“What is a friend? A single soul dwelling in two bodies.”
- Aristotle [“Or perhaps four?” – Vincent Lyman]
I would like to invite you to read and experience this story, which is a conversation; a dialogue – about friendship. I offer it here (blogspot: https://montaguewhitsel-4friends.blogspot.com/) in the hopes of sharing it with a wide range of readers.
These four friends have been ‘with me’ since the early 1980’s when I wrote a story about a hike they took down to an old, well-known but abandoned house_ the remains of the first Whittier House. They have been central to the development of the fictional world in which I have come to set almost everything I have written since then; from stories and poems to poetic and philosophical dialogues. The current story -- which begins and ends at the Wickersfeld Railroad -- began to take shape in 2018 and has come to fruition in its present form in the last couple years or so. It now feels 'matured' enough, to me, to want readers. So I am setting it free_
The Four Friends explores the workings of this particular friendship; the ways in which these four individuals came together in the 1940’s and the forces that then tore them apart; 'keeping them' separated—and then how they came back together again. The stories they tell are all 'conjured' through a vivid process of remembrance, recollection and resourcement over the course of one night and the next morning. The 'conjuring' is instigated by Octavia Winslow; a friend and colleague of Geoffrey Whittier; his family’s historian and chronicler--a central character in my imagined world of 'Deer Hill.'
These stories have themes ranging from vivid recollections of their early experiences together to stories of mysterious encounters, most revolving around the Whittiers; in whose world the four friends came together. The stories they tell deal not only with the joy and the love between friends, but also loss, personal tragedy and the struggle to make one’s way in the world. Each of the friends has their own stories to tell; and are glad to share them. The conversation that unfolds here through four 'Acts;' going deeper and deeper into memory’s troth—starts in one location, then moves to two others before the process of remembrance, recollection and resourcement comes to an organic and satisfying resolve for the friends.
If you choose to read The Four Friends, please feel free to leave comments or ask questions. First and foremost, though, I hope you enjoy it. The main theme I have come to embody in this dialogue is how friendship contributes to our living of these brief mortal lives in which we find ourselves.
Blesséd be!
I hope that we all may be able to be, as Lori Ann Grayson says, “fortunate,” in the sense of “having had good friends.”
Sincerely, Montague Whitsel
Blogspot: https://montaguewhitsel-4friends.blogspot.com/
