Creative Writing Contest 2008

Islesboro's Fourteenth Annual Creative Writing Contest

Coordinated by Katie Nelson.

Exploration plays a vital role in human nature. A recurrent theme is the quest for knowledge, the conquering of new frontiers, and the search for new lands. Marco Polo sought a route to China, and Juan Ponce de Leon sought the Fountain of Youth in the New World; 19th century Americans sought the western frontier, and 20th century countries sought the moon. What is it that drives people to explore, to seek the unknown?

This is the prompt to which students responded for this year's Creative Writing Contest. Middle school students wrote both a poem and a prose piece on the theme of exploration, while high school students were allowed to select a topic of their choice. Students were awarded at an assembly March 28, 2008.

Middle School / High School Level grades 6-12

POETRY:

Fourth Place: "untitled " Davis Boardman, Grade 7

Third Place: "The Path" Jesse Tutor, Grade 8

Second Place: "Ruins" Richard Coombs, Grade 12

First Place: "Exploring the Wild Blue " Claire Boucher, Grade 8

Middle School Level grades 6 - 8

PROSE:

Third Place: "Maisie's Story" Aven Howell, Grade 7

Second Place: "Nameless " Jesse Tutor, Grade 8

First Place: "The Woman with the Golden Headdress" Claire Boucher, Grade 8

High School Level grades 9 12

PROSE:

Third Place: "Return" Richard Coombs, Grade 12

Second Place: "Twists and Turns" Sarah Cowles, Grade 11

First Place: "My Brother, The Diabetic" Michelle Reidy, Grade 9

And a special thank you to

To the 2008 Contest Judges: Ruth Hartley, Mary Hauprich, Bonnie Hughes, Seth Johnson, Nakomis Nelson, Sandra Oliver, Melissa Olson, Lisa Satchfield, Jackie Stolte

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2008 Winning Entries

Middle / High School Poetry

1st Place Poetry -

Exploring the Wild Blue ~ Claire Boucher

A little girl one day flew,

Into the Wild Blue.

Swam and swam within the water zoo,

Into the Wild Blue.

Explored with the fish and the mermaids too,

Into the Wild Blue.

Said to a young merman, "I do",

Into the Wild Blue.

Sprouted fins and flippers too,

Into the Wild Blue.

Forever she'd stay and a journey pursue.

All in the world below.

Forever Into, the Wild Blue.

2nd Place Poetry -

Ruins ~ Richard Coombs

Standing tall and grand over all around them.

Bent and crippled like a hobbled, old man.

Hidden amongst the tallest trees.

Buried beneath the shifting sand.

Once the grandest testament to man,

Now nothing but piles of stone.

A shattered dream looms before us.

Built from bricks, sweat and bone.

The mighty stones that once stood high,

Are sanded down by time.

These are the mystic ruins,

That I speak of in this rhyme.

Life is spent to find out what

These hallowed halls contain.

Was it made for love of madness?

Was the project all in vain?

What happened to the people?

Who used to dwell within?

How long has it spent in solitude?

When will it come to an end?

Questions are asked and answers are few,

But still we try to press on.

We get the best, the very best view.

We thirst for knowledge, all day long.

3rd Place Poetry -

The Path ~ Jesse Tutor

The unknown, the hidden, the dark.

It tempts us with its obscured secrets and clouded treasures.

Headlong we go with our eyes wide open and our ears pricked

Into the dark abyss that we all must enter at some point in time.

We are scared and lonely and there is no one beside us

Yet we march through and banish the darkness far away

And left in its place are things that have become normal.

For we have not only explored the unknown but made it common.

What once seemed terrifying is now natural

And things that were unknown are now understood.

We all must walk through the darkness.

What matters is how we come out of it.

4th Place Poetry -

untitled ~ Davis Boardman

Swimming through the blue sea

Shells

Glass

Crystal

Pure Beauty

Dive down

To grab a handful of feather light sand

That reveals

Shells

Glass

Crystal

Pure Beauty

Middle School Prose

1st Place Middle School Prose -

The Woman with the Golden Headdress ~ Claire Boucher

It was hot. The kind of sweltering weather that's so moist, the air is too heavy to breath. The site being uncovered was believed to be a small ruin of some ancient civilization that had been discovered two years before, but because of lack in funding, never had been completely excavated. Each archaeology student was drenched in sweat and skin caked with dirt.

