A Bright Red 10-Speed Bike

I was listening to the Happier podcast the other day, where one of the topics of conversation was:

What did you do for fun when you were 10 years old?

It's a good one. The answer is supposed to tell you what you should be doing now for fun, or even work. Because when you were 10 you were yet to be constrained by society's notion of what you should be doing or by sensible goals like earning money, so you don't starve. (Which still weighs on my mind a bit. Because I don't like being hungry.)

When I was 10 years old I wrote a horror book with some friends. I also still liked playing imaginative games that usually involved pretending to be characters from books. I am still miffed that I always had to be one of the maids while my friend got to be the princess (we were reading a lot of Francis Hodgson Burnett at the time). These games also involved a lot of climbing around on jungle gyms, which were of course, castles.

The age of 10 was also when I received a gift from my parents that became one of my prized possessions: a bright red 10-speed bike. It was a big deal getting a 10-speed, instead of riding around on your purple and white kids' bike doing loops in the driveway.

And I recently discovered it is still around, and now lives in the garage at our family's summer house. When the Hub and I were on vacation there in June we went for a ride around the lake and I just loved it. It was like being 10 again.

Here's our favorite, well-loved Galway Lake:

So when the Hub suggested that we get bikes to ride to our local park, and possibly even further afield at some point, I didn't even try to fight him. You see, I'm not a naturally outdoorsy person. I do love doing things outside, once I get there, but I'm such a homebody that it takes some convincing first. He's actually had to make me agree that every Sunday we will do something outside together, whether it's playing golf, tennis, going for a bike ride, or gardening. He stopped short of making me sign something, but that probably would have been a good idea.

What did you do when you were 10? And does it have any relation to what you do now for fun or work or possibly even hint at a second career?

Related Posts:

• Early Writings: Dear Diary
• Early Writings: A Horror Fanatic
• Early Writings: Some Things Don't Change

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Early Writings: Some Things Don't Change

In the last installment of Early Writings, I discussed my early fascination with horror. I wrote a short, and frankly, very disjointed book with some friends at the time, about the Sawyer family and their battle with the supernatural.

I am learning a lot about the person I once was from all of my childhood possessions, including my early writing, which arrived in the boxes of items sent over by my mother this summer.

The book about the Sawyer family does not seem a million miles away from my recent obsession with reality TV programs such as Ghost Hunters and Haunted Collector. So why do these things intrigue me? The best answer I can come up with is that I love stories about real life, and so often in these programs they are digging into the past, finding out the histories of the people who lived (and sometimes died) in the houses before them. Sometimes the stories are tragic, but often they are just littered with ordinary everyday details, like the ghost in the hotel who whistles while still going about his daily work.

And of course, like so many people, I'm sure there is a part of me who wants to think that the people I want to stick around do -- at least in some sense or the other. Or maybe it's just that I can't believe there are people who make their living from ghost hunting. I mean, how do you get jobs like this? (Not that I would want to do it. My imagination is in overdrive as it is.)

So with that, I will leave you with another random chapter from the book. At the end there's a chapter called The Conquering (not written by me) that kind of ends it, as one member of the family goes through the mirror into the "human spirit world" and basically tells the ghosts to go away. But before that we have... Horrifying Dream*.

Tara danced into her room humming a soft quiet melody. She flounced into bed and pulled the covers up to her chin. After a while she was snoring. Mrs. Sawyer peeked into her room and smiled. But only if she knew what she was dreaming! 

First, Tara saw a long neverending graveyard. Her mind focused in on a small corner of it. She could see all her family except herself. Where was she? Then all of a sudden she saw the grave. It said "Tara Sawyer. Died November 23, 1987."

"No! No! No!" she screamed. "What's wrong?" said a voice. Tara looked it was her mother. Tara didn't want to tell her mom what happeded so she just said "I had a bad dream."

During breakfast she realized something. Today was November 23, 1987. She gulped. 

After breakfast she went around telling everyone that they should leave the house. Her mother thought this was unusall for Tara so she gave her an aspirin and a puzzle book and sent her to bed. 

While she was concentrating on her puzzle she started thinking about her fathers death. Tara started to get dizzy. The room spun around fast. Voices echoed in her ears. Leave this house, go away. A female voice screamed at the top of her lungs and suddenly everything went black. 

When she woke up all visions of this were gone. She told her family about it and they belived her. Mrs. Sawyer was getting a little trobled by these happenings. 

I would be troubled too. I might need to take an aspirin now and go to bed with a puzzle book.

*As usual, not corrected for spelling and grammar.

Related Posts:

• Early Writings: A Horror Fanatic?
• Early Writings: Dear Diary

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Early Writings: A Horror Fanatic?

I do love a good horror film. Not the bloody gory stuff, but give me a good old-fashioned haunting any day. And worryingly, this has now extended into an obsession with American reality T.V. programs where "professional" ghost busters visit the homes of people experiencing unexplained events. I may soon need to cancel our cable subscription to the "Really" channel -- but not until I stop going out of the house.

From a very young age I was pretty worried about what was hiding under the bed. I guess you could say I had a pretty active imagination, as I often wondered if skeletons came out of my closet at night and danced around me as I slept. At my parents' house last Christmas, the Hub and I found a picture I had drawn of a big blue monster hovering over the bed of child (most likely me).

But what I didn't realize was that my early writing also touched on the supernatural.

In the boxes my mother sent over this summer, I found a book written in conjunction with some other girls from my class at the Catholic school, which would put me in the age range of 10-12. It had no title, but it did have an introduction, which will give you a pretty good idea of where we were going with it (I will only include those parts of the book that I authored, which seem to make up the largest proportion anyway. I have also kept in any grammatical and spelling mistakes for authenticity).

This is a story about a family of five girls and a boy. The children's father is dead but their mother is pregnant.

Good news and bad, I see.

The family moves into a large mansion. Karen, who is the youngest, suspects a spook. Her suspicion may be right because many spooky things start to happen to everyone. The Sawyer family is unaware of the exciting adventures to follow. We hope you will enjoy this spooky book. 

Each chapter essentially details a "spooky" event, of course, like in The Family Meeting.

Mrs. Sawyer had called a family meeting. Everyone arrived in the parlor just at the right time.

What time is that? I am glad they are a prompt family -- and that they have a "parlor" -- my early writing seems to be riddled with references to grand old houses. Clearly another obsession of mine.

Mrs. Sawyer started talking about the strange happenings. Without any warning Sara got up and walked to the book case. She pulled out a book to show the family. Instead of carrying the book over to the couch, she screamed and droped it. Her mother saw her hands and almost fainted. They were covered with blood. Jessica took her to the kitchen to be cleaned up.

David went over and looked at the book. "Come here!" he yelled franticly. On the book was written:

And it was written in blood! 

What else could it possibly be written in? This is a horror story, after all.

Mrs. Sawyer ordered a full exspection of the house. Tara and David: The basement. Jessica and Jenny: The Upstairs. And Mrs. Sawyer, Karen and Sara were the downstairs.

It's almost as if I was scripting one these reality shows where they sweep the house. And good thing too, because look at what they found.

Other creepy things were found: A bloody knife, A piece of black cloth, A page of a book with a blood stain on it and a once shiney ring with a red ruby. "A scary house and a scary atmosphere," whispered Jessica. 

I'll say, egads, not a ruby ring!

I know you're dying to find out what happens. Stay tuned for the next installment: Horrifying Dream.

Until then, check out "Really" and its plethora of ghost programming. And you'll soon see how they must have used my early horror writing -- particularly "Haunted Collector" which is all about objects -- as a template.

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