Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.
Once upon a time there was a beautiful and harmonious street called ‘Golden Street’. The inhabitants were wonderful people and they all shared a real sense of community. When one of their number was found to be in need of something, they only had to ask their neighbour for a helping hand.
Every day the inhabitants would breakfast together and they would share their plans for the day and what might help they might need to accomplish their project, however big or small. Then, as a street community, they would work out a means by which each person could achieve their project by the time the sun was setting.
One day, a newcomer moved into the street. He was different to the other neighbours. He was tall and thin. He had long hair and a beard. He dressed in white kaftans and loose white trousers. He wasn’t particularly confident participating in the breakfast meetings because he was still trying to learn their strange language.
Because of that, the neighbours began to discuss his ‘strangeness’ amongst themselves. They started to imagine reasons why he seemed so unconnected to them. Soon, they began to stare at him as he wheeled his bike along the street. Given his natural timidity, he began to stay inside and eat his breakfast alone. The neighbours were convinced that he was scheming something quite dreadful behind those curtains. ‘Perhaps he is a spy’, whispered one. ‘I think we should start protecting ourselves and our properties from this weirdo’, added another. ‘I am convinced that he is the vandal who pulled up my carrots last week’. Suspicions grew as to the behaviour and motives of the newcomer.
And because of that intensifying fear about him, the friendly neighbours of Golden Street decided that the most advisable course of action was to get rid of him. Their breakfast meetings now revolved around ways to make him feel so uncomfortable that he would have no option but to leave. They began to menace him: leaving dirt on his doorstep; putting rubbish in his letterbox; even puncturing the tyres of his bike and daubing it in thick yellow paint.
Until finally, they succeeded in their attempts to ostracize him. The newcomer became weary of living in Golden Street. So he humbly took his few possessions and his bike and moved to another street where his quiet, gentle nature and his wonderful, healing hands were greatly appreciated. Forever.