Most Popular Posts – Jennifer Kropf

Can I be in your Shelfie?

Straight up, I have a lot of books. That shouldn’t come as much of a surprise to many of you. At Christmas, most of my presents are fresh printer-and-ink-smelling rectangles in tacky Christmas wrap, simply because I make it easy for my husband to guess what I want by constantly adding a pile of Marissa Meyer, Veronica Roth, Marie Lu, Lindsay Cummings, Kate Quinn, and Kiera Cass volumes to my Amazon Wishlist, along with the random other authors I decide to obsess over. And don’t even get me started on my Bill Johnson collection.

With technology and self-checkout robots dominating society, I’m relieved that real books with paper pages are still a thing. Gone are the days where Christmas shopping was as easy as purchasing a CD, or a DVD that you knew someone liked. Now with Spotify and Netflix, who needs stuff like that?

And now here comes Kindles and e-books, rising up from the guts of the literary world with its robot tentacles to scoop up as many of us as they can. Some people love reading on a Kindle or their phone, and I’m sure that’s where the future is headed. But it’s just not my thing.

Don’t go dying on me book-lovers. We need our libraries to live on!

In the midst of the buzzing technology that runs this world, I find my happiest place is still sitting by the window in a plush chair, with a cup of something only slightly less hot than burn-your-mouth temperature, with all the other sounds turned off, holding open a book and getting lost in a great story. And since moments of rest are sort of God’s thing, something He holds high on the list of valuable things for your life, I hope some day I can be responsible for the story that brings someone else into a place of peace.

Because, really. After all these years of raising babies, it’s about time I kick-start my writing career, wouldn’t you say? I’ve been telling stories since I was a little girl, and now that I have kids of my own I want them to go on adventures and live a life with all the magic of getting carried away into other worlds. So please pray for me, friends! Shoot one into the air right now if you can. I need all the faith-fuel I can get as I start to send proposals to literary agencies. And you can bet your buttocks I’ll keep you in the loop as much as I can!

Now tell me, what kind of story would you want to read about?

Parallel universes on the brink of war with a psychologically unstable (but hilarious) female lead that has totally fallen head-over-heels for a guy who hates her guts.
A chilly Christmas tale that forces an uncoordinated faithless female protagonist to face off with villains from old Christmas legends.
A fairy-tale retelling with a twist that pits two sisters against each other in a dangerous competition to hunt down the greatest threats their historians have ever recorded.

Let me know! I’m sharpening my pencils to take notes…

A Glimpse of Rome Through Geeky Glasses

Dreams. Dreamy dreams. Dreaming of dreamy dreams.

We all have that one dream, the one that never goes away, even if life provides a heaping pile of lofty distractions. Occasionally something reminds us of it and we pause to go back to dreamland for a moment. We let out a long dramatic sigh and for a split second that thing we want the most is so close we can almost taste it.

Nice, isn’t it? To experience it for just a moment? If only everything were possible and we had unlimited amounts of money and each of us possessed our favourite super power.

Really, there is only one conclusion. Dreams suck. Yep. It’s official. We always take it too far by adding on new branches to our dream tree and suddenly what started as a small dream turns into a completely ridiculous impossible venture.

Go us.

I happen to be incredibly guilty of being a ‘brain-wanderer’ (yes I made that term up which is why it’s lame) which leaves me staring off at nothing for long periods of time, getting lost in non-existent worlds or situations. I can sure dream up some funky dreams. Some of them are probably attainable. But I’ll be honest, most of them aren’t.

My biggest dream though is one that doesn’t seem to want to scamper off, even when I try to ignore it, forget about it, or even beat it down. Realistically there is no reason for me to want to get rid of it, except for personal insecurities, but there are always loads of excuses to. For example, I’m a mamma now. Most of my time is already spoken for by a little stump of a creature who doesn’t even know he’s needy. I love him to death quite frankly. Which presents a problem when the opportunity comes around for me to be selfish and take some time for myself. All I want to do with my time is help him, make sure he’s full, gotten his sleep, isn’t afraid, doesn’t feel alone, has clothes to wear, has food to eat and sing adorable songs to gently put him to sleep. It sure makes it hard for me to want to take off and live out my dreams when I care for him so stinking much. He rules my world. What a little punk. It’s like he’s already got me all figured out.

