YAHWEH IS THE FORCE WHO IS A PERSON

YAHWEH  IS  THE  FORCE  WHO  IS  A  PERSON

YAHWEH  IS  THE  FORCE  WITH  NO  DARK  SIDE

YAHWEH  IS  THE  FORCE  WHO  IS  ALWAYS  AWAKE

By   Forrest   Wayne   Schultz

     Pointing to these three statements he had just written on the blackboard, Professor Alethia told us that our term paper will consist of (1).  showing that the Bible teaches these truths about God and (2). contrasting them with the Star Wars theology. 

     He then closed the class and bade us a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Grantville, Georgia, USA, Earth, Solar System, Galaxy, Universe, God

December 17, 2015  Anno  Domini 

Killer Obits

Killer    Obits

     Please do not ask me how it works:  I have this special radio which is able to pick up super- remote (and super- small) radio stations.  Last week as I was moving the dial at random I happened to pick up the beginning of a broadcast by a station calling itself “Podunk Radio Coming To You From Out Here In The Boondocks”.   The announcer then stated that “the program you are about to hear is the first in a series of very important ones, to be broadcast daily, about the subject of Killer Obits, that is, of obituaries that do not inform us of deaths, but rather obits which announce deaths in advance because they themselves CAUSE the deaths!!  In style each of them is a combination of journalism and sermon.  Each of them purports to be a live recording of the message delivered to the target audience indicated.

     The first of these followed immediately after this introductory statement.  It was delivered to all criminals and terrorists, and, like a sermon it warned them to immediately repent (or “you shall surely die!”), and like a report on the CBS Evening News With Scott Pelley, it was short and to the point.  After this terse warning/promise all across the world there were reports of criminals and terrorists who repented and of many others who suddenly died from no known medical cause.

     This same pattern then was repeated daily with each one aimed at a special group of bad guys.  And the results were similar.  After the killer obit directed at Communists was  sent to all Commies, a few repented and the rest were executed, with such results as the Chinese fully repudiating Communism and the North Koreans doing likewise and announcing plans to reunite with South Korea.   When the killer obit directed at false religions was sent, most rejected it and were slain while many repented and sought out Christian churches and missionaries to learn Christianity.  Similarly with the next obit aimed at Humanists – some repented, and some did not. 

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          The fifth killer obit was aimed at those in nominally Christian churches who believed in false doctrines which had corrupted these churches.  Many repented and many did not.  A whole book could be written about this, but all I will say here is that the most astounding thing was Pope Francis repenting of Roman Catholicism and urging other RCs to do likewise.  The result of this as well as of the aforementioned obits, was that suddenly everybody was studying the Bible and changing their thoughts and lives accordingly.

     The following day, the sixth day, was a day of double surprises.  Those waiting (and wanting) to be “raptured” were granted their wish, which got the anti-dispes upset (for obvious reasons), but which was quite painful for those who were raptured because the first thing Christ did was to berate them for their false notion of spirituality.  He told them, “God and I care about EVERYTHING, not just spiritual things, so you guys need to get this straight.  Now you shall listen to my lecture on this…….”.  He then abolished their sin nature (so that they only had a righteous nature), and then proceeded with his talk.

      On earth the Christians also had their old nature abolished so that they too henceforth only did good and never sinned any more.  As a result they were now in the right frame of mind to move full speed ahead on straightening things out on Earth.  And, since all the various kinds of bad guys had been removed, there was nothing standing in their way – it just took a bit of re-education, which was amazingly rapid now that sin no longer stood in the way.

     In re the American political situation, Hillary is no longer with us since she refused to repent, but I am pleased to announce that Bernie Sanders and President Obama and V.P. Joe Biden all repented, as did many of the Republicans, with the result that the rest of Obama’s term was great as was his successor, Chris Christie.  They all quickly learned and began the implementation of God’s Law.

Forrest W. Schultz

November 13, 2015  

My thanks to Stephen King for the ‘killer obit” concept.      

The Kitten And The Crickets

The  Kitten  And  The  Crickets  --  A  True  Story

 

     Before I moved to Coweta, while I was living in Riverdale (in Clayton County) I took my boys for many walks in the woods near our house and in the woods on the other side of Upper Riverdale Road around and behind what was then called Clayton General Hospital (which was  small then).  In one of these walks on the east side of the hospital along a lane one of my boys heard a kitten mewing.  We interrupted our walk to investigate and found it hidden in the tall grass along the road.  It was a beautiful black little kitty and was very hungry.  I did not want to interrupt our walk so we decided to catch crickets (which were abundant in the grass) and feed them to her until she was full.  Then we continued our walk taking her with us and then back home.  We kept her for the rest of her long life and enjoyed her very much – she was one of the finest pets I have ever had.

