Writing Poetry

 

You might surmise that someone whose education was in computer science and business and who spent his work career in those same fields would not have much writing or creative ability. But you’d be wrong. I’ve had the opportunity this week to write two different poems and would like to share them.

 

The first was due to a posting that was shared by a high school English teacher of several discarded first lines of potential poems that had never been written. This inspired me and I chose a first line that I thought would work well. You can see the result below. This took me only 20 minutes or so.

 

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Like a Bowl

 

I am a bowl, chipped at the rim,

Still to be used, but without the fine trim.

Some look at me and turn up their nose

But I'm useful still, and better than those.

 

A lot of people are just like that,

They're worn down from use, but handy to have,

Battered and scraped, and looking quite poor.

So love that old bowl, and use it some more.

 

 

This next one was from an English assignment from one of my grandsons. He freely admits that writing is not one of his skills. But he had to write a sonnet. So he provided the topic, and I gave him possible rhyming words. He then put his ideas down and I did the necessary wordsmithing to put it all into iambic pentameter as required. The below joint effort took about a half-hour.

 

 

Ode to a Choo-choo

 

I see them on the road through nearby town

It’s riding on a track that’s made of steel

It has more cars when going up than down

I love the way it roars and how it feels

 

The wheels on all the cars are set in pairs

The sound they make is always clicky-clack

When going fast they move a lot of air

The engine’s on the front but not the back

 

The ones between might be a box or tank

There’s no caboose, they’re all now very dead

Most cars are written on, and never blank

The final car has lights, it’s called a FRED

 

To know these things I need to use my brain

The thing I love the most is called a train.

 

 

So what do you think? Have I lost touch with my creative side? I freely admit that I’m better at structured writing, i.e. poems with rhyme and meter, than with the blank verse that’s more common these days. But this kind of writing is still quite fun to me.

 

Middle School Drama

The Students

Judy was one of the tallest students in her 7^th grade class. While it’s not unusual for girls to get their growth earlier than boys at that age, Judy had gotten hers earlier than most. The other students in her class would tend to use adjectives such as tall, pretty, or even large words such as statuesque to describe her. But her close friends, who knew her well, would use such descriptors as kind, friendly, or loving – words which focused on her personality instead of her physical attributes.  She had only been in this school since last spring, but she already had several close friends.

Paul was one of the few students who was taller than Judy. But his was not a result of early growth – rather he was taller because he was older than all the others in the class. He had been held back twice already because he was a poor student. But he used his size as a way of bullying other students. His fellow classmates were generally afraid of him.

At the other end of the height spectrum was Thomas. If you were acquainted with his family, you would conclude that he was likely to be taller than most eventually, but he was a late starter and for now was the smallest in his class. However, what he lacked in height he made up for in his intelligence and he was generally well liked.

 

The Confrontation

It was the first day of school after the Christmas break, so perhaps Paul was tired of visiting relatives for the past two weeks and being the “little kid” compared to all his relatives. But whatever the reason, he was trying to reestablish his position. When he saw Judy at her locker at lunchtime, he came up behind her and put his arm on the adjoining locker – effectively blocking her in with the open locker door on one side and his arm on the other. Speaking loud enough for the other students in the area to hear as well, he said to Judy, “Hi there, beautiful, how’d you like to be my girl this year?”

Judy had no desire for such a relationship, but she didn’t want to give a totally negative reply, so she just said simply, “Please leave me alone.” Refusing to be rebuffed, Paul reiterated, “Aw, come on, we’d make such a great tall couple.” Judy responded again by telling Paul, “No thank you.”

Thomas had his locker right across the hall. Although he didn’t want to get involved, he could sense Judy’s discomfort. So he crossed the hall, and, coming up behind Paul, said, “You heard the lady, Paul, please leave her alone.” Paul turned his head and, having to look down at Thomas who was a good foot shorter than he was, said, “Get lost, shrimp!”

Not one to be put off so easily, Thomas repeated, “Please leave her alone.” Paul’s response was to turn toward Thomas and give him a push, saying, “Pick on someone your own size!” He then turned back toward Judy.

Once recovered from that push, Thomas again crossed the hall and tapped Paul on the back. When Paul turned to face him again, Timothy swung a fist toward Paul. Being so much shorter, his punch connected with Paul below the belt. Paul immediately collapsed, holding his abdomen, and groaning. Freed from being pinned against the locker, Judy stepped over the groaning Paul. She briefly turned and said to him, “Yes, Paul, pick on someone your own size!”

 

The Aftermath

There were a number of whispered conversations all that afternoon. Judy’s friends all wanted to talk to her and get her perspective on what had happened. Paul’s former followers, who were never really friends, kept saying in his direction, “Pick on someone your own size, Paul.” Thomas heard a continual whisper of “Nice job, Thomas!”

The teachers, none of whom had happened to witness the actual event after lunchtime, were silently happy that Paul had been put in his place as school regulations prevented them from any physical encounter with a student. But their response of closer scrutiny of Paul for the rest of the school year ensured that he was no longer able to collect a gathering of followers and be the bully that he had previously been.

At the end of the school day, Thomas was a little surprised when Judy came up to him at his locker and said bluntly to him, “I’d like to have you as a protector, would you be willing to walk me home?” And so, to the sigh of many other girls in the hall at the time, Thomas did so – the first of many such walks together.

Spelling Words

             Each week our grandsons have new spelling words as part of their literacy curriculum. This past week, the list of spelling words for fourth grade were based on words with the “-r” sound – noting that this includes words with “-er,” “-ir,” and “-ur”. So, some of the words were percent, circus, and surprise. I noted that all of these words have to be memorized, as it’s not obvious from the sound which vowel is supposed to be used. For example, these three words could just as easily have been spelled “purcent,” “cercus,” and “sirprise” and they would be pronounced fine.

