Gena’s senses are filled
Gena could feel the cool wind whipping at her hair as she stood clasping Noah’s hand tightly. It felt warm and big and strong, enfolding her small fingers in its embrace. Wrapping her fingers around his made her feel safe after years of grasping in the darkness with noone to guide her. She was so glad she had finally found him, her fingers tentatively brushing his in the blackness until he had firmly gripped her hand and brought her with him, and a bond had been formed that nothing could break.
“Do yew know what we be standin’ before me lovely Gena?”, his deep, gentle voice said somewhere close to her ear.
Gena could not guess what it was. She thought by the tangy taste of salt on the air they must be somewhere close to the sea, but they had walked quite a ways from the ships. By her reckoning they must have turned back towards the coast after walking further inland. The soil felt gritty beneath her feet and she could smell the sharp scent of the Cypress trees which liked to grow quite near to the sand.
“Are we standin’ near the beach?”, she asked tentatively not sure what he expected her to say, desperate not to disappoint him.
“Come now let us be walkin’ a little closer and we will see what yew be thinkin’ then”.
He gently guided her forward about ten paces and then they stopped again. Suddenly there were new scents on the breeze, the smell of freshly sawed wood, the sandy smell of mortar, the rising scent of packed dirt.
“We are standin’ near some buildin’ aren’t we”, she said, “but whose I cannot tell”.
She ran through the list of buildings that were being worked on but could not determine which it was.
“It’s bein’ ours my beautiful Gena”, her husband’s voice whispered in her ear, “Come and let me show yew, but first we’ll be goin’ round the back of the house”.
Gena didn’t know what to think, what to say. She had not thought to have a house built for them before the little baby came. She had pictured them all three, crowding into the the small confines of their room on the ship. She had not dared to wish for something more, believing she would be happy and cosy with her loved ones even in such cramped conditions. She had not dreamt of this.
Noah led her behind the small structure.
“Here is where we’ll be havin’ some pigs and a cow when the weather turns good again”, Gena could hear the pride in his voice, “the King hisself has promised us a fine milkin’ cow and five pigs.
She tentatively reached out her hand to stroke the well-made fence that would contain their own farm animals. The fence felt strong and sturdy beneath her hand, the beams interlocking snugly, each one perfectly straight. She could not see the things her husband made with his hands, but she could feel the way they fit together and knew that he was very good at what he did.
“Come now, I want to be tellin’ yew about what else we have ourselves on this fine piece of land we have here”, he paused thoughtfully, “our own land it’s bein’ too.
It seemed a very great thing for them to have their own land, where before they had face a lifetime of working another man’s land for pittance, barely able to feed themselves. She wished the war had not happened, that their great city had not fallen, but she could see the good in this for them too.
She felt the ground gently sloping downwards beneath her feet as they walked a little way from the house.
“Now me love”, Noah said and she could hear the joy in his voice, “we be standin’ lookin’ directly out towards the sea”.
Gena felt the cool, salty breeze on her face and she could hear the waves rushing up the beach, over the sand.
“And right before you reach the water there’s bein’ a stand of tall Cypress trees”.
She could hear the wind rustling the leaves in the trees, smell the dark scent of their resin, feel the coolness of the shadows cast from their broad branches.
She heard his voice fill with pride again, “and a little bit before you reach those there trees I’ve planted us some apple trees from the seeds the King hisself has given us. They should be burstin’ through the ground when Spring comes along and one day we’ll be havin’ ourselves a fine little grove”.
She could detect the scent of freshly turned earth, a warm damp, slightly sandy smell. She thought it would be very good indeed in a few years to be able to pull down those ripe, crunchy apples and taste the juicy sweetness on her tongue.
“Now you must be comin’ over here too”, Noah was tugging at her hand as eagerly as a child.
“So where do you think we are bein’ standin’ my dear one?”, he asked, his body close to hers.
She stood for a minute thinking. She could hear the tone of the wind changing as it move through some other trees, their leaves must be dangling closer to the ground. She felt a gentle brushing against her face and reached up to grasp the hanging leaves between her fingers. She listened carefully and somewhere below her she could hear the gentle gurgle of a brook, running over smoothed pebbles and down to the ocean.
“And we have a brook on our land too my love?”, she said her voice filled with joy, questioning him although she already new the answer.
“That we do my dearest”, he answered his voice full of happiness.
She tilted her head and listened carefully.
“And by the sound of it, we’ve got ourselves as fair a fishin’ pond as that ole Engin has too”.
She did not see Noah gently shaking his head, as always astounded by how attuned his wife’s other four senses were.
“Shall I take yew over to the house now then”, he asked.
“Yes… please… let’s go”, she said, her voice filled with excitement.
He led his wife back to the front of the house, and then carefully helped her up the steps so they were standing in front of the door.
“Here we are then… home sweet home”, he put his arm around her shoulder as they stood there.