I’ve always wanted to get published and write novels full time as my career. I have many dreams, some you would laugh at because they are so far fetched, but this one trumps them all. I picture myself sitting in some little hole-in-the wall apartment in Rome, Italy, finishing off an epic sci-fi novel that will leave the world with their jaws hanging open in anticipation of what happens next.

This might sound strange. I don’t exactly come off as the well-spoken type. I’m one of those people that can write something that sounds pretty, but the moment I open my mouth I sound like I’ve stuffed my vocabulary into a blender and failed English seventeen times.

No, I don’t want to live in Rome. But some day I would love to travel there and sit with an unhealthy-sized cup of coffee and write an action packed book with just enough romance that all the saps out there buy into the story too. I would wear geeky glasses and everything, just to make it all feel legit.

Pffffft. Ridiculous. Who has the money for that? Or even the time? Seems like a lot of work to make this dream come true. I’m probably better off to stuff it into my “maybe later” box and never think of it again.

If I’m being honest though, I don’t think God gives us dreams for no reason. His reasons though, are likely not always what we think. Maybe He just wants to see if we are willing to give them up to follow Him. Now whether we are willing to give up our dreams for Him, that is the biggest test. It really doesn’t matter where they come from, God or us, we aren’t called to chase after fantasies, even if it would be incredible to wind up in history-splattered Rome with my nerd-glasses and an armful of notebooks with endless ideas.

We just need to praise Him, no matter what we are doing with our lives currently. I think the praises that come directly from the surrendered most abandoned hearts in those face-in-the-mud moments are the most touching to Him. Even if the songs aren’t that greatly written, sung or played. He just wants our true feelings, our true love, scribbled down on a cola stained napkin, and expressed to Him our very best.

I think the little drummer boy had it right.

Peace out.

Poop Happens. So grab a shovel and deal with it.

There was an eerie whistle coming off the fields; its source was unknown. Only vacant emptiness hung over the green wheaties for miles. The sky was a dull grey, creeping over the landscape like it was its own life form. All seemed…ugh what is that horrendous smell?

Manure season. That’s what. What a wretched time to live out in the country.

I would have loved to sit outside today and observed God’s creation from my rickety lawn chair. But unfortunately the air is clogging my windpipes. I will die out there.

Time to come in and seal all the windows. With duct tape. And fabreeze. And then maybe I will gag myself and make a blanket fort to hide under to try and trap out this horrific smell. I wish I’d thought ahead and invited a friend to come over to suffer through this with me. At least then I could complain about it and make mildly inappropriate potty-humour jokes to pass the time.

Life’s storms, eh? Sometimes they come in the form of spray manure.

Ironically enough, I feel like this is God showing me something incredibly important. And JUST when I thought I got everything He was trying to say, this happens. And I realize all over again that He is sending me a message.

His message isn’t that He wants to choke me in a hot vat of animal waste. It’s about attitude. It’s about what your heart is doing. God is really asking me in this season, Do you trust me?

Ugh. I do. I know I do. Just let me be in control this once, please?

Sometimes it’s insulting when God asks us to trust Him. I get in these “zones” where I think about my education and capability to be able to get things done correctly and I think I can do quite an excellent job. And then God shows up. Do you trust me? And I’m one mega fist-flying hissy fit away from burning my house down for no reason.

Last year my journey to the Love Encounter conference was not flat. And by that I mean I fell into valleys and had to climb mountains to get to the end. But staying on the right course, even if it’s the un-level one, is key. If I’d gone my own way I would have gotten distracted by pretty flowers along the side of the road and after pulling off for too long I would have gotten lost in the magical forest. I never would have had to climb the mountains or scale down the rocky valleys. That might have been nice. And the Love Encounter would have looked really pretty. But it would have been dry, and lifeless. Those mountains that I conquered shaped the vision of the LOVE Weekend and changed my heart to understand the true purpose of where God was going with it. I needed those hikes. Or I wouldn’t have gotten it.