            This set the creativity in my brain off. As I pondered all the words in this category, the thought came to me about cases where there are words with different vowels but the same “-r” sound and they are pronounced the same way. So, without boring you anymore, here is the little story that came to my mind…

 

            In the mountains and valleys of West Virginia, they enjoy eating all kinds of things. And unlike those of us who live in cities and suburbs, there are other kinds of animals that grace their menu – things like possum and squirrel. But in addition to eating the meat, the other parts of the animal can be put to good use, including the pelt and fur. After removing it from the animal, it must be scraped and dried. One of the methods of drying is to spread the hide on a small tree. In one small community, a man named John has perfected this art and has begun selling his wares. He takes a small evergreen tree, perhaps 5’-6’ tall, cuts it down and nails a couple of crossed boards to the base. He then removes all the needles and small branches. What is left works really well for hanging/draping the drying pelts.

            One day a friend of his was walking by John’s cabin and noticed that John had another brand-new drying tree sitting next to the front door. Being curious, he knocked on the door and when John answered, he asked, “Who is the fur fir fer?”

 

 

My Fictional Writing

Over the past eight years, I’ve posted over 600 entries to this blog. That’s a little more than one entry each week for that period of time. The majority of them fall in two areas – recounting information about my genealogy interests and the many ancestors I’ve investigated, or about my personal life. The latter includes stories about my grandchildren, or, increasingly as I’ve gotten older, the various medical issues that I’m dealing with. Rarely have I ventured off the path of these categories of reality. Thus, it was as much a surprise to me as to anyone when I got drawn into writing fictional stories. This is the back story about how that happened.

 

The Start – A Contest

It was nine months ago, in June 2022, that there was an editorial in our local newspaper by Bill White that was asking for entries into a “bad writing” contest that he was running. The contest was based on the fictional words that Snoopy (of Charlie Brown fame) would always start his writing – “It was a dark and stormy night…”. I thought to myself, this might be interesting. So, I spent just a few minutes composing my own entry – a 77-word long sentence that could be the opening paragraph to a fictional book. It read:

“It was an overly-warm, sultry day in late May – which forebode a summer which would have many more such days – when struggling attorney Frederick Flintstone Forchelli, who was convinced that his parents must have named him after drinking something much stronger than the diet Pepsi that he preferred, opened the door of the small non-airconditioned office on the upper floor in the converted factory/office building which was all he could afford at this stage of his career.”

I sent it off, then went about the rest of my day. To be honest, I really didn’t think about it all that much. It was just a few minutes of my day at the time.

 

The Challenge – and the First Book

About four months later, after Bill had posted the winners of his contest (I wasn’t one of them!), I decided to post the above sentence on my Facebook account. I got some good responses to it, such as “Love it!” and “You’re talented”, and one that said, “Definitely bad writing!” But then my cousin Tom said, “You have the traits of becoming a great writer. GO FOR IT!”

The latter I took as a challenge and thought, “Why not? Could I write ‘the rest of the story’?” And so it began…

That evening, I opened up a document, copied the above as the first paragraph and began writing the next paragraph – simply expanding on a description of what Fred Forchelli’s office might have looked like. I didn’t have a title for my book, I didn’t have a title for the chapter except calling it “Chapter 1 – The Office”. I had no idea what the plot was going to be. And I didn’t even know what chapter 2 was going to be about.

I just wrote in a stream of consciousness style – letting the words flow as I typed – and hoping that my creativity wouldn’t simply dry up after a few paragraphs. I’m a fairly good typist, so each night I would write 1-2 chapters of about 3-4 pages (6x9 paperback size). I also made the decision to post each chapter to my blog as I finished – so that I could remove any temptation from going back and making changes.

I do my best thinking either in the middle-of-the-night awake time I have about 2-3am, or in the early morning. It wasn’t until a few days later, around chapter 7, that I was far enough into the book that I had an idea of where it was going – and where I also felt good about giving names to the other characters in the book. I also finally gave the book a title. Then, in a flurry of activity, I finished the remaining 4 chapters in just two days.

The last sentence in the book, harking back to that initial long sentence, was “Welcome, Mr. Forchelli,” she said, “I’m your new assistant, Wilma.” Thus, I completed the Flintstone connection by introducing Wilma to Fred.

I’ve published a number of books for others – initially using CreateSpace, a product of Amazon at the time, then more recently with KindleDirect, the replacement for CreateSpace. Thus, it was a fairly easy process to do the necessary formatting, create and register a title, design a cover, etc., then send the book off for publication – both in paperback and Kindle e-book format. Here is the result of that effort.

[Fred Forchelli – Book 1 – The Piece of Paper]

 

I thought I was done with my fictional writing efforts – but that turned out not to be the case.

 

Another Question – And the Second Book

When I had written the first book, I had put the following on the title page:

[Fred Forchelli Title]

 

I had intended this to show that Fred was not world-renowned, that he was not well-known, but that he was simply an investigator and attorney. However, someone who read my first book didn’t get my point and asked me what it meant. Taking another look at it, I realized that I had set myself up for a second, and a third, book in the series – simply by removing the crossed-out words in the title one line at a time. So, it was back to the writing cycle.

I began the second book much as I had the first – writing one chapter at a time in stream of consciousness style, with little idea on what the next chapter would bring. Chapter one was simply titled “The New Office”, describing Fred’s new two-room office with his new secretary/receptionist, Wilma, in the outer office. However, Wilma quickly become Fred’s assistant in this latest investigation.

Like the first book, it took roughly a week to write the eleven chapters. I published it on Amazon after it was finished.

[Fred Forchelli – Book 2 – The D.A.’s Dilemma]

 

[Spoiler alert] As one might have expected, on the last page Fred proposes to Wilma and she accepts.

 

Becoming International – the Third Book

Having already decided to complete the series by making Fred world-renowned, I wasted no time in starting the next book. This time I at least had decided on an international setting/location before I started. But I still did not know what the case would be about or how Fred and Wilma would solve it. So, I just started writing and hoping that those issues would be resolved before too long.

