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VOAT - The Sea! The Sea! Read & Vote

  • 05-12-2020 9:59pm
    #1
    Moderators, Arts Moderators Posts: 17,231
    Mod ✭✭✭✭


    Just 3 came in, but considering how slow the forum is now, I think that's brill.

    A huge thank you to those who entered. I hope you got something out of it.

    To the rest of you, please read, enjoy and vote.


    PS. trout, you absolute pup.

    Which Story gets your vote? 4 votes

    Story 1
    0%
    Story 2
    25%
    Das Kitty 1 vote
    Story 3
    75%
    Galeecho beachkm85264 3 votes


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  • Moderators, Arts Moderators Posts: 17,231 Das Kitty
    Mod ✭✭✭✭


    Story 2
    So it’s a short story you’re after, I’ll give you a — BANG — short story. That’s the sound your boy’s cheek bone makes when it splinters into a hundred pieces. I found him just walking home from the cinema, with his girl, she’s run off now. Good looking wee biddy, but she didn’t hang around when I busted your boy’s knee with a wheel brace — BANG — that’s the wheel brace now; I always carry it around, it hooks inside my track suit bottoms, dead handy. Jesus! He’s bleeding all over the place. Bit of a bleeder your boy, screamer too I’ll bet but he won’t get a scream out when I’m at him, every time he opens his mouth — BANG — just like that, he gets the wheel brace.

    Now let’s see. What are we doing, he seems pretty much under control, squirmin’ around like a foetus – BANG - there you go, there’s one for luck, right on the spine. Always like to give the spine a good a crack, nice bit of long term damage to be goin’ on with. He can’t breath, he’s snortin’ like a horse, ha that’s funny, that’s funny that is. So what’s next, I could rob the f**ker he’s gonna have twenty quid on him for sure, but it’s really more about the fight you see, it’s good to get a good oul work out on one of these dickheads, not too big, not too small, well dressed, nice bird, out havin’ a nice time! Lets drag him up this entry here, that’s it face down get a good bit facial scarring into the bargain, lovely job – BANG - boot that time, f**k up you noncey bastard, think I know what your snivelling about?

    So it’s ‘Why?” is it? “Why would I?” and “How?” as well. “How” in your whiney “trying-to-understand” voice. Why do you do this? Why do you do that? And how could you be so cruel! What’s cruel love? Beatin’ some nonce with a wheel brace is cruel is it? Draggin’ him up an alley and trampin’ his face in not to your taste, is it? Well here it is: why the f**k wouldn’t i? I took a beaten like this every week from before I can remember, I don’t know what cruel is, you wanker, because I don’t have anything to compare it to! It’s not that hard to understand, (BANG- stop with the groaning pretty boy, someone’s gonna hear us) that’s all there is to it, you don’t need to get the shrinks in, any f**kin’ monkey could work it out. Walk down the corridor f**kwit, call into any cell and ask them what “hurt” is, ask them what the word “violence” means, ask what are Daddies for, what are Mammies for, ask them what does it feel like when someone cares for you, ask them what is it like to care for someone.

    You’ll get some pretty f**kin’ short answers, cause it’s a pretty short story, all in.

    And don’t think they’re makin’ it up, they’ve put their time in with everyone from the Samaritan visitors to the God Squad, the Nurses, Doctors and Counsellors the €500/hr Psychiatrist all trying to stretch out the oldest and simplest rule in human nature, give him nothin’ but **** all his life and you you’ll get it all right back again with interest. When you’re talking to one of them one on one, they’re not makin’ it up, they’ve nothin’ to prove, they’ve been through it all with the white coats and it means less than nothing to them, it’s the way it is, that’s it.

    I can’t read hardly, I can’t write, I can’t even talk right. When I was 3, the social workers took me away because I was found in my cot with maggots in my nappy. Apparently I wasn’t crying when I was found like that, I didn’t give a f**k. Do you know why I didn’t give a f**k, cause that’s all I knew. Those f**kin’ maggots could have ate my legs off and for all I knew that was what my legs were there for in the first place, and you know those first 3 years were actually the most stable of my life, I’ve never had regular contact with the same people or lived in the same house for that long since. Do you or will you ever get that? Get what that kind of treatment creates?

