For almost four months now, I’ve been interviewing fellow Substack writers as a part of my “On Writers” series. One of the questions I ask my guests is “When did you start writing and why?” Most of them have had adorable answers about writing stories since they could hold a pencil and how they drew their own pictures and their moms would staple their books together for them and they would sell them to the whole town and everyone thought THEY WERE SO DAMNED CUTE.
Me? I got drunk one night four years ago, decided to try my hand at a story I’d had in my head for years, and fell in love with writing. At like 2 am. Definitely not as cute, though you could do worse on a late-night bender, amirite?
But then, after my recent interview with
, where she told a similarly innocent story, I remembered that I did write a book when I was young. It’s definitely not as cute because it was a school assignment, and I think I was in 7th or 8th grade, but whatever.So I pulled said story off the kids’ bookshelf, took pictures of all the art, and typed out the text for your reading pleasure (unedited, except obvious misspellings). At least I’ve got one story that the Cozy Corner of our Fiction Crew might enjoy (and I’m pretty sure that’s only because my teacher told me this had to be a children’s story and I couldn’t behead any orcs).
The fact that I still have this little book indicates that I knew I was a writer long before I ever fully realized it. Without further ado, here is Tim’s Adventures, annotated with my ridiculous thoughts along the way.
Once there was a wood elf named Tim.1 There wasn’t really anything different about this particular elf. He was just a wood elf.2 Now believe it or not, Tim was 3956 years old and his hair was still black.3 No gray, although that is normal for elves I guess. And now that I think about it, there was something different about Tim. His eyes. They were dark blue, like none ever seen before. Everyone knew those eyes. They said his eyes held the secrets of who he was.
One day, Tim was walking through the woods (for he is a wood elf)4 and he noticed a tall tree with a tree house in it that he had never seen before. He climbed the tree as fast as he could up to the house.5 He popped his head in and saw a strange sight. It was an old man. What would an old man be doing here? Then he realized that the man was an elf because he had the pointy, elven ears. But why was he so withered with age? No elf grows old with the years. They show no sign of age, old or young.
“Who are you?” asked Tim.
The old elf looked at him and replied, “My name is too long to be worth telling. Call me Grandpa Elf.” Then he peered at Tim and said, “So what is troubling you Tim?”
“I was wondering…why do you look so old?”6
“Because I am, of course.”
“But you are an elf, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then why do you look so old?”7
“Because I am. Very old. Older than you can possibly imagine.”
“Well so am I,” explained Tim “almost 4,000 years!”8
“Then you are only a child in my eyes,” replied Grandpa Elf,9 “But that is not important. We need to get down to real business.”
“Wait. How did you know my name? And what are you talking about?” asked Tim. He was very confused by now.
Grandpa Elf looked at him and replied, “I know more about you than you do.” He leaned over and stirred the fire. “Its cooling outside. I hope we can keep a fire going long enough for this tale.”10
“What’s there to tell?”
“Much that you need to know. We will start with where you come from.”
“You were not born. I found you in the top of the tree that you now live in. That night, it glimmered with a pale blue light. I built you a house in the tree but kept you with me for a while. When you were old enough to live by yourself I showed you your house and erased me from your memory.11 I have kept an eye on you, secretly, since then. Over the centuries I have learned much about you. I believe that the stars sent you as a gift. A gift for the woodland elves.”
“A gift! What for?” asked Tim completely astonished.
“To save the elves,” continued Grandpa Elf, “to save them from being made into slaves.”
“By who!?”
“Be patient. I was getting to that. There once was a very evil elf, many, many years before you were born.12 He did many terrible things. Only I had the power to kill him. I did. But his spirit has come back. It haunts the woodland.13
He will soon ensnare us all, making us his slaves. That is, unless you defeat him once and for all. I have seen your power. Just by looking into your eyes. My eyes are the same. We are so similar. That is why I took you under my wing and named you after myself. So what do you say?14 Will you accept the challenge?”
“Well I don’t know…I’m no more than a normal wood elf and I am in no way fit for adventure.”
“But you are the only one who is fit for this adventure,” Grandpa Elf protested.
“I’m sorry,” replied Tim, “It just won’t work. You will have to find someone else to do the job.”15 With that he climbed down the tree and went home to sleep.16
Due to all the images, I’m about to hit the length limit for email. Since this is a pretty suitable halfway point, I’m going to break it into two parts. What is Tim going to do? Will he ignore the call of greatness only to spend the rest of his life trying not to stab fellow wood elves with his sharp shirt? Or will he rise to the challenge of the menacing evil elf he’s apparently never noticed before and save the day?! Find out SOON!
Tim! Not Timiflus, Tim son of Tam, Timberscaler? Just Tim?
I’m starting to understand why the original opening line of “The Wheel” was “Jack Colby was your average American man…”
Did I have an aging complex in my early teens?! I certainly don’t now because I’m quite happy with all my greys…just don’t let any of them fall out…
lol apparently my writing was snarky as heck back then, too.
Easy to do when there is a FUCKING LADDER, TIM!
Whoa, Tim. Almost four millennia of life experience, and you don’t realize this is kind of a dick move?
If at first you don’t get elf-slapped, try and try again.
The balls on this guy……..wait, do elves have………if they do, are they pointy?
Get ‘im, Gramps!
We can all agree that Grandpa Elf is Gandalf, right? I mean the name almost looks the same.
Seems unnecessary, but ok.
“Wait, was I born or was I not born?” - Tim, probably
We can all agree that the evil elf spirit is Sauron, right? The Necromancer of Dol Guldur IN THE MIDDLE OF WOODLAND INHABITED BY WOOD ELVES?
I say there are two elves named Tim?
Is this “Gone in 60 Seconds” now or what? The job?
Again, the pointy cahones on this guy…
This is awesome. I love the fact that he just goes by "Grandpa Elf" lol
I totally have some LOTR-inspired stuff from childhood, too. I feel like it's a rite of passage!
I remember that book! Glad you kept it!