As before, the answers were not long in coming. But the case that Fred and Wilma had to work on was presented to them in the form of a puzzle – one that had defied being solved for several decades. This was a very different kind of case. But, of course, they were ultimately successful.

Only nine days after publishing the second book, I published the third book.

[Fred Forchelli – Book 3 – The Priest’s Puzzle]

 

It was now mid-December, my series was complete, and I thought my career of writing fiction had ended. Little did I know!

 

Following the Hints – the Fourth Book

The next several weeks were ones that were not conducive to any further writing. I was dealing with a number of physical issues – including going to the ER on Christmas Day and spending a few days in the hospital for sepsis. By mid-January, I was once again back home, being even more diligent at spending my days in my recliner with my feet up so that the ulcer on the bottom of my foot could heal. But in such a position, my creative juices began flowing again!

I had drawn the Fred Forchelli series to a nice conclusion. So, what was I thinking about? Fred’s client in book one was Elizabeth Olshevski, who wrote detective stories under the name Betty Rubble (there’s that Flintstone connection again!) In book two, Elizabeth has started writing books which are based on her friendship with Fred and she sometimes models the character in her book after Fred. This was just the hook I needed.

Thus, in mid-January, I wrote one of Betty’s Rubble’s books – one where Fred is not the investigator, but one where the investigator is modeled on him. My writing was not quite so ferocious in speed as before, but within two weeks I had complete yet another book.

[Betty Rubble – The Case of the Purloined DNA]

 

I suppose I modeled the hero in this book somewhat on myself as well – using my knowledge of building family trees and using the power of DNA to find missing relatives. So, it was fun in a way that was different than the Fred Forchelli books.

 

Going On – Are There More Books in the Future?

I did not know whether this Betty Rubble book was merely the first in a series or whether it was the end of my fiction writing (at least for a while). But it’s now approaching two months since the last one and at this point I do not sense the “creative juices” flowing for right now. Will they again? Who knows. For now I’m content with what I’ve done over the last several months.

You can find all the above books on Amazon.com – just search for the title as shown (don’t search for my name, as there is a very prolific writer in Australia by the same name and you’ll mostly just see his work.) My books are $4.95 for the paperback version (each is 40-45 pages), or $.99 for the Kindle e-book version. I’ll never get rich selling them. The KindleDirect/Amazon  pricing model has me getting a royalty of $.82 for each paperback sale and $.35 for each e-book sale. But I hope that whoever reads them will enjoy my efforts.

I should also mention that I’ve written a few other short stories over the years. They are not long enough to put into book format, so they can only be found on my blog. These are obviously free of charge for anyone who wants to read them.

The Carwash

Kevin and the Marble

 

 

Fifth Grade Writing Assignment

One of the interesting aspects of coordinating the schooling for our grandsons is helping them work through new projects. For Isaiah and Caleb, in their literacy class they are studying various genres of writing. Their major assignment this week was “Assignment: Write a Mystery”. Here are the instructions that they were given (in addition to the typical instructions of using proper spelling, grammar, and punctuation, etc.):

You are going to create a short mystery in your journal!

Directions:

1) Make sure your story has a beginning, middle, and end. 

2) Your story must have at least three paragraphs.

3) Write about the following: 

Pretend you just found a backpack by your front door. There are five items in it.

4) Answer the following questions in your writing:

- What are the items in the bag?

- When did the bag get left by your door?

- Who left it there?

- Why did it get left for you?

- Where are you going to take it or what are you going to do with its contents?

- How will you solve this mystery?

 

I thought that this was an interesting assignment. Since I typically review their assignments earlier in the week, I thought I’d write an example of what they should be doing. So I decided to write my own response to this assignment – written from the perspective of one of them. I did this while one of them was sitting next to me working on another subject – and when I showed it to him he was astounded that I had only taken 15 minutes to write it. My biggest challenge was not having to write at least three paragraphs (of at least five sentences each – which is a requirement for all their writing this year). Rather, it was keeping it in alignment with all the other requirements and making sure that all the questions in (4) above were answered.

So, here is my submission to this fifth-grade writing assignment.

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The Backpack Mystery

Our dog, Mocha, is usually pretty quiet. But whenever he hears someone in the front yard he jumps up on the sofa to look out and then he barks. I was not surprised when he barked this morning while I was in the kitchen eating my breakfast. We often get deliveries from Amazon and while most leave things by the garage door, some put the packages by the front door. I wondered what we were getting delivered today, but I stayed to finish my breakfast before my cereal got soggy.

After breakfast I went and opened the front door. I was expecting to see a brown box from Amazon. So I was surprised to see instead a bright blue backpack. I looked around, but whomever had left it there was long gone. It was starting to rain, so I picked it up and brought it inside. Then I got surprised again – there was a tag tied onto the support straps and written on the tag was my name! What was going on? I already had a backpack – it was old and worn and this wasn’t it.

Sitting on the couch, I unzipped the backpack to see what was in it and pulled out the contents one-by-one. It was a strange collection – a brand-new notebook of drawing paper, a set of colored pencils, a page of address labels – each one with a name and age on it, a large pre-stamped mailing envelope which was addressed to the local children’s hospital, and a smaller envelope with my name on it. I checked all the side pockets, but they were empty. Then I looked closely at the address labels – noting that while I did not know any of the individuals named, all the ages were between 5 and 9. It was only then that I thought about looking in the smaller envelope.

There was a single sheet of paper in the envelope. The words on the page suddenly made it clear what was going on. They said, “You are a very skilled artist. I’ve seen some of your work. There are many children who are confined to their bed in the local hospital who would love to have one of your drawings. Please share your talents with them. The backpack will be yours to keep.” It was signed, “A. J.”.

