00350201 (2 Bakers and 2 Wheelers)
“IGNITE.”
“Now I’ve brought you all here to tell you, first of all, I’m not *better* than you. Just, um, higher.”
“Wacky, man,” says Roberts primarily for grinning partner Franklin beside her. They’d been partaking of the sacred bush just before. Now: here. Fire brought them together.
“True, Albert is lower in contrast, but we all work as a team, a TILE if you will. Blue (he points to himself), green or red, take your pick (he points to Roberts and then Franklin), and, finally, you (he points to Albert).”
“Me? I ain’t lower than anyone. I’m a prevert and I’ve accepted my role in life. It’s you guys who are in the wrong. Trying to kill me!”
Silence from the still guilty feeling women, as Claude says: “Now, now, Albert. No one is in the wrong. Each has their challenges, *including* me. That’s what I’m trying to say to you.”
They look each other over with this, one by one, realizing the truth of it all, if only subconsciously. A TILE, back and forth and across balance. Blue should have been opposite yellow and green opposite red, but Claude wasn’t in charge of setting up the chairs. Probably an intern, he thinks.
“I’ll begin,” he then says.
a number of characters in a number of sims
“So nice here beside the fire. So, whaddaya think, Wheeler? Is Claude on to something?”
“I want to be independent right now.”
—–
So Baker shared some links and let her go. Cloz they were here, Sporminore and its Roberts and Franklin (and Albert?) just north. Claude to the (Wild) West again, where’s he still under employment at the Umbrella Club where we first ran into Darla and Lois and those other girls, the purple clad one and the other one we haven’t revisited under the umbrella itself. Moray and the now bombed and destroyed Docks Town 2 sims to the east of us. Apples and Etherea — and now Darla and Lois again — about 400 meters southwest in Darter (Ohio parcel). Let’s see, Shelley, yes. Also in Cloz, having escaped the explosion by returning to the Triggerfish Motel. Ah yes, Triggerfish.
But first, Zander. Sorry: Codlet.
But that’s not Shelley on the beach behind the island shack. Liz instead, and we’re not quite ready for her story. Back to Triggerfish…
There. We start again. Apologies. Still no Shelley. That’s The Musician, her fiance, her soon-to-be husband if all goes well for him. Wonder what he’s doing here? Hold on, I’ll have to log Baker back in for this.
Looks like he’s getting at least semi-professional advice about his marriage, his life in general from Dr. Rabbid Baumbeer, who we haven’t seen in a while in these here photo-novels, 35 in a series of… well, we’ll see. Let’s listen in.
five
“Tell me 5 things you love about Shelley, George.”
“She has a castle.”
“Good, that’s one.”
She’s rich… apparently.”
“Two.”
She’s… pretty.”
“Pretty or beautiful?” the doctor tried to clarify.
“Beautiful, let’s say.”
“‘Beautiful, let’s say’? Or just ‘beautiful’?”
“Beautiful,” he then amends per this suggestion. She was! He knew Wheeler was underneath all that innocent exterior stuff, the goofy hair and all. He’ll dig it out soon enough.
“We have two more. That’s three.”
“Sheeee’s… intelligent.”
“Nice.” He waits for the last.
“Sheeeeees’s… smart.”
“I think that’s the same as intelligent.”
“Okayy. Sheeeeeeeeeee’s… ummmmmm…”
“Resourceful?” tries Dr. Baumbeer hopefully. Always a good one to plug in when a client is stumped here.
“Resourceful, yes.”
Dr. Baumbeer then hands him a card over the counter. “This is my meeting group. The Rabbid Rabbits. I’d like you — and your fiance hopefully, if she wishes — to join us this Saturday. Or the Saturday after that if you want. Some Saturday, let’s say. Sunday is right out, having merged with Monday to create Munday. No one does anything on Munday. And Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday I’m here.”
“I understand.”
“Number’s right there beneath the logo of the rabbit eating his, I mean, its foot. Please join us,” he emphasizes, then gets up. George — The Musician — follows suit. Their session in what some call the Triggerfish War Room has ended.
This is how it began.
“5 cents please.”
Cloz again
“Is that white stick mellowing you out a bit?”
“A bit,” Shelley admitted, but still so anxious. Big wedding coming up. And she’d just escaped being blown to pieces over in the Moray Docks Town! If it wasn’t for George and Debbie over there being so booring…
“Good, good,” returned Wheeler, taking a toke of her own. “You know (pause) he thinks you’re me. Deep down, I mean. Remove the goofy hair –”
“Hey!”