    Jesus! This f**ker’s gonna die on me. Ah f**k him, f**kin’ Mammy’s boy, f**k he can bleed. And that’s it really, that’s all for tonight, I was right, he did have twenty quid on him, twenty pounds and thirty pence to be exact. I think he actually has copped it you know, well there you go, all in a good cause, just shows you how good I am eh. And speakin’ of being good, here’s a thought, when you’re rushin’ around livin’ your good life, workin’ and bringing up your squeaky clean kids here’s a thought to be goin’ on with; I’m out there. I’m on your planet. Down your street. In your field. I’m even on your beach, and sooner or later I will get you, or yours. And you can live the good life all you want and look down your nose at me at every corner I’m on; the corner where there’s nowhere to play; in the school without the funding for my special needs teacher; in the hostel were no one wants to work and no one comes to visit; I’m everywhere you don’t want to see, I’m right there, soaking up the disgust you have for me.


  • Moderators, Arts Moderators Posts: 17,231 Das Kitty
    Mod ✭✭✭✭


    Story 2
    Paddleboard

    You’ve been sitting on the paddle board so long you can feel the press of your bones through your skin. The water coughs in the gap between the two boards where you and your cousin have managed to lash them together. You rock, rub your shins to stave off shaking in the night’s chill.

    It’s your cousin’s turn to sleep, though neither of you have really slept on your turns. You can see the shine of her eye beneath her lashes when you’re not scanning for lights moving across the water.

    Earlier, when you were still adrift, when it was daylight, before you tore your shoulders paddling madly for the island, before the tether of the lobster pot. Before all that, four gleaming dolphins broke the surface nearby, and your panic gave way to awe. You could do with those dolphins now, to stop your mind from going to what’s next. What’s next if no one comes? What next if the weather turns?

    Your cousin’s hand comes across, holds your forearm.

    “Look,” she says, and you watch her staring up into the night, a sigh lightening her chest.

    You lie next to her, on your own board. You lay your arm across your stomach and hold yourself as meteorites streak the sky.


  • Moderators, Arts Moderators Posts: 17,231 Das Kitty
    Mod ✭✭✭✭


    Story 2
    Fifteen weeks since I saw the sea. It was the longest time in my life away from the water. I kicked off my sandals and walked to the edge of the water. It hit my toes and then my ankles, cold refreshing and cleansing. Little pebbles and shells eddied around the sudden obstruction but a few steps took me past them to knee depth. I was back in my natural environment at last.


    Anyone born within sight of the sea is never settled away from it. They say we have salt water in our veins. That is silly. Everyone has salt water in their veins. You couldn’t live without it. I read somewhere that the concentration on salt in our bodies is exactly the same as in sea water. It is one of the proofs that all life started in the oceans. I don’t know if that is true but I do know that being away from the sea was the hardest part of my lockdown. Others missed shops, pubs or hairdressers. I missed the beach.


    After living within 2 km and then 5 km of home I now had a full county to travel in and one with hundreds of miles of coastline. If I was never allowed to go any further I didn’t mind. I had all I needed in my own county. How I pitied the inhabitants of Carlow and Tipperary. They had lakes and rivers but it isn’t the same as the sea.


    Every chance I got I was at the beach. I found new ones but usually ended up at the old favourites, the ones within walking distance of my childhood home. There I watched children dig holes, make dams and divert water into moats around their sandcastles. They were the same as we were a generation or two ago. These children of the smart phone era are still fascinated by seeing how water will find its own level. They may be distraught at the destruction wrought by the incoming tide but the next day they are back at the same spot, the holes dug deeper and the mounds built higher.


    They shun adult help. It needs delicate hands to get the desired shape. Buckets and spades are often discarded in favour of direct contact with the sand and stones. Their parents hovered around, snapping from every angle. Each creation gets displayed on Snapchat or Instagram.


    I don’t think there is a single photo of the multitude of sandcastles we built. In those days, cameras were too precious to take to the beach where they might be damaged by the same sand and water needed for our craftwork. It doesn’t matter. I can still see everyone. I see the single, perfect sandcastle produced when every single grain of sand, compressed to exactly the right degree, emptied from the bucket. I see the more elaborate structures with pebbled driveways to multi-turreted fortresses. I see the dams that lasted until the next heavy rain, engineering masterpieces that involved whole squads of kids working in harmony most of the time.


    There are no pictures, except in my mind. There I can not only see but feel and smell every one.


