It began as a small bump on a small twig of a limb. A minute bump on a large silver maple tree, it had no self awareness. Winter was nearing its end and Spring was about to enter as a whisper in the warming wind. All the plants were coming back to life. Within a week, the little nub became a bud. Jefferson, the leaf, was about to be born, Jeff as he would be known to friends and family.
This silver maple tree stood alone and proud in the front yard of the Mason's house. It had been there through the birth of the three children. Their parents had planted the tree when they had moved into the house. That had been fifteen years before. Winter had been cold, but it was now the beginning of March.
Jeff could feel pressure from the tree and the tension releasing on the other sides of the shell which formed his bud. Suddenly it split. "I can breathe," said Jeff as he first tasted fresh air and started to emerge. Jeff, a new leaf, was born. Rapidly over the days which followed, he began to grow into a full size leaf. By the middle of April, he was and adult leaf. As an adult leaf he turned darker green on the top which faced the sun and silvery on the underside.
Jeff loved the sensation of the sun, the wind, and the rain. He also loved the darkness of the night. Thrilled by the music of the birds and locusts, he even liked the sounds of traffic and sirens. As he breathed, he filtered the air making oxygen for animals, humans and fire. Thus he was recycling the air.
Jeff could tell the well being of the tree and the tree sensed its environment through him and the other leaves like him. The sap of the tree ran through Jeff's veins like blood in a human and the veins also acted like nerves conveying signals to the tree and back. Jeff was fed through these veins.
Spring passed and it became Summer. Sometimes it got so hot that Jeff felt as though he would be baked. The temperature was over a hundred degrees for days at a time. After a while with no rain and cooking under the hot sun, some of the leaves began to turn brown on the edges and fall. Jeff was lucky. He was getting enough water from the roots of the tree to hang on. The Mason's began watering the tree and it gradually began to perk up and the leaves stopped falling. It had lost about a fourth of its leaves. Jeff had sensed the tree's concern for itself. It could have died.
Finally rain began to come again and the Mason's no longer watered the tree. Temperature was beginning to drop and the season was changing. Jeff was beginning to run out of time. As it got colder the tree began to supply less food and water to Jeff. It was getting hard for him to hold on. His color changed to yellow then to brown. He stopped feeling anything. Then one day with a gust of wind, he came loose from the tree and floated to the ground. His life was over now, but come the end of winter new Jeffersons would bud and spring from the good old silver maple tree.
Author notes
Childrens, Inspirational
In a list
A contest entry
- Nature's Beauty At Its Best by KingWolf.
525 points, ended May 6, 2007, 9 entries
Honorable mention
• next story in this contest, remove from contest - Concept Short Story by otnemem.
139 points, ended May 25, 2007, 10 entries
Gold trophy winner
• next story in this contest, remove from contest - Nature's Best by felanor.
200 points, ended June 5, 2007, 9 entries
Honorable mention
• next story in this contest, remove from contest - SILENCE IS A LOVELY WORD by Violette.
170 points, ended April 18, 11 entries
Bronze trophy winner
• next story in this contest, remove from contest - Children's Stories by Adele Ellen Bakker.
300 points, ended July 30, 33 entries
Honorable mention
• next story in this contest, remove from contest - ANYTHING ABOUT TREES!!!!!! by Avalanche..
175 points, ended July 17, 8 entries
Silver trophy winner
• next story in this contest, remove from contest
Please tell me what you think
Comments
1 - 39 of 39
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How Lovely, this is someting I might have read when I was working with pre-schoolers or kindergarden.. It lends itself well to pictures and teaches without them knowing it.. Always a bonus.
My favorite line was (whisper in the warming wind) beautiful .
beginning: 5, language: 5, plot: 5, ending: 5, dialog: 5, characters: 5.
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Ah! Artaq!
You found one of my few kiddie stories. Don't let it get out that I've written any!
I'm very pleased that you like this. I tried to get it published in an ezine and they severly criticized it
. I haven't tried to do a rewrite. I rarely go back for rewrites. I'm not good with them and I figure it's best to move ahead. If I become successful, my publishers or people I hire can fix up the stories I've already written.
Andy
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This is a great way to introduce children to the cycle of life by personifying a leaf. Would make a good 'early reader' for environmental studies. I hope DD likes it too... we shall see if it passes the seven-year-old test. Good luck
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Hi Adele!
I hope this passes the DD7 test. I'm not really in the habit of writing children's stories. Most of my stuff is for adults.
Thanks for hosting.
Andy
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aww that was cute!!! I love the description and the topic!!
Good Luck!
Silent
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Hi Raven!
Thanks for hosting this contest and for reading, commenting, and all the applause. I appreciate it. I'm glad you like Jefferson.
May you have many goood entries and much fun.
Andy
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Nice. At the end, he falls and dies, though. All the little two-year-olds would be crying, "Nooo, not Jeff!" A nice story, though. Thanks for entering.
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Hi!
Thanks for hosting this contest and for reading and commenting. I appreciate it.
It's true that the leaf dies, but at the end it says there will be many more Jeffersons.
I hope you have many good entries and much fun.
Andy
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Great concept!
I was completely swept away by your originality. But I would also like to ask the same question as the person below me- where is this freak tree of nature and why is it in season?
Then again, it's a short story so it doesn't have to make sense.
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Hi!
I'm very glad you like this story.