But for me, anticipated was hanging in the air like the hope of cool weather. I was the only girl in this expedition, and in fact, it was my first time to Belize. I had only done a few minor digs throughout college, and they had all been in the U.S. Yet here I was on my senior project, exploring the world. Now that I was here, I didn't know if this was the exact field of study I wanted to spend my life with. Even though I wasn't interested in spending my life sweating, I felt something different and special about this place. Many of my peers resented me for my gender, but I had learned to not let it bother me. My short, stout and mustached professor, Mr. Stevenson walked over to investigate my work.

"Find anything interesting, MS. Copplen?" he asked me in a demanding tone.

"Nothing completely uncovered so far, but I think this piece right here is a piece of a pot or bowl, I'm going to keep looking for the rest of it," I replied holding up a postcard sized piece of hard material. It looked as if there was a chiseled design in it.

"Keep looking here, and take everything you find back to the researching center in an hour, to study these items further," he replied. "Remember, this senior project will not be graded on what you uncover, but how much you learn from this experience."

"Mmhmm," I replied dismissively. I was anxious to finish working.

I continued for a while longer, then slipped the piece of stone into a plastic bag and then placed it gingerly in my pocket, and packed up my tools to head off to the research center. I remember something mysterious from that walk back that made me forget about that awful heat. In the distance I saw a woman with a bundle in her arms, humming softly and swaying her infant back and forth. She had dark skin and was wearing a golden headdress. There was something grand about her that made me feel honored to be in her presence.

Then as quickly as it had come, she added away, and I turned around myself searching for her. I then remembered how common it was for hallucinations to occur in such heat, and dismissed this encounter with a glug of water. The last drips of water left in my canteen felt refreshing, though it kept me yearning for more.

The research center smelled like grime and boys, a combination so putrid that it lingered in my nose long after I had showered and reported back to my tent for bed. I was glad to be the only girl, only because I got a tent all to myself, free of smelly students.

I didn't bother unrolling my sleeping bag; it was too hot for covers anyway. It had been a long exhausting day, and it felt good to rest my aching body. As soon as I turned off my flashlight I was cast into a deep sleep.

Suddenly, I was looking down on an ancient civilization, hidden in the midst of a narrow valley, surrounded by jungle. Townsfolk in simple clothing were bent over chiseling away at stone temples being constructed. The people reminded me of paintings of the ancient Mayans found in my text book. The people worked in silence, covered in their sweat. It was a day similar to the one I had been working in.

All of the sudden, the people dropped their sharp stone tools and looked up from their labor. A man with a look of royalty had walked out of a stone structure on top of an already finished temple. Beside him was a woman dressed in a golden headdress. The man held a new born infant above his head.

"Your future king has been born!" he declared loudly as he tenderly handed the baby to the woman. My guess is that he was the king, and she the queen. The people below showed a great amount of respect to the couple as they stared in awe at the small innocent royal. I then recognized the woman as the one I had seen earlier. This place I was in had been her home, her way of life, and her family. I realized that my senior class was excavating this woman's home, and that even though she had lived thousands of years ago, I was uncovering her story. It brought a new meaning to archaeology, and I remembered why I was so interested in becoming an archeologist. All that sweat and filth would be worth it in the long run.

The sunlight shining through the mesh window in my tent woke me gently. I knew I had better get up, but I was too wrapped up into reminiscing on my dream. It didn't seem possible that it had been just a dream. I remembered every bit of it distinctly, and I'm not one that usually remembers dreams. I went over it in my head and slipped my hand into my pocket. I pulled out a postcard piece of stone out of my pocket I had been positive that I had left it at the research center. At the moment, I realized that my dream had been an exploration through the story of this one piece of stone. I suddenly felt awake and ready to start the day at the research center. I was going to uncover the whole past of this mysterious stone city. I had become motivated to do this through exploration of my dreams. Maybe once I uncovered the truth, my fellow students would respect me.

