Previous Challenge Entry (Level 3 - Advanced)
Topic: Sad (07/26/07)
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TITLE: Rejection! Rejection! Rejection! | Previous Challenge Entry
By Marilyn Schnepp
07/29/07 -
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It was after midnight when I stepped into the all-night diner. "A cup of coffee, please," I said to the girl beind the counter as I shook out my umbrella and sat down on a stool. The diner was almost empty and the juke box was playing an old Ray Price song, which was telling anyone who was interested...the sad story of my life.
"...Hear the whisper of the raindrops
Blowing soft against the window
And make believe you love me
One more time...For the Good Times."
Taking a sip of coffee, I dropped a dime in the slot on the counter, punched D-4, closed my eyes and listened to the sad song play again; not once, not twice, but as long as my dimes held out.
"Don't look so sad,
I know it's over;
but life goes on
and this old world will keep on turning."
By the time I left the all-night diner, my mascara was smudged, and my heart was on my soulder for all the world to see. I'd spent a fortune on the juke box and only one dime on coffee. Later, as I lay alone in my bed I could still here the words of the song walking through my mind:
"Don't say a word
About tomorrow or forever,
There'll be time enough for sadness
When you leave me."
And I cried myself to sleep.
TEN YEARS LATER:...Same time, same place; but this time the coffee was fifty cents a cup and the story of my life was on B-6 instead of D-4, and it took a quarter; but I listened to Diana Ross tell it like it is:
"Good morning, heartache
You old gloomy sight,
Good morning, heartache
Thought we said 'good-by' last night.
"Might as well get used
To you hanging round...
Good morning, heartache,
...Sit down."
Jesus wept, Simon Peter went out and wept bitterly, and once again I cried myself to sleep.
That's life. Take, for instance, the young man who was away at school and wastefully spent his father's hard earned money on booze, party girls and foolishness; and then when he was broke, he'd write home and ask his father for some more money.
His father, who was not a rich man, finally decided enough was enough; so the next time his son wrote and asked for more funds, (which came in the briefest of brief Telegrams) - it read: "No mon, no fun, your son."
So the father immediately sent back a terse telegram of his own, which read: "Too bad, so sad, your dad."
As a writer of sorts, I find this brief, simplistic correspondence between father and son a perfect example of how a writer can turn an "Ouch" into a grin. A sad tale of woe into a chuckle.
The "Ouch" of rejection comes to all, even to Jesus, the Savior of the world - who was rejected by His people, His home town, and even His friend, Simon Peter; and just for a moment while He hung in agony upon the cross...He cried out in a loud voice to His Father, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me."
Don't look so sad, my friend, for Jesus has promised that "He will never leave thee nor forsake thee." And I believe.
Yes, Jesus wept. Peter went out and wept bitterly; and I, an earthling from the fallen planet Earth cry myself to sleep every night - but tomorrow; tomorrow there'll be no more tears, no more sadness, and no more crying.
Soon, the sad state of affairs on planet Earth will come to an end; no more "kiss offs, put downs, brush offs or rejections"... and happiness will reign forever.
"Even so, come, Lord Jesus." (Rev. 22:20 KJV)
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I would have briefly, even in just a sentence or two, revealed why the narrator was so sad.
I liked the transition from the serious to the hopeful and happy ending.