering scorch and stump. The trains gone, the men gone, there remained no evidence of the agents of destruction. Yet the soil seemed to cry in agony, and black tears shed from the darkened sky fell to inky blood on black granite, collected, and crept outwards in the wasted veins of once-clear rivers. “Sherman’s vengeance on Atlanta,” a Boston newspaper reported, “exceeds not the destruction wrought on this once-verdant valley.” De-souled, de-solaced—more than desolate land, this land was Desolation. And it was into Desolation that my father ventured one bright February afternoon, quite unwillingly, to retrieve a friend.'