2nd Place Middle School Prose -

Nameless ~ Jesse Tutor

 His eyes closed softly as he fell into the open arms of his pillow which embraced him like a long-lost son. Dreams entered his brain and felt out every crevice of his memory and brought things into his mind that were nothing to the boy but everything to the dream. Visions of friends and family with faces of joy, laughter, and love crossed over his closed eyes only to be replaced by masks of sorrow and disappointment in front of a backdrop the color of fear. Yet among this tragic scene a figure appeared that the boy immediately recognized although he knew he had not once laid eyes upon the silhouette that now stood before him. The figure radiated hope and made the boy smile as he slumbered away. As he reached out a hand to the spectral figure it dissolved in his hands and he was left with a painful stab of longing.

The dream discovered another wrinkle of his brain and dove into the memories hidden there and brought out a recollection of a speech that the boy had given, although the topic of the speech had drifted completely away. The boy was a masterful speaker and enthralled the audience with his words and wrapped them around the listeners so that they were covered in the vibrations that passed through his lips. But then his breath caught and no noise came out of his mouth for there in the audience was the figure that so recently deserted him and the one he so desperately wanted to see again. He had eyes for no other and the rest of the rapt audience became unimportant in the presence of this mysterious stranger that the boy had known all his life. Yet still the features of the being were clouded and blurred, like he was looking at them through a layer of rippling water. He cried out a question to the figure filled with anguish and longing and the figure spoke back an answer that the boy could not understand but one that was filled with sorrow and grief but also with hope that they might find each other at some point in the real world and not only converse in this dream creation that wasn't even real but in the authentic world where they had control of their reality. The boy pleaded for a name, anything to help him find the body behind the outline that he gazed at now. The figure merely turned away and slowly walked into nothingness and with each retreating footfall the boy became lonelier and sadder and wanted nothing more than to run after the disappearing shape. Yet, his body refused to move and the boy could only stare as the figure vanished completely.

The boy awoke.

3rd Place Middle School Prose -

Maisie's Story ~ Aven Howell

 Maisie wasn't a dull child, by any means, but sometimes she gave the impression that she was. Sometimes her handicap hid the bright, inquisitive child hiding just underneath the surface. People who saw her would stop and whisper "what's wrong with her?" They thought that Maisie didn't hear, just because she wouldn't turn her head. Only the people who knew Maisie and really understood her, could truly judge Maisie.

To understand Maisie's real personality, we must look back four years. Maisie lived with her father, pregnant mother and two year-old twin brothers. It was Christmas morning.

When most children wake up on Christmas morning, they anticipate all the treats that Santa Claus has brought them. But the first thing that four year old Maisie thought of when she woke up was the snow. When a person wakes up, especially a young one, they often think of things that we would least expect. Upon awakening, Maisie sat straight up in her little wooden bed, saw the snow, and ran to the window. Her little room was simple, with a small window positioned just so that Maisie could see outside from her bed. Maisie rushed to the window, and pressed her hot cheeks against the cool glass. The frost melted immediately, and Maisie drew a picture of a present in the mist from her breath. Then, she remembered! It's Christmas! Presents! Christmas!!!

Rushing down the hall and into her parents' room, the first thing her parents saw when they woke was a three foot tall, frizzy red-haired, girl with bright green eyes and a smattering of freckles across her nose, screaming, "Wake up, wake up, it's Christmas!"

"Shh, Mais Mais, I know that it's exciting, but first can we get your brothers?"

"WAKE UP ALEX, WAKE UP JAKE, IT'S CHRISTMAS!"

Two identical boys with jet black hair tumbled out into the hall. The only way that you could tell them apart was from the different colors of their striped pajamas.

As the little family walked downstairs, you might imagine what happened next; Christmas breakfast, presents, screams of delight, smiles shared and crumpled paper. This was the first Christmas that Maisie would remember.

