Summaries for Four Stories: Two Stones, The Island, Philomen, Marker at Yellowknife

Two Stones

Young Analisa stands quietly in the late afternoon sun on the shore of Lake Michigan, preoccupied with the memory of an argument between her parents just shortly before their arrival to their vacation cottage: So begins Ron Teachworth’s short story "Two Stones." So distracted is Analisa that at first she fails to hear a voice, and when she does is startled to find that the voice is that of a stone: "Don't be afraid," the stone tells her. "I am here for you to find. I have been waiting a long time. Please don't be afraid."

Reading between the lines of this entertaining story for young people, we detect the inner workings of the Self, the whole of who we are, with its fragile persona. The two stones become a metaphor for the young girl’s parents. Out of the depths of the Self comes native wisdom and insight, and for Analisa the teaching of the stones is the basic text of being in relationship with others. Ron Teachworth is a writer who tells stories of depth to and about young people.

To view all original photos from the Two Stones prototype see www.toddweinstein.com.

The Island

That Ron Teachworth’s short stories about young people are entertaining should be enough, yet his stories also explore deeper and more personal themes. "The Island" is a case in point. We meet Julian just as he is about to embark on a journey of discovery, namely to explore a small island in Lake Arrowhead and especially its abandoned and rusting 1940s-era pickup truck. Why it’s on this little spit of sand just a hundred yards offshore and how it got there in the first place are but two of the mysteries that propel this delightful story forward. Each question unravels into another as Julian seeks his truth—and along the way saves the life of a young woman named Jena.
A delight in itself, "The Island" also gives us a peek inside the universal psyche, the world of symbols and images, where a lake can evoke the unconscious, a young woman the anima (or feminine side of the male psyche), and an old truck the anima mundi (the spirit of the whole world, dancing and alive). Julian’s story is the timeless hero’s journey, described so eloquently by Joseph Campbell in The Hero with a Thousand Faces, and we—like Julian—cannot complete the journey without being forever changed.

Philomen

In "Philomen," writer Ron Teachworth returns again to the depths, this time to the ocean. His characters are young people who tend to prefer their own company and pursue their own paths, and in "Philomen" we meet young Kes, drawn inexorably to the sea, who saves the life of a young girl caught in the dangerous offshore undertow. In his stories, Teachworth explores themes of psychological development and growth, and in this story Kes receives the blessing of his father, even though his father drowned in a tragic accident even before Kes himself was born.

Trying to explain the events of a strange day in terms of the ordinary world of cause and effect and relationship, Kes and his mother encounter a young woman named Victoria—who was saved from a watery grave by Kes’ father, even though the act of heroism cost him his own life. Victoria, haunted by the guilt of having survived when he died, and Kes, in search of his father and his own destiny, encounter one another in the shadows of a shared dream, and together they emerge as more complete individuals who can now step into the future.

Marker At Yellowknife

As in earlier stories, "Marker at Yellowknife" deals with the metaphysical, taking the reader to one of the most remote locations in North America. The story intrigues us with a young man’s discovery of an unknown object, found along the shores of the Great Slave Lake. The elements of water and beach are reminiscent of earlier stories and provide a certain element of natural stability to the story, while we learn about an omnipotent and positive force existing in the region for many years. The story within a story provides insight to the local people and pulls the reader into a Indian cultural we know very little about. The green bar of light that visits the Marker at Yellowknife lives with us long after the story is over.