  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 36,711 pixelburp
    CMod ✭✭✭✭


    Well, story 1 certainly has the most gut-level impact - not sure I see the prompt within it mind you :D The other two stories seem positively sedate by comparison, but that's not meant as a criticism; there's a pleasing, nostalgic & contemplative tone in both. Story 3 feeling the more obviously personal by dint of its mention of lockdown - I'm guessing it's written from recent experience!

    Congrats to all three writers though, fair play: were this a face-to-face meet, I might feel more emboldened towards more detailed, constructive criticism; rather, the written word on a forum can lack the necessary context of the typist :) That I would come across less constructive without the ability to read my face.

    edit: I wonder should this be a sticky? I have a thing against them, believe that they're missed by users half the time *shrug*


  • Moderators, Arts Moderators Posts: 17,231 Das Kitty
    Mod ✭✭✭✭


    Story 2
    pixelburp wrote: »

    edit: I wonder should this be a sticky? I have a thing against them, believe that they're missed by users half the time *shrug*

    Good point. Unstuck


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,429 Sheridan81
    ✭✭✭


    I'll be truthful as I'm not here to make friends. If you don't like my opinion, don't cry like a baby, just ignore, as I will you.

    On first reading, I enjoyed all three; some of the best compositions I've seen on here (not saying much as this forum is mainly rubbish). On second reading, a couple lost their allure a little.

    Story One
    Presumably it qualifies because it mentions the beach in paragraph three? It hits you like it's narrator, knocks you awake, makes you sit up. It has a certain potency; it flows well, makes you believe that you're listening to the internal dialogue of a genuine nutcase; it's unnerving brutal honesty, dark, bleak, discomfiting, piques interest, the writing isn't bad at all, the character fleshed, real.

    But the vulgarity of the low-class idiom of the speaker becomes grating and a bit repetitive. It has the tone of a commonplace, airport thriller; not poetic, not the language beautiful, not fully fulfilling aesthetically; too many '****s' for my liking. It's theme is not something I would care to explore, it's almost the antithesis of the type of literature I most admire, and although I relate to the outsider angle in the vein of Raskolnikov and Meursault, this protagonist is too uncouth, uncultured and downright dim to compel me to truly enjoy his violent world.


    Story Two
    This appears to be a poem, at least that's how I'd define it. I'm not sure why there's a period after the line "before the tether of the lobster"? I don't like it. It's abrupt. Perhaps a semi-colon or dash would be better there? Anyway, I actually got a feeling of romantic tenderness between the two stranded individuals on first reading, which is possibly not the intention of the author as they are cousins.

    I think the narrative could be analogous, sprinkled with metaphors for the passage of time, the struggle of existence, the impact and fleeting nature of beauty, isolation and mortality. When I see the setting of night blended with the reflection on daylight's events, the torn shoulders paddling to a distant goal, the yearning for a glimpse of dolphins again, and the pondering of the lonely predicament "What's next if no one comes"? "What next if the weather turns?", it reminds me of life itself.

    When I hear of meteorites streaking in the night sky, I think of comets, fast and fading, like ages of man, but also survival, as the meteorite is the sole survivor of the space invader. Thus, the observer's urgent situation is mirrored in the sky.

    But then again, you can read anything into anything; maybe that wasn't the intention at all? Just reading it one last time, the "lay your arm across your stomach" line makes me think that the narrator is in the early stages of pregnancy!

    Personally speaking, I wouldn't be too fussed about a bunch of dolphins; I'd be more sparked by the meteorites.

    Story Three
    Nostalgic, sentimental bordering on sappy, contemplative, reflective, sensitive, touching, nicely written but not overwrought with description. Again, I am naturally disposed to see metaphors (where there may be none devised), in the relationship between children, the sand-building and the supervising, observant guardians.

    "They shun adult help. It needs delicate hands to get the desired shape. Buckets and spades are often discarded in favour of direct contact with the sand and stones."

    "Their parents hovered around, snapping from every angle."

    The above lines make me think of kids and their search for independence, the desire to live their life without influence from an older generation, inevitably making and learning from their own mistakes, as is, in reality, preferable to mollycoddling and suffocating.

    "They may be distraught at the destruction wrought by the incoming tide but the next day they are back at the same spot, the holes dug deeper and the mounds built higher."

    This makes me think of the human spirit; indefatigable and indestructible; perseverance in the face of life's challenge.