This year God has been bringing me back to those moments, reminding me what He taught me back then so He can build on it this year. Last year we climbed mountains. But this year we are building towers.

“Brave”. That is the theme for this year’s conference. I can’t wait to watch what God is going to do with this. I can’t wait to stand among the bravest of women. And when the enemy starts to spit arrows, I’d like to fire a couple back. I was nervous at first. I was afraid to set out on this new adventure again. But God asked me to trust Him. This year is going to have new battles, but for the first time since this TLE ball got rolling, I’m not afraid. Instead of ducking behind a rock, I’m going to grab my theoretical bow and cling to God’s promise. And the moment He says “Go!”, boy oh boy, I’m going to charge!

What I don’t want to do is walk into the battle unprepared. That is just plain dumb on my part. But in order to be prepared I need to have the right attitude. I need to ready my mind and my heart to stand against the attitude-manure that is going to make me and this entire conference stink if I let it get too close. Set me free God, from this manure season! I want your sweet fragrance to fill the sanctuary all weekend. I don’t want to drag in my manure-smelling attitude. That can leave with the wind. Let’s get this right.

Now I need to go call my husband and tell him that when he gets home he’s going to just have to wait out the poop-storm in his truck. If he comes and opens the front door then my entire fortress will smell like the inside of a cow’s bowels. I can’t have that.

Kropf out.

Fear the Pirate Dragons

All I can hear, apart from a few bugs and birds making odd noises from somewhere I can’t see, is the sound of moving water as it tumbles off the hot tub thingy and spills into the pool, making a “blub-blub-blub” sound. The weather called for thunderstorms today but I can only see clear blue when I look up. That doesn’t mean there won’t be a storm though; those things seem to appear out of nowhere and vomit up a half-ocean of water upon Davenport in a split second. But regardless, God has given me a good day. And I’m eating Jolly Ranchers. It doesn’t get much better than that.

I’m trying to decide where to let my mind wander as I sit here. What’ll it be today? Superheroes? Super-villains? A self-reflecting version of a Tomb Raider? Zombies? Storm Troopers? Pirates?

Pirates. Definitely pirates. (When in doubt, always go with pirates).

This morning I want to encounter danger, just for kicks. And since Phil just started piping in answers to Family Feud from somewhere in the house behind me, I’ll try to keep focused without adding any random words, like “chips” or “picnic” or whatever else I hear him yell out.

Here I am with open water in every direction and not a single pebble of land in sight. The water seems calm. But I know a storm is coming because the wind makes an eerie grumble and moves back and forth across my flesh, giving me chills that I decide to hide from my crew. A captain should never let on about her fears.

Of course, I’m the Captain. It’s only logical.

I dragged my crew from their favourite island, the comfortable yet occasionally dangerous port called Daven, which crawls with law enforcement who don’t take kindly to people like me and my crew of water thieves. We’ve been asked to leave during more than one visit, which often results in a ridiculous looking bar fight during which I sit back and wait it out until its over. My men all collapse eventually. I chose them for their ability to work under stressful and non-ideal conditions but if I’m being honest, they’re all terrible fighters.

It’s embarrassing. Sometimes when we port in new places I pretend I don’t know them.

Jolly Rancher had the worst attitude about leaving Daven this time. He’s still back on the Poop Deck staring back towards the island that left our view three hours ago, pouting. What a baby. In fact, why any of my crew even like the Daven Port is beyond me. The place is jam packed with poison ivy and every single one of those nut bars has caught it.

When I raise my spyglass to try and spot anything in the distance that isn’t liquid I feel a tap on my shoulder. I pull my eyes back without fully turning around to see my first mate Orlando Cross, the most well groomed pirate on my ship and the only pirate on the seas that I can fully trust, mostly because he doesn’t look or act like a pirate. I raise my eyebrow to invite him to tell me what he wants. He holds up a basket with bananas and coconuts inside.

“Boys want a picnic,” he states.

I stare at him, unwavering. I don’t even know what to say.

Oy.

I turn back to the water without responding and raise my spyglass again. As I do, I hear a crumpling sound that reminds me of walking on dry leaves.

