Roy's Story

Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored!" Why fly with the big flock? Find yourself a rare bird! Put it on your life list -- don't cook it in a pie!

Yesterday I sat down to write a post for TGAB in the library at the Vo-Tech. Another substitute teacher saw me and came over and started talking to me. I really wanted to blog, but he seemed very adamant about sharing a story idea he had with "someone who could really write it out."

To humor him, I opened Microsoft Word and started taking notes from his description.

The story was about a boy whose mother died at birth and whose father treated him harshly or indifferently, blaming him for his mother's death. But the boy was forgiving of all his father's faults. And secretly, the father was indeed attending the boy's sporting events, etc. Just not telling the kid.

Up comes a war, the boy enlists and starts writing his father letters from the front. Finally one day his father decides to write back, after never having answered any of the other letters. And as the father is writing, two servicemen come to the door to tell the father that his son has been killed.

I'm just typing this out as the guy is saying it. And I look over at the guy, and he's crying. Honest to Bored Gods, crying big tears! "Doesn't this sound tragic?" he asked.

I said, "Did something like this happen to you?"

No, he said. He was just moved by this particular tale, that the father would actually be writing a confessional letter to his son just as the soldiers were coming to tell the father he'd lost the son.

It's funny, the stories we tell ourselves and the various themes that move us to tears. Personally I am more likely to cry at happy endings, or in stories or films that wax philosophical about our relationship to one another.

Roy thinks I could write his story and make it a best-seller. I didn't disabuse him of this notion, not after seeing how deeply he felt about this tale he can't tell himself.

Lighter note: On my facebook, I listed this date as my birthday. It's actually my sister's birthday. Today I'm getting best wishes from all my Facebook friends! I feel like I've stolen something valuable from Sis. Shame on me!

And by the way, if you've been trying to befriend me on Facebook and haven't heard back, I was having some trouble getting the request thingy to work. So try again! Or, you don't have to. My best stuff goes on here at "The Gods Are Bored."