Gateway to history
Output from casual writing - and possibly a prompt!
Girding my loins in readiness to start drafting work on my new project (having finished all the initial planning yesterday) I wanted to spend a little time just writing - something.
In part to test my own theories - a) that you easily find things to write about, and b) no writing is wasted - I settled on a little micro-view from our holiday rental. It’s only a few hundred words, but it opens the door to a whole universe… Perhaps walk through it, if you feel that way inclined..!
Gateway to History
The coffee table, although low, is square and very large. With a profusion of grain on display, it purports to being made from solid wood, though one can never be sure these days; even the way the grain ‘wraps around’ at the ends of the narrow timbers forming the top might be no more than clever disguise. In tone it feels too pale, anaemic almost. Perhaps it is this creaminess which suggests fakery. Without doubt it is robust, and with a surface area of more than a square metre (excluding the low, almost floor-level shelf which is as large as the top itself), generous enough to accommodate almost anything you should wish to deposit there.
In the centre of the table is a large ceramic item. Vaguely concave, it is not flat enough to be called a plate or a platter; neither is it sufficiently deep to be thought of as any kind of vase. The edges — perhaps one-and-a-half centimetres deep — are black, its upper surface glazed white. Three items rest on it: a small squat and vaguely medical bottle doing duty as a vase; a rather ornately decorated candle covered by what might best be described as a glass cheese bell; and a blackened faux wicker cylinder designed to house round coasters made from the same material. The vase holds a sprig of imitation flowers, the candle is un-lit, the container half-full. Two of its coasters (one black and one cream) are sitting untroubled on the table top. Were you to pick one up you might perhaps find yourself disappointed by their plastic feel, the wicker facade clearly deceptive — unless they have been treated by some chemical or other to make them more durable.
Between the two coasters sits the remote control for the television which, un-illuminated, waits in the corner of the room. The only other item on the table top is an almost perfectly symmetrical cube. This too is made to look as if it is constructed from wood or wicker or raffia, but paler than everything else, it also suggests impersonation. The cube’s function is to contain paper tissues. One such tissue is poking out through a small rectangle in the top of the vessel. It looks ‘ready’ — and even from a distance of a few feet you can see it is more substantial than a conventional paper hankie, and not one that will disintegrate at the first blow.
Beneath all of this, a large square and open basket rests on the lower shelf. You can tell that this is indeed made from wicker — and thick strands at that! You can also tell that it contains a number of magazines, though of what flavour, topic, or year of publication you are unable to define.
And that’s it?
Except for the things you cannot see and cannot know. What were the last drinks to adorn those two coasters? They must be out on the table for a reason. And not only what were the drinks, but in what vessels were they contained, and who were the people drinking from those vessels? Always assuming it was two people.
Were they watching television? The positioning of the remote suggests as much. If they were, then which buttons were pressed, what had they been watching — or avoiding watching? If you were able to trace those final transactions, what would that tell you?
And who was the last person to pull a hankie from the cube, and why did they do so? To blow their nose? To sneeze? To wipe away a tear having found themselves crying — or indeed, laughing? Or to mop-up a spill from one of the glasses, or cups, or mugs that had previously sat on the black or cream coaster? Perhaps they might have switched off the television and pulled a magazine from the basket, tipping their drink during that process or perhaps in throwing the publication carelessly down on the table. That would pull together most of the items on the table, would it not? Apart from the candle (unlit) and the artificial flower. At least one of those last two are surely present for decoration purposes only.
So, all in all, there’s not much there, just the coffee table and the few things scattered upon on it.
Really? Not a great deal? Only the gateway to an infinite number of possibilities and who knows how many finite histories…