Gena reached out the back of her hand to feel the wall of the house that Noah had built for her.
“Why Noah”, she cried in suprise, stroking the cool stones gently, “it’s bein’ made of stone… however did you make this in time”.
He could have winked if she had been able to see him, but as it was Noah was not the winking type and he gently took her hand instead.
“Well.. since we men been finished on the Rawtharn’s cottage over there we’ve had time to build this one here and I put in a bit of extra time before that… that’s why yew haven’t been seein’ so much o’ me in the evenings my love. I hope yew’ll be forgivin’ me. And that good lad Steen has been helpin’ a lot and the King hisself said we could be usin’ some of the stone. And I thought to myself… we should build out of stone now so I can be keepin’ yew and the wee baby warm this winter”, he paused for a minute, “it’s not bein’ as big a the Rawtharn’s then, but I think it’s bein’ warmer and we can always make it bigger when more young’uns are comin. I think there’ll be bein’ enough room for us three for the time bein”.
He rubbed her swollen belly thoughtfully.
She wrapped her arms around his waist and pulled him as close as she could with her belly as large as it was now. She smiled up into his face her hand on his broad shoulder.
“Thank yew Noah… it’s bein’ the most nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me”, she said and then kissed him soundly.
“Now… are yew plannin’ to be takin’ me on the inside tour?”.
Hooray for houses! How wonderful these two are… Noah describing everything to her, in his very amusing dialect, and Gena’s reactions. I love it! Quite the house, too. I’m sure you’re happy to finally get a roof over some of these folk’s heads!
Of course, with the sweet post… I can’t help but wander if something evil lurks around the bend…
I love these Welcome Home chapters.
And it’s about time we get a healthy dose of Noah after these recent glimpses of him.
I thought it was wonderful how Noah described everything, too, but I also enjoyed reading Gena’s perceptions, how she was using her ears and her nose to tell her so much of what was around her. Even her hands, as when she was feeling the fence.
That one picture by the brook scared me a bit though… I hope Gena doesn’t go wandering out there alone — that bank is steep! (I am a little afraid of heights, though, so maybe it is just me.)
You crack me up with your peasant dialect. “I think there’ll be bein’ enough room for us three for the time bein”…
Ah, well, I suppose it is soon back to the evil stuff, but this chapter was a nice break. But there should be a new baby coming quite soon, methinks! Not to mention Gena looks like she’s about to burst. Cute! I can’t wait for the babies to start coming.
Hi. yey! glad to see some people are happy and we are getting closer to seeing the babies which is nice.
It’s good that Gena has a sweet caring husband like Noah. I hope my future husband is like that!.
Keep Simming!.
See ya.
Wow that girl has got some senses! I loved the way you wrote that. Noah is so good to her. This was a nice chapter to read after the one before it. I’m glad that there are some happy couples on the island.
Wow… I’m sorry I didn’t realise I had totally forgotten to respond to these comments… sorry
I am so happy to finally have some houses to play around with. I am trying to be realistic about this whole colonial thing but it had been hard just playing with these boring wooden rooms.
I realised I had been neglecting Noah and Gena a lot… out of all the couples till now they had the least posts written about them. So it’s nice to get to know them a bit more. Also we had never even seen them together till now.
Don’t worry Lothere… Gena is pretty good at finding her way around… she had arleady learnt where the steep fall to the creek is and will be careful
heights are a bit scary though.
I’m with you there Pandora… Noah is wonderful. I guess I love him because he is kind… when you’ve been in contact with unkind people in your life you come to value simple kindness.
Yeah Tiana… actually it seems like the peasants are the happy happy ones at the moment.
Noah and Gena are so perfect it’s kind of hard to imagine them without each other. They’re so in love and happy and trustful. ^^
Verity, you do an excellent job with Noah and Gena. It’s amazing how well the senses can take in when sight can’t be relied on. I never realized it fully until I was taking an Orientation and Mobility class during my undergrad (I’m certified to teach the Visually Impaired). We were blindfolded at various times to learn techniques and it was a real eye opener (pardon the cliched pun). Noah is perfect with her. He’s not overbearing, but he gives her the info she needs. If you were to bring him out into the real world people would call him a saint for being with Gena.
That must have been a really interesting class to take. I am always amazed by how well people do when they are blind or deaf. The fact that deaf people can learn to speak amazes me. And when you think about Helen Keller… she was blind and deaf! And she could speak a bit just from feeling the way people held their throats when they were talking. That is just so phenomenal.
I’m really glad Gena has Noah. She is really lucky in that time (well I guess not so lucky since I made her and I can decide whether she has a nice husband or not). But back in those days she would just be seen as a burden on society. Poor girl.
It was interesting. I also had to learn to read Braille by sight. Though attitudes toward the blind have come a long way, I think to many they’re still looked at as a burden. Something like 70% of people with severe visual impairments are unemployed in the US alone. When people find out that my BF is legally blind they suddenly look at me like I’m Mother Theresa. Oftentimes all people see is the blindness and not the person behind it. I’d say Gena is lucky no matter what time period you put her in.