I was pretty sure that the “A. J.” stood for “Auntie Joy”. This was her way of keeping me busy – by sharing my drawings with children who would really appreciate them. I had a long weekend ahead of me as 25 drawings don’t just happen overnight. Actually, 26 drawings – because I would do one more as a thank you to “A. J.”.  But the next week there would be a lot of happy faces in the children’s hospital. And my drawings would be helping those children to smile – perhaps for the first time in several days! Thanks, Auntie Joy for giving me a new way to bless others!

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What do you think? Do I get an “A” for my fifth-grade writing assignment?

Kevin and the Marble

Kevin was bored. It was late summer, but school wouldn’t start for another two weeks. He and his dad had moved to this house last month but the only other boys in the neighborhood that he’d met did not have similar interests to him. The Smith twins down the block to the right were both athletically minded and were at baseball practice or games nearly every day. Because Kevin had grown up in the city that was not something he’d gotten used to.

In the other direction he’d met three kids around his age. Marcia seemed like a nice girl, but she had some sort of muscle disability and was confined to a wheelchair, so board games were her primary outlet. Tim would have been fun to play with, but he was totally consumed with video games and Kevin’s dad had a firm stance on how much of that Kevin was allowed. And the only other kid that Kevin had met, William, was three years younger and didn’t share any interests with Kevin. While it would probably be better when school started, for now there was not much to do.

Kevin’s mom had passed away about a year ago. She had been ill for several years so while it was good that she was no longer suffering, that didn’t mean that Kevin did not miss her. Kevin’s dad had stayed with his job in the city so that Kevin could finish the school year there, but at the beginning of the summer he had changed jobs and the two of them had moved here where they could live in a house with a yard instead of in the high-rise apartment building that they’d had in the city. Kevin liked this new house and the large park across the street. But being able to go there and run around and enjoy the fresh air was getting old. Kevin really wanted to have friends.

Not being into athletic games and with his dad’s restrictions on the amount of video games he could play was not a problem in the city. There were a number of boys in Kevin’s building who had begun a marbles club. They could play either in the dusty empty lot next door, or, if they were not too loud, in the recreation room of the building during the day when the adults were at work. The rec room had worn low-pile carpets instead of hard linoleum floors, so the marbles did not go sailing off when they were hit. Kevin had a small bag of marbles, and his friend Jimmy would loan him a shooter when they played. Kevin’s dad seemed to recognize this attraction and had bought him another bag of new marbles as a reward for helping get everything packed for their move. But they were all small marbles and Kevin didn’t have a shooter – his dad did not seem to realize that significance.

[Marble pictures]

Thus it was that on this sunny Saturday Kevin found himself wandering around the park for the fourth time this week. His dad was home but, having begun a new job, was working a few extra hours this morning getting familiar with all that his job entailed. Kevin was over on the far side of the park near the creek that ran through it when a glint of something shiny in the weeds caught his eye. Focusing on where he saw that glint, he knelt down and pushed the weeds to the side.

There it was – a marble! And not just any marble, but one unlike any that Kevin had seen before. Most standard glass marbles have a colored swirl running through them to make them look like a cat’s eye. The swirl can be one of several colors – red, orange, yellow, green, and blue being the most common. And there are some more expensive marbles that have two or three colors running through them. But this marble that Kevin had plucked from among the weeds had FIVE colors. The primary swirls were orange, green, and blue, but the edges of the swirls were enhanced with red and yellow – almost like the swirl edges were on fire! This was NOT a standard marble – someone had spent a lot of time putting all those colors in and it was likely a pretty expensive marble.

But more significant to Kevin – this was not the average size marble either. It was a large marble – a shooter! And a shooter that put to shame all the ones that his friends back in the city had in their collections. And one that certainly was several rungs above the old worn shooter that Jimmy loaned him. Kevin was ecstatic!

 

Running home, Kevin burst into the den where his dad was poring over a pile of papers from his employer. Holding up the marble so that it caught the light streaming in the window, Kevin exclaimed, “Dad, look at this marble I found in the park! It’s a shooter! And it has five colors!” His dad began to reply, “That’s a really nice marble, Kevin. But I think you should know …” But Kevin didn’t hear this last part. He was already running out of the room as he shouted, “I’m going to go downstairs and practice marbles in the family room.”

Kevin first went to his bedroom to get his two sacks of marbles – both the small bag with the worn ones and the new bag that his dad had gotten him. He then bounded down the stairs to the family room. Like the community rec room back in the city, the family room had some low-pile carpet on the floor that made it acceptable for playing marbles. Kevin moved aside the items in the middle of the room, marked a rough circle using his older marbles, put the newer marbles in the center and then knelt down with his newly-found shooter.

Holding the shooter in the crook of his first finger and using his thumb to launch it, he first tried a few low-speed shots just to get the feel of it. It didn’t take long until he had gotten back his form and could reliably hit one of the smaller marbles and knock it out of the ring. Now it was time to try some combination shots and see if he could knock out several smaller marbles at once. Aiming at a cluster of three marbles in the center of the ring, Kevin let loose his shooter with as much force as he could muster. His aim was true and the shooter hit the cluster with a loud C-R-A-C-K!

 

It seemed like time had stopped. While two of the three marbles in the cluster had gone sailing out of the ring, sitting in their place were the shattered pieces of Kevin’s prized shooter! There were three larger chunks, a few razor-edged shards, and the glints of a number of smaller pieces that were now dotting the rug. The five colors from inside the shooter were now reduced to just some dull colors among the multiple pieces of glass. Kevin felt like his heart was also shattered like the shooter and he stood there in shock.

It was then that he became aware that his father had come into the room. He wrapped his arms around Kevin’s shoulders and gently held him. Kevin turned into his dad’s embrace as he haltingly sobbed, “It … it broke. I’ve only had it for … for an hour, and … and, it’s broken!” Kevin’s dad held him even closer.

“That’s what I tried to tell you earlier, Kevin,” his dad said. “Because of the time it takes to make these fancy marbles, the cooling process of the glass takes longer and sometimes makes them more brittle. I lost my favorite shooter when I was about your age because of the same problem.”

