#1. Story - Toy Soldiers

First Draft:

"Time really doesn’t heal; it just blurs things..” He muttered, his face immune to every emotion it tried to portray. “Have you ever noticed that flowers don’t bloom for every season? Well, I am a howling winter with a sheet of solid ice. I haven’t seen life for years.” A repetition of images displayed in his mind, passing like a movie of the times his father held his hand, with sheer warmth and love. His mouth contorted into a bittersweet sneer and then calmed, the images subsided into the abyssal depth of his mind.
The day was sunny while the breeze was absolute cold, cutting through his layers of clothing. “The wind never held any common sense,” He replied as if the weather was talking to him. “It never held any common sense or happiness - why should I?” A pile of grey stones lay in front of him only to be scattered from the kick of his black boot. No matter how many times he kicked that pile of rocks they would never form the shape he wanted, just as whenever he tried to control his life it would never follow through as he wanted.
Abruptly he stopped, while the wind carried on. “I stand here today, just as any other day. But today I stand here no longer as a naïve boy of misfortune, today I am a free man who will do as he wants and live as he wants. No more toy soldiers or guns, nor being governed by the shadow of that little boy and that mountain of a man. This is a new day of hope and clarity, this will be THE day, a day that I will tell my son about. Son, That day I stopped believing in high above and down below. That day I stopped believing he was ever coming back.

Final Copy:

“Time really doesn’t heal; it just blurs things..” he muttered, his face immune to every emotion it tried to portray. “Have you ever noticed that flowers don’t bloom for every season? Well, I am a howling winter with a sheet of solid ice. I haven’t seen life for years.” A repetition of images ran around in his mind, passing like a movie of the times his father held his hand, with sheer warmth and love. His mouth contorted into a bittersweet sneer and then calmed, the images subsided into the abyssal depth of his mind.
The day was sunny while the breeze was utterly freezing, cutting through his layers of clothing. “The wind never held any common sense,” He replied as if the weather was talking to him. “It never held any common sense or happiness - why should I?” A pile of grey stones lay in front of him only to be scattered from the kick of his black boot. The stones strewn over the road reminded him of the scattered pieces of his life, never would he be able to put them properly back into place.
Abruptly he stopped, while the wind carried on. “I stand here today, just as any other day. But today I stand here no longer as a naïve boy of misfortune, today I am a free man who will do as he wants and live as he wants. No more toy soldiers or guns, nor being governed by the shadow of that little boy and that mountain of a man. This is a new day of hope and clarity, this will be THE day, a day that I will tell my son about. Son, that day I stopped believing in high above and down below. That day I stopped believing he was ever coming back.

Reflective Exploration:

I included this short story as one of my final pieces in my portfolio as I think it is one of the best pieces I drafted over this semester in class. I thought that I went really in depth with the man’s emotions and described the setting very well.
For my target audience, I drifted towards teenagers/ young adults. This is what I seem to do a lot of the time because I feel it is the only audience I can relate to and feel that the audience can relate to me as well.
As for techniques- I tried to use flashbacks when he thinks about his father and the times they use to share, imagery- to try and make the reader imagine the place and feelings. I also used metaphors to give an even more vivid picture of the scene and emotions.
My self-evaluation in attempting to use the aforementioned techniques is that of course it can always be better. I believe that I can create some good metaphors and similes to describe a scene or a person. I need to increase my vocabulary to create more modified and descriptive scenes and emotions to make the plot even more realistic!
Overall, this piece does contribute to my growth as a writer I believe, because I really tried to be as descriptive as possible and tried to put in as much emotion as possible, more so then anything I had written previously!