"Week 1 Storytelling:There was an old woman."

There was an old woman had three sons,

          Jerry, and James, and John:

          Jerry was hung, James was drowned,

          John was lost and never was found,

          And there was an end of the three sons,

          Jerry, and James, and John!

There was an old woman named Elizabeth, who loves to sleep with her sneaky cat sitting on her shoulder while staring at her face. She also had three sons, Jerry, James, and John, for whom she never cared.

(The sleep old woman: photo by Libiotto)

One day, Jerry, James, and John decide to leave their home, town, city and the world, without telling their mother, who never loved them. The kids deprived of their mother's love started hating their lives and felt as if they were useless. Before leaving, Jerry, James, and John planned to eat a dinner for the last time, where they cooked a lot of delicious food together. They had a lot of fun cooking. After eating three of them departed in different directions while their eyes full of sorrow.

An 1865 political cartoon depicting Benedict Arnold and Jefferson Davis in Hell. Source:Wikipedia

 

Jerry was hung, James was drowned,

   John was lost and never was found,

Since Jerry, James, and John had a strong feeling of love for each other. Not after very long, Jerry hung himself and committed suicide because for him life was pointless without his brothers.

(Swinging corpse silhouette:Wikimedia Commons)

On the other side, James had the same condition like Jerry. He did not want to live a lonely life. As he was walking through an unknown place, he saw a river and drowned himself, while yelling  "Jerry, and John I cannot live without you guys."

(Houdini swims above Niagara Falls in a scene from
The Man from Beyond (1922). Source:Wikipedia)

Lastly, John, who was the youngest of three and was unaware of the real world because Jerry and James always led him through the difficulties of life. John had no idea of where to go. So, John went straight into the road where his brothers left him and no one knows where he went there after.

(Walled Garden, Lydiard Park and House, Lydiard Tregoze, Swindon:photo by Brian Robert Marshall)

And there was an end of the three sons,

          Jerry, and James, and John!

When Elizabeth woke up from her sleep, she looked for her sons, but it was too late and her sons were gone forever. She realized their importance in her life when she had no one to talk to or yell at. From that day Elizabeth never slept again.

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There was an old woman had three sons,

          Jerry, and James, and John:

          Jerry was hung, James was drowned,

          John was lost and never was found,

          And there was an end of the three sons,

          Jerry, and James, and John!

Author's note: The story is about an old woman and her three sons, Jerry, and James, and John, but without any background or detail. My story is descriptive and detailed compared to the original source. All you know from original rhyme is that there is an old woman and three sons, addition to how their lives came to an end.

~ ~ ~

Bibliography. This story is based on the nursery rhyme "There was an old woman" in The Nursery Rhyme Book, edited by Andrew Lang (1897).