Four years later, a happy and tired eight year-old Maisie was driving home from her first Junior Swim meet. She didn't win, but settled with second place. The blue cloth seats of the Mini Van were so soft, Maisie started to fall asleep, to dream of everyone cheering, her family's faces standing out in the stands, with little Ellie, jumping up and down with excitement to cheer her big sister on.

Suddenly, the car stopped, and Maisie raised her head just in time to see the bus, rushing towards the car...

When I woke up, I had no idea where I was. I smelled the strange smell that hospitals often carry. Then I remembered. The bus. Oh. Where was everyone? I tried to open my eyes. My eyelids felt like lead, but finally I got them opened. Everything was blurry and unfocused. I started to panic. Where was I? Then I heard voices. Mom's voice.

"Will she be okay?"

I wanted to scream "I am okay" and I tried, but nothing came out. Mom was crying, I needed to do something! Struggling, I tried to wink, but instead, both eyes closed. Open close...Open close...Open close...I had never, in my life, worked so hard. It was worth it though. I heard Mom scream.

"She's moving, See! Look at her eyes!"

Then, exhausted, I fell asleep.

When I next woke up, I heard quiet voices beside my bed. My bed. No not my bed. A hospital bed. Wait. How long had I been here? In bed. Not my bed. Oh. Where am I? Open close. Open close. It was getting easier.

"Maisie, oh Maisie, wake up."

Ellie's voice. Maisie opened her eyes. She was in a hospital bed. Maisie tried to talk. With no reaction.

"Mais Mai? Can you hear me?" Maisie's mom's voice. She hadn't used that pet name for her since she was about five.

Open close. Open close. I can do this, Maisie thought, I know I can.

Then another voice, high and tinny, "It's good she's responding, but she might not be able to understand you."

Maisie hated that voice.

Lips suddenly brushed Maisie's ear, and her mother whispered to her, "I know you can hear me honey, just try hard to show me. Rehab starts tomorrow."

Maisie felt the need to smile, and ever so slowly lifted the corners of her mouth. Her mother simply smiled back, but couldn't hide the relief in her eyes.

The next day at rehab, Maisie began to control the muscles in her face, so that she was able to smile easily. A week later, Maisie could wink. From then on, every day she discovered something else that she could do. When Maisie went out in public, the truth was, she didn't turn her head because she didn't want to. Not yet. Later, she'd show them. Rudeness deserved to be ignored from Maisie's point of view.

Maisie vowed to herself that someday she would enter another swim meet.

Every day may bring tears, worked muscles, screams of frustration. But every day also brings something new, or the memory of just three months ago and what she couldn't do. Anyone who has not had the experience that Maisie had, might never understand how uplifting it is to suddenly realize that you can move your big toe again. Or that you are able to grasp a pencil? Wishes that will someday be granted but not quite today are okay. Someday every wish will be granted. Every day, each thing learned anew is one step forward on her journey to recovery.

An explorer is not just a person who sails across the sea, or discovers a new land. Exploring isn't always material. Sometimes discovery can be inside a person, and that is often the most important kind of exploring. Maisie's kind of exploring.

High School Prose

1st Place High School Prose -

My Brother, The Diabetic ~ Michelle Reidy

September 28, 2006: They day my brother was diagnosed with diabetes. It was just like any other Thursday, I went to school, there was a soccer game, and then I went home. My brother didn't go to school that day. He went to the doctor's. In the month or so before this date, we noticed that he was getting skinnier. His jeans were looser around his waist and he had lost a few pounds. He went from 90 pounds to 84 and at the age of 10, he should not have been losing weight. Since I was at school, I thought nothing was wrong and when I got home I was expecting to see him.

After school, I went to the soccer game. Since I run cross-country during the soccer season, the team runs from the school to the soccer field that is about three miles away. It was early in the fall, so the warm summer air was still floating around this small island in Maine. I was a ball boy along with a few other people. I had to stand around the field with a smelly old blue soccer jersey on, finding lost balls that were kicked into the forests of cat nine tails. Being a ball boy was not the best way to spend the soccer game, but it taught me a lot about the sport.

