Friday Fictioneers – Excavation

~ Neil MacDonald
PHOTO PROMPT © Rochelle Wisoff-Fields

I climb painfully down into the trench, gripping the ladder—aware my back is twinging, aware I have only a couple more seasons. The new ones chatter like baby birds in a nest. Once, I too had their brash certainty. Breath rattles in the ribcage of my mortality.

The crown of a skull peeps out from the dirt, and the young ones crowd around, waiting. The skull shows signs of decorative plaster tinted with red ochre.

What thoughts and feelings animated this cranium? Why the ceremonial treatment? We will never know, and I am filled with despair.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

33 thoughts on “Friday Fictioneers – Excavation”

    1. Thanks so much Rochelle. I’m afraid I’ve been unable to post a comment on your site for the last couple of weeks (several of us are having this difficulty with WordPress). This is what I would have said “I like the idea that it was the violinist’s passion, not necessarily her talent, that captivated”

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      1. Dear Neil,

        I have wondered since you’re ususally the first to comment. I know Sandra’s been having a tussle with commenting. WordPress is most definitely being a thorn in everyone’s flesh. At any rate, thank you for letting me know.

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  3. We may be able to uncover the detritus of life, but the life itself alludes us. I’m sure a depressing thought of one who devoted their life trying to reconstruct those thoughts behind that cranium.

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    1. Not so much his enthusiasm as hope of ever knowing. Thanks, Ian. By the way, yours is one of the sites that Wodpress won’t let me post comments. What I’d tried to say is “And yet we create a desolation and call it peace”

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      1. You’re very welcome, Neil, and so sorry you’re not able to comment again 😦 Thanks for the comment here and glad I got that futuristic feel conveyed.

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  9. Yes. I really like how you’ve set up an interplay between youth and age, life and death here. The old archaeologist feels his own mortality as he studies the remains and thinks about the life of the individual he’s discovered. This story is rich with ideas, and they’re ideas I’ve felt as I’ve researched, not archaeological remains, but just my own family history. The frustration and grief are in that too.

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  14. I doubt seeing a skull would help his current disposition. This is so true of where people find themselves atimes. Where we need to give comfort whilst carrying pain or solving problems when your problems are mounting.
    Great writing.

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