new boy in tribe. name is pell.
pell family walk in from east valley last moon. father dead. mother tired. pell maybe twelve winter. skinny. eye always on ground.
nobody talk to pell. not because tribe mean. because tribe busy. and new boy who don't talk is easy to forget.
oog watching from distance. watching pell eat alone. sit alone. walk edge of camp like he practicing being invisible.
then one sun. zul walk up to pell. just walk right up. ten winter old. no fear. no politics.
zul: "you draw?"
pell look up. shocked someone talking to him.
pell: "...what?"
zul: "draw. on wall. with charcoal. you draw?"
pell: "no."
zul: "good. me neither. want to be bad at it together?"
pell stare at zul. zul staring back. completely serious.
pell mouth do something it probably haven't done in a long time. small. barely there.
smile.
they go to cave wall. they draw. terrible. absolute mess. some kind of animal that might be horse or might be cloud. nobody can tell. they arguing about it.
zul: "that leg."
pell: "that not leg. that tail."
zul: "why tail coming from FRONT?"
pell: "it creative."
zul laughing. pell laughing. the kind of laughing where the body remember it can do that.
oog watching. not involved. not needed.
and oog learn something. oog always think welcoming someone mean big gesture. speech. formal thing. adult thing.
but zul just walked up and said "want to be bad at something together?" and that was the whole door. that was the entire door.
you don't need to be good at something to offer it. you just need to be willing to be bad at it next to someone who alone.
love, oog
Well I suppose I learned last summer that life is short, definitely too short for holding grudges. So when @GamebredFighter said he wanted to sit down and break bread of course I took him up on it. Today he came to Wisconsin, sat down had some dinner and chatted it up. Turns out we have more in common than different 👊👊👊 Felt great to bury the hatchet and make a new friend. Life is too short to hold grudges, bury hatchets and move one with your life. So glad Jorge was able to come to Wisconsin today.
My dear friend & incomparable author Dan Simmons died Saturday from a stroke at age 77. He defied literary norms, exploring historical fiction, horror, crime & other genres. His must-read titles include THE SONG OF KALI & HYPERION. He was one of a kind.
https://t.co/NcBFT4hBc6