“You used to play marbles, too, Dad?” asked Kevin. “I never knew that.”

“Yes,” said his dad. “I’ve seen you get interested in them the last few years, but I’ve been so involved in taking care of your mom that I never got around to sharing that with you. I think it’s about time to rectify that situation. Let’s get out the vacuum and clean up this broken glass before it gets imbedded in the carpet. Then I have a few places that I’ve noticed on my drive to work the last few weeks that I’d like to show you.”

Kevin’s dad was true to his word. After they’d done the vacuuming and collected the marbles from under the sofa and around the room, they spent the rest of the day together. Their first stop was at a fast-food place for lunch - one that had been Kevin’s favorite back in the city. Then they went to a large toy store. But instead of Kevin’s dad picking anything out, he let Kevin choose a couple of marble shooters – so he’d have a spare if needed. And he even let Kevin pick out a new video game. His dad had veto authority over the one that Kevin chose as there were still limits on the level of violence or other unacceptable behavior in the video, but that was fine with Kevin.

Finally, they stopped at a YMCA in the same part of town where they lived. It was close enough that Kevin’s dad said that he would be allowed to ride his bicycle there on Saturdays as long as he paid attention to the traffic and rode safely. There were a number of group activities that Kevin could participate in. They didn’t have a marbles club, but the person at the front desk said that if Kevin could get at least three other people interested, that he could start a club and they could use one of the rooms for their club meetings. Kevin felt that he was up to that challenge.

 

When they got home later that afternoon, Kevin turned admiringly to his dad. “Thanks, dad,” he said. “I didn’t think you understood, but I’ve underestimated you. Thanks for being my dad!”

Kevin’s dad smiled back. “And I appreciate you for the attitude you’ve displayed through all of this. Now, do you think you’d be willing to play a game of marbles with me? I’m pretty rusty, but if you’re patient, I might be able to become a worthy opponent.”

 

Fred Forchelli - Credits

Credits

I began a week ago with only a single long sentence that I had submitted to a “bad writing” contest. Posting it on my Facebook account, my cousin Tom challenged me to finish the story. Drawing on my creative juices, I wrote one chapter at a time – strictly in a stream-of-consciousness style – not knowing how the story would turn out and, as I finished each chapter, only having a vague idea of the title of the next chapter. I was writing about one chapter (2-4 pages) a day, waiting for a new round of creative juices before beginning each chapter.

Despite my asking each day for any ideas or comments, it was not until around chapter 7 that someone responded. That anonymous comment made it clear that the navigation from one chapter to the next was not obvious. I went back and added prior/next links in each chapter – the only change I have made to any previously written and published chapter.

At that point I had still not given names to any of the characters except to the main character – Frederick Flintstone Forchelli – who had been named in that first single sentence, and to Jennifer, the person in the Office Services company who Fred relies upon for some administrative activities. But my daughter, Kim, commented that if the “hero” is Fred Flintstone, then the “bad guy” needs to be Barney Rubble. I then also added his wife Elizabeth (Betty) as well as George Jenson (a barely concealed reference to the Flintstones spinoff – George Jetson). I'll let the reader decide what happens to Fred’s new assistant, Wilma!

Thus invigorated, I wrote the last four chapters of the book in just 36 hours. It all fell together surprisingly quickly.

So, my thanks on this to:

·         My cousin Tom who got me started

·         The anonymous poster who was confused about how to navigate

·         My daughter Kim who gave me ideas for names – which I needed to make progress

It’s been a wild week! I hope all of you have enjoyed reading it as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it. This has been a new experience and a fun one.

 

< Prior Chapter

 

 

Fred Forchelli - Chapter 11

Chapter 11 – The Aftermath  

It was a chilly fall day when Fred stepped off the elevator and walked down the hall toward his new office. A lot had happened over the past several months.

Mayor McNaught had apologized for his inappropriate conduct during the last re-election campaign. The city solicitor had decided not to take any action against him. He was overwhelmingly so well liked and continued to do so much for the city that this slight indiscretion could be forgiven.

The trials of George Jenson and Barnard Olshevski had been surprisingly swift and predictable in outcome. With both men testifying against each other there was no question of their guilt. They had each been found guilty and were now serving life sentences in separate prisons.

Elizabeth Olshevski had been the recipient of much sympathy. She had also finally made the decision to seek a divorce from Barnard and it had been granted. With that burden lifted, her creative juices had begun flowing and she had published not one, but two additional mystery novels over the summer. Still writing under the Betty Rubble pseudonym, no one questioned that her latest book was dedicated to Fred Flintstone. That remained a private joke between the two of them.

The board of directors of Jeremy Spencer’s venture capital company had reorganized. Absent the presence of George Jenson, they had hired a new director to help guide their investments. The university had denied any knowledge of George’s escapades and they were now seeking a new person to head their diversity office.

 

But the biggest change was in Fred’s career. Bolstered not only by a generous infusion of cash, anonymously of course, from Elizabeth Olshevski, Fred was making the move to a new spacious office. It was not only air-conditioned, but had two rooms – an outer room for his new receptionist/assistant, and an inner one for himself. George had supervised the purchase and placement of the furnishings. In his inner office he had kept the battered wooden desk – that just held too many memories of his past. But the metal bookcase had been discarded and replaced with a mahogany bookcase and a new file cabinet that now held all his manila folders. The bookcase held not only his law books, but the top shelf had a complete set of the Betty Rubble mystery series – each personally engraved on the title page by “Betty Rubble” herself.

Fred’s old wooden visitor chair had been replaced with a matching pair of comfortable padded ones, but he still retained his high-backed leather chair. The pencil sharpener and coffee pot were now on the cadenza behind his assistant’s desk in the outer room. This room also held a comfortable couch for those waiting to see him – with the fabric matching that on the padded chairs in his inner office.

