Before I Die…
“Before I die, I want to ________”
I’m not the kind of pony to think about something along the lines of something like that. I never really thought of anything that would lead me to think about something even remotely close to that before.
The only reason why I’m even thinking about it now is because of the giant wall in front of me. It really would be hard not to notice it, especially since it was on the side of one of downtown’s old, abandoned apartment buildings.
The wall was just like any other kind of walls, except for it being painted over with chalkboard paint. The paint wasn’t the only thing that stood out though; there were places where anypony walking by could add their own…whatever to the wall. This was done by using the chalk that was left out for anypony to use. Fillies, colt, mares, stallions…ponies of all shapes, sizes, ages, and race walked by and read the wall while a few added onto it.
Now, the wall itself could have been ignored by me. I could have just walked right past it, paying it no attention and go on with the rest of my day.
The thing that really caught my eye was the crowd. It just struck me odd how so many of them would just gather around a wall, reading what others have written and adding their own things to it. Some of the passersby would stop to read what was written, bringing smiles to few and chuckles, tears, and various forms of strong affection to others. This spectacle is what pulled me in.
Now, here I was, in front of the wall, just simply reading a few of the things that were posted.
Marry my marefriend, live my life, reach the moon, become a royal guard, date one of the princesses, see my colt get married, make my own business, tell her how I feel, get rid of my stalker ex, eat more sweets, drink less, be a better sibling…
There were a lot and it looked like there was room for hundreds more. It was an impressive sight to behold, though also a jaunting one as well.
Seeing all of them, written on that chalkboard painted wall, reading as much as I could see, and seeing a few of the faces of the ponies nearby, it made me want to join in, to write something down, to see how anypony would react.
The thing is, the more I wanted to write something down, the harder it was for me to do so. I was drawing a blank, just staring at the wall, holding a piece of chalk in my hoof.
Come on. How could a pony whose special talent is being able to think and understand words easily and effectively not have even the smallest, most idiotic thing to add onto this? I mean, shouldn’t something like this come easy for me or something? I would be using my special talent in the process. I sighed and shook my head.
“Come on, you idiot, think of something, anything. It wouldn’t matter how big or small. Just…just something. Come on! Think of something!”
Something tapped my shoulder, making me jump straight into the wall. I shacked off some of my now growing headache while a few of the ponies laughed at my expense.
“Are you okay?” some voice asked, the sincerity easy to hear.
“You mean, besides my new headache?” I replied, not caring about trying to hide my annoyance. “Yeah, I’m okay.”
“You sure? Nothing broken?”
“Yeah, I’m okay.” I looked down at my hooves and kicked a bit of dirt. “Not like that was the first time that has happened to me.”
“Oh…..” the voice said, unsure of what to do next.
I looked up, curious to see who exactly I was talking to, and saw a light blue earth pony mare with dark blue, with a white streak, mane and tail. The scarf she was wearing seemed to have been homemade and matched her mane colors, with a few light blue thrown in every now and then.
She walked up close to me, making my heart beat faster. What’s she thinking? What’s she going to do? As she stepped past me, I couldn’t help but sigh. Yeah, way to lift your hopes up. Like that would ever happen.
“This is a pretty impressive wall, isn’t it?”
“Huh? Oh, yeah. It is pretty impressive. Especially if you consider how old the building is as a whole.”
“That’s not what I meant,” she said as she giggled a little. “I meant, look at all of the ponies here. They took time out of their days to either write on the wall or to read what was written. Some of them might have busy schedules, while some might have a lot of free time at the moment.”
I looked around, seeing the crowd of ponies the two of us were in, and ran a hoof through my mane. “Just looks like all of these ponies have nothing else to do.”
The mare shook her head and looked at me. “That might be true, but that doesn’t make it any less significant. Just look at the wall.” She turned her head to face it. “Loads and loads of ponies wrote on it. Some of them wrote down stupid things, while others wrote down inspiring words.”