     This is a true story and I am writing it at the request of my son Johnny, who wanted reminiscences of days of yore.  For another such story see my “The Water Hose Snake”.

 

Forrest W. Schultz

October 23, 2015

 

My Identity At Stake ???

My Identity At Stake ???

By Forrest W. Schultz

     When I learned from my grandpa’s will that he had left a message for me in his (now my) safe deposit box I immediately was reminded of that scene in The Bourne Identity where the amnesiac Bourne goes to his safe deposit box to learn about his past – to find out who he is. That is, I wondered whether there was something which had happened to me or which pertained to me which I was unaware of, which would be disclosed to me by the message from my grandpa in the safe deposit box. The lawyer had made an appointment for me with the lady at the bank who is in charge of safe deposit boxes, and, after I left, I drove straight to the bank, arriving right on time for the appointment.

     I was immediately ushered into Miss Anderson’s office. It was SO good to see her again – it had been a while. She was like a grandma to me, and – if truth be told -- I liked her even better than my real grandmas! We took some time getting caught up, and how delightful that was! Finally, our chat was over and we attended to the business at hand.

     As we went down to the basement, where the safe deposit boxes are located, I confided to her my concern about what my grandpa’s letter to me might disclose. She both tried to allay my fears and also said to me, with a twinkle in her eye, that maybe something exciting would be contained in his message to me. At last the moment arrived: we inserted our keys, I opened the box, Miss Anderson left the room, and I sat down at one of the tables. In the box was a large envelope on which these words were printed: DO NOT OPEN THIS ENVELOPE!!! IF YOU DO SO, YOU WILL SURELY DIE !!!

     I sat there stupefied when suddenly out of nowhere there appeared a tall woman with gun in hand wearing a Hillary Clinton mask who told me to hand her the envelope! I was so shocked and scared I obeyed her at once. She then told me to remain seated, which I did. And then she went over to another table where she sat down, looked at the envelope, laughed, opened it, and dropped dead, making a very loud noise.

     Miss Anderson heard it and re-entered the room. I was so panicky I was barely able to tell her what had happened. She told me to stay seated while she telephoned the police. They took only a few minutes to arrive, since the police station is only a block away.

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     It only took a few minutes for the detective to interview me and Miss Anderson and for the coroner to pronounce the woman dead (of a heart attack).  When her fingerprints and photograph were uploaded into the computer, no match was found. The detective told us he was taking a hair sample to send off for DNA testing to see if her identity could be determined that way. Nothing more was discussed, and before they left the detective told us he had heard of banks robbed by people wearing masks of Presidents, but never of one by a robber wearing the mask of someone RUNNING for President!

     One thing I did not tell either Miss A or the detective was the warning I had seen on the outside of the envelope. The reason I did not do so is that the warning is no longer there!!! This whole thing is weird enough without having to talk of any more weirdness! Another strange thing is that the envelope is not sealed! And there is NOTHING inside!!  When I told Miss A how puzzled I was at what had happened, she replied that (with a twinkle in her eye) that she knew someone who might be able to explain it – her niece Mandy, who enjoys solving puzzles like this,  and in playing tricks like this on people.  Maybe, mused Miss A, Mandy had something to do with it, because when she was here recently she spent a lot of time with my Grandpa.  Miss A then invited me to have supper with her where Mandy will be present, which would give me the opportunity to chat with her. 

     I accepted her gracious offer, and, a few hours hence, at that supper (and afterward) I had a long chat with Mandy.  She revealed to me that she and my grandpa and the masked women and the policeman and coroner planned it all.  The masked woman, who was suffering from an incurable cancer, used this device as a way of masking her suicide.  And Mandy and my Grandpa planned the thing as a way to get me and Mandy together so we would fall in love and get married, which, indeed, is what happened:  very rapidly after Mandy’s revelations I was soooo smitten with her, I did not hesitate to do so or to go along with Grandpa’s plan whereby we would live in the house he bequeathed to me and to, together with Mandy, run the business he owned in town.

     And, in so doing, I DID find my identity!!  Mandy and I did not always live HAPPILY ever after, but we always lived INTERESTINGLY ever after!!  I shall not provide here the details of exactly how Mandy and my Grandpa hatched and carried out their plot.  For those details see the Appendix.  Just kidding, there is no appendix – why not try to figure out for yourself just how they did it!

