AWHH Children’s Writing Competition S1-3 Second Place

By Katrina Patrick -

In the S 1-3 age group of A Write Highland Hoolie’s Children’s Writing Competition, Iona Durbin won second place with this great entry…

My Highland Home

Iona Durbin

‘Tis a cold and stormy night and I am struggling to drift off to the dark, unconscious, rest of sleep. I toss and turn, I open my eyes the overwhelming oblivion of the dark; an invisible python wrapping around my mind and grasping my thoughts, moulding them into worries. Something is wrong. I blindly grope for the light in the dark, hoping and praying that that will be all I find. I find the switch. Light fills the room with a ghostly, pallid light that definitely hasn’t come from the lamp. I look outside. Lightning. The trees are being tossed franticly like clothes in a washing machine. I make my way into the corridor surprised by how normal everything looks. The flooring perfectly hidden underneath the grey, fluffy carpet. Laundry draped over the drying
racks, christmas cards from two years ago balanced haphazardly on the cupboards. Maybe it is just the room that is feeling strange. I hear the deep rumble of thunder tear through the air. It should be safe in my sister’s room. But she is asleep. I don’t want to wake her. I decide to sleep on the sofa downstairs instead.

The morning comes, my room slowly filling with sunlight. Wait a second. I could have sworn I slept on the sofa last night… Oh well, it must have been a dream. I get up to look out of the window. The sun is shining bright, casting the tall, dark shadows of the trees across the ground. I see the chicks run out of the coop, unable to wait another second before they can start exploring. Three white ducks waddle out after them, closely followed by Pepper our hen. Coppery brown leaves carpeting the forest floor.

I head down the beautiful, oak staircase towards the kitchen for breakfast. Opening the white cupboards I reach up to the top shelf for the rice crispies. Later I head towards the studio, a room above our garage where we do art, drumming and creative stuff like that. It is definitely my favorite room. The welcoming smell of wet paint and incense greets me as I open the door. The creative clutter like an ocean of inspiration. I stay up there for a while, working on a painting of a hand. When I come down it has started raining with no warning, (as it so often does on the west coast) so I bolt down the balcony steps towards the office door. Unfortunately it is locked. As I head towards the sliding door on the side of the house the sky splits open, buckets of water pelting my head, drenching me with cold water. Sliding open the door I throw myself into the shelter of the living/dining room. I’m soaked.

After drying off I practice playing on our beautiful, black piano. For a while I just do that, until I get bored and go on my phone for a bit. I am in the middle of watching a video when I hear the dinner-bell. The dinner-bell is a bell that people ring when dinner is ready. Sometimes we just use it to call the people upstairs, down for other reasons. Anyway, so I rush downstairs, the rays of sunlight shini n g through the window in the roof like a waterfall of transparent gold. Dark green leaves brush my shoulder as I pass one of our many potted plants. This one is a tree with beautiful, lush, waxy, green leaves. For dinner I have some delicious, creamy chicken soup. We sit at the table, with it’s beautiful, quilted tablecloth. After dinner I lounge on the sofa with the rest of my family, watching tv. After that I traipse up to bed. I lie in bed for a while thinking about how lucky I am to have such an amazing highland home.