    "I don’t think there is a single photo of the multitude of sandcastles we built. In those days, cameras were too precious to take to the beach where they might be damaged by the same sand and water needed for our craftwork. It doesn’t matter. I can still see everyone. I see the single, perfect sandcastle produced when every single grain of sand, compressed to exactly the right degree, emptied from the bucket. I see the more elaborate structures with pebbled driveways to multi-turreted fortresses. I see the dams that lasted until the next heavy rain, engineering masterpieces that involved whole squads of kids working in harmony most of the time."

    This lovely paragraph seems like a metaphor for generation upon generation of life, will and effort; friendship and love encapsulated and wrapped in memories.

    I could be mistaken and I suspect the sandcastle/tide metaphor is overplayed and a bit twee and obvious at this juncture, but it's a sweet, pleasant short story nonetheless; the mood and tone brings to mind a short story I read by Truman Capote a long time ago.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 146 km85264
    ✭✭


    Story 3
    Congratulations story 3, but as I said earlier congratulations all three entries, it was great to read them all, always lovely to see different takes on the same theme. I hope I have the cycles to stick in a tale next time it comes around


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,252 echo beach
    ✭✭✭


    Story 3
    Best Christmas present ever. I won a VOAT!

    I'm delighted to admit to story 3 and thanks to all who took the time to read and vote. Particular thanks to Sheridan81 for the detailed feedback. You possibly read more into a simple memory/reflection piece than I intended. It was based on my observation that while children are exactly the same as ever the parents have changed. Our parents had a style best described as 'benign neglect' which allowed for a lot of freedom while now there is the 'helicopter parent.'

    Story 1
    I enjoyed reading this although it isn't really my genre. Mention of the sea gave the impression of being shoehorned in so for that reason I couldn't give it my vote.

    Story 2
    Beautifully written bringing you right into the scene and, as someone else said, almost poetic language. It somewhat straddles poetry and flash and might fit better if it committed to being one or the other, if that doesn't sound too pretentious a comment.


  • Moderators, Arts Moderators Posts: 17,231 Das Kitty
    Mod ✭✭✭✭


    Story 2
    Congratulations echo beach!

    I think that’s the first time a piece of creative non-fiction won a VOAT. It’s a fantastic story.

    I wrote #2 about the paddle boarders who were rescued off Aran during the summer. It was interesting to get feedback, as I probably assumed everyone would know the story.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,119 volchitsa
    ✭✭✭


    I've just come across this thread, and loved the stories. The first wasn't really about the sea, but an arresting story all the same. Unforgettable.Clockwork Orange style, but not derivative. TBH I couldn't read it all first time round, it was too brutal. I read the others, and the comments, and only then was I able to read the first one fully, to see where the beach was mentioned!

    Since the competition is over, there's not much point in me giving an opinion but I did love both the other two. Maybe the second a little more, for its poetic style, but I also love the idea of children nowadays still being able to find a bit of the freedom that we had, even if it's only when they're at the beach.

    Uncivil to the President (24 hour forum ban)



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  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 36,711 pixelburp
    CMod ✭✭✭✭


    So what do people reckon: with the Xmas holidays, are folks less or more likely to find the time to write. IE, another VOAT on the cards? Seems like a good opportunity for me to have another excuse not to contribute ;) :eek:


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 146 km85264
    ✭✭


    Story 3
    pixelburp wrote: »
    So what do people reckon: with the Xmas holidays, are folks less or more likely to find the time to write. IE, another VOAT on the cards? Seems like a good opportunity for me to have another excuse not to contribute ;) :eek:

    Sounds good.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 29 Gale


    Story 3
    Enjoyed these. The feedback is great. Good to see the effect on readers.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,016 Blush_01
    ✭✭✭


    Sorry, I haven't read these yet, but I will, I used to be a more regular poster here, delighted to see VOAT back again.

    Is it going to be a regular feature? If so, I wanna play please!

    Edited to say: Well done to the three entrants.

    Entry 1 - not what I would normally read, the gratuitous violence wasn't my cup of tea but it did serve its purpose, and the imagery (especially of the 3 year old) was impactful.

    Entry 2 - as I'd read the thread before I read the entries I knew the background and the context gave me a different lens to the other readers I think. Some beautiful imagery and turns of phrase. There's a sense of magic or hope juxtaposed with the attempts to conceal the distress of being lost at sea.

    Entry 3 - a beautiful creative non-fiction piece, and not overly indulgent. It's not easy to find a neat balance in nostalgia between sentimentality and biography.


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