“Sorry. You know what I mean. You need to grow up more yourself to match Liz’s advancing age. She’s 17 the last time I checked, almost legal to be married herself. You’re, what, 23?” Wheeler looked over on the brown couch they both sat upon. The umbrella eyes would come soon. Then she’d be out of her control, automatically know more than herself. To impart wisdom before it happened was important, the locking in. Shelley *was* her. But she didn’t need to know that yet.
“How’s Newt holding up?” Shelley decides to ask. “I heard — he’s also trying to change The Musician to meet the times, get rid of his punk look and all.” Did Shelley approve? She didn’t know yet. That would also come with the locking in.
“Newt’s fine. Listen, daughter of mine, daughter I didn’t know I actually had until that last photo-novel.”
“33 isn’t it?”
“34.”
“Jeez.” Shelley takes another toke, considers the length of the process. Her own story is quite complicated and that’s only one of a multitude, heck, one of a multitude involving Wheeler alone (!).
“Anyway, we need to review. Just like Newt did for The Musician.”
“Crap.” Shelley extinguishes the last of her white stick, preparing to get serious.
(to be continued)
00350205
They’ve quickly rebuilt the destroyed Moray Docks Town but as a Halloween tableau, appropriate for the season.
I sense the spiders had a strong involvement in the decision, mutated after the blast and obviously more threatening than ever.
Radiation didn’t do anyone no good.
on the old docks (continuation)
Girl of his dreams: blown to smithereens by the Triggerfish atomics, making them so so happy if no one else. And he’d only been gone three minutes days! He never bought her that beautiful red rose — flower stand also vaporized in the bombing. He never told her he loved her, or at least liked her a whole whole lot. She never got to travel with him to the Wild West of Nautilus, where the best fishing is, where he constantly visits and leaves her with other companions, the butchers, bakers and candlestick makers of the world, opportunists all. The void will likely never be filled, he feels. Not fills.
Still twirling, Bob Jr. Jr. thinks from his snapping position again, but it’s just a helicopter now and not Shelley, part of the town’s recovery efforts. We were saved by the graces of the Gods! Wonder where the whirling girl of his dreams went after she left me that awful awful morning after that wonderful wonderful night? Must keep in contact with her. Despite the trauma.
“Will you look at him over there, still snapping away like nothing had happened, like the town was the same as before, all picturesque and stuff.”
“Hey, how did *we* escape the blast?” But then Al remembered going back to Luther’s place that night which was just out of the fallout range. Like Bob Jr. Jr. and Shelley, they were saved by love or at least a whole whole lot of like.
“Another 3 eyed one,” states Luther, reeling in his bite.
“Get use to it,” responds Al.
various
Waiting for more change in Spornimore. Sporminore.
Everybody has them, some more than others (apples, oranges, bananas).
After so much effort he’d finally caught one. Himself.
Gathering of clones (Umbrella Club inductees).
00350208
“Isn’t it beautiful, George?”
“Musician here,” requests George, who goes by that around other people generally. “Until we’re properly married anyway and tied the knot between us.”
“Oh George,” she said, and kissed him in front of the vanilla layer cake also tied with a knot, anticipating the big event. There’s no doubt they like each other a whole lot, probably a whole whole lot. But do they love each other? Now is the time to find out if ever.
“Now your turn, George.”
“Your turn, *Musician*, what? Your father is standing right over there.”
“My father has been dead for 10 years. That’s *your* father. Newt, remember?”
“Newt, right.” He remembered. He thought.
“And he’s been calling you George for I don’t know how long. Probably since we started dating. *Anyways*, kiss me again. Put on that new hud you got and let me have it. Newt’s too busy trying out the tea to pay attention. Plant a good one right on the kisser.”
Wait… that *was* her father. He said this to her as she puckered in front of him, making her think as well.
“Oh George,” she decided, “let’s not argue about relatives right here, right now. Let’s focus on us. Whatever family issues remain to be solved, we’ll be the stable point in the middle of it all — that’s the important thing. ” She then made the first move herself right when Newt — whoever’s father he was — put his own thing to his lips, synchronicity noted.
And let’s go with Shelley’s father. Too much lead up text to change if I don’t. It’ll work out.
(to be continued of course)
00350209
“I really like your giraffe, George. So soft — just like our kiss, tee hee. Say you rode in on it?”
“No, I never said that.” George also enjoyed the kiss but he remembers more a gap, a lack. Something had happened and he can’t quite figure out what. A confusing day, actually. First the thing about the dads and then this.
“So you flew in on that bird thingy you’re sitting on, right?”
“Also incorrect.” How *did* George, I mean, The Musician, get here? And was this an actual rehearsal for their wedding? Or were they just checking out the location, perhaps not even convinced yet this is the right place for their super important event?
“I mean, you look like you’re 1/2 bird yourself mounted on the thing like you are, a *bird* yourself.” She tried to laugh but found the utterances couldn’t quite reach her lips, her still warm lips, but cooling quickly, the memory of the softness fading.
