Post by Hendrick Davidson on Apr 5, 2010 23:59:25 GMT
Country: England
Current Time: Midmorning
Area/Setting: A dirt road outskirts of a small village. The road often forks to other, smaller ones leading to yards of residences or to the small farms surrounding the village. The road is flanked by trees, brushes and the occasional fields or crumbled stone walls.
Weather Conditions: A pleasant day of early autumn, it is still quite warm and the sun is shining from a nearly cloudless, blue sky.
The signs of autumn were visible in the trees of the small town near London and even the air had that crisp tell-tale scent of the incoming winter. As the leaves slowly started changing colour and the air felt chillier each morning, the people of the modest English town were keeping busy with getting things done for the winter. It was more difficult this year, as many houses and farms were now sorely lacking the manpower to get some of the jobs done. Women needed to step up and learn the tasks that might have not been familiar to them before, but somehow they managed - maybe it was merely something that was written in the basic nature of the people, in their natural will to survive.
Farm life was not foreign to Hendrick Davidson, although it felt like very a distant thing to him now. He hardly resembled a farm boy anymore, dressed in neat shoes, straight trousers and a dress shirt that was covered with a jacket quite similar to any simple suit jacket, all in the same deep black colour. The white clerical collar stood out from the uniform black, appearing almost luminous in the soft mid-morning light. The young priest's light hair was cropped shorter from the sides and left slightly longer from the back, but not long enough to reach over the collar of his shirt. The air was not yet quite cold enough to warrant wearing an overcoat, making the man's profession all the more unmistakable to the villagers. Hendrick was a man of medium build and height and obviously someone who enjoyed or at least had enjoyed outdoor activities at some point of his life - maybe not someone one might easily imagine being a priest, but certainly not grossly out of the norm, either.
The truth was that being a priest had never actually been something Hendrick had planned on doing when he had been only a boy. A teacher, maybe. A journalist, an artist and in his childish mind, even being a cowboy had been an options he had carefully considered. Instead he found himself here, in a strange country, carrying a Bible and half-finished sermon he was to present to the good people of this small town the next morning. He had come across the place almost purely by chance and as it happened, God had not led him astray this time, either. The minister of the local parish had fallen ill just this week and Hendrick had naturally promised to come to his aid. Even though the old priest, having been with his parish for several decades by now, had his doubts whether he could trust his entire congregation to the hands of this young American priest, he had little choice after he realized that the fits of hacking cough would hardly be gone by Sunday morning.
There was a lively, brisk spring to Hendrick's step as he made his way along the dirt road, taking in the sights and sounds of the countryside. He had decided to walk to the small pond he had spied earlier upon arriving in the village, figuring that the word of God would come to him more easily in the midst of the peace of the nature. He had already decided on the topic of his sermon and had managed to write half of the text the previous day, but had hit something of a creative wall in the middle of it. Most people thought that these words just flowed to the priests and in fact, sometimes they did, but it did not work quite so miraculously all the time. Hendrick was sure that a spot of fresh air and some time in quiet reflection would see the sermon finished in no time at all.
A sudden and forceful bleat interrupted Hendrick's thoughts and before he even had time to react, something huge and most likely very dangerous, lunged at him from the shrubs and bushes at the side of the road. The mere surprise caused for the man to instinctively drop the things he was carrying, the Bible falling down at his feet and the three papers consisting of his sermon fluttering down on the road. Hendrick's blue eyes were wide with fear and surprise for a good moment, before he slowly came to the realization that the mysterious attacker had, in fact, been a white-and-brown ram. The animal was brandishing quite an imposing set of black horns and Hendrick took a step away from the animal. The ram did not appear too hostile, but Hendrick wasn't actually too well-versed in the body language of sheep, so it was difficult to say. He had no idea where the animal had appeared from, but clearly it should have not been walking around free - who knew just what kind of damage such a beast might cause?
The woolly brute bleated again, eyeing Hendrick in a way he could only interpret as being curious. The man opened his mouth to talk soothingly to the animal, but the ram had already noticed something more enticing than the black-clad man. It snorted, eyeing the few papers now lying on the road near it's feet and the ram craned it's neck, it's lips working on grabbing the edge of one of the papers. Hendrick's blue eyes widened with sudden horror and he waved his arms frantically at the animal. "Hey, no! No, stop that! That's not for you! Shoo! Go on!" The animal seemed to care little for Hendrick's efforts of scaring it away and in stunned dismay the young priest watched his precious sermon disappearing into the animal's gullet with trained efficiency.