Thanks for hosting this contest and for reading, commenting, and applauding. I appreciate it. I hope you have many good entries and much fun.
Hmm. What do you mean, 'why is it in season?'.
Andy
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I meant....
As in why did it have leaves? probably shouldn't have said 'in season' I guess. That's proly only for flowers huh?
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this was a cute story. I wonder just where this tree was that it would be full of leaves in April. Anyways, I liked this story a lot. I can tell why you have so many trophies for it!
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Hi!
My silver maple is full of leaves here in Oklahoma. I'm glad you like this story. Thanks for reading me, commenting, and all the applause. I appreciate it.
Andy
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This is a very different interesting piece. i enjoyed it the thought of a leave having a name and a life like you have described brought a smile to my face.
Good write and a great read
good work keep it up and thanks for entering -
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Hi Kmp!
It's good to be competing in another of your contests. I hope you like this story.
Thanks for hosting this contest and for reading and commenting. I appreciate it. May you have many good entries and much fun.
Andy
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it's good but it's not really my taste
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Thanks
Thanks for hosting this contest and for reading and commenting. I appreciate it. I hope you have many good entries and much fun.
Andy
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INTERESTING!
This really was interesting and you could see you are very talented to get such weird and wonderful ideas come to your head.I enjoyed reading this beacause it was different.
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Thanks
Thanks for hosting this contest and for reading and commenting. I am glad that you found this interesting and I'm glad that you enjoyed it. I really appreciate it. Thanks again.
Andy
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I loved Jeff. You portrayed him well, his hopes, his fears, his likes and dislikes. You personified him perfectly. I also like how it was aimed for children. The story wasn't long, it wasn't complicated, but it did well to describe the life cycle of a tree's leaves.
Well written, and good luck in my contest.
~Felanor
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Thanks, Felanor
Thanks for hosting this contest and for reading, commenting, and applauding. I really appreciate it. I am glad you like Jeff. It was a fun write. I hope you have many good entries and a lot of fun.
Andy
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this is nice, maybe a little too nice in comparison to the examples i gave but this was very interesting, i like original narratives and this was short sweet and entertaining, a strong contender for my competition.
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Thanks
Thanks for hosting this contest and for reading and commenting. I really appreciate it. I'm glad to be a contender. I hope you have many good entries and a lot of fun.
Andy
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A great story Andy Well done and very well written Good luck in the contest.
~Princess~ -
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Thanks, Princess
Are you related to PrinceWolf? I hope I do well in the contest. Thanks for reading and commenting. Are you entering?
Andy
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This was a cute story. I enjoyed reading it and loved how you gave even a simple leaf a name and personality of its own. Thank you for entering my contest and good luck.
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Thanks
Thanks for hosting this contest and for reading and commenting. I hope you have many entries almost as good as mine. I also hope you have a lot of fun with your contest. This was different for me. I don't usually write children's stories. I hope you didn't mind that this is aimed at a young audience.
Andy
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I totally loved this story. It was awesome. I love being able to picture everything in my mind. The best of luck to you in the contest.
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Thanks
I am glad that you like this story. It is quite a change from my usual writing. I am very pleased that you like this so well. Thanks for reading and commenting.
Andy
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This reminds me of the children's specials that used to be on when I was younger....ones that showed the life of some object and how it interacted with the other things around it. Very well written and nicely descriptive.
Thank you for entering, and good luck in the contest.
beginning: 4, plot: 5, ending: 4, characters: 4.
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Thanks, Barbara
I am glad that you like this story. I don't usually write children's stories, but something came over me and I gave it a try. Thanks for hosting, reading, commenting, and applauding.
Andy
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enjoyable
Hi Andy, a great bit of light reading, and a nice twist on being born living and dying.
very well done.
beginning: 3, language: 5, plot: 5, ending: 4, dialog: 4, characters: 4.
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Thanks, Bill
Thanks for reading, commenting, and applauding. I tried to write a children's story. That's not really my forte. I'm glad you like it. You think kids would?
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nicely written. Descriptive and almost educational. I liked the masterful style that this was written in. You've transformed an ordinarily mundane object into an object for concern.
The subtle metaphor for human existence in this piece is very impressive. -
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Thanks
Thanks for reading and commenting. I am glad that you felt for Jefferson. This was a short write for the Mod Squad Challenge contest. I am also glad that you like this piece.
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this was a side of your writing I hadn't seen before and was very impressed with. A leafy children's story and you told it so well I hope you give some more of these a try I must admit I had the theme to the Jefferson's bouncing around My head "Moving on Up"
well done You have risen to the challenge and completed three different and interesting writes. I hope you had fun writing them and will try your hand at other Genres in the future, thank you very much for your entry. All the best in the contest
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Thank you, Paul
Thanks for all the applause. Two of the stories were genres I hadn't tried in story writing, adult comedy, and children's writing. War stories I'd done before. I had fun, but I know that the competition is tough. Thanks for all the applause and the nice comments.
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Good
Hey, this might have been inspirational in a sense...but it was sad too...especially the ending. Good work, man. Wow. I never thought that I'd ever really read anything like this and enjoy it...but you made it interesting. Good work. -
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Thanks
It was kind of a documentary. I had intended more dialogue, but it just didn't come out that way. Anyway, seems like a children's story. I hope the judges like it. It is not my forte.
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