Author Archives: Jasper Clement

Buried Alive

This story um… is from our Paine side of the family and it goes back to I believe around 1727, the year 1727. And we had a relative named William Winston and. . . he wasn’t a wealthy man, but he worked hard, but he was relatively poor. And he lived up in Northern Virginia and he met a woman who he fell deeply in love with. She was. . .she became his paramour. She was all he had hoped for in a mate and he decided this is going to be the woman that. . . I. . . I am going to marry, and her name was Sarah Dabney. And, so he started courting her as they did back in that day, and the courting process went on for quite a while. Um. . . long enough for him to save up a lot of the money that he had and he had made from work in order to buy her what was going to be one of the most beautiful rings that anyone in Northern Virginia had ever seen as an engagement ring. And. . .they were going to get married in mid spring, and it had been a terrible winter, and William Winston lived in a small, small house. You know back then it was probably a shack. But, the poor weather continued and it snowed and then the snow to rain and sleet for quite a while but he and Sarah went ahead and got married. I think it was. . . late. . . late April of 1727 if I am correct on the date, and word got out that she had this incredible engagement ring that he had gotten for her that was (you know) a sign of their betrothal. And, the word got out. . . and she fell sick with pneumonia and he thought um she became really really sick and. . . to the point to where the doctors pronounced her dead. And this was like a month. . . this was not long after they had been married. And he was devastated, he was totally traumatized. And he buried her . . . I guess he buried her in a somewhat shallow grave and the word had gotten out that his wife who had this beautiful ring. . . that this–this laborer who had married a woman and given her this just almost priceless wedding ring–that she had died.

And  three–I guess they would have been equivalent to highway men,robbers, grave robbers–after she had been buried, they dug her up, and because the ring fit so tightly on her finger that they couldn’t slide it off of her finger, and they cut her finger off! Well he was back in his home, and they dug her up in this dark and stormy night, and he’s (you know) probably sitting at his little table in his little shack with the candle flickering and the wind howling and the rain beating and the roof leaking and you know just crying into his hands. . . and there was a scratching at the door! And he’s– and he (you know) he’s just just sobbing and the scratching continued and it got louder and louder and louder and he finally realized somebody or something is scratching at my door! And he got up and he went to the door and he opened the door and there was Sarah and she hadn’t died, she had been buried alive! When they dug her up and cut the ring off of her finger it. . . it. . . it resuscitated her enough, along with the oxygen that she was able to breathe again. . . and that’s the story. And they lived happily ever after after that.

The Thursday Story MJ

Once upon a time, not so far from here, there was a widowed lumberjack. He would wake up every morning very early and go into the forest and always come home around lunch time. Now this lumberjack also had a young teenage daughter. One night the teenage daughter said to her dad “I’m so bored. I hate eating all the same foods we do. Can’t you do something different?” So the next day, the lumberjack decided to wake up even earlier and cut even more wood so that he could buy his daughter rich and delicious foods. Well, he worked all day, and around lunchtime he came to his house, and the door was locked and his daughter was nowhere in sight, and he was tired and he was hungry, and. . . he just couldn’t believe his life. Right at that moment, right at the moment he was about to cry, he heard a voice that said “Don’t cry. Why don’t you tell me your story?” So the lumberjack thought maybe he was hallucinating because he was so hungry. So he slid down the wall of his house, and started to tell the voice his story. He told the voice how he had been working so very very hard and how he had got up even earlier this morning because his daughter had said she wanted to eat more rich and delicious foods. And he worked all day and he came to his house, and it was locked and his daughter was nowhere in sight. Right at that moment, the voice said to the lumberjack “Climb the stairs.” The lumberjack looked around and he saw no stairs. Of course he saw no voice either. But he decided to follow the instructions of the voice. Sure enough, he put out his foot, and although he couldn’t see it, he felt a step. He climbed one step, two steps, three steps. And when he got to the top of this imaginary staircase, the voice said “Open your eyes.” The man opened his eyes, and there were all kinds of jewels: rubies and diamonds and emeralds, and the voice said “Take as much as you’d like.” Immediately, the lumberjack started to fill his pockets with the rubies and diamonds and emeralds, and as soon as he had filled up his pockets, boop! Suddenly, he fell down, and he was right at the door of his house. Of course, right at that moment, here comes his teenage daughter. She opens the door, she says “What- what are you doing? What do you have in your pockets?” He said “Shh-shh! let’s just go inside,” and he went inside and locked the door. Well, he. . . decided to put all of his jewels in a special box in the living room, and the next thing he knows, there’s a knock at his door, it was one of the neighbors. “Oh lumberjack, oh lumberjack, can we please borrow some wood? We see you have a beautiful fire.” The lumberjack said “What are you talking about?” The lumberjack went outside, and sure enough, there was this light radiating through his windows. Well, he really didn’t want to tell the neighbors what was happening, so he just told them “I’m sorry, I can’t help you,” and he went back into his home. Well the lumberjack was now a very. . . very. . . wealthy man. So he took all the jewels, and um. . . got money, and was able to buy a house across the street from the palace of the king. Now, luckily for the lumberjack’s daughter, the king also had a teenage daughter. The two girls would get together and do fun things, and one of the funnest things they would do is go to the princess’s swimming pool. Now it was really a swimming hole, um beautifully decorated, all kinds of plants surrounded this beautiful swimming hole. So, one day when they went swimming, the princess took off her beautiful diamond necklace and hung it from a limb. They jumped into the water and had a great day, and everyone went home. When the princess was sitting at dinner with her father the king, she realized she was not wearing her necklace, and all she could think was “The last time I had it I was with the lumberjack’s daughter.” Well right at that moment the king said “Well. . . now I understand how that poor lumberjack could become a millionaire. He’s a thief! His daughter obviously stole your necklace.” Right at that moment, the king had the guards go for the lumberjack and the daughter. The daughter was put in an orphanage, and the lumberjack was put in the middle of a square with a sign around his nack that says “This is what happens to those who steal from the king!” 