Grantville, Georgia

July 8, 2015

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The Water Hose Snake

The  Water  Hose  Snake

By  Forrest  W.  Schultz

 

     I did not WRITE any stories before 1986, but long before that I COMPOSED stories in my mind, some of which I TOLD to others.  One of these I told to my sons when they were boys while I was taking a walk with them in the woods when we lived in Riverdale.

     The story came to me while we were nearing a large pile of trash someone had dumped into the woods.  In this pile was a garden hose.  As one of my boys was walking toward it, I shouted to him, ”Do NOT pick that up!   That is a water hose snake.  It is camoflouged to look just like a water hose.  It lies completely still until someone comes and picks it up.  Then, before you  know what is happening, it suddenly bites you!  Its bite is so poisonous that you die right after being bitten!!”

     At first he stopped and looked really scared.  Then I laughed and said I was just kidding.

     Then, several weeks later when one of his cousins was visiting and joined us on one of our walks,  my son then played the same trick on him!

     I also made up a story about a pipe monster which supposedly lived in those large pipes found underneath roads used to channel runoff water.

     A week ago, at his request, I promised my son Johnny, who is now a middle aged man,  that I would write down some memories of the days of his childhood, beginning with this one about the water hose snake.

 

Grantville, GA

July 6, 2015

Where Is Ed Hubble ???

Where  Is  Ed  Hubble  ???

 

     Ed Hubble was always a secretive person around here, where he lived for the past twenty years selling quart jars of Lisa’s super-delicious corn chowder.  Lisa and a few of her close friends and relatives did the cooking and canning in her old farmhouse’s large kitchen from which Ed and his helpers toted the jars into the large adjacent room at the back of the house where they were sold to Lisa’s many customers who came from miles around.

     This suddenly ended after exactly twenty years when Lisa died (as she foreknew she would!), and the store was closed, and Ed immediately vacated his rented house and prepared to leave on the express train to his brother Nathan’s house several hundred miles north of here.

     I was Ed’s chief helper and the one in charge of the store whenever Ed was not present.  Ed appreciated my help which he expressed by leaving me a generous retirement fund.  And I was the only one he told of his future plans and to whom he bade goodbye.

     Therefore I was the one whom his brother called that evening to deliver the shocking news that Ed had not arrived on the train!  When he choked up and could not continue talking he handed the phone to his daughter Laura, whom I told that I was with Ed when he bought his train ticket, after which we took a brief stroll and had a brief chat in the park adjacent to the train station.  I said goodbye to him at about 3 PM, which gave him plenty of time to catch the train, which was scheduled to arrive at 4 PM.

     I then revealed to her what Ed had revealed to me in our chat, namely that he devoted all his free time here to writing fantasy novels, to be published under a pseudonym.  He had just completed his twentieth novel – he wrote one novel for each of the twenty years he had been here.  And he had chosen to do this here in our community because of its great folklore, much of which he used in his writing.  Lisa’s foreknowledge of her own death (which some of her ancestors also had) is but one such example of the folklore of our community, which Ed regards as “a magical place”.  Laura knew about this because it was to her that he sent his manuscripts, who then had them edited and published.  She thinks his books might be relevant to his disappearance, which is similar to an event in his last book.  Maybe he is trying to repeat in his life something he put into that story!!

     In our conversation Laura and I sought for answers as to why Ed was not on the train, and we quickly ruled out deception (Ed was not lying about his intentions of being on that train) and we do not believe anyone either murdered or abducted him

 

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    While Laura and I were having our conversation she was walking to another room in her house; and when she got to that room she heard her cell phone ringing.  She interrupted our conversation to pick up her cell phone and was overjoyed when she heard Ed’s voice on it!  Ed had called to apologize for having missed the train, which he had to do in order to do a favor for someone here.  He then caught the 6 PM train, which will arrive at the station up there at 9 PM.  Whew!!  What a relief!

     After Laura ended  her phone chat with Ed, she got back onto her landline phone and we resumed our conversation.  She then told me a secret of some super great news she learned about today.  She has a big surprise for Ed.  About a year after his 20^th  book is published, the publisher is going to come out with a special 20^th anniversary edition which will include all 20 of his books arranged into five tetralogies.  Wow!  And I heard about it even before Ed did!!