(And now that I feel like a total comment whore I’m going to go catch up on what I’ve missed over in Lothere.)
Your boyf is blind? I am really flattered that you think I write Gena and Noah’s relationship well. I try to make it seem realistic but I don’t have any experience with that so I wasn’t sure how well it would come out.
I think you are very right about people just seeing someone’s disability and not thinking about the actual person. I can’t believe that 70% of visually impaired people in the US are unemployed! That is terrible! I don’t understand why it should be like that, there is no reason they can’t do lots of jobs perfectly well if the companies would just be more accommodating. This has been something I have been trying to explore with Gena, the fact that people assume that she can’t do anything and she is just a burden. When really she works just as hard and can handle most things just as well as everyone else.
I love your comments so don’t feel like a comment whore. There is nothing better than to open up my website and see a whole lot of new comments
I cheated with my blind character (Kiv, back in the day) and made him have superhuman other senses. As he said, he could run to the lakeshore despite being blind. Honestly, the topics of disabilities is one of those I’m afraid to touch, because someone with some experience is going to come along and know I got it all wrong, or did it too shallow-ly. I tend to stick to what I know, which a writer is supposed to do anyway, I guess.
I do have another somewhat-handicapped character coming up, but once again….
Yes, my BF is blind. BUT he’s not totally blind, he does have a small amount of vision. What he has is degenerative so he eventually will be totally blind though. Gena and Noah’s relationship is very genuine and loving.
I think part of the problem for corporations is that while the technology is there to make most jobs accessible to people who are visually impaired it is extremely expensive. It is therefore much easier (read: cheaper) to hire someone who is not. My mother’s reaction when she first heard that the BF was blind was not very kind. She basically thought I’d end up being the main breadwinner and housekeeper. It’s not true though. My BF cooks, I don’t. He cleans, does his own laundry, is gainfully employed. I’m the one without a real full time job. I love how you handle Gena. She has her insecurities, which everyone does, but she is very capable and works very hard.
Lothere, I can definitely understand your reluctance to write about disabilities. The one thing I think writers have in their favor is that in general, no two people with the same disability have the same experience. I’ve worked with people who are visually impaired, hearing impaired, autistic, physically impaired, emotionally impaired and on down the list. Each person is different, and each handle life in a different way. But ultimately, when you’re writing you need to stick to what you’re comfortable with.
Oh and Verity, if you’re interested in Helen Keller, there’s this awesome new book called Miss Spitfire: Reaching Helen Keller by Sarah Miller. It is about Annie Sullivan, who was also visually impaired.
It is a very sensitive topic to write about disabilities so I hope I do okay with Gena. It is hard to write something that you can’t comprehend but I still want to try. And I guess you can sort of try and get a feeling for what its like, as Cearbhaill said with her orientation and mobility classes, trying to do various things with a blindfold on, or just trying to take away that sense and concentrate on the others for a while. But it is something that I could never truly understand so at times it is hard to write and I run the risk of offending someone, which I hope I never do.
I guess I end up sticking to what I know in the end though because I constantly am worrying that my characters start to converge into one person that is probably me
So I am always trying to think about who different people react to various situation and not do my reaction or an extremely cliched stereotypical reaction.
I am wondering if this somewhat-handicapped character is one we have already met Lothere… or is it a completely new character. Malo? or maybe Estrid and Brede’s son, ack I can’t remember his name. I wonder how things are going with them actually. Those kids must be almost teenagers now.
And I’ll check out that book Cearbhaill, it sounds interesting.
Oh I forgot about poor Daeglan. He has some developmental and/or personality problems, but I have been neglecting that family so terribly the last few years. So much so that you think he’s close to a teen!
He & his sister just turned 6 in August.
I plan on doing more with Daeg later, though, and hope I can do it convincingly. Eeps. Now that I know Cearbhaill is reading…
I don’t really count Malo as handicapped in my mind, but I guess he is. He is quite good at communicating through gestures by now after a thousand years working at it, but he can still only truly make himself understood for abstract or complicated things through writing. And most people don’t know how to read in the 11th century, so he’s perhaps more handicapped than a mute man would be nowadays.
I will be doing more with Malo soon, and I would bet that finding myself confronted with the practical difficulties of writing a chapter about a man who can’t talk will quickly change my perception of him into his being somewhat handicapped indeed.
The character I meant is not entirely new, but close…
Sorry for filling your blog with comments about my own story…
Whoops… I can’t believe he is only 6. Hmmm… now I am totally intrigued about who the character is going to be. And please don’t hesitate to comment about your story in my blog, I think I do it quite a lot in yours (oops sorry). And I asked you anyway
. And I think it is interesting to compare storylines sometimes as well as writing techniques and issues that one has to deal with writing these sort of stories.