Marston Swain, Jr. Waits for His Life to Begin: Ten Sentence Story #166

At the ripe old age of 11, Marston Swain, Jr. was a blue boy who could not wait for his life to begin.

The problem with being such a young and pretty lad is that other people wait on you while you wait for them — creating a circle of endless waiting — where nothing ever gets done but a lot of talking happens around the edges of your everyday living.

Marston waited when he woke up in the morning and he waited while he ate breakfast scones.

He waited when he took his afternoon nap under a glimmering sun.

He waited some more as he was prepared for bed to dream of his soon-to-arrive life.

Marston Swain, Jr. knew he was an important person because he had frilly shoes and neatly coiffed shags of chocolaty hair that, for some reason, always smelled of blueberry muffins.

Marston was good at ordering while waiting: He ordered his au pair to fetch him things like caramel candies and freshly powdered socks; he commanded his mother to shower him with butterfly kisses; he demanded his butler tell his father that Marston was still waiting for the pony promised on his sixth birthday.

And so Marston sat his life away, whiling away the missed moments of compassion and human understanding and mortal disappointment that bothered other children of his learned age and social wisdom.

He was much too busy to worry about a withering childhood — he had other things to do and servants to see and ponies to impress — and his life would finally begin as it always began every single day… tomorrow.

Yes, Marston Swain, Jr. would wait for his life to begin tomorrow — while the rest of the world longed with him for something, anything at all, to actually start to think about happening.