look at E go

Long, long ago in a land far away lived the little letter e. e grew up in the land of Alphabetville until he reached the ripe age of E. That's when our story begins...

E woke up one morning and went to work. He worked like all the other letters. In the word factory. All day, from 9am till 5pm the letters of Alphabetville labored to make words. Short words. Long words. Strange words. Simple words. This was their life. It's what they talked about in the evenings at home or in the pub.

This one particular day, E stopped what he was doing and looked around. "I declare," he declared, "I am in most of the words around here." This epiphony hit him so hard that he started to feel quite proud of himself (despite there was no "E" in proud). He began talking about how prominent he was in most words. He bragged to J. He bragged to M. He bragged to Z. He bragged to all 25 letters but mostly, he bragged to his neighbors, D and F, about how important he was.

This went on for weeks. D and F had had enough. One night, they agreed to meet at the pub after work but didn't tell E. They devised a plan to inform the rest of Alphabetville to stop making words in the word factory until E got the message.

The entire population of Alphabetville (from A to Z) agreed. The entire population, that is, except E. For E didn't know anything about the plan.

So, that next morning E went to the word factory like any other day. But this day he was all alone. "Hmph," he thought, "I don't need the rest of the letters. I'm in most of the words anyway. I'll just work like nothing is different. Then I'll get all the credit. They'll see!"

He proceeded to make a word:

"_ _ E"

He knew it meant "one" but it didn't look right. "No bother. I'll just make another word." he thought to himself. So he crafted the word:

"E _ E _ _ _ _ E"

He thought, "Hmmm, that doesn't look like the word 'everyone'. I'm in it 3 times but it still doesn't work."

This went on all day. E was exhausted. The 5 o'clock whistle blew. Time to quit. Worn out by all the futile wordsmithing, E went to the pub to get a drink. Half way through his root beer, it dawned on him.......... *

 

*author's NotE: This simplE story nEEds a conclusion. Can you hElp? UsE a comment bElow to writE your vErsion of how it should End. I challEngE your crEativity. (oh by thE way, this is part of BridgEt ChumblEy's blog carnival on thE onE word, "Ego")

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Comments

[Bridget]

Very clever, Scott. I need time to come up with something, but I think this will have to do for now:

E could not GO anywhErE without the hElp of his friEnds.

[Jilly]

... that there's only one E in lonely, and that's what he was. His Ego had to go or so would all of his friends! So E let his Ego go and as it left so did the lonEliness. So his friEnds came back and they were happy togEther, for you can't spell together, without E right in the middle.

Poor D and F, bet they wished they were K and O (K.O.) when E let his ego go!

[Glynn]

Inspired by Bridget's comment: hE could only gEt by with a littlE hElp from his friEnds.

[Scott Couchenour]

Bridget - thanks for stopping by. Nice ending.

Jilly - Great ending version: "only one E in lonely"...I love that!

Glynn - I liked that ending too. Thanks for sharing.

[Kelly@tabithas-team]

Without the support of others, his work had no meaning.

[Scott Couchenour]

Kelly - Very nice!

[Ryan Tate]

....that he was merely one letter in a story about the alphabet. Like a tree in a story about a forest, he was part of a greater story. It wasn't his story. It was someone else's story. He had to figure out who's story it was. But first he had to go get his neighbors and friends to help him figure it out.

[Scott Couchenour]

Ryan - Sweet. We are all just one letter in a story, aren't we? We are all vital. But we need each other to complete the message.

[jasonS]

I was going to attempt an ending, but the ones provided are already perfect! Thanks Scott. Really enjoyed the story (and its point). :)

[Derek]

...being essential to a job is not the same as being enough to get the job done. E realized that for all his prominence and presence it was his team around him that gave meaning to their task. His success was secondary to and dependent on the success of his team.