 

Forrest W. Schultz

Grantville, Georgia (another “magical place”)

May 28, 2015

 

 

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THE GOLD WATCH

THE     GOLD    WATCH

 

By  Forrest  Wayne  Schultz

 

 

     I had always wanted a gold watch – a watch with a beautiful face and hands and numbers enclosed in a gold case that opened when you pressed that special button at the top – a watch like my father had when I was a boy.  This fond childhood memory suddenly surfaced when the lawyer placed such a gold watch before me, informing me I was inheriting it from a benefactor who had died a few minutes ago.  I was also inheriting all of this man’s other wealth – his magnificent house and land, his BMW, his stock portfolio, and his bank account.  In fact, all of these had been put into my name a number of years ago.  As per his instructions, I was just now finding out about this.  In return for his largesse, this man asked me – but did not require me – to undertake a certain task, namely, that I prevent a woman from being murdered!

     The matter became even weirder as the lawyer unfolded the details.  The benefactor does NOT know who the woman is or any facts about her except that she will soon be murdered unless I prevent it!  And, one more thing – somehow (he knew not how) the Gold Watch will help me to prevent this murder.  After signing the pertinent legal documents and receiving the keys to the house and BMW, I thanked the lawyer, told him I would try to prevent this murder, although I do not see how I could do so if I did not even know who the intended victim was, plus I have no experience in criminology.   As soon as I left the lawyer’s office, I went to check out my new house and the ten acres of land surrounding it.

 

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     My adventure began after I sat down in one of the chairs in the yard behind the house.  It was a beautiful sunny day.  I pulled out my gold watch, which looked especially gorgeous in the bright sunlight.  After I closed the case and was about to put it back into my pocket, I suddenly heard, emanating from the top of the hill adjacent to the back yard, a shriek followed by a thump as a man standing there placed his hands over his eyes, and then fell and rolled down the opposite side of the hill into the river at its base.   By the time I ran up the hill and looked down the other side I saw him being devoured by an enormous crocodile.  Noting the position and brightness of the sun and where I was sitting holding the watch, I concluded that the sunlight must have bounced off of the case of my gold watch into the man’s eyes, temporarily blinding him and causing him to fall.  I then noticed that near where he had been standing there was a picnic table on which there was a briefcase.  When I opened the briefcase I found in it a document containing information about a woman:  her name and address, photos, and a biographical sketch.  Was the woman referred to in the document in the briefcase the woman who was to be the victim of the planned assassination?  That is what it looked like.

    If so, this answered the question of the identity of the woman who was the intended victim of the murder, and the role of the gold watch in helping to prevent her murder.  But I did not know if the man who had died was the assassin or the man who was on his way to deliver the information to the assassin.  (And I did not know who the party was who had hired the assassin.)  And, why was the man standing on the hill behind my house?  If he was the assassin, why was he not proceeding on his way to the house of his intended victim (which was several miles north of here)?  And, if he was the info delivery man, why was he not going to meet the assassin?  Had this man been placing me or my house under surveillance?  (And, if so, why was he standing there is broad daylight where anyone could see him?)  I was getting hot standing here in the sun, so I took the briefcase with its document with me and walked down to my house and sat down in the study there to ponder the situation and to try to determine my next move.

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     My pondering was unproductive.  I was reminded of an expression which was popular back in the sixties:  “I am getting nowhere fast!”.  Immediately after I gave up, I received a phone call from my old friend Jenna, whose voice brightened my day.  Jenna is an excellent FBI agent whose fine qualities were exhibited in the episode I recounted right after it occurred in 2008 (see The Strange Old Man and The Purple Ring).  She began her conversation by quickly telling me that our mutual friend, Corrie Belle Adams, would be receiving her Ph. D. degree in June.  Then she got to the main reason for her call.

     I was utterly astonished when she told me that the FBI had uncovered a plot to assassinate a woman here on my property this afternoon, namely the Welcome Wagon lady who would be visiting then.  AND, when she told me the name of this woman, I almost had a heart attack:  it was the SAME woman named on the document I found in the briefcase!!  I was so stunned I could not speak, which was good, I guess, because Jenna continued non-stop telling me the details of the op planned by the FBI which would be put into place as soon as they arrived here, which would be in about ten minutes.  Then she hurriedly said “goodbye” to which I replied with my own “goodbye”. 

