The days are growing lighter and I’m spending too much time staring out of my window. Think I’ll pack a knapsack and head south to meet the spring. (Sure they’ll understand at work.) I can’t shoe a horse or sweep a chimney, so I’ll just knock on this cottage door here and offer to tell a tale – a whole life in one hundred words – for my supper.
Returning
Born under the shed, behind the compost bin, the little vixen’s first smells were the fecund scents of placental blood, mother’s milk, mushrooms and leaf litter.
When her mother was hit by a lorry reversing in the lane, she escaped to the park and shared the dawn with a locked-out drunk and two teenage lovers. Many times she raised cubs herself; one long summer of plenty with an old dog fox who stayed.
Skin and bone now, today she hobbled back onto my lawn, raised her dark snout to a sudden swathe of blue sky and sniffed the spring air.
M J Lewis ©2015
Please click on the LINK for a whole glorious dawn chorus of stories from around the globe. Thanks as ever to Rochelle, our very own conductor of the Friday Fictioneers. Photo prompt by Erin Leary.
Goosebumps! The whole thing, even the intro. Bravo, MJ 🙂
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Thank you so much – the tingle factor! I really value your opinion.
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I enjoyed that encapsulation of the life of a fox. I believe foxes do return to familiar territory for their last days.
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There was a skittish little vixen playing in the crocuses in the next garden to mine this week and I’m pretty sure she’s the same one my son watched this time last year when he was still at home studying. Fascinating creatures!
Thanks for your comment.
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Dear MLJ,
Well written life cycle of the fox. Nicely done.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Thanks for stopping by. Yep, that circle of life…Oh dear I feel a song coming on!
Cheers,
MJ
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Dear MLJ,
This was a very nice slice of life. Ambrosial at he start and sad as the circle closed full turn at the end. Well done.
Aloha,
Doug
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Hopefully she had a better life than her mother. A delightfully descriptive story.
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Thank you!
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Back at the homestead we’ve already had a discussion about the various spellings of swath/swathe (You say a swath of tomatoes; I say a swathe of tomatoes.) and also the pronunciation of fecund – one of those words I’ve more often read than said. And now I am definitely dropping ambrosial into the teatime conversation!
Thanks for stopping by.
MJ
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OK so it’s better than my fox story – (I did make a change) – I could almost see the world through her eyes and her sniffing.
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Fox lovers united. Thank you.
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Great descriptive work. I really enjoyed this. I hope the best for the little fox. He’s had a difficult run of things.
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Thank you!
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Lovely story. I felt like I knew the foxes whole life in those few words.
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Thank you. I am kind of fascinated by the foxes who share my part of London – that combination of urban and feral.
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Wow, this gave me the willies, a good thing. You and David Stewart should both leave your imaginations to science.
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I’ll take that as a huge compliment – thank you!
I try everything out on my grown-up daughter who had a great visceral reaction to this one – and I’m now seriously worried she might run away with a fox.
I’ll get them to pop my imagination in a bottle and put the lid on quick when I pop my clogs.
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Delightful take on the prompt. Foxes are truly magical creatures aren’t they. Kudos!
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Thank you. I agree – wonderful creatures
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Wonderful story and your descriptions are bang on the nail.
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Thank you! I really enjoyed writing for this prompt so nice to know it worked for you.
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I really enjoyed this and it sounds to me as though your fox had a well-lived fox life! Excellent job of translating your observations and experiences with “your” fox into a story to which we can all relate.
janet
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Thanks for your kind comments. I did want to get over the idea of sadness that the fox is dying, but also indeed a well-lived life.
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