When I left the soccer game, I thought my mom was going to come and pick me up. That didn't happen. My dad came in his old red truck to get me. He was quiet at first so I had to ask what was wrong. He told me bluntly that Mom had to go to the hospital with my brother and they wouldn't be back for a few days. He told me that when they were at the P.A.'s, they tested his blood sugar and the meter couldn't read it because it was so high. The P.A. sent them to the Pen-Bay hospital in Rockport and then they sent them to the Maine Medical Center in Portland.

I was only half listening to him. However, I got enough information to know that something was wrong. The car ride home was long and quiet. It seemed like the trees passed by the window one by one and I could have counted each one and given them a name. There were small breaks in the silence when one of us would ask a question and the other would answer, but that's it.

Later that evening, I called my mom to ask if everything was all right. She told me that my brother was diagnosed with diabetes and that there were going to be a lot of changes once they returned home. She talked with Dad for what seemed like hours. I was watching T.V. and listening to my dad's part of the conversation in the other room. They talked about my brother and what would end up happening. Over the weekend, we kept each other updated with what was going on.

On Sunday, when my brother and my mom finally returned home, everything seemed normal. He was acting like his usual self - mom was a little tense, but for the most part, things were normal. We talked about some of the changes that would be happening and about what the basics were for his diabetes. Mom told me that there are two types of diabetes: type I and type II. Type II is not a life-long thing. Type I is a life-long disease that never goes away. This is what my brother had.

When we were getting ready to eat dinner, it was like a slap in the face for me. Everything was chaos before we ate. I was watching my brother and thinking about what was going through his mind. He sat down at the table, took an alcohol wipe and wiped his finger ff. Then he put a small gray plastic thing to his finger and pushed a button. When he pulled it away, there was a small spot of blood on the tip of his finger. Mom had already taken out a small white strip and plugged it into a meter. He put the spot of blood on the strip and waited. The meter beeped and then it showed a number on the small screen which showed the amount of sugar that was in his blood. Then my brother and mom figured out how many carbohydrates he was going to eat, did some math and he pulled out his medicine. His medicine is called Novolog. He has to take it every time he eats something. After he took his Novolog, he took another shot called Levimeire. He has to take the Levimeire once every day and he takes it at night. His medicine comes in the form of shots and he has to inject the needle into his stomach or his leg. He took the medicine that he needed and we sat down and ate.

Once we sat down, everything seemed to calm down. There was a lot of questions asked over dinner like, "What is a good number for blood sugar?" and "What is the medicine supposed to do?" The good numbers that my brother should have for his blood sugar are anything between 80 and 140. The medicine that he takes keeps his blood sugar in the safe range. If his numbers are too high, then some of his organs can start to shut down and if the numbers are too low, then he can pass out, go into a coma, or possibly die.

During the first few months, my brother was favored a lot. I spent a lot of my time with my friend and his family because I felt welcome there and I knew that I could go there without being yelled at. Also, when I went there, I could have fun and take the major responsibility off of my shoulders. I knew that my family loved and cared about me but at the time, they had to focus on my brother because of his diabetes.

Over the past year or so, I have learned a lot about this disease and I am glad that I have. I am now comfortable staying home alone with my brother because I know what to do in case of an emergency. If his numbers become really low and he passes out, he has this glucagon pen which will raise his blood sugar levels. Thankfully, this has never happened, and hopefully never will. He carries around glucose tablets in his pocket and if he feels low, he can eat one or two. Testing before he eats and correcting for the number of carbohydrates he will eat has gotten easier and it is not as chaotic as it was.

Every three months, my brother goes to the diabetes clinic in Portland and they go over his blood sugar numbers, and they make changes based on those numbers. They talk to a nutritionist who goes over his diet with him and talks about changes that can be made to keep his numbers in the "good" range. They also look at new things that can make life easier.

I now know that diabetes will not only be with my brother for the rest of his life, but it will be with my entire family. We are still trying to overcome all that comes with it. We are slowly learning more and more everyday and it brings us closer together. I don't feel left out and not important anymore because we are learning as a group and the more we learn, the easier it becomes. It is not easy to go through this alone and my brother has a great support group made up of friends and family who really care about him and want him to be all right.