“Oz,” he then said, remembering. 1/2 man 1/2 bird indeed. He flew in from his imagination. We’ll go there soon, but first the couple need to pay a little trip to Dr. Rabbid Baumbeer via his Rabbid Rabbits group. The Musician (George) explained it was necessary because of the gap he felt, which Shelley was also now experiencing. They had to resolve that before the wedding fer sure. The Musician was convinced that the doctor could fix their issues, family stuff as well.
They spent half the night arguing who Aunt Bernice belonged to, his side of the family or hers. This could not continue; something had to be done.
blue place
She/he went from the cross…
… to The Cross.
Page’s convincing portrayal of the “church lady” image of Aunt Esther was in marked contrast to the “blue” material of her stand-up act and record albums.
“What can I say, that’s my aunt.” “No it’s *not* (pause) Okay, yes it is. But…” “But what?”
00350211: staying on Nautilus instead…
“Shoo, cat. I’m not actually a bird.
“Hey, watch it! You nipped me you little booger. I’m *not* a *bird* (!). Not really, although, come to think of it, I might taste like chicken.”
—–
A star once more, a pink to match the green in the middle of The Cross which made me dance and drove the toys away, right and left (she thinks).
A red statue created as mate and partner to the blue on the other side of the star-man. Are these toys as well (she ponders)? No (she decides).
—–
I had thoughtful Blue Bird sit at a handy bar while I continued to remotely look around the artsy place set on a high beige ridge of the North, the same Nautilus continent region featured in every other post of this here photo-novel so far, save 3. Staring at her from this angle, I realized that she was also part cat as well as part bird, offering up an alternate explanation for the black cat’s nipping back there, like attracting like. Love nip it was in this scenario, not a hunger bite. Blue Bird considers this as I explain it to her, but rejects it as a partial answer. “We have enough 1/2 and 1/2s in these photo-novels, 35 in a series of 35 so far. Time to go for the all or nothings more don’t you think?”
She was a woman, I was in a gallery dedicated to the efforts and sufferings of women, what could I do? I had to shore things up a bit here; follow her advice put to me kindly instead of harshly, picket fence instead of barb wire. She could have gone with the latter, which would have been more subconsious. Instead: alert and awake, making choices that others would also be pleased with. It satisfied her, I could tell. A suggestion is just that if so framed. I did not have to heed the guidance, although I most likely would have been wise to do so. I ramble…
thorns and roses
“Okay, Liz is your kid. I get it. Whether factually or fictionally — doesn’t matter.”
“I am Arthur Kill,” states actor Lemont Sanford beside her, also staring at the “Break the chain” statue by Eva, “but I am also me. We made love in both ways.”
“How do I approach *Liz* with this is what I’m wondering?”
“Tell her we have a common aunt that convinced you to go with me over George — The Musician if you will.”
“Oh, he will,” replies Shelley to this. “I’m kind of sick of the ambiguity.”
“Then tell him.”
“No,” she stands firm. “I’m done with it. The wedding is off. We will get married instead. Just like in the film.”
“What film?”
“Stop it, you know what film.”
“The film of our life?”
She sighs. “We have the same aunt. We are already married in a way, future moved to present. We have a child, 1/2 black and 1/2 white, just like us. *No* ambiguities. We are a couple, a team. I, I mean, *they* brought you back to play Kill van Kull, the sophisticated twin cousin of Arthur. You did swell — too much so, as character became reality, bringing Esther in the picture as well.”
“Act I, scene 7. How could I forget.”
“Cut back to the Inky Man from the Boulder Scene still hiding in the rocks, head in the sand — *cringing* (recoiling) instead of Fred. But it *wasn’t* Chaplin. Instead…”
“Keaton, Buster Keaton,” Arthur, I mean, Lemont finished the thought.
“They were heading for the church. I know where this is now!”
“Let’s go,” he deadpanned. No ambiguities any more. The Cross has spoken.
In this “joke” above, Buster recoils after realizing the potential bride he approached from behind is actually an African-American. Although this joke is overtly racial (one of the few in Keaton’s oeuvre), modern audiences may not realize that at the time it would have been illegal for Buster to marry this woman.
“I’ve watched it over and over,” Shelley says about the scene. “This is overt, *period*; this is a line drawn in the sand. No going back! Save the boulder sequence the rest is trite garbage.”