Fred had also decided to upgrade his use of technology. Taking center stage on his desk was a docking station for his laptop that also connected to a large screen monitor and a full-sized keyboard. No more squinting at the laptop screen while doing his research. And no more plugging in and unplugging his laptop when he needed it. The final object in his inner office was that trusty fan – not that he needed it for cooling now that he had air conditioning, but he had gotten used to the gentle breeze while working. The fan was on top of the new filing cabinet as there were no more wide windowsills in this new building.

Fred had enlisted the aid of Jennifer in locating someone who could make him a professional website befitting his new status as a well-known member of his profession. And Marvin Jones had been good to his word and, when appropriate, had recommended him to others.

Fred had asked Jennifer if she would be willing to leave O’Brien’s and come work full-time for him. She had politely declined as she liked the variety of work at O’Brien’s. But when Fred asked if she had any recommendations for someone else to fill that role, she offered to locate one for him. There had been a twinkle in her eye as she said this.

 

Arriving at the door of his new office, Fred stopped for a moment to admire the gold-leaf writing on the door – “Frederick F. Forchelli, Investigator and Attorney”. Reaching for the doorknob, he was surprised to find it already unlocked. His new assistant that Jennifer had picked out must have already arrived. He opened the door and was greeted by the attractive young woman seated at the desk. “Welcome, Mr. Forchelli,” she said, “I’m your new assistant, Wilma.”

 

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Fred Forchelli - Chapter 10

Chapter 10 – The Crime

Fred arrived at the office earlier than usual the next morning. He had a lot to get accomplished that day. He had already stopped at O’Brien’s Office Services on the second floor and gotten permission to have exclusive use of Jennifer for the day. He’d need her considerable skills to pull everything together.

With her help he dictated notes to be typed, made copies of the appropriate newspaper articles, pulled together the online research results that he had uncovered, and started organizing everything into a cohesive report. Around late morning when Fred felt that they’d be able to get it all done that day, he made a call to the local District Attorney and scheduled a meeting with he and others on his staff for early Monday morning. He was so focused on pulling everything together that it was only because Jennifer insisted that he stopped for lunch. He did so, but only allowed himself a half-hour so that he could get back to work.

Toward the end of the day Fred signed on to his Amazon account and ordered a couple of books. He was not willing to wait even for the promised one-day delivery, so he ordered the Kindle versions. He had some reading to do this weekend to help clear up some of the loose ends.

It was nearly four o’clock when he took the several copies of his report – each in a separate notebook – up to his office. He was tired from the whirlwind of activity that day – and so was Jennifer. He had thanked her profusely. While her contract with O’Brien’s did not allow her to accept tips, he made a mental note to have some flowers and a thank you card delivered to her on Monday.

 

On Monday morning, as promised, Fred met with the local District Attorney, Marvin Jones, and two of his staff. Sitting in Marvin’s spacious office, Fred passed out copies of the notebooks that he and Jennifer had prepared, and he began going through the chronology. They had not gotten far when Marvin, realizing what he had in front of him, asked Fred to pause for a few minutes. They moved into the conference room next door and Marvin asked most of the rest of his senior staff to drop what they were doing and join them. Fred did not have enough copies of his notebook, so they had to share.

Fred began over in his presentation – beginning with the drilling/fracking operation, then how Jeremy Spencer’s venture capital company invested and eventually took over and how Jeremy benefited and became quite rich because of that investment. Then he noted how George Jenson, upon the death of his mother, realized that he was now the sole heir of Jeremy’s estate, but that it was apt to be several decades before he would benefit, and he got greedy. Thus, it was that he contracted with Barnard Olshevski to arrange for Jeremy to meet an untimely death. The police report confirmed that Barnard had been there that night and the presence of the heart medication in his car was an indication of how the murder was committed. Fred suggested that the DA’s office would be able to get proof of payment from George to Barnard through requisition of bank records – something that Fred could not do.

Marvin was an experienced, no-nonsense type of person. He barked a few orders to those in the room and they quickly left to complete their assignments. He had initially taken Fred as just one of many such private investigators/attorneys, but the way that Fred had pulled everything together and the quality of his presentation made a very positive impression on him. Before Fred left, Marvin told him, “You have a lot of potential, we’ll be talking more in the future.”

Fred was on cloud nine. But he had one more important task to perform that day. Pulling out his trusty flip-phone and calling up a number he had saved that weekend, he dialed it. When the feminine voice answered, Fred said, “Betty? This is Fred. We need to meet.”

 

Later that week the news media was abuzz with the happenings. No one was terribly surprised when a group of six policemen entered one of the local bars in the big city and arrested “Bro” Olshevski. They all knew that he was a bad dude and he’d been arrested several times before. But when he was taken before the local magistrate the next morning and charged with the murder of Jeremy Spencer that was unexpected.

But it was the simultaneous arrest of George Jenson – and not in a bar, but in the Diversity Office of the University – that really got people’s attention. Their up-and-coming star, the winner of the Chamber of Commerce Futurist Award, was arrested on a charge of accessory to murder. Because he was viewed as an extreme flight risk, he was also denied bail.

Almost immediately Barnard and George turned on each other. They may have thought they were diverting attention from themselves, but, of course, they only succeeded in providing additional proof of how they were both guilty.

 

On Thursday evening, in a quiet recess in the back of a darkened restaurant, Fred met with his client – Elizabeth Olshevski. Her husband had been arrested earlier that day, but the news media had not yet connected his quiet arrest to that of George’s more spectacular one in another city.

Fred had determined that the only way that a photocopy of that police report would be in the packet of hints would be if the photocopy had been of the one that the police had given to Barnard when he had been warned on that fateful night around the corner from Jeremy Spencer’s house. And one of the few people who would have had access to that copy was Barnard’s wife – Elizabeth.

