Over the River and Through the Woods

[PacNorWest]

#1

Mark put one foot in front of the other. The journey started, for there was no other way to reach home. Vaguely, he knew it was 2700 miles to North Carolina, and that was where he was determined to go. As a reasonably fit man for his age, he figured on ten miles a day, working up to fifteen and then twenty.

The gooey mud coated his feet and even in December the stench of the mire lay heavy in the air. He had a thousand regrets, who wouldn't.

He spotted an intact can, lying in the mud. No label, that, had washed off and the can use by date was obliterated. It wasn't bulged, so he used his knife to open it up. Mark was pretty sure it was canned dogfood, and he told his mind to keep thinking corned beef hash.

He was hungry. He considered it food and happy to have it. He gagged swallowing the slab he pried out with his knife, and kept walking.

He had to find a way to cross the Columbia River. He was on the North side, and that's where most of the tributaries emptied into the large river. In the winter time it wasn't smart to go North, and he didn't have the clothes for a Montana adventure.

He walked, trying to follow the paved road toward Umatilla. There was a bridge there, if it was still useable.

There were no recognizable landmarks, only rock covered with the mud, everywhere.

[sssarawolf]

Oh dancing here, thank you Pac so much.

[Catshooter]

Sweet! No, the Columbia would not be fun to cross. Over a mile wide in a lot of it. Whole new story, yea!


Cat

[Lake Lili]

Snoopy dance of happiness... Thanks for giving us a taste!

[Sammy55]

We're dancing here, too!!

WhooooooHooooooooo!! Pac started another one!!!! YES!!!

Thank you muches muches muches, Pac!!

[CGTech]

hmmm, dogfood....

[Sully]

Oh, wow Pac! You didn't even have a chance to rest up a little bit. But I'm really glad you started on the new story, and yes, I know I'm being selfish..but I sure do love this story.

Sully

[PacNorWest]

#1b

Clora sent her young men on a hunt, she hoped it took every last ounce of their energy; so there was none left to fight, bicker and argue. She had Teddy doing some math for her, he wasn't the least bit interested in hunting.

She had him figuring out how many steps, how many miles and how many days and/or months it would take older people such as Joy and Warren to walk from New York city. Teddy was humming right along, his pencil flying over the paper as he worked.

"I reduced the average stride by one third, and had to recalculate everything. If Joy had high heels on, I'm going to reduce it by half. Grandpa has a long stride, but if their tired or hurt, I think I should reduce his stride by half."

Clora nodded. She intended to give him the approximate mileage from Portland to home and let him figure out when Mark might arrive. Clora estimated ten months of travel. It would be interesting to see what Teddy came up with.

Clora also intended to see if Teddy could teach Luke and Liz math. Anything, she thought desperately, to keep at least three of them busy. It wouldn't hurt if Robert, Gary, Lou and Sam sat in on the lessons, for a good solid background refresher.

They had saved some of the school books, but not all; and Clora was preparing a lesson plan to start school at home.

They needed a calendar made, and for some reason it made her think of Evie, Ben and Ben's purple-pet-ual calendar.

Ahh, Ben. Such a change from what he started out to be, to what he ended up with. Out of the six of them, she and Wayne were the only kids left. Clora was thinking hard about Zander, Jane, Sandy and Ben. Today with it's deep snow was very much reminiscent of that snowed in time at Grandma's, and Clora supposed that was the reason for all the memories. There was a small zinger of a thought that went racing across her conscience, and faded into nothing. Clora shrugged. Maybe it would come back, or maybe it wouldn't.

Clora had wondered time and time again why the EMP potential disaster hadn't registered with her precognition. The idea was simply blank in her mind. She could feel Mark however, could tell he was on the move. He was headed home. Clora said a prayer for his safe passage.

[Dennis Olson]

Texican has been banned from this thread.