I looked at the wall, trying to see her point. Be part of the Royal Guard. Get taller. Learn cooler magic. Find that special somepony. Take care of my family. Cook better food. Find my talent. Keep having fun.
“I see your point. A few of things are kind of stupid.”
She tried to stifle a giggle, and failed a little bit.
We just stood there, looking at the wall, as if it would disappear at any moment. “Have you written anything down yourself?”
I scratched my cheek a little. “No, not really. I tried to, but……I just couldn’t think of anything. Kept drawing a blank.”
“That’s silly. It’s pretty easy. Just grab a piece of chalk, place it against the wall, and write something. Just write down the first thing that comes to mind.”
“Oh really? That simple?”
“Yep.”
“So, where is yours?”
“It’s near the corner over there,” she said, using her hoof to point. “Though, I think that it would be completely surrounded by others by now.”
“If it’s over there, why are you over here?
“I wanted to see the ones around what I wrote, but there were ponies writing things down and I didn’t want to get in the way. So, I decided to just walk by and see if I could find some opening and read what was available.”
“And then you startled me and we started talking.”
“Yep. Not a total loss in my opinion.”
‘Not a total loss in my opinion.’ Did she just say that? What does she mean by that? I kicked myself internally. Stop over thinking it. She probably didn’t mean it that way.
“It’s been fun talking with you, but I’ve got to go do something.” She turned away from me and kicked some dirt. “Maybe I’ll see you again.”
“….m-maybe.”
And just as quickly as she happened upon me, she was gone. Nicely done. You could have at least asked her for her name. How are you going to find her without it? I sighed and looked at the wall. All I wanted to do was think of something to write down on this stupid, flipping wall and now I feel like I just missed a golden opportunity.
I looked down at the chalk, still in my hoof. ‘Just write down the first thing that comes to mind.’ I looked back up to the wall, Could it really be that simple?, and put the chalk against it.
A couple seconds later, I put the chalk back where I found it and worked my way through the crowd, looking around to see if I could find that mare. Just as I neared the edge of it, I tripped on something and landed face first. Swear, this is happening way too much recently.
“Do you need some help?” a voice said after it giggled.
I looked up and found out it was that mare from earlier. What are the odds-“No, I’m good,” I said while picking myself up.
“So, I’m guessing that you wrote something down.”
“Yep.”
“Are you going to share what it is?” she asked, way too cutely.
I walked past her. “Maybe.”
Explanations (Purely Optional)
So, if you are reading this, I’m guessing you read the actual story. What this will be as just an explanation of how this story came about.
You see, the whole “Before I Die” wall thing is an actual thing and it is done pretty much as it was described in the fic. People just go up to a wall, either on the side of a building or on some flat wooden planks, and use chalk to write something down. They could be serious, silly, aspirations, dreams, goals...whatever.
Now, the idea of the fic come about just like how the beginning of the story did. I never really thought about stuff like that before, but it really seemed like an enjoyable thing to watch. A few of my friends said that they put some stuff on the wall and that they enjoyed doing it, for whatever reason I do not know.
The more I thought about the whole wall thing, the more I got curious about it. So, doing what I do way too often, I “researched” the idea about the wall via the interwebs. I found the actual official site about it and decided to see how it started out and spread. Needless to say, I was amazed. The person in charge, can’t remember her name for the love of me, started out by just writing on a blank side of an old wall and leaving it to the public and loved the turnabout of what happened. Since then, it has gone to a lot of different cities and it even has been translated to a few different languages.
The more and more I thought about it, the more the idea of the story happened.
While ‘working’ on it, I figured out that it would be interesting to challenge myself with the first-person-isc feel of it. Random start and roughly four weeks later and here we are, reading the explanation for the understanding of the story and yes, I know that that was poor sentence structure but shush.
Oh, one more thing. The reason why I ended it the way that I ended it is because…well, truth be told, I couldn’t think of any other way to do it. And yes, the stallion did, in fact, write something down on the wall. What it was is up to all of you to figure out. Yep, I’m going there.
