Shrunk to Fit - 2. Sailing By

Quite successful as a story because it has a beginning, a middle, and an end. It’s an interesting little tale too. Easy to picture in my mind even with your minimal descriptions.
;–)
 

Folded paper boats are among the West’s traditional origami designs.
;–)

The boys should use a glossy magazine instead of the traditional newspaper as their source material, although that would mean their boats would be much smaller.
;–)

46 minutes ago, droughtquake said:

It’s an interesting little tale too.

Thanks, drought.   It does indeed have movement but since there's no one character, maybe the arc is what's missing. Anyway, as I said, while liking it, I suspect it didn't meet the brief. 

I get your point, northie, but I lean toward considering it a story. The are characters, jostling boys, identified at the beginning, and there is dialogue advancing the plot in the middle, and their is an achievement to signify the end. I like it. I saw the whole thing in my mind's eye, and took great pleasure in the boat that held together and sailed on by. Regardless of any parameters, you wrote 'something' I found charming... it took me back to my own childhood.   

I took a series of psychology tests a couple years ago. One of them was to look at a black and white drawing and create a story about what I saw. There were several pictures I was given to create stories about. Each story had to have a beginning, middle, and ending. My stories were more like sketches, but were accepted as being sufficiently complete for the purpose. None had any dialogue. I think, in part, the stories were depressing because most of them were pretty dark. And, strangely enough, they all seemed to involve Gay characters! I wonder why that would be!
;–)

I don’t know who creates the rules on what constitutes a story, but I think the definition is broader than any that a pedant might create. And I know pedantics. I only have to look in a mirror!
;–)

9 hours ago, Headstall said:

you wrote 'something' I found charming

Thank you, Gary.   This challenge is just that - something to be written to a prompt and to have an exact word count. As you might expect, some of my efforts are better than others.   

7 hours ago, droughtquake said:

Each story had to have a beginning, middle, and ending.

That's certainly part of the definition of a story.   But of course, there are authors who work to subvert that. Not me, I hasten to add.

6 hours ago, northie said:

That's certainly part of the definition of a story.   But of course, there are authors who work to subvert that. Not me, I hasten to add.

I hate trying to read a novel that has no chapter divisions, just paragraph after paragraph after paragraph. There’s no obvious stopping place. Did the author expect me to read the novel from cover to cover without pausing? (I can’t remember the title, but it was an Oprah Book Club selection and I think it had a post-apocalyptic setting.)

1 hour ago, droughtquake said:

hate trying to read a novel that has no chapter divisions

Don't try reading any 'stream of consciousness' novel then, like James Joyce or similar. Not that I have read Joyce but I've certainly ploughed my way through books with no chapters. I suppose, why should a writer be concerned by how easy or otherwise a reader finds their masterpiece? 

1 hour ago, northie said:

I suppose, why should a writer be concerned by how easy or otherwise a reader finds their masterpiece? 

That has been a discussion topic with another of my favorite GA authors. He prefers to post very long stories. This is complicated by GA restrictions on posting more than one chapter in too short a time. But he has bowed to public opinion and usually splits his longer stories.

I see nothing wrong with a story told in a single scene. I think you did it here, and well. Better than others, too! Consider Samuel Beckett (though his scene was much longer than yours, and Godot never did get himself there! ).

DQ, don't you bother with Beckett. You would just be very annoyed!

1 hour ago, Geron Kees said:

DQ, don't you bother with Beckett. You would just be very annoyed!

The only Samuel Beckett I’m interested in was in Quantum Leap! Scott Bakula was pretty hot back then. He was still hot in Star Trek: Enterprise and on Looking. I’ve seen most of Quantum Leap, but I’ve only seen some of Enterprise and Looking. I watched the backdoor pilot of NCIS: New Orleans, but never got into the show even though I’m a faithful fan of the original NCIS.

Scott has played at least two Gay roles: Jim Olmeyer in American Beauty and Looking's Lynn. But one of his first roles was the Off-Broadway production (and later, the Pasadena Playhouse production) of Three Guys Naked from the Waist Down – I’m sure I’m not the only pervert here who would want to see pictures of him in that play! He was on the cover of Playgirl in 1995, but that suggests he didn’t appear in a nude pictorial.

Scott also had a role in Life as a House, the movie that proved that, contrary to all the green-screen evidence in Star Wars, Hayden Christensen actually could act.
;–)

13 hours ago, droughtquake said:

That has been a discussion topic with another of my favorite GA authors.

Who could you possibly mean...?   

8 hours ago, Geron Kees said:

I think you did it here, and well.

Thanks, Geron. It didn't get a very good technical response when I first posted it on my external blog. Good that @droughtquake considers us both 'his favorite authors'.   

I enjoyed this very much! It brought back pleasant memories of childhood. I'm not certain on the story versus scene debate. I tend to lean toward scene, but the many arguments for story are quite valid. Thanks. 

14 hours ago, JeffreyL said:

I'm not certain on the story versus scene debate.

You're not the only one.   It's sometimes difficult to tell with a piece this short. Whatever, it is, I'm glad you enjoyed it. 

It's a short story that is really a sketch drawn in words, when you picture it in your mind you see the story. That's not just writing that is skill.

48 minutes ago, Mancunian said:

It's a short story that is really a sketch drawn in words,

And with this, you cover both points that are discussed in the other comments.  Whatever it is, I'm glad you enjoyed it.