“We have chips,” Orlando offers. When I look back this time I see that he’s pulled a bag of them out of the basket and is holding them up for me to see. How he managed to score those is a mystery. But I hesitate. We have a job to do and I hate wasting time. But I do love chips.

Orlando challenges me. “Bet you can’t eat just one.”

* * *

I ate several. And I don’t regret it. I can still taste the salt that lingers on my lips when I bite them in thought.

“We ought to head South. If this rumoured sea lord is as bad as they say she is, then she won’t be afraid to venture into the Dragon’s Throat,” I say.

A number of heads snap in my direction, including Orlando’s. Mostly they just blink in surprise. Jolly Rancher puts his hands on his hips like he’s having a temper tantrum.

“I’ll throw myself to the sharks before I let you take me into the Dragon’s Throat!” he hisses.

“Be my guest. And I never said we were going into the Dragon’s Throat. I said we were going to head towards it.” I want to smack him. He doesn’t deserve the name “Jolly”. He can be such a bear.

“You heard the lass! Man up, you soft shelled tacos!” Orlando barks at the men. They start moving about the ship and I look out across the sea towards one of the most dangerous canals I’d ever heard whispers about. The men who’d built it had been eaten alive by dragons, or so they say. I was just a girl at the time and the tales had sunken deep into the most tormented parts of my brain, giving me nightmares for weeks.

But I grew out of that.

I turn and cross the Spar Deck, glancing up at the Foremast. I see Crabby Joe high up in the Main Top flicking peanut sized chunks of wood from where he’s sitting. Even though he’s far away I can hear him whistling like a content child. Apart from Jolly Rancher, Crabby Joe will probably have the biggest issue with heading towards the Dragon’s Throat when he finds out. I can only pray that we don’t actually have to go inside once we get there. I don’t know if I will force my crew to follow the sea criminal into the canal if I see her go in. I’m undecided about that.

The lassie’s name is Blue Diamond. She’s a sea brute who’s shameless trail of crime has put many old friends of mine in a kerfuffle. I’m only going after her to even the score.

Well, that and because yesterday a reward was placed on her head that I couldn’t refuse.

I feel the pull of the ship as it turns against the ocean. Orlando is behind my wheel, carrying out my directions. I want to steer the ship myself though so I head towards the stern.

When I get there, I feel a chilled wind ripple through my clothes and it makes me pause. Though I don’t see a ship behind us, I have a dawning feeling that we are not alone. I glance up at the clouds that are forming above in large chunks spotted with an unpleasant grey. The storm I anticipated is crawling over us. I think it’s about to explode into a wicked chaos. I would swear if I thought it would help. But I know it won’t, so instead I turn to Orlando.

“Let me steer. And get this ship at full speed,” I say to him. He sees the uneasy look on my face but doesn’t ask. Maybe he already noticed the storm coming in.

* * *

I think that maybe I can relax now that the clouds seem to be holding their tears, and because we are a few more hours into our search and I know Orlando is overseeing the pansies. I even close my eyes for a moment just to feel the air, but when I open them and glance ahead towards the cliffs, something else catches my eye, something that shouldn’t be there. And I second guess myself because of the likelihood. But when the red sails peek out from behind the jagged rock I instantly understand why I’d felt like we weren’t alone.

“Cross!” I yell at Orlando, suddenly in full pursuit mode. He whips around and catches my gaze, his silver buttoned up jacket making him look like a British gentleman who got lost looking for his afternoon tea and found himself on my ship by accident. “There’s a ship ahead! Someone must have been following us!” I call down to him, even though I am already halfway down the stairs to the main deck.

The men have already started to notice; I see Crabby Joe standing far above us, pointing frantically and yelling like he’s been trying to get our attention for a number of minutes. I won’t ask why he didn’t just climb down and grab me to make me see but I let it go. I have bigger problems now. The foreign ship is turning in our direction; it’s obvious.

I almost drop my spyglass when I rip it out of my pocket, but I catch it amidst my fumble. I’m nervous.

“Captain, the sails are red!” Palm yells at me like I’m not standing a foot away from him.

“I know!” I shout back, pulling the spyglass to my eye. The circular picture I see wavers up and down. My hands are shaking. Blimey.

