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is this about a friend that committed suicide? if so it’s quadruply interesting and must be read many times! if so, I find it extremely inspiring.

Thanks Bhi,
Your comment is so true. Thanks for reading and for the kind comment.
Cheers,
Jim

so I returned and having read the story ten times or so trying to understand what exactly you were trying to write about a phrase now stands out

it is a page straight from Thomas Hardy. yeah I think I know what you tried to do here.

if Franciman separated the penultimate paragraph and rephrased a bit, I thought, the story will be more clear and meaningful.
I’ll show you what I mean,

I’m now sitting on my front terrace, watching my neighbour at work. It’s hot and the sun is still high, although it’s early evening. Apart from Gabriel Oak riding on a combine harvester, it is a page straight from Thomas Hardy. I am drinking French Cider. It’s bought from the local shop; it’s cheap as chips, and it’s dry, refreshing and wonderfully moreish. I think it’s so cheap because there are no expensive chemicals in it. The cider, and the scene unfolding before me, both suggest that I should be drinking the cider in an earthenware beaker, from the hand of the Farmer’s wife after laying the dust of the long-standing barley I have just scythed through. But times have changed, both on the South Downs and here, in the Creuse.

His wife wears designer jeans, a vest top, and slingback sandals, and he sports a baseball cap. I watch him throw his van at the bends way in excess of the national speed limit, perhaps listening to the Kings of Leon. It’s still a one man job to harvest a field of standing grain.  
 
I can only admire such men’s knowledge and skill. Generations of Creuse farmers have contributed to the amassed knowledge and folklore required to plant by the Moon’s phases and harvest at the promptings of the seasons. Man and nature in harmony; a good, old excuse for quaffing the cider.
 

well I tried honestly and if you edit your story in a similar and/or better way not only I will get it now but also like it very much.

all the very best,
N

Short and sweet. I like the brevity. It paints a picture of a thousand colours or autumn.

So well sang and very timely.

I have my own song about the particle but I’m not sure UKA is ready just yet. Perhaps not as sweet as yours.

Sometimes I’m lost for words. A simple like button would be apt. I like.

Very nicely written and paced but the end was a complete let down. So what? So they found mother. Who’s they? You have to make clear what’s in your head.

This is again, well written but it needs filling out. The end is unexpected and too bizarre. To get to that end, you need to tell us that the boy grew up, got married, had a daughter and what happened to her. And all that time, Noodles got sharper and pointier.

I’m a bit stumped. All these literary phrases and descriptions may make for pleasant reading, but where do they lead? For what is this piece written? One reads it, waiting for something to happen and nothing does. And the ending makes no sense. As you write well, try to put something together that goes somewhere and says something, or at the very least, tells a story.

you are a passionate woman.