Door #writephoto

20 Replies
Door – Image by KL Caley

Another day, another dozen old buildings.  A lot of them were called “castles”, some “towers” and then there were the ancient manor houses, though anything newer than 15th century was right out.  This struck me as strange since most of the restoration jobs made these places about as authentic as Disneyland.

OK, I’ll admit, my sense of romance had worn a little thin after the first dozen.  As I entered, my first thought went to lack of indoor plumbing and how cold and damp they must have been.  Brrr. 

And let’s face it, it wasn’t just the castles.  I had lost the romance over pretty much everything in life. 

Life.  It had become a bore and a challenge.

No.  Romance was something for children.

Well, at times I guess it could be stirred a bit.

This last place at least looked a little more like what my old fantasies about castles were about than some we had visited.

I’ll admit that my spirits were a little higher.  Not sure why.  The bright sun?  The

And then I found the door.

I was exploring the wall around the keep and went off into a hidden corner.  Nothing really to see there, but I was still a little miffed about the kids teasing me over some of things that I missed that were in dark, hidden corners of some of the other places we had visited.  I did not want to be caught having missed anything!

I was heading back to the main group and stopped.  Did I really see it?  I turned back and there it was, plain as day, a door in the wall about three foot high.  How had I not immediately seen it earlier?

What was it for?  It was obvious that this little door was part of the original structure, not the patch-job restoration.

Suddenly I was a 12-year-old boy once again, playing in the woods behind my house.  Of course there were no ancient castles there, but there were plenty in my imagination.

And in my imagination I found an old wall deep in the forests of Michigan.  Yeah, just outside of Detroit, where everyone would expect to find an ancient castle, right?

In a hidden corner of my imaginary castle wall there was a small, hobbit size door.  I had found a key and opened the door and entered a different world.

And I had met her.  Even at the tender age of 12, I had instantly fallen in love with my dream princess.

But that little day dream had grown dark, hadn’t it?

Through most of my childhood I had searched for my imaginary door, knowing it had to be there.  I mean, it was always there in the books, wasn’t it?

But I wasn’t living in a book, and never really found it.

By the time I left for college I had pretty much forgotten it.

When the woods were bulldozed while I was at school, I didn’t even feel anything more than a bit of nostalgia that part of my childhood was gone forever.

I looked down at the real door that I had found in the ancient castle.

This was bright daylight and thousands of miles from Detroit.

Without thinking I reached into my pocket and pulled out the large key.

How did that get there?

I shrugged and put it into the door.

It opened!

It was a tight fit, but I was able to squeeze through!

I stood and looked around.  It was exactly as I had imagined back when I was 12!

“Welcome home.”

I turned.

She was even more beautiful than I remembered.

***

This was written for the writephoto challenge. KL Caley is now the host of this challenge and provided the photo at the top as well as the key word, Door.

20 thoughts on “Door #writephoto”

  2. Pingback: #Writephoto Round-Up – DOOR – New2Writing

  4. Pingback: #WRITEPHOTO – Door by Trent’s World – New2Writing

  5. Gary A Wilson

    Ah KL . . .
    You can be such the romantic.
    My first romance when I was about this age was such a rolling mess that I hated letting go of and kept me thinking & rethinking it for way to long.
    This last time it came to mind was thanks to a British romantic I know who inadvertently set the whole mental flim clip looping again.
    Sigh and hmm.
    Thanks 😊

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply ↓
    1. trentpmcd Post author

      Hi Gary – Unless you commented in the wrong place, this is a KL inspired story but one that I wrote. Funny, it is the second “writephoto” story in the last two months or so where the protagonist somehow returns to a magic realm they knew as a child. Maybe I am having a miniature mid-life crisis this spring ;)
      Thanks for stopping in.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply ↓
  8. Marilyn Armstrong

    All the times I was in England — maybe a total of three months — I was a determined castler. I couldn’t help it. I remember thinking how chilly they would be in the long wet winters in England, but I figured roaring fires in huge fireplaces and lots of woolly things.

    There were a few huge Crusade castles in Israel too. Even THEY were chilly and damp. Maybe it is the nature of stone building with walls 8 (or more) feet thick that just hold onto cold and dampness.

    We all longed for that key. I’m glad you found yours. Or your virtual doppelganger did, anyhow.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply ↓
    1. trentpmcd Post author

      When I was in England I actually enjoyed visiting castles quite a bit, but did as many ancient sites as possible – decades before I “met” Sue, I was much more drawn to them… One part of this story is almost true – I visited with a 10 year old nephew. He was mad at me most of the trip because I didn’t let him explore one dark corner of a castle. thing is, I let him explore ALL of the dark corners and had no idea what he was talking about. That being said, after that I made sure I saw every nook and cranny and didn’t miss one single square centimeter of any castle we visited….

      Like

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