So many stories II

The Green man
Out in the woods to party, eat mushrooms. It starts out very safe, very fun, playful, joyful, wonderful, non-scary. As they are in the cabin, then there starts to be strange sounds, they find an alien-like creature dead in the river (that one photo of the e.t. like creature with the tongue hanging out of his mouth.
They are in the cabin and then one guy pulls back the blinds quickly and that face is up next to the glass, green, bizarre, unflinching, unmoving. The girls scream. They all freak out. Finally someone pulls the blinds back over his face sot hey don’t have to see. He’s still there after a number of minutes. One in their party is not scared. He insist that the person is not evil. “if he wanted to do something, he’d do it.”
He goes out, and the blinds are open, and the creature goes towards where he goes out, you can hear him talking to him, and then they’re screaming for him not to go, not to do it. But he does and then he walks off with the guy.

They don’t see him.

The next night, one guy hears something so he reaches over to the light switch, and he turns on the light and that face is sitting directly under the light looking at him. He runs to the other side of the bed, and he stands. Then he looks down under the bed to see the man, and he sees another one under the bed. He goes to open the door and there’s one at the door. They just stand there.

Slowly they acclimate.

a study in fear, the unknown, a new experience, understanding, compassion, the ability to overcome ones fears and seize opportunity. almost as if they get to a point that they realize what a special moment this is, and they have the ability to look at it in a historical sense, in that once the incident "ends" if ever, they will toss it about for ages, so it empowers them to ask and to know the answers to all the questions they would like to know in the future to make sense of it. as if they realize that if they cower in fear, they'll be tortured. they must make a positive sense of this and make it something that is shared to be able to integrate it into their lives.


The Game

Black team vs. White team, basketball.
One of the most amazing cheerleaders, fans, colors, teams.
Introductions, songs cheers, beautiful cheerleaders, great rivalry, parents and alumni.
Electricity in the air. Hot dogs, popcorn, cotton candy, candy bars, etc, school fundraisers, pta mother types.

The white team, “faking it” by simon and garfunkle is their introduction song/cheer. The drumming at the beginning of the song and end of the song are the black teams songs. Missy elliot with slick rick.

The game is incredible. Kids making incredible shots, incredible plays, impossible jumpers, back and forth, steals, fouls, injuries, funny stuff, arguments, comraderie, dunks, blocks, twisting/turning layups, overtime, double-overtime. Last second shots, back and forth, fearlessness from both sides, great halftime show, loose balls, huddles, speeches, layup drills, bad calls, reversals, three pointers, news reporters, etc. corny nerdy kids, bands, etc, etc, etc. the fundraiser bake sale. popcorn. little brothers and sisters of the kids. parents conversing. people in the community know one another and their kids, grandparents have played other grandparents. the gym is in the private christian school, connected to a church. prayer before the game, a group prayer after.

The two sides combine for a halftime show involving both teams. Bitter rivals, that love each other and respect one another. Immaculate beautiful uniforms, cheerleaders. A black guy on one team is dating a white cheerleader. The white hunk star on the other team is dating a black cheerleader.

a study in difference, in the strength of two completely different, yet completely similar communities, that are supportive, cohesive, and non-hating. that love competition and the highest ideals of sportsmanship, fan behavior, performance, technical skills, parenting, coaching, excitement and the feeling that the world stops and that everyone in that gym is sharing something special.

Little Black House on the Mountain Plain

Authentic story of a black family in slavery. They purchase their freedom, takes years. They go on their own but end up in the west in Colorado. They pick a great place to make a cabin, a great field. However, they do not know that the place they picked, is on high elevation and when the winter comes, it’s hard, long, the snow is deep and they end up losing their baby, a 5 year old and another kid loses feet to frostbite. The father almost dies trying to get a deer to eat. He almost succumbs to hypothermia, but makes it back. After falling in a creek.
This will require research into slavery, purchase of freedom, stories of wild west survival. (Indians, buffalo, snow in, frostbite, hypothermia, losing kids in winter, etc, etc, etc.
In the end, they make it through the winter. A daughter, 14 falls in love with a boy. The father insists that she get married. “she aint gonna want nobody else if she wants your boy, and if he keeps hanging out with her, then he’s going to spoil her." Either rhe marries her, or he stays away. not much dialogue, mostly beautiul scenes, ala tak fujimoto. authenticism in everythign that is shown, from clothes, slavery, the wild, and the constant death that used to befall such people. not political, a study in conditions, personalities, realities and human survival.

