Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Leather Lore to the Core Bead Story Contest

These beads are the color of rough deep brown bomber jacket leather, of sweet soft dark Godiva chocolate.

They are small but strong, ready to ride. I hear engines in the background revving, when I look at them. Silently telling their story from history.

They look like ceramic tiles in a deep, deep brown with a scuffed glossy shine.

Like they washed up from a shipwreck off the coast and were found in the sand, half buried.

Or like survivors of an inferno, the tiles found in the ash, from a ceramic tile factory in ancient times, in Italy below Vesuvius.

Like they went down in the wreck of a steamboat on the Mississippi river, and came up in the mud of a farmer's field as he was hoeing his corn, to mull over the crusty beads in his work calloused hand.

What story do you see, when you look at these rough and ready bomber jacket beads? Tell me a tall tale, post a story comment and win them if you are selected, winner announced on Saturday.

9 comments:

Lorelei Eurto said...

I see an Indiana Jones type story and he's looking for these little treasures but they're perched high on a pedestal with lots of booby traps.

Booby Traps?!

Yea, Booby Traps.

(No no no, that's GOONIES!)

LLYYNN - Lynn Davis said...

I should have put a felt fedora, all battered up, and a bullwhip in the photo, Lorelei, that's a good one. All dusty and ancient, the quest for the lost beads! An adventure story ...

lynn1231 said...

I have a distressed brown leather couch that I love to curl up on and read a good book. These beads remind me of that brown leather.

LLYYNN - Lynn Davis said...

I know just what you mean, I have a bomber jacket leather loveseat that's so comfy to sit in, pre-distressed like the leather they used to make airmen's jackets out of. It makes me think of fellows in those grainy photographs, with their airplanes waiting behind them, in their hats and jackets ready to fly out into 'the wild blue yonder.'

Amanda said...

I can see how you can get leather out of those beads, but my mind (since I always crave The Sugar) only interprets chocolate from these beads. Very rich, dark chocolate... with only a hint of bitterness. Just enough so that you notice it right in the middle of the bite, but the sweetness washes it away.

I could see these two beads (chocolates) being set out on a little hammered gold plate atop a coffee table in front of the fire, with candles lit and red wine in two glasses.

But just the two chocolates.

Like some kind of romantic-diet-evening.

"I want to seduce you, but I know you're counting calories! One for each of us, my love!"

It's model romance.



I must have food on the brain, because I was starving all day yesterday, and now all I can think about is chocolate.
You've RUINED me! :P

LLYYNN - Lynn Davis said...

Amanda, you made me laugh and also reach for the Dark Chocolate Kisses - just enough to satisfy that choco-craving, but not too much to kill the appetite.

What a picture you paint, too funny and so visual. Maybe I should have a warning label on these beads - DO NOT EAT!

Melissa J. Lee said...

When I was doing my graduate work in English Renaissance literature, I used to do a lot of research at the British Library in London. The warm brown of these tiles remind me of the worn stamped leather bindings on the 17th century books I used to read - very fragile, but with tons of character and, of course, the weight of history behind them. I love them (the books and the tiles)!

LLYYNN - Lynn Davis said...

Yeah, stamped leather tooled book bindings, I didn't think of that. I love to collect old books even if their bindings are in bad condition, because they are so lovely. I like that idea for the beads, gives them a quiet dignified historical feeling. Maybe a book of charts and antique maps ...

Melissa J. Lee said...

Yep, antique maps were exactly what I was thinking about. To me the design sort of suggests a compass rose. Beautiful work!