One of the main characters of my story is the kind of guy that all the cool kids hang out with. His name is Frank Featherstone. He may not be all that bright at his school work but he positively excels at all kinds of sport. To crown it off he is the school boxing champion. With his short brown hair put into a brush-cut he is a lean mean killing machine.
Now there happens to be another main character of my story with the name of Philip Birch. Now Philip on the other hand is generally quite useless at most things, in his own eyes, and he is rather untidy. He has a freckled face and a thatch of red hair and has a complex about his appearance as some freckle faced boys may have.
Frank and Philip are sworn enemies and Philip generally avoids Frank more than Frank avoids him. Philip likes to preserve his untidy appearance and avoids Frank like a cold shower in winter.
However, things take rather an unusual twist in both of their lives which leads them to a place where they end up as best friends. Not just any place, but a cold dark underground shaft somewhere where a rather sinister wizard lurks.
About Me
About Me
If I go back in my mind, the very first thing that I can remember is my maid picking up a long snake from the ground outside and tossing it into a large galvanised basin of boiling hot water. If you think about it logically it was almost symbolic of somebody having the victory over something evil. Like the evil serpent being thrown into the lake of fire. Somehow the scene did not seem quite so cheerful to me and symbolised a life of continuous good over evil. The boiled snake left me feeling ill and depressed.
When I was young our maid was like a second mother to me. I was a shy and withdrawn child which was probably because I never went to a preschool and mixed with other children. I enjoyed killing red ants and climbing trees when I played in the garden on my own. With my vivid imagination I created imaginary friends and entertained myself for hours.
Shortly before I started school we moved from Johannesburg to Cape Town. It was the year 1980 and I remembered feeling terrified. I guess most children do feel afraid of school on their first day. There were loads of other children in my class all dressed the same. It was rough at first but I soon made loads of friends. School wasn’t so bad.
After a couple of years of finger painting and learning to read something changed at school. The funny thing is nothing had changed; only the way I perceived things was somehow different. Like I was suddenly very afraid and sad all at the same time.
