One unfortunate thing about growing up in the early 60s is that the phenomenon of Television Syndication was first getting real–and they started with Lassie and continued with Leave It To Beaver. Supposedly there are seven or so basic stories in the human story grab-bag, but Lassie and Beaver only used one each. The Lassie story: Little Her-Name-Here is trapped under a lean-to in the woods, and she doesn’t have her medicine. Lassie finds her, barks his/her heinie off to the nearest first responder, who finally gets the message and follows Lassie just in time to rescue the stricken child. Then Lassie goes back to June Lockhart and the rest of the family, only to find Timmie stirring his uneaten food around with his fork because he’s afraid Lassie will never return. O joy that Lassie is back safe and sound–till the next episode. (After a few years, the townspeople rescued by Lassie outnumbered those who hadn’t been.)
The Leave It To Beaver story: Beaver and his pals talk about doing something really neat, but they’ll get in trouble if they do it. They all agree to do it the next day. Only Beaver does it, and he gets in trouble. Ward gives him a good talking to, and Beaver learns a valuable lesson–which he promptly UNlearns in time for the next episode. (Oliver Sacks should have studied him and his short-term memory loss.)
My Three Sons, I Love Lucy, My Friend Flicka, Sky King–all had basic stories, not well told, flogged to death. So I have decided to tell a NEW story. It is at most eighteen words long, but there are pictures. It relates to the discussion above, but obliquely. The reader will have seven puzzles to solve. Five of them are pretty easy: How do the pictures illustrate the five acrostic words? The sixth is only a little harder: Which one of the acrostic words illustrates the picture illustrating it, and why? But the seventh one can take from half an hour to forever: What story can be told that will logically link all of the illustrations? Solving THAT one, dear Reader, will make you a better storyteller.
Here’s the image/story/quintuple acrostic:
One with Clay, Image and Text 