2nd Place High School Prose -

Twists and Turns ~ Sarah Cowles

When I was five years old I saw my first swim meet. I was standing by the pool, watching my older brother speed through the water and cheering with all of my might because that's what I saw the other people around me doing. It was in that moment that I knew that I wanted to swim. I wanted to swim because of the thrill that each meet would give me as I challenged myself to swim faster and faster. I did not know, at that precious age, what an adventure my swimming career would really be.

When people saw the way that I watched older swimmers in my first years of swimming they might say that I had a very hungry look on my face, the kind of look that an eagle might get when it is about to swoop in on its prey. My hunger was to get the fastest possible time in each race that I swam.

The first win that I ever got in a swim meet was in the last meet of my first season. It was an exhilarating feeling. The beginning of the year had been disappointing for me, not because I was a bad swimmer, but because I was comparing myself to the much older and more experienced swimmers around me. In meets I would be disappointed with a time that was slower than the goal I had set for myself and downright discouraged if I did not win.

In winning the last event that I swam in my first year, I set a high standard for myself in the rest of my swimming career. The second year that I swam was a learning year for me. I learned that no matter how much I wanted to win in every single event that I swam, it was not possible for a six year old to do so.

The longer that I swam, the more I enjoyed it. By the time I was ten, I was only taking off two weeks a year. It was not because an adult was pushing me to swim as much as possible but rather because I was pushing myself. I did not know what these hundreds of hours in the pool at this age would do to my career as I aged.

The hours of practice paid off. By the time I was fifteen years old I was placing first in every meet that I competed in. I was being scouted by college coaches across the country and I still loved it. Swimming was what got me through many of the trials of being a teenager. Whenever I was stressed I would go and swim as much as I could. If something was wrong with my social life, the same thing worked. The result was incredible, I loved winning, and I loved to be able to look up at the clock after a hard event and see that putting my heart into it had, yet again, paid off.

High school flew by for me, not only was I getting outstanding grades in most of my classes, I was popular, and I was swimming, I had decided to stay in my home state to go to college, so that I would always have the opportunity to come home. After my graduation from high school, in which I left behind many of the schools states swimming records, I went to college and continued to swim while I majored in business. However, I found it was harder to stay popular in college while continuing to swim. This was because college involved partying, which meant late nights and less time to practice. It was the first time in my life I questioned whether or not I wanted to continue to swim. In the end, I chose swimming over partying; it lost me a lot of friends, while at the same time gaining me respect from likeminded people, who soon became my close friends.

When I was a junior in college I took hold of three records at my school, I discovered the people who had previously held the records had been on the United States Olympic swim team. When I talked to my friends about it, they said that I should try to qualify for the next Olympic trials. It was one of the most important decisions that I had ever had to make and I decided that it was worth everything that I would have to give up.

After talking to my coach, my closest friends and my parents, I decided to try to qualify for the Olympics. It took hours and hours of practice a day. I had to drop out of college to fulfill this dream, and wile I was skeptical at first, I knew that the end results would pay off. I trained for a year and by the end I had a time fast enough to compete at the Olympic trials. I was so proud of myself. I had a hard time believing the fact that I soon could be one of the few that got to represent my country as one of the best swimmers in the world. It was amazing.

When the day of the trials came, I was completely ready. I had been preparing for it for the past year. I told myself that it was mine, that I had worked since I was five years old to be on the Olympic team and that it was time to claim my rightful place. It ended up that the hundreds of thousands of hours that I had swam in my life to prepare for this moment had finally decided to take its toll on my body. As I was on the starting block at the beginning of my race, I felt a twinge in my knee. I did not thin of it at the time it happened, but as I dove into the water I felt a sharp pain. It was the Anterior Curciate Ligament in my knee that had been weakening over the years of use, snapping when my knee twisted wrong as I took off from the block.

It was the most painful experience that I can ever remember in my whole life. I knew that my swimming career was over from the moment that I felt the crippling pain. When they finally fished me out of the water the last ting that I recalled before I passed out from the pain was the awful realization that I would probably never be competing in another swim meet in my life.