      I was so nervous I could not relax so I went into the back yard and sat down again in the same chair I had earlier and decided to calm myself and get my mind off of this latest revelation by getting out my watch and enjoying its splendor and beauty.  AND THEN – I know you will NOT believe this, but I swear it really happened: the same thing that happened before – the sunlight bounced off of my watch blinding the eyes of a tough looking man standing on the hill (who looked like the other one), after which he shrieked, fell down the hill on the other side into the river and was devoured by another crocodile!!  Then I remembered one thing Jenna had said in her conversation:  the leaders of the bad guy assassin gang were called THE TWIN TOUGHIES.  I calmed myself quickly and did solve part of the puzzle of all this – from where each of them stood they could not be seen from the house, and from where I was sitting in my back yard they could not see me or my chair.

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     From this I concluded that each of these two “toughies” had been surveilling my property from the spot where I was standing, which is the ideal vantage point for this purpose.  And then, using my binoculars, I saw a surprising thing.  Near the top of the tallest tree in the front yard was an old tree house which appeared to still be in good shape.  Immediately thereafter I saw a man climbing the tree and entering this tree house in a prone position, which was necessary because (although the tree house was quite wide and long) it was not high, which is to be expected since it was made for very small children.  The man then, from the case he was carrying, withdrew the parts of a sniper rifle which he rapidly assembled.  He positioned himself so that the rifle was aimed toward the walkway leading to the front of the house.

     Fortunately, I could not be seen by this man, but, nevertheless, I walked very slowly and quietly toward and then into the back of the house.  I was so nervous I was having trouble holding my phone steady enough to call Jenna.  I finally calmed down enough to try to make the call, but then she called me.  My voice was shaking as I told her of the sniper.  She was very excited and super-happy, exclaiming, “You just did the first part of our job for us:  we do not need to look for the sniper!”.  She was profuse with thanks, which I greatly appreciated but was still very nervous.

     Based on what I had told her, she decided to keep all of the agents off the property except for herself and one other agent, who entered the property from the footpath at the peak of the hill, so as not to be observable by the sniper.  They then each positioned themselves where they could easily aim their rifles to take out the sniper.  They decided to fire simultaneously at exactly 12 Noon (a few minutes hence) when the nearby camponile would begin its loud chiming.  And, thus it was.  Both shots were “spot on”, and the sniper was taken out.  And the sound of the rifles’ firing was masked by the camponile.

 

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     Jenna then divided her crew into two teams:  one team to recover the body of the sniper and his rifle, and to take them to headquarters; and the second team to search the house and property to be certain no criminals were present.  (None were found.)  This team then was organized and posted around the perimeter of the property to prevent any criminals from entering.  None did.  And, the Welcome Wagon lady’s visit at 3 PM went off without a hitch.

     In the meantime the FBI learned the location of the criminals hideout  but when they arrived they found that the four remaining criminals in the gang had committed suicide when they learned that the sniper had been taken out.  And someone, it is not clear who, spread a rumor that the Toughie Twins had fled the country – I have no idea how that was done, but ANYWAY there was no more threat to the lady.

      I never told anyone about the Gold Watch, so it did not get any credit but it told me it did not care – it had satisfaction in knowing it had done right and accomplished a great feat.  And, of course, it must not be forgotten that silence is golden, right??!!

     And, of course, it was so good to see Jenna again, and to learn the good news about Corrie Belle, so I was rewarded in that way as well as from the property I inherited.

 

Grantville, Georgia, USA, Earth, Solar System, Galaxy, Universe

April 18, 2015

 

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RETURNING TO RURAL ROOTS: THE THIRD ADVENTURE OF THE CYANOCUBE BEARER

RETURNING  TO  RURAL  ROOTS:

THE  THIRD  ADVENTURE  OF  THE  CYANOCUBE  BEARER

By  Forrest  Wayne  Schultz

1.     Returns  Of  The  Three

     What a great way to start a day!!  I finally persuaded my supervisor to permit me to do my work at home on the computer.  AND I decided to move back into my spacious boyhood bedroom in our spacious ancestral home:  I am really sick of urban/suburban living – I yearn to return to the rural community where I grew up.

     I had no sooner finished packing my stuff into my car when I received a phone call from our family’s lawyer informing me that my father had died and that the house and farm had been put into my name after my mother died so that I now own it:  all I need to do is sign a few legal papers.  AND my father has donated his body to medical research and wishes no funeral or memorial service for which I am also grateful.  AND my father had, wisely, because of his declining health, leased out all of the pastures and fields to the adjacent farmer, so that all I will need to do is to tend to the garden and yards surrounding the house.

