{"id":8446,"date":"2014-06-16T19:28:20","date_gmt":"2014-06-16T23:28:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/?p=8446"},"modified":"2025-12-24T09:49:13","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T14:49:13","slug":"between-the-twelfth-of-never-and-forever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/?p=8446","title":{"rendered":"Between the Twelfth of Never and Forever… (by BluewindFarm)"},"content":{"rendered":"

SUMMARY:\u00a0 <\/strong>A time of contemplation as a man reflects on what’s happened in the past, and what good could come from any of it. —\u00a0 \u2018How am I gonna be an optimist about this?\u2019 —<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Rating: \u00a0K \u00a0(695 words)
\n<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

A Seedling Challenge inspired short story.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Finding Solace Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Between the Twelfth of Never and Forever<\/a>
\nBetween Forever and Where No One Stands Alone<\/a>
\nSo, This is Christmas<\/a>
\nNot as Originally Designed<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Between the Twelfth of Never and Forever…<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2018How am I gonna be an optimist about this?\u2019 <\/em>he thought to himself.<\/span><\/p>\n

The man sat watching the lives of others moving around him, and remembered all the changes that happened during his life.<\/span><\/p>\n

‘People come and people go, I just never expected to one of those who\u2026 went.’<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

*****<\/span><\/p>\n

It had been a dream that drove a man to cross the country to find land in the wilderness to call his own \u2013 The Ponderosa.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ben Cartwright had raised three sons who any man, or woman, would be proud to call their own.\u00a0 Three sons were nurtured with love and respect by their father, always with the memory of their mothers.<\/span><\/p>\n

The ranch had prospered with the first shovel that pierced the soil, turned the earth, and became the foundation for everything else that was to come.\u00a0 The abundance of livestock in the herds of cattle and horses that roamed within the boundaries of their thousand square miles was proof that they were doing right by the land.\u00a0 Stands of fir and pine were harvested and replanted as good stewards of nature\u2019s bounty.\u00a0 As for the mines\u2026\u00a0 no strip mining would ever touch this jewel of the Sierra-Nevada.<\/span><\/p>\n

One son had left for college, but returned once he received his degrees\u2026\u00a0 The other two sons had no inclination to seek a higher education, they wanted nothing more than to live their lives right there.\u00a0 Oh, they might leave for a little while, cattle drives, vacations, business trips, or to help a friend, but their hearts were as firmly entrenched within the land as the trees for which their ranch took its name.<\/span><\/p>\n

Over the years, there were distant family members who had essentially visited<\/em>, left their mark on their hearts, and moved on\u2026\u00a0 Abel Stoddard, Gunnar Borgstrom, Clay Stafford, Cousin Clarissa, Cousin Muley, and Cousin Will.\u00a0 But then there were the close family members who were such an unforgettable part of their lives\u2026 Elizabeth, Inger, Marie, and Adam\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Adam\u2026 He\u2019s somewhere out there making his mark in the lives of others.\u00a0 The man remembered the day Adam had proclaimed his desire to see the world, to maybe put his degrees to good use elsewhere.\u00a0 Far-away lands and people, the desire to see the locations of literature\u2019s classics\u2026 the draw had been too keen, he couldn\u2019t resist the yearning any longer.\u00a0 The Ponderosa could no longer sustain him.\u00a0 That had been a sad day in the lives of the family; Adam had left to seek his own dream.<\/span><\/p>\n

And then there were new members to the family,<\/em> Jamie and Alice\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

*****<\/span><\/p>\n

The man remembered a younger Little Joe, and how the two older brothers would relentlessly tease him about the \u2018girl of the month\u2019 once he was old enough to be interested in girls. \u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2018Cain\u2019t believe Shortshanks finally found someone to settle down with and become a husband, and a father\u2026\u00a0 yeah, he woulda made a great father.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2018Pa always said everythin’ happens for a reason, but I know Joe cain\u2019t accept that right now.\u00a0 Probably won’t for some time to come.\u00a0 Shucks, I had to go an\u2019 die on him and now this\u2026\u2019<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

The big man had been as helpless as everyone else.\u00a0 Forced to watch from afar as the flames consumed the house while Joe urged the team and wagon to race across the land; Candy and Jamie held on for dear life.\u00a0 How he wished Joe could have been in time.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2018My little brother ain\u2019t never done nothin\u2019 to deserve somethin\u2019 like this happenin\u2019 to him.\u00a0 Pa neither for that matter.\u00a0 Guess the only thin’ good to come from what happened is that I\u2019ll get to help Alice raise Joe\u2019s child.\u00a0 That, and Marie is dotin\u2019 on her first grandchild somethin\u2019 fierce.’<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

~The End<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

NOTE:\u00a0 The opening thought in this story was the prompt from a weekly Seedling Challenge.\u00a0 <\/strong>This story is a Missing Scene or What Happened Later for Forever,<\/span><\/span> with part of the title inspired by the Jonny Mathis song, Twelfth of Never.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tags:\u00a0 Family, grief<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SUMMARY:\u00a0 A time of contemplation as a man reflects on what’s happened in the past, and what good could come from any of it. —\u00a0 \u2018How am I gonna be an optimist about this?\u2019 <\/p>\n

Rating: \u00a0K \u00a0(695 words)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":3495,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"template-full-width-post.php","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[23,41,61,13,40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8446","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drama","category-hurtcomfort","category-missing-scene","category-whn","category-challenges","wpcat-23-id","wpcat-41-id","wpcat-61-id","wpcat-13-id","wpcat-40-id"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/godshands.jpg?fit=1133%2C717&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8446"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8446\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}