Before moving to Israel, I sent a cargo shipment ahead of me, filled with what I had left, once I had sold or given away those things I didn’t need. I brought with me more books than clothes; more browning scraps of papers and personal effects; more fading photographs and childhood collectibles, than practical needs, like furniture or furnishing.1
These were the sum of my relatively short existence; these were the things that were irreplaceable, the memories of a life elsewhere. Some people hold great importance in acquiring expensive material goods; but I think what we value most in the end are those things which reminds us of a particular place, a particular time or a particular feeling from our pasts.
Orson Wells’s classic Citizen Kane illustrates the idea powerfully: no matter how much wealth and power newspaper tycoon Charles Foster Kane accumulated, his last thoughts are of his childhood sled “Rosebud” taken from him when he was sent off to boarding school. It’s a movie that everyone likes to talk about, but not enough people have seen: Roger Ebert wrote an excellent review available online, which includes a worthwhile viewer’s guide.
In among my boxes, was one folder of papers from perhaps twenty years ago, in which I had written various and sundry story ideas. These were some of my earliest and silliest attempts at writing, with ideas drawn from the various genres of fiction I was then reading.
I’d stapled them together at some point, and there they’d remained hidden, until being re-discovered, here in Israel. The idea occurred to me to share these story snippets. Most are just beginnings, or premises, which I never developed. I leave it to you, to tell us how the story goes.
Judging from my handwriting, this first one is likely circa 1985 (the same year, incidentally, that Orson Wells died), and seems to anticipate the flipped-fairy tale concept of Shrek….
(1That’s not to say I didn’t bring anything practical– I loaded up with electronics, stereo and video equipment… just in case.)
Regibald, A Dragon’s Tale
It was Fryday, Regibald suddenly recalled, as he continued to stare at the stranger who with great intent, also continued to survey him. For some odd reason, he found the visage terribly familiar without being conspicuously memorable; a handsome face with properly lengthened snout: well-set, intelligent eyes; and a pleasantly speckled green complexion.
I say, just what are you doing in my bathingcave?” Regi slurred out. There was no response.
Oh, sorry, quite stupid of me!” He suddenly realized he’d been staring into his mirror, his half-numbed brain still trying to recapture the circumstances of the night before. He now remembered: the knight roast he’d attended had started to sour soon after that be-damned drake Rodithrax arrived with his double-be-damned bitch of a mate, Vermibuff.
That’s it. Want to find out more, or add to the story?
Here’s what I wrote would be the continuation: Regibald gets transformed into a man; forced to enter human world; by accident becomes hero-knight; is sent off to kill a dragon; ends up bringing harmony between two societies.