Fred had also done some further research into the Olshevski couple. While still legally married, Barnard and Elizabeth lived apart – she being a respected English professor and he a long-time criminal. But there was more to it than that. Barnard’s legal name was Barnard Rubble Olshevski. And Elizabeth, besides teaching, was also a prolific author. She published under the pseudonym of “Betty Rubble” – Betty being short for Elizabeth and Rubble being her husband’s middle name. She wrote mystery stories – some of which had been Fred’s reading material the previous weekend.

Elizabeth had a suspicion about her erstwhile husband’s involvement in Jeremy Spencer’s death. But she couldn’t go to the police herself – if Barnard had any suspicion that she was accusing him, her life might also be in danger. Thus, it was her familiarity with the plots in her mystery novels that had led her to become the anonymous client and to let someone else become the accuser. And the name connection between Barney and Betty Rubble and Fred Flintstone had just seemed too perfect – which is why she had chosen Fred to help her.

Elizabeth had been quite successful as an author and had a sizeable bank account from her book sales – which her husband had no knowledge of. While Fred felt that she had been more than generous in her initial anonymous payment to him, she was so grateful to be free of the fear of her husband that she promised that there would be an additional payment in the future.

 

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Fred Forchelli - Chapter 9

Chapter 9 – The People

Fred wanted to find all that he could about the six men on his list. He decided to start at the end of the list with someone he knew and work backward.

Mayor Robert McNaught was the latest of a long line of men from that family who had served in various offices. His father had been a long-time county commissioner and his grandfather had been a Justice of the Peace as well as served in the county office as zoning officer, county treasurer and perhaps other positions over the years. If Robert had a flaw, it was that he was always trying to be better than his ancestors. He was now in his second term as mayor.

It appeared that in his desire to be re-elected, he had accepted significant funds from a few individuals and felt that he owed them a favor in return. Since he had considerable influence on the city council, he had proposed some tax exemptions that appeared to benefit those donors. Fred did not feel that this was among the list of offenses that his client was concerned about. The fact that it had already been exposed in the newspaper meant that the city solicitor knew about it and would take appropriate action.

Robert was married to Jane McGonigle. She was very much into the social scene and participated (and frequently ran) a number of local charities. There was nothing of concern there.

 

Next on Fred’s list was George Jenson. Since he was not only a significant donor to the mayor’s re-election campaign and had been awarded the Futurist Award by the Chamber of Commerce he almost certainly was somehow involved in this case. He had a degree from a well-known university and had lived in the city since his graduation. He was employed as the Chief Diversity Officer for one of the local colleges. While that was impressive for someone not yet 30 years old, it didn’t explain where the funds came from for his donation to the mayor. Fred felt that perhaps he had come from a monied family.

He checked George’s LinkedIn profile but that did not tell Fred anything he didn’t already know. He next checked an online copy of the yearbook from George’s alma mater. That yielded the name of the city where he had graduated from high school. But, more significantly, the yearbook had a picture of George – and it matched one of the individuals that appeared in the grainy picture that Fred had studied earlier. Putting the pictures side-by-side, it was pretty clear that they were of the same person – or that George had a doppelganger.

Suppressing his excitement, Fred began doing some targeted Google searches for the city where George had come from. He found him listed as the grandson in an obituary – and of course it also gave the names of George’s parents. It appeared that George’s mother, Jane, had died a few years ago. Further checking revealed that George’s father, Michael, was employed as a high school math teacher. But those facts did not account for the wealth that George appeared to have. Leaving that as an open question for now, Fred moved on to Jeremy Spencer.

 

Jeremy’s obituary was, of course, a good source of information. He was unmarried and seemed to be focused primarily on running the venture capital company which he had founded. But there was not a lot of information in the obituary about what the company was invested in. Fred knew that many such venture capital firms requested having a hand in running the companies they invested in – in return for supplying the necessary funds. He turned to a number of internet sites and federal 990 filings. Like other such firms, the picture was a pretty complicated one. But buried in one such filing a name jumped out at him – the company that owned that drilling/fracking operation that was the subject of one of his “hints”. It appeared that Jeremy’s venture capital firm was the primary investor and that they owned a considerable share of that company.

Checking further, Fred located the information he had been searching for earlier – the date that the company was established. While the two men from Eastern Europe had been good at finding sources to drill/frack, they did not have the business acumen to run the company once it became a production operation. Jeremy had supplied the funds, helped select others with the ability to successfully run it, and essentially forced the two men out. In return, Jeremy became the primary shareholder and had profited greatly.

This also gave Fred the information he needed about the two Eastern European men – Vladlen Dazdraperma and Vsevolod Mstislav. He took them off the list of individuals to check out further.

The link between Jeremy and the drilling/fracking operation established, the next thing to establish is who inherited Jeremy’s estate – since he was unmarried. Fred looked for further clues in the lengthy obituary. There in one of the concluding paragraphs Fred found it. First there was a mention of Jeremy having been preceded in death during the past year by his sister Jane. Then it mentioned that he was leaving his estate to his nephew, George. Having just done some research on those names, Fred turned back to his now trusty subscription to Newspapers.com and quickly found the obituary of Jane [Spencer] Jenson! This was the source of George’s wealth!

 

Fred’s mind was racing! In just a few hours’ time, he had connected nearly all the hints into a cohesive story. He looked at his watch – it read 2:20 pm. Now he was shocked as well. He’s gotten so involved in his investigations that the hours had flown by. Feeling the need for a mental break as well as some refreshment, he decided to take a trip to one of his favorite fast-food restaurants. He’d earned it.

 

About an hour later, Fred returned to his office. He still had one more person to investigate and one more of the “hints” to connect to the others. He pulled out the copy of the police report and his notes on it. With his growing familiarity with using the power of the Internet and searches, he began typing.

The name Barnard Olshevski was uncommon enough that it was relatively easy to find further information about him. He was not a local resident but lived a few hundred miles away in another city. It also appeared that he had a long rap sheet as his name showed up in arrest notices on several occasions. His nickname was not the expected “Barney”, but “Bro” – using his initials to identify himself. His wife, Elizabeth, appeared to hold down a legitimate job as an English professor at the local university. But “Bro” seemed to be in trouble with the law on a frequent basis.