“So the Blue Diamond keeps her sails black and blue!” he is still yelling and it takes me a moment to register what he is saying. I drop my spyglass. Palm is right. This isn’t Blue Diamond’s ship.

“Then who’s following us?” I ask, my nerves finally beginning to settle. My eyes narrow in on the wide boat with scarlet sails, the one who’s crew seems to have known about us for longer than we’d known about them.

“Can’t tell. It’s unmarked. But they’re coming right toward us now,” Orlando says, raising his own spyglass.

I stand silently for a moment as I think. We’ve come too far to turn and run away. But just beyond this new ship is the Dragon’s Throat canal which I think I’d like an excuse to run from.

Run or fight? Run or fight? Run? Fight?

Run.

No…dang it. Fight.

“Send some men to the gun deck. We’ll see if these sailors want to chat.” I state it with confidence that I’m not actually feeling. But something about being followed lights a fire beneath me. It makes me angry. I want to at least see who my pursuer was. I want to prove that they made a mistake by testing me like this.

Half my men head below deck and I turn to Orlando. “You think they were hired to stop us?” I ask him, wondering if maybe these blood red sails were working for the Blue Diamond.

He shrugs. “I think that’s what it’s supposed to look like. But no pirate in their right mind can ignore the reward on Captain Blue’s head. They’re trying to scare us, Captain. Trying to shake us off so they can capture the Blue Diamond for themselves,” he guesses.

It makes too much sense for him to be wrong.

“So a fight it is,” I decide, once and for all.

* * *

The clouds roll in again. They caught up to us, threatening to spill a downpour upon my crew.

It doesn’t take long for us to make it close enough to the oncoming ship that I can make out faces in my spyglass. They are most certainly pirates, though some of them dress in full black like they are of a specific breed I’m unfamiliar with. I keep my jaw set, determined not to let my ignorance worry me.

“Just give the order,” Orlando says from beside me and I know the guns are ready. But I don’t give the order because the oncoming ship hasn’t attacked us yet. I watch them closely, my gaze bouncing around the deck of their ship, trying to spot their plan, or their next move, or who they are. I don’t feel like I have enough information to engage in a full blown attack. But I want to beat them to it if they are planning the same fate for us.

Their ship comes right up alongside ours without them making a single move. I stare across the space between us, searching for their captain. It should be obvious, but it isn’t. I can’t tell one pirate’s rank over another’s. Not a single one of them is wearing a hat.

“You think they’re military?” Orlando asks quietly. He is searching for their captain too, and like me, he fails to identify the right pirate.

“No,” I shake my head. No patriotic navy boat would look like this, or act like this.

My eyes wander over each of them now that I can see their faces and fall on one in particular. This young man looks at me from beneath dark eyelashes with a subtle smirk on his face like he knows something I don’t.

“Found him,” I whisper to Orlando. I think maybe the Captain’s tactic to blend into his crew is intentional, until he speaks. Then I think that maybe it’s just a coincidence.

“Good day fair Captain. I trust you’re enjoying this weather?” he calls across, locking onto my gaze and forcing me to drop my spyglass.

I try to take in his features, to study his stance. Dang, he’s good-looking. Tall, dark and handsome. That’s going to be a bonus distraction I didn’t anticipate.

“You want to talk about the weather?” I inquire. His petty subjects astound me.

“Actually I came to take your ship. Don’t take it personally,” he says, and before I can react, a dozen hooks are flying in my direction. Orlando’s hands pull me to the ground seconds before I could get knocked out by one, and I roll over twice to get out of the fire-zone. I jump to my feet.

“Fire!” I yell over the ship. There is a rumbling of small explosions that come from below, shaking the deck beneath my boots. I see at least two holes get blown in the side of the ship with the red sails. I whirl around to find what became of Orlando and my gut wrenches at the sight of him getting knocked over and restrained by three enemy pirates. I don’t know how they boarded my ship so fast. It had taken them seconds. Long fingers coil around my arm and I spin and twist to break the attackers grasp. I fumble out my sword as I turn to face the pirate and raise to block a fast swing that was headed in my direction. Past my adversary I realize that my entire ship is engaged in a heated battle. It dawns on me, at the exact same time that rain starts hitting my face. The storm has caught us. How wonderful.