Significant events in Hernan Cortez conquering of the Aztecs all aspects animated, except the emporer, cortez, malinche, narvaez and the boy-king of spain
• Many Spanish went to the new world in order to make a fortune and a name for themselves and then return to spain in great wealth
• The king of spain was the king of germany and france also. He had a condition which caused his mouth to appear open all the time. He was very young and traveled on the road from place to place administering and lording over issues/seeing patrons constantly
• The spain had just gotten from underneath the yoke of a 300 year Moorish conquering which left the country fractionated.
• An earlier expedition to the new world ended in disaster with the entire crew being massacred. They were essentially slaughtered and ambushed.
• From the first Spanish ship seen on the coast of mexico, the king of tenotchtitlan had heard of them within a day or so by runners.
• The Aztecs and the Spanish, (once under control of cortez) literally saw their men as extensions of themselves and (not as obvious) were also extensions of their personalities
• The Spanish never would have been successful if not for the alliances they built with the tlaxcalans and other native tribes who themselves were straining under the yoke of Aztec oppression and tribute, including those who would be sacrificed
• The Aztecs, having lorded in relative peace over their people, would stage mock battles, which rarely if ever ended in anyone beign seriously hurt or killed. Their strategy in battle was to capture and not to kill.
• Cannibalism was a long held practice. If someone were a great warrior, they would be rewarded with the thighs, and on down to various body parts to other warriors depending on the valiance of their efforts.
• The rich traditions and cultures of the Aztecs were lost. Featherworkers, scribes, their histories burned, treasures looted and melted down.
• Cortez was almost captured at least a dozen times. Only saved due to the Aztecs trying to capture rather than to kill him.
• The final siege of tenotchtitlan was a bloody battle fought daily. The Aztecs would break the causeway to sow the Spanish advance, and then the Spanish would have to come back the next day to fill in the causeway to fight again.
• At the time the Spanish captured the king, they could have easily have been defeated they were vastly outnumbered, but they captured the king, who was eventually killed. He had a very fatalistic view of the Spanish advance and was in deathly fear from the moment he had heard of the ship being off shore.
• Cortez had to leave tenotchntitlan to fight Narvaez. The man who selected cortez to lead the expedition, had changed his mind before cortez had even left, when he had seen the size of his force, and the amount of provisions he was securing. The lord did not want or trust cortez, so that’s why he sent Narvaez, who was captured and had an eye plucked out.
• From the outset of cortez seeing and seizing treasure from the Aztecs, he sent treasure back to spain and to his father so that he could have the funds to bribe and influence his way with the king and his emissaries to be named a potential lord of the Aztec lands (mexico).
• Almost all of this is known due to the many inquiries, personal narratives and interviews and investigations of the riches in the Americas and accusations that the money was stolen/misappropriated. The Florentine codez.
• The entire expedition was a continue unceasing bloodbath.
• The Spanish had interpreters. They first landed and captured a couple of natives and keeping them for a year, taught them Spanish. The Spanish had wives who had babies by them.
• The final siege of tenotchtitlan required boats be built to mount a naval battle.
• Many of the farms of the Aztecs were floating on flotillas which were docked, and food and plants were grown here.
• The gardens of tenotchtitland had nets where thousands of birds and plnts/flowers grew in private gardens.
• Cortez was plucked from relative obscurity. If it were not for cortez, it is doubtful that the Spanish would have been able to moutn such a successful attack for at least a large number of years. His cleverness, ruthlessness and cunning were unparalleled. In fact the model for pizzarro.

the story of the amazing personalities of cortez and the emperor. the straining yoke of aztec rule, the greed and manipulation of cortez, the relationships, how they perceive one another. like, when cortez comes into tenotchtitlan, they look as if alien creatures to the natives that have never seen armor, horses or white men, or beards or swords, etc. everyone but a few are animated, because they were all pawns but a few in a much larger story, controled by a large extent by the main characters. a little about the moorish occupation as a backdrop, and the history of europe up to that point, and the king of spain who was also the king of other areas.