     When I arrived at the lawyer’s office I was pleasantly surprised to see that his son Dale, a friend from my high school years, had also decided to return to our rural community and was now working at his father’s law firm:  he had hated working at the high-pressure law firm in the city where he was treated as little better than a slave.  AND, to top it all off, Dale told me that our highly cherished school classmate Jenna, had also decided to come home to work in her family’s business and will be arriving tomorrow.

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2.     A Most Unusual Murder Mystery

     After I signed the legal papers and finished my getting-up-to-date chat with Dale I went to move into my inherited house.  I had no sooner arrived when I received a visit from yet another friend, this one from my college days.  He works for some kind of super-secret FBI-like group that has uncovered a plot to assassinate a woman at a house in the woods about a mile north of my house.  He has just finished installing into that house a super-advanced electronic surveillance system.  He is very short-handed now so he wants to install the reception devices into my house with me the monitor.  After his terse plea to me to do this, he plunked down a HUGE amount of cash to pay me.  This plus his friendship plus my sense of duty caused me to accept.  He quickly installed the equipment, instructed me in its use and then departed.  This equipment provides both an audio and video coverage of the house and the area outside the house plus a telephone tap.

     After he left and I finished moving in I contacted via the Cyanocube my supernatural friend Michael and the following conversation ensued:

“Oh, Michael, are you there?”

“Yes, I am, Cyanocube Bearer, and I have been awaiting your call!”

“Aha!  I assume then that you know about this criminal gang and their plans and that I have returned to my ancestral home and have been asked to play a role in the prevention of their crime.”

“Indeed, I do, and I have important info to convey to you.  First, your friend and his team have been brutally slain by the criminals. Second,   The entire criminal gang was killed a few minutes ago when their house sank into a sinkhole.  And, third, the woman targeted for assassination has vanished.”                              

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     I was so dumbfounded I have forgotten exactly how we concluded the conversation, except that we agreed to keep in touch.  Then I finished straightening up my bedroom and getting it stocked with food,  most of it in my minifridge so I would be near the surveillance equipment.

     The next morning an alarm went off and I heard the sound of a car coming up the driveway, followed by a video screen showing me the back of a woman getting out of this car.  I was stunned when I saw the back of her head – this woman had RED hair, not BLOND hair, as the mystery woman did!  Then she turned around and I saw her face and was thoroughly astonished when I saw that it was JENNA!! 

     Then, suddenly the answer came to me.  I remember that when we were in high school one time she told me she wanted to travel around

incognito as a blond-haired woman!  Then, after a bit of thought I decided not to say anything to anybody about this since I am now the only one alive which knows about this.

3.     A New Mystery

     As I was pondering what to do now, her phone rang and the tap showed the call was from Dale.  I immediately shut off the surveillance equipment.  To use it any more would be snooping.  In re Dale and Jenna, well, I am going to keep that as my mystery.

April 7, 2015

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Where Is Carrie ???

Where   Is   Carrie???

     For me Carrie is, figuratively speaking, “the girl next door”.  (Literally, she is the girl in the next block.)  Or was.  Until today.  When she disappeared.  Which I discovered when I saw that her car was not in her driveway – where it should have been!  A large sheet of paper affixed to her refrigerator told me to go to “you know where” – that secret place in her study – where I found her brief good-bye note:  she had made her decision to go to the mission field, something she had long spoken of as a possibility.  Details, she said, would be supplied to me by Martha, who would stop by this evening for that purpose.

     Indeed, I had no sooner read her note when I saw Martha’s car pulling into the driveway, and when she got out of her car – WOW !!  Another shocker!  Unlike her usual quiet demeanor and appearance, Martha was clad in a gorgeous dress and was bubbling over with excitement as she filled in the details of Carrie’s great fortune in finding exactly the kind of work she was hoping to do:  work to which she now will be devoting the rest of her life!    Martha was very aggressive in forbidding me to feel sorry that Carrie is now gone from here and in exhorting me to rejoice that she had found her vocation.  AND, before I knew it, I began to rejoice with ever more gusto; AND before I realized what was happening I had fallen MADLY in love with Martha.  To cut to the chase – we will be married tomorrow – she already has the license!  Whew!  As the Bible says, “you never know what a day may bring forth!”.     

Forrest W. Schultz

February 13, 2015

Last year I wrote my fortieth short story.  So, this is my 41^st.  The numbers in 2015 add up to 8, the number of new beginnings.  So, this is my new beginning! Oh, yeah, and, guess what – tomorrow is Valentine’s Day – go figure!  F.