I duck and swing, aiming for the kneecaps of the burly man who came to take me down. I need to go save Orlando without this man following me. My sword makes contact and I’m out of there faster than he can realize what happened. I feel a flutter in my stomach as I run, but I can’t decide if it’s a queasy sick feeling that’s going to make me barf or if it’s my adrenaline starting to stir, making me stronger. I hope it’s the latter.

I jump over a fallen man and nearly wipe out when I land because of the rain that has by now soaked the deck of my ship. I hear more explosions. A crackle of thunder erupts in the distance and I come sliding to a lurching halt as the dark barrel of a silver gun meets my forehead. My chest is pounding, making my breaths heavy. A gun. I look past it to the holder and find the Captain of the red sails that must have jumped ship at some point during the chaos. My eyes dart over to Orlando who is being held steady by two large men I would never want to fight. Then I look back at the Captain, the dark haired stud who holds me hostage at gunpoint. It’s too bad I’m going to have to beat him up in front of his crew. I’m waiting for my chance when he speaks,

“My name is Captain Philip. You and your crew are now my prisoners.”

But even as he says the words, the ear-piercing whale of something horrific fills the air. It’s so loud I almost throw my hands over my ears. A dark chill crawls up my spine like a spider running for its life and I look back towards the Dragon’s Throat canal where thick eerie smoke is lifting from the cliffs. Whatever dark bone crushing monster is living in that canal just got hungry. And now it knows we’re here.

Even Captain Philip isn’t smiling anymore.

End of Part I.

Here is a picture of my afternoon for your reference:

Kropf out!

Silence of the Pigs

This will be a different kind of blog post today. I want to give a glimpse into the uncharted territory of a place that is constantly moving through wisps of colour and untamed adventures in lost worlds. This place haunts me at times, but amazes me at others. And though I can be looking straight at someone; an acquaintance, a teacher, a consultant, this place is often travelling in a different direction than what it’s supposed to, making it exceedingly difficult for me to focus. On more than one occasion this area has been my downfall. It’s been my struggle – the one that others don’t know about or can’t possibly understand because it’s hidden behind my naturally deceiving green-umber eyes. This place is my advantageous yet treacherous ever wandering mind. It’s strange, in a way, to put the thoughts that spear in a hundred different directions every second into words, because usually they move too fast for me to catch a hold of them. But heck, why not give it a shot? I’ll grab my butterfly net.

I was sitting outside. The sun was warm, almost a little too warm, making me sweat in places I don’t want to talk about. But I barely noticed it. Because as I was sitting in my rickety rusted lawn chair and staring at my boring yet frustratingly addictive phone, I was rudely thrown into a mental state of panic when I heard the sharp rising squeals and screams that erupted from across the fields. My eyes shot up. Around me, miles of various crops stared back at me blankly as they drifted in the gentle wind. But my heart started to thud a little faster. Because regardless of the calmness in the fields that wrapped around my backyard for miles, usually screams only mean one thing; danger.

There was an eerie dancing in the breeze. Something was wrong.

I stood, eyes grazing over the fields one last time, and then headed for the shed. I don’t keep a lot of things in my shed, just what’s been tossed in there over the years; tools, gardening gloves, a shovel, a tarnished bike with only one wheel, a first aid kit, a hatchet, a few dead mice, extra gasoline and…my grandfather’s black bow.

My arrows were mostly destroyed, with notches chipped out of them and whatever glossy finish that once covered them being mostly disintegrated. But I still remembered how to shoot, though I hadn’t done it in a very long time.

I took what I needed, considering the history for only a moment before I slung the sheath of arrows over my arm, and then squished a spider that fell off beneath the toe of my boot.

Spiders. They don’t scare me.

I headed for the fields. At first, I considered that my best option would be to move into the corn so that I would be shielded on all sides. But my instincts told me it would be faster to go on a direct path through the wheat. So I went, gripping my bow so tightly at my side that I could feel a splinter edging it’s way into my pinky.

