Exerpt from "Green Eyes"

This is just a few paragraphs taken from my first completed story. It is my life down on paper.

I have always been the type of person to search for answers, and it’s helped me in a big way, but it has also caused me a lot of pain. From all my experiences, I came to the conclusion that all things happened for a reason. I realized that we can’t change the things that have happened to us, and sometimes it’s hard to accept them, we just have to learn to deal with the fact that not everything goes our way. All the heartache and all the pain that we endure, help us learn something new, help us become stronger. I could justify the death of my Nanny; I could even accept it. Being exposed to death as a child, made it seem like such a natural thing. Also if my Nanny hadn’t have passed away, we wouldn’t have moved to England in 1995 to be closer to my Aunt Sue and Uncle Tom.

Moving for me was never saying goodbye, it was another chance, a blank slate, a new life that I could change into anything I wanted it to be; and in truth, we never really do say goodbye, we say “see you later.” In fact, it wasn’t until we moved away that I really developed a relationship with my grandfather. I guess it wasn’t until he lost his wife that he truly realized how important we were. He seemed afraid to let a week go by without calling my house and telling me and my two brothers’ how much he loved us.

He lived in a small village called Abbertysswg in South Wales. His house sat right at the bottom of the Half Way – a road that led right up the side of the mountains and straight through Abbertysswg forest. Whenever we visited, he would take my brothers’ and me for a walk up the mountains with Bonny – his German Shepard – to a place known as the Falcons. He told us a story once about why the Welsh flag had a red dragon printed on it.

“The Welsh dragon always used to be green,” he told us, “and he used to live on the top of those cliffs, where the falcons fly around. But one day, a bigger, stronger, red dragon flew over the mountains, and he got jealous when he saw how much land the green dragon owned. So one evening, when the sun had gone down, the red dragon flew to the top of the cliffs, and threw the green dragon down, burying him in rocks and rubble. Ever since that day, he was known as the Welsh dragon.”

We believed the story; every word of it.

Every time we went to visit my grandfather, we would have his famous shepherds’ pie, sit around the living room and watch as he drew pictures of horses and war planes, and then go for a walk to the falcons. Later, my brothers’ and I christened those fields, the Great Valley.

Author's Note

My English teacher suggested I try to get this published, I'd love to find somebody interested in reading the whole thing.