As the months went by after the surgery that I had to go through to fix my knee, I realized that even though the swimming had been the most important thing in my life, it was not the only thing in my life. I was still a young woman who could do anything that she wanted with her life, except swim competitively again. This was what brought me through the awful pain, both mentally and physically.

My parents convinced me to go back to college, to complete the business major that I started. A month before I graduated, I decided to switch majors and o into sports coaching and management. I decided not to throw away everything that I had learned in the past fifteen years and instead open up my own pool, where I would become a coach of young athletes.

Although I cannot say that is what I had intended for myself when I was five ears old (standing by the pool that my brother was competing in) I have to say that having a ligament tear in my knee was probably the best ting that ever happened to me. It was through that experience that I learned that not everything goes the way that you planned for yourself and that a few twists and turns in your life would add a lot more texture to the final story that you had to tell.

3rd Place High School Prose -

Return ~ Richard Coombs

The ship touched down with all the grace of a crippled goose. Thrown from the cockpit seat, Captain Jean Severen, shielded his face from the impact with his hands, groaning as he landed. "I knew I should have invested in some new landing gear before I flew all the way to this place." He stood himself up, brushed himself off and walked back to the control panel of the ship. He held down a large, circular button and cleared his throat. "Captain's log. Day thirteen of the voyage. I've finally managed to make my way to the unmarked planet. The current air readings signify a breathable atmosphere, comprised mostly of nitrogen and oxygen. I have apparently landed in a tropical climate zone, as suggested by the thick, vibrant flora seen outside the ship. There is no sign of sentient life, and no sightings of hostile creatures have been made since the landing. I shall commence the exploration of the surrounding area forthwith."

Taking his hand from the recorder, he wiped his brow and signed, running a hand through his shoulder-length, raven black hair. Adjusting his glasses and grabbing a few essentials, he opened the blast-shielded door and stepped down onto the mysterious, unmarked planet. The ground below his feet was green and lush, the grass reaching about an inch above his ankle. No flowers decorated the ground, but huge tree towered above the forest floor. He could make out a large stone pathway a ways away and he walked towards it, cautiously at first, but then with renewed vigor. It was black as night and at the center, two parallel, yellow lines ran across it, following down the black path to both sides.

Scratching his head, Jean pulled out his portable recorder, turned it on, and bean to speak. "First sighting of ruins, an ancient pathway, presumably for primitive vehicles." He started to move along the path, careful to keep track of how far along it he was moving. After walking for another ten minutes, he stopped and noticed, with delight, that more relics existed on this path. He ran up to what appeared to be a metal chariot. It glistened in the sunlight, red as a ripe apple in springtime. He ran a hand along it, but immediately drew away when he felt the heat coming from it. Again, he drew out his recorder. " A discovery has been made. I have found a primitive vehicle, still preserved in fine condition." He moved around to the front of it. "The exterior design seems similar to that of a hover craft, but it does not appear to possess the capability of anti-gravity processing. Commencing interior search." He gripped a weak part of the metal and ripped it upward. His eyes widened as he looked at the gears and wires before him. "Now I know they were primitive." He ran a hand over what he assumed was the main power unit. "This seems as it if could only employ a mere two-hundred and fifty horse power."

He left the vehicle, marking his position o that he could return for further study. After walking for a while longer, he acme across a large sign, laying in the center of the path . It was written in a dead language, one that he could not translate on his own. He drew out a pocket scanner and brushed it over the sign. "Translation, please?" he requested.

After a few minutes, the machine buzzed the answer. "Translation complete. Sign reads, LINCOLNVILLE, 3MI. AHEAD."

This puzzled Jean. Was Lincolnville an important ritual site? A city? What could it possibly be? He shrugged and decided that he had down enough scouting for now. His findings recorded, he trekked back to his ship and sat down to mull over this. He pressed the recorder button one last time. "Day' final entry: A ruin site has been discovered and in the subsequent days, I shall be commencing a full investigation of this area known as Lincolnville. I have high hopes for what I will find on the planet, the home of our ancestors, Earth." He set the recorder to the side and he yawned, turning in for the night, his mind buzzing with activities of the days to come.