The lumberjack was quite depressed, sitting in the square with a sign around his neck. People would come by, some would throw tomatoes at him, some would yell at him. But, one day, this very kind man walked by and just dropped a coin. The lumberjack said “Kind sir, thank you so much but, what am I going to do with a coin? It would make me feel so much better if I could just tell you my story.” Right at that moment, the lumberjack started to tell the stranger everything that happened. That he was a hard working lumberjack. That his young daughter had asked him to do something so she could eat more rich and delicious foods. That he decided to wake up earlier and cut more wood so he could make more money so he could give his daughter what she asked. He talked to the stranger about the voice that told him to climb the stairs, and about the riches that he was able to find, and how he was able to buy this palace across the street from the king. And the stranger decided that this man was not really a thief, he was really a nut, and he went on his way. But right as the lumberjack was telling his story, the princess decided to go back to the swimming pool, and right as she was gonna jump into the water, she had an urge to sneeze. And as she lifted her head to sneeze, she saw her necklace hanging on the limb. She immediately ran to her father and said “I made a mistake, my friend didn’t steal my necklace, its right here. I forgot, I left it on the limb!” Well the king was a very good king. But more importantly, he was very just. And he decided that the best thing to do was to forgive the lumberjack, and give him back his palace and all of his riches, and of course his daughter was taken out of the orphanage. And they all lived happily ever after.

Now this is the Thursday story, somewhere around the world, some version of this story is told every Thursday night. Some people find it very funny, some people find it very wise. Would you like to continue this tradition?

The Lion Who Laughed

Alright this is a story about the lion who laughed, because the lion laughed, this is about a lion who laughed. The lion is a very cruel king, he gathers all the animals in the forest, he is a very cruel, cruel king! So all the animals gather in the forest, he goes “Everyone has to laugh at somebody who tells me a joke.” He pulls the tortoise up, the tortoise has to tell everyone a joke. If everyone laughs, he survives. If one person does not laugh, then he dies. He gets eaten by the lion. So! The lion is ready for the tortoise to make a joke and everybody laughs! The tortoise tells the funniest joke in the world, the lion is laughing his ass off, except the sloth. The sloth has not said a word, he is not laughing. So naturally the lion eats the turtle, okay? Or the tortoise sorry. Next day in the forest the lion gathers everybody, he’s a very cruel king, and he goes “Oh my god, some animal’s gotta tell a joke, or I am gonna eat an animal if everybody laughs then the animal is saved! If one person doesn’t laugh then damn. . . I gotta eat the animal.” So it happens to be a kangaroo. The kangaroo’s all nervous and he knows he is going to die and he’s the worst joker in the world. He tells a joke and the lion just stares at him, everybody is just like “what the hell was that?” No laughing. Uhh. . . but he gets eaten, he gets slobbered up but! The kangaroo is dead because he just got eaten but the sloth is laughing his ass off, and everyone is like “Yo, why are you laughing? You were the only one that didn’t laugh yesterday, now you’re the only one laughing today. What’s going on?” And he goes “Ahaha I’m not laughing at the kangaroo joke, I was laughing at the tortoise joke from yesterday. That shit was hilarious!” So the moral of the story is. . .don’t be a sloth.