Arthur Kill mostly agreed. They’d have to edit, they settled. He had a new role. Let’s begin again; technicolor; picket fences.
gloryous night
What am I doing here? she thinks while she smokes. Here in Eels with a man I really don’t know that well, a *black* man. Not that I’m prejudice, she also understands. It’s just… the world at large. They see an opening and they’ll go in for the kill, Arthur Kill in this case, or the actor who plays him. Poor, sweet Lemont Sanford, much more like his (Arthur Kill’s) sophisticated twin cousin Kill van Kull, as is often the case for the creation of secondary characters to balance a first. She was just reading recently that in the first part of the last century it was illegal to be doing what they’re doing. It could come back.
George, she then ruminates further. I *can’t* marry him. Arthur, I mean, Lemont — keep doing that — we have the same aunt, which means we’re destined to be married ourselves. George and I bickered and bickered over what family member belonged to who that night, never fully deciding on Bernice. Now the riddle is solved. I had to go top to bottom on the problem. Liz is the answer. Any questions or issues that arise along the way point to her.
Better get at it again, she thinks while taking the several last draws off her cigarette before heading back inside. Not bad here in Eels, she ponders. Nice light.
She then heard an actual bird, a rarity in Her Second Life. She couldn’t spot the source. She’ll ask Lemont if he heard the same. If she CHANGE could get out from under this Umbrella.
00350214
She tried to get back to the center of Linesville (ORACLE term) but instead landed here, a new place apparently. No more blue highlighted boulder but the location was still certainly blue, like Aunt Esther’s offstage act as Page. She had a new outfit that she just tried out here to success — suspenders — colored such, reinforcing the situation. She’d taken to buying men’s clothing because the women’s stuff didn’t seem to fit her. Darn weight gain during COVID times! But new lover Lemont Sanford, also offstage, didn’t seem to mind. They had a common goal. The creation and then overseeing of Liz — destiny. They were having fun with it on the dark side, opposite of what most consider The Cross to be. Yes, The Cross needs to be in the center of Life, the middle of the passage between cradle and grave. But this is certainly not what The Preacher envisioned. Or did he? (we’re similar in other ways — like the *ORACLE*)
This is the middle now. Is the wedding with George actually off, though? Despite this new, erm, complication? She keeps staring out as if trying to find the answers in the great beyond, past the buildings in the distance, past this Life itself.
She contemplates buying some weights or joining a gym to bulk up her upper body, because that’s where the fitting is looser on the new garb. Waist and hips — perfect. COVID, pheh. The changes it wrought seem to lie around every corner. People must adapt to the times or else be lost. Lemont is helping.
“It looks great, baby, don’t change a thing,” he said just yesterday here. She stares out again. Where *is* my costar in this film?
Kentucky
“Told you there was those type of holes on The Cross. Shall we?”
“Jesus, Shelley. You’re going to get us sent to the *Bad* Place with talk like that.”
“I think,” she ventured not too boldly, “we’re already there.”
“Right, heh.” After laughing nervously, he looked around, under the Umbrella again. Shelley applied more lotion. She did this every morning; said she always woke up with an itch. “How is it today?”
“Still there.” Legs now. In just a minute she’ll go inside and do the rest. Couldn’t wait until after breakfast. More bothersome than usual for some reason. Thought it was getting better.
“You really need to go to the doctor. How long has this been going on now?”
“2 months?” she questioned, trying to think back to the beginning. It was all her damn fault. And, yes, let’s blame the pandemic again. Laziness of hygiene for one. Folds increasing on the skin.
“Does it bother you when we…”
“No. No effect there.”
“That’s because we’re in the other Life. The Second one. If we were in the First, if we were real flesh and blood people, then…”
“Yeah,” she answered. “Guess so.”
—–
“Alright I’m ready.”
“Just a minute, I’m checking the stocks.”
Men, she thinks at the doorway under the mistletoe. This is going to end just like with George. The Preacher continues to be unhappy.
fun with blue
Lemont Sanford, aka Arthur Kill aka Kill van Kull aka Lampton, parts ways with Shelley Struthers, his destined soulmate, he feels, his lover in marriage and death do us part, he desires. Trained instinct is leading him to a higher glory. When he finds it, he sends a teleport invite to Shelley to join him and give up the lower form. Thanks Laffoon! And, er, the other ones.
effort to get here
It’s always fun when The Woods gives you something that directly resonates with your writing. Witness this 14.3 pound Fit For Life weight found just off a path pretty far away from any house, and an object I don’t think was there about a month ago when I first hiked it. Brings to mind both the blue ball or sphere seen in the last post, coupled with the reference of Shelley’s desire to take up weight-lifting a couple of posts before that. Now I’m convinced she needs to — bulk up her upper body to better fit into her male oriented wardrobe now. We’ll see how it goes. Thanks for continuing to read this stuff my fellow adventurers! We stay on the Orient-like Omega continent for at least the start of the next section. Let’s turn the Page again…
Sunklands 