The screams began to rise again unexpectedly, sending chills through my bones and making me almost falter my next step. I swore, not using one of the worst words I could think of, but still one that might not have been appropriate to say out loud at my mother’s house. But I didn’t have a lot of options on this route. They would see me coming. I knew they would.

I broke into a run, hoping for the sake of the screamers that I wasn’t going to get there too late. My body drove forwards into a string of long strides that made the series of buildings before me draw closer, giving me better vision of what was to come. But there was trouble. I suddenly ducked left when I saw movement, and nearly plowed into a silo. I winced at the impact of my shoulder colliding with the blue metal wall before I was able to correct my calculation.

Okay, I swore again. This time it was the worst word I could think of. Bad Jen.

I put my back against the silo and slid down to a sitting position to clear my head and try to refocus from the throbbing that was making its way down my arm. The screams had died down, which made me nervous. I hoped I hadn’t missed my chance to intervene.

There was a noise that made me freeze. It was like the sound of someone crunching popcorn seeds in their teeth. But as the sound became a rhythm, I realized there was someone less than twenty meters away from me that was walking on gravel. And he was drawing closer. If I was going to move, it had to be now.

I snatched my bow out of the grass and peered around the silo, searching for the company. And when I saw nothing but an empty laneway that seemed to extend at least half a mile before it even reached a road, or any kind of civilization for that matter, I bolted for the next building over. As I approached, I heard a commotion inside, something that made me stop at the door before going in. I reached up slowly and drew an arrow, as my eyes narrowed in on something past the door that I couldn’t see yet. The screams, they came from this building.

The thudding began rising in my chest again. I held my bow up, a little nervously because there was a good chance my aim was rusty, and I inched the door open with my foot. Everything inside was dark. Shadows stretched across the length of the building that were almost too dark to be defined. But I could see movement. I could hear it too. I reached to my back pocket and pulled out my phone, which in addition to having a sweet Pinterest app also contained a rare high tech lens that would allow me to see in the dark. I held up my phone and kept my eyes glued to the screen as I scanned the room with appropriate caution. And then the noises began.

It started like a low pitched growl, similar to what might appear in a child’s nightmare. And then it rose, cracking into a tone that went higher and higher until the frequency was so startling it sent shivers rippling across my flesh. I dropped my phone in alarm and spun around, trying to blink away the blurriness that was starting to form. I peered down the arrow that shook slightly under my grip and tried desperately to make out the shapes that were positioned in the darkness around me. I needed to shoot, now, or it would get me, whatever it was. I opened my mouth but my throat was dry.

“Hello?” I rasped, hoping it wasn’t too late for friendly conversation. When there was no reply I started to shrink down to retrieve my phone, which had bounced a half a meter from where I was standing. I rose slowly, flicking the night vision back on, and raised the device in front of me, and as a sudden form appeared, filling the screen, I shrieked. Fear exploded through my limbs, making me spring into action. I released my phone and heard it clatter somewhere in the darkness. My hand shot back up to my bow and I shot the arrow, hitting whatever monster was before me right between its bright threatening eyes.

I couldn’t breathe.

I was ready to run but I’d heard a slump on the ground. And no more noises were coming from the darkness. So instead, I leaned forwards with my hands on my knees and tried to catch my breath. This felt unreal. Finally, I marched forwards and grabbed my phone, unable to stand it any longer. Whatever monster this was, I needed to see it. I flicked the light on my mobile to its fullest measure of brightness and tilted it down to see what I’d hit.

A pig. It was a pig.

I grunted.

Well that was a whole lot of drama for nothing.

Yesterday I was sitting outside on my phone. Lame. I know. But I do love Pinterest. And as I was sitting there, I overheard the legitimately startling sound of our distant neighbour’s pigs squealing so loud that it really did sound like I’d woken up in a horror movie. What really happened was I took a look across the bean field, shrugged to myself, went back to pin a cool recipe and then headed inside for a pomegranate. But in those short moments of looking out towards my neighbour’s farm my mind took me through a completely different scenario, all in a matter of seconds. And I thought it would be interesting to share.

It can’t stop it. It does it on it’s own.

….and now I feel like bacon.