Current Time: Midmorning
Area/Setting: A dirt road outskirts of a small village. The road often forks to other, smaller ones leading to yards of residences or to the small farms surrounding the village. The road is flanked by trees, brushes and the occasional fields or crumbled stone walls.
Weather Conditions: A pleasant day of early autumn, it is still quite warm and the sun is shining from a nearly cloudless, blue sky.
The signs of autumn were visible in the trees of the small town near London and even the air had that crisp tell-tale scent of the incoming winter. As the leaves slowly started changing colour and the air felt chillier each morning, the people of the modest English town were keeping busy with getting things done for the winter. It was more difficult this year, as many houses and farms were now sorely lacking the manpower to get some of the jobs done. Women needed to step up and learn the tasks that might have not been familiar to them before, but somehow they managed - maybe it was merely something that was written in the basic nature of the people, in their natural will to survive.
Farm life was not foreign to Hendrick Davidson, although it felt like very a distant thing to him now. He hardly resembled a farm boy anymore, dressed in neat shoes, straight trousers and a dress shirt that was covered with a jacket quite similar to any simple suit jacket, all in the same deep black colour. The white clerical collar stood out from the uniform black, appearing almost luminous in the soft mid-morning light. The young priest's light hair was cropped shorter from the sides and left slightly longer from the back, but not long enough to reach over the collar of his shirt. The air was not yet quite cold enough to warrant wearing an overcoat, making the man's profession all the more unmistakable to the villagers. Hendrick was a man of medium build and height and obviously someone who enjoyed or at least had enjoyed outdoor activities at some point of his life - maybe not someone one might easily imagine being a priest, but certainly not grossly out of the norm, either.
The truth was that being a priest had never actually been something Hendrick had planned on doing when he had been only a boy. A teacher, maybe. A journalist, an artist and in his childish mind, even being a cowboy had been an options he had carefully considered. Instead he found himself here, in a strange country, carrying a Bible and half-finished sermon he was to present to the good people of this small town the next morning. He had come across the place almost purely by chance and as it happened, God had not led him astray this time, either. The minister of the local parish had fallen ill just this week and Hendrick had naturally promised to come to his aid. Even though the old priest, having been with his parish for several decades by now, had his doubts whether he could trust his entire congregation to the hands of this young American priest, he had little choice after he realized that the fits of hacking cough would hardly be gone by Sunday morning.
There was a lively, brisk spring to Hendrick's step as he made his way along the dirt road, taking in the sights and sounds of the countryside. He had decided to walk to the small pond he had spied earlier upon arriving in the village, figuring that the word of God would come to him more easily in the midst of the peace of the nature. He had already decided on the topic of his sermon and had managed to write half of the text the previous day, but had hit something of a creative wall in the middle of it. Most people thought that these words just flowed to the priests and in fact, sometimes they did, but it did not work quite so miraculously all the time. Hendrick was sure that a spot of fresh air and some time in quiet reflection would see the sermon finished in no time at all.
A sudden and forceful bleat interrupted Hendrick's thoughts and before he even had time to react, something huge and most likely very dangerous, lunged at him from the shrubs and bushes at the side of the road. The mere surprise caused for the man to instinctively drop the things he was carrying, the Bible falling down at his feet and the three papers consisting of his sermon fluttering down on the road. Hendrick's blue eyes were wide with fear and surprise for a good moment, before he slowly came to the realization that the mysterious attacker had, in fact, been a white-and-brown ram. The animal was brandishing quite an imposing set of black horns and Hendrick took a step away from the animal. The ram did not appear too hostile, but Hendrick wasn't actually too well-versed in the body language of sheep, so it was difficult to say. He had no idea where the animal had appeared from, but clearly it should have not been walking around free - who knew just what kind of damage such a beast might cause?
The woolly brute bleated again, eyeing Hendrick in a way he could only interpret as being curious. The man opened his mouth to talk soothingly to the animal, but the ram had already noticed something more enticing than the black-clad man. It snorted, eyeing the few papers now lying on the road near it's feet and the ram craned it's neck, it's lips working on grabbing the edge of one of the papers. Hendrick's blue eyes widened with sudden horror and he waved his arms frantically at the animal. "Hey, no! No, stop that! That's not for you! Shoo! Go on!" The animal seemed to care little for Hendrick's efforts of scaring it away and in stunned dismay the young priest watched his precious sermon disappearing into the animal's gullet with trained efficiency.
