I appreciate Denise's willingness to be here each week for all those waiting with bated breath each Sunday to see what challenge she will give us. That gives us plenty of time to get our short (only six sentences) stories written and linked to her site at Girlie on the Edge's Blog on Thursday or any time through the following Tuesday. That is plenty of time! The reason we link up is so people can go to her site and quickly click on the links of the other writers and read their stories. Easy peasy!
Being suddenly jarred awake from the impact of the car hitting a pothole, she rubbed her eyes and slid over on the vinyl car seat to glance out the side window.
The seat wasn't quite long enough for she and her brother to truly be comfortably reclined and sleep through the night while their parents took turns driving.
All she saw were stars in the sky and every once in a while a sliver of the moon whenever there was a break in the dense old-growth forest.
The narrow two-lane highway seemed to follow the curves of the river below on the other side, and with each turn of the car, her body tilted first this way and then that.
After what seemed to be hours of following a logging truck, they began to be leaving the forest and were at the outskirts of a small community where they were greeted by a tall metal rusty-red glowing conical shaped structure which was broad at the base and rounded at the top.
What were they burning and why, she wondered as she stared at the exhaust which was mixed with small red debris swirling upward from the brilliant flames that could be seen through the screens at the top.
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| Wigwam Burner Courtesy of the National Archives Catalog |
Those times of driving through the night so the kids would sleep, and those times of being the kid, there are lots of memories in this story. Well told!
ReplyDeleteThanks. Lots of memories. . .
DeleteThis brought back memories of our trips from Ohio to Virginia and following the logging trucks UP Long Mountain! Slow moving, lots of exhaust, and exhausting! So glad when the Interstate was finished!
ReplyDeleteI think so many people were celebrating when the interstate was completed! We certainly did on this side of the country.
Delete...yeah and cigarette-smoke-filled-sedans! The smell of vinyl and tobacco smoke is one of those tiny-corner-of-the-mind memories of childhood. Along with triangular vent window, of course.
ReplyDeleteSo the photo caption says, 'wigwarm burner'... are you going to make me go ask google? lol (in part, the fun here is to see how long I can resist looking it up...ain't easy! lol)
Fortunately my parents didn't smoke, so I didn't have to endure smoke filled cars.
DeleteThose little triangular vent windows just kind of disappeared. They were there and then they weren't.
So, how long did it take you to resist looking up wigwam burner? LOL
Hey Clark, I looked it up! Your SSS's are a perpetual learning experience as I had never heard of a Wigwam Burner.
ReplyDeleteAs is your style of writing, it didn't take me long to remember and appreciate the conveniences of modern vehicles lol.
Thanks. Some states referred to the wigwam burners as tepee burners, but this state used the term wigwam burners.
DeleteThose vinyl seat covers were cold to sit on in the winter and hot and sticky in the summer, especially when skin came in contact with the covers.
Oh, those memories of late-night road trips, looking at the stars through the rear window. Back in those days I could crawl up on the back dash! I also want to know what a wigwam burner is. :-)
ReplyDeleteAt the saw mills there are a lot of sawdust and wood chips left over from turning the logs into lumber. Instead of burning the sawdust and the wood chips in the wigwam burners, now those byproducts are used in other ways. The biggest reason for discontinuing using wigwam burners was because they created a lot of pollution.
DeleteThis is great use of the six sentences challenge. I made my first attempt this week and hope to try again.
ReplyDeleteThanks. Glad to see you participating in this blog hop. It is fun!
DeleteI enjoyed this as it is so reminiscent of childhood road trips, from vinyl seats to those stinky "pepper shakers". Thanks for it, well done.
ReplyDelete"Pepper shakers." LOL, I had to google that. I know a lot of people collected salt and pepper shakers. It looks like one could just collect a lot of different tepee pepper shakers. The wigwam burners certainly could be called stinky "pepper shakers."
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