Smokey Mountain Breakdown

I would have liked to have not learned the editing tricks I picked up. I would have liked to have kept plunking away at stories without thought to form. The thing is, I'm just obsessive-compulsive enough to get carried away with it. When I worked in the corporate environment I used to enjoy making forms. I like boring things. I find them relaxing. So now I'm editing. Lots.

DAMN YOU, ENGLISH LANGUAGE!!!

I picked up a couple of new story fragments yesterday.

Story Fragment #1: There is a ghost story from around here that involves a headless wagon driver. No one seems to know how he lost his head. I will need to consult with Pastor Jimmy about this. If anyone knows the rest of the story it will be him. I know there are a few Grassy Fork ex-pats who read the blog, so if you remember this hant story from childhood, we would all like to know the rest of the story.

Story Fragment #2: True story. Long ago, a woman gated her four year old child up in a cave. She went by each day and gave it a piece of candy. The child eventually starved to death in the cave. The law found out and the woman went to prison. I need to find this story on my next research trip to the library. Hopefully there will be something in the Plain Talk archives.

Of course, it's a dreadful story. But I need to know why? Even crazy people have reasons for doing such things. Crazy reasons, but I feel I really need to know the crazy reason. And what's up with the candy? This sounds like the premise of an excellent story to me. And I'm already churning things around for it. But first, I need to know what drove this mother to do this. Four years is a bit late for post-partum depression, isn't it?