Wednesday, March 2, 2016

Post: A Six Sentence Story


It was once a bustling place, this town, boasting a dry goods store, a green grocer, a milliner, and a lumber yard. When the weather was pleasant, the bench in front of the bank held members of the "spit and whittle club," as they were known, a collection of retired gentlemen who whiled away their time watching passers-by and gossiping. The local teens hung out at the drug store, the girls, sipping sodas, perched on stools at the counter, while the boys horsed around in an effort to impress them, farmers would gather at the feed store and talk about the weather and crop yields, and the door to the post office never seemed to close, as town folk and country people alike came in to pick up their mail.

But the big city called to the teens, and the drought closed the feed store; groceries were cheaper in the next county and only the spit and whittle club wore hats anymore. The remaining boards at the lumber yard were used to cover the windows of the empty buildings, and one by one, the spit and whittle club members quietly passed away, their bench empty.

Shortly after the bank was sold, the flag at the post office was lowered for the very last time, and the town was no more.



Linking up with Ivy at Uncharted for Six Sentence Stories with the prompt "post."

21 comments:

  1. Love it. Especially the "spit and whittle" club. This really paints a picture.
    And no nightmares. ;)

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    1. This is loosely based on the town where my mom grew up. There is still a post office and a bank and a bar and that's about it. An elderly cousin was a member of the spit and whittle club. He used to sit on the bench and smoke cigars and poke me with his cane when I went by.

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  2. Creepy, especially as you've taken me to a ghost town, and I've seen the emptiness and left-over-ness! Very evocative.

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  3. A true story of Americana. So many towns where a highway build a few miles away rerouted life away from small downs that once flourished. Lizzi's right, creepy, but not in your usual way. I bet if you walk the streets you hear the echos of days gone by. Love it! (Don't forget to link up).

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    1. What's funny is this story is based on the town where my mom grew up. The population when she was young is almost identical to what it is now (just over 400), but with better roads and cars, there are practically no businesses there now, and most of the homes are very run down.

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  4. Towns like these are sadly everywhere...nostalgia is lovely but its really too bad

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    1. I have such fond memories of going to the drug store and getting a nickel ice cream cone!

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  5. It is so sad to see country town gradually die this way and cities get bigger and totally without personality like any other city. I feel privileged to have worked in Australia's country towns 40-50 years ago which were probably not unlike those in the US.

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    1. I would imagine our little country towns were very similar. And we certainly still have some lovely little towns here that have flourishing business districts, but it takes effort to keep it going.

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  6. A wonderful look back at the good old days! Life was so much simpler back then before the changes choked it out and the town disappeared.

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    1. Thank you! I love little towns that have parades on Main Street and potluck dinners at church and everyone literally knows everyone else.

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  7. Aw...*sigh*
    I liked your telling of this story Dyanne. But it made me sad. An American story unfortunately still unfolding in many states.

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  8. nice painting of a picture (more of showing a time and place, now gone)
    engaging story, yo

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  9. So I read this a couple of days as I read the one before this one at my job...somehow when I read your posts at work I cannot comment ...freaky right

    your description paints a lovely time in the past then brings the reader back to the present time and the realty of how things change is realized....

    :)

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  10. Hi Dyanne...just stopping by. I don't understand this story thing. LOL. Is this a link up? Not TToT this week?

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  11. This tugs at my heart. It is my hometown. There is less going on there every time I venture back home.

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