As Fred started noting all the instances where Barnard/Bro had been arrested and what charges had been filed, he came across a wanted poster from earlier in his “career”. Looking at the typical frontal and side views of this life-long criminal, Fred realized that he recognized him. Once again pulling out the grainy picture from the manila folder, Fred held up the picture next to his computer screen. There were some differences – for example the wanted poster showed a man with black hair and the “hint” picture showed someone with graying temples who was several years older – but otherwise it was obviously the same person. Fred might not have connected the pictures if he just had the frontal view on the wanted poster, but the sideview had Barnard in essentially the same pose. But why would Barnard and George be photographed together?

 

Acting somewhat on intuition, Fred opened up Google Maps and keyed in the location where Barnard had been encountered by the policeman. It showed an upper-class neighborhood with tree-lined streets and large houses. Fred then opened another window and looked up the address of the late Jeremy Spencer. Returning to Google Maps, there it was! When Barnard had parked his car and drawn the attention of the neighbor who called the police, he was right around the corner from the home of Jeremy Spencer – and on the night before Jeremy had been found dead.

In addition, Barnard had a bottle of some sort of heart medication on the seat next to him – and Jeremy had died due to cardiac issues. The newspaper articles following Jeremy’s death had mentioned questions about the cause. Fred opened up the ones that he had saved on his computer earlier in the week. While he was not a physician, it seemed that there was certainly a possibility that an overdose of some heart medications can cause cardiac stoppage and death. The newspaper articles did not go into a lot of detail. But Fred was now in possession of information that could reopen any prior medical investigation!

 

It was starting to get late. Fred needed to get some rest while he thought through all that he had discovered today. He also needed some supper – but a light one as his lunch had been so late. And he could do with a good night’s sleep as well. He refiled everything in the manila folder, turned off and packed up his laptop, turned off his now trusty fan, then turned off the light, closed and locked the office door, and headed for home with his head still spinning.

 

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Fred Forchelli - Chapter 8

Chapter 8 – The Timeline

Feeling refreshed the following morning, Fred decided that he needed to follow the inclination that he had when he first received the envelope – to put the events in chronological order. But several of the six pages only contained misleading information as the facts were on the reverse and he did not have printouts of the information that he had filed electronically. So, he got a blank sheet of paper and cut it into six smaller pieces that he could put dates and events on.

The oldest event was obviously in the article about the farm being turned into a drilling/fracking site. There were a few dates in the article itself and he had recorded others in his notes. He quickly realized that he needed more than just six pieces of paper to make his timeline, so he cut up a second blank page as well. He recorded the primary events related to this “hint” and spread the pieces of paper across his desk appropriately. The earliest was the discovery of oil on the farm, another was for the purchase of the property by the two men with yet-unpronounceable names, a third (that he had discovered during his investigation) was the purchase of that small company by the larger corporation. Fred realized that he didn’t have dates for everything. He put a note on the second piece of paper about the “green” protest and a “?” for the date when it might have been absorbed by some other protest organization. He also put a “?” for the date on the third piece indicating the purchase of the initial company by the larger conglomerate. He silently chided himself for not having done the best job of investigating this piece of the puzzle, especially as it was the one hint that seemed the most straightforward.

Next, Fred put down the information about the Chamber of Commerce Award Banquet from two years ago. He noted the date of the banquet and the award that had been left off the page when the article was cut – the Futurist Award. He also put down the name of the recipient, George Jenson, as he had previously recognized that George was involved in donation to the mayor’s re-election campaign. He put that piece of paper to the right of the conglomerate purchase.

Then, Fred created a piece of paper for the re-election and the editorial comment that criticized the mayor. He put both the mayor’s name on that piece as well as George Jenson’s. That one went on the far right of his growing timeline.

Looking next at the last newspaper article and referring to his notes about the obituary that he had uncovered on Newspapers.com, Fred wrote down the date and the name of the deceased, Jeremy Spencer – followed by the word “died”. That piece of paper he placed to the left of the one about the Chamber of Commerce Award Banquet. He wasn’t sure where it went relative to the piece of paper with the “?” date about the purchase of the fracking/drilling company, but he’d get back to that problem later.

Turning to the copy of the police report, Fred began writing down the date and suddenly realized that it was the day before Jeremy Spencer’s death! Why had he not noticed that before? Something else he needed to check out today. He also recorded the name of the person who had been cited – Barnard R. Olshevski – another Eastern European name (probably Polish), but at least this name was pronounceable. He placed it immediately to the left of the piece of paper with the “died” on it.

Finally, Fred looked at the grainy picture. He had no idea who was in it, but he needed to place it in the timeline, so he turned it over to copy the date on the back. Again, something that had not caught his eye before, this date was only a few weeks after the police report and the obituary. He wrote down the date and the word “picture of two men” and placed the final piece of paper in his timeline.

 

Leaning back in his chair, Fred reviewed the pieces of paper spread across his desk. There were eight pieces of paper with dates on them – one of the dates being a “?”. And there were names of six individuals – the two Eastern European men, Barnard Olshevski, Jeremy Spencer, George Jenson, and Mayor McNaught. The only things tying the events together were that three of the pieces of paper were about the drilling/fracking operation, the name of George Jenson appeared twice, and two of the pieces of paper were dated with consecutive dates.

Fred pulled out the cover letter from the manila folder. Most of the nouns were plural – wrongs, perpetrators, individuals, misdeeds. Was Fred investigating one series of connected misdeeds or were they only connected by the commonality of the perpetrators? It wasn’t clear. He wished that he could have a conversation with his unknown client. But she(?) chose to remain anonymous.

However, one thing was certain – this exercise had revealed a number of things that he didn’t know, and he needed to do some further research. He gathered up the eight pieces of paper into a chronological pile and put a paperclip on them. He had a long day ahead of him.

 

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