I scrolled down the page just yesterday and noticed just how much Second Life stuff was taking up the screen. Well that just won’t do! I want to maintain a balance here, between that which is done digitally in a user-innovation based virtual world and that which is not. Thus, I present to you Miss Liz.
Miss Liz has always been a curious creature. Her parents always thought so, in any case. She never maintained a steady collection of friends – they would come and they would go just as quickly, once they figured out she truly was as ‘weeeiiirrrrd’ as the other children said. It bothered her not.
It was late in the month of June when the fateful event occurred: boarding school. ‘There’s nothing more proper than boarding school, to set a girl on the right path!’ her Aunt Hettie would proclaim, while shoving handfuls upon handfuls of glossy brochures with perpetually smiling girls on them under the nose of Liz’s startled mother. Miss Liz just turned her nose up and retired to her room with all the gracious elegance of a marmot with a burr in its tail.
‘Don’t humph and moan,’ mumbled her mother, as the last drab dress was wheedled into fitting the tiny suitcase with promises of sweets and warm iron pressings to come. ‘It doesn’t become a young lady to sulk so. Madam Perpetua will never allow it at the Very Distinguished Finishing School for Young Ladies of a Particular Age and Disposition.’ Liz cared not.
‘I shall not attend,’ asserted Liz, ‘I shall not attend any school which will not maintain a succinct title, in the very least. What am I to tell people? Hmmm? That I attend the VDFSYLPAD?’ She had to think over the abbreviation for the school’s title – it took her more than a few seconds to work out all the letters. ‘That’s ridiculous!’ Her voice had steadily risen to a screech, though was tempered by a plaintive moan as she collapsed back against prim covers of her overly pink bedspread. ‘What am I to do there, Mother? Hmm? Surrounded by dozens upon dozens of young ladies of a particular age and disposition? A disposition, I might add, that I believe I most certainly don’t share?’
With a hefty grunt, the lips of the suitcase pursed closed, the solid catches on the side glaring in protest as they were tested and probed – just to be certain, mind, that the disgruntled clothes-carrier would not pop open in the most embarressing of circumstances to spill its contents where all could see. ‘I will not go,’ grumbled Liz, with a resolute set to her pointed chin.
There was one whole week until the beginning of the school term. Mother had told her to enjoy being home until then. Miss Liz thought differently. She would not be plunged into an over-important school for miscreant girls who needed correcting. If there was anyone who needed correcting around here, it was that Aunt Hettie, who had convinced her mother of it in the first place! She had one whole week to set things right. Miss Liz would get her way, one way or another.
(a little note… Miss Liz most certainly does not get her way, at least in this instance. Apparently her mother can be quite firm, when the need arises. This is a picture of her at the swimming carnival. All good boarding schools for young ladies of a particular age and disposition must, after all, have at least one swimming carnival. They must also have a lacrosse team, and the school mistress must have a haughty English accent and an upturned nose. So there!
Oh, and in case it wasn’t obvious that these are not overly polished pieces of writing… they’re not. They’re just ‘sitting down and throwing out some ideas about who the person is and so forth. Nothing edited!)
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