Jack's English Journal

I woke up on Sunday morning to a beautiful sunny day, it was the day of the meeting. The plan for the building of the windmill would be put to the vote. All the other animals and I shuffled into the barn in front of Snowball and Napoleon. Snowball came up with the idea for the windmill and was, very convincingly, arguing for its construction. However, Napoleon strongly disagreed with Snowball; he opposed the building of the windmill, saying it was nonsense and useless. I wasn’t sure who I agreed with, but I knew that I had to decide today.

As we all made our way into the barn, I stood with the other pigs at the very front. Snowball began to speak to us about how the windmill would benefit us and the farm. He spoke very passionately of different advantages to his plan. He was continually interrupted by the sheep’s bleating and eventually I couldn’t take it anymore, I stood up and shouted at them to quiet down. Once they were quiet Snowball continued to claim that the windmill would improve the farm’s productivity. I found myself agreeing with Snowball and many of the other animals were nodding their heads in agreement too.

After Snowball had concluded his speech, Napoleon stood up and stated quietly ‘This plan is nonsense, the windmill would be useless and why any of you would vote for it is beyond me.’ Napoleon sat back down and didn’t seem to care what any of us thought, or even for that matter, what Snowball thought. Snowball was incensed with Napoleon’s words, he sprung to his feet shouting over the sheep; he spoke of electricity, electricity that would power all of our machines. An easier life, a better life for all of the animals and I. We knew who was going to win this vote, Snowball, the windmill would be built after this. Just as we broke into support for Snowball and the windmill, Napoleon stood up, he took one look at Snowball and screeched. A terrible, high pitched screech that silenced all of us.

As silence fell upon the barn, nine terrifying dogs dashed for Snowball; they chased him out of the barn and I ran out of the barn to see if Snowball would survive. Snowball was running fast but the dogs were faster and were gaining on him. Suddenly, Snowball slipped and I was sure he would die, then and there, in the jaws of the dogs. They snapped they’re jaws onto his tail and pulled; Snowball jumped up and whisked his tail free just in time to escape the dogs. Before any of us knew it, he was gone, through a hole in the hedge never to be seen again.

Just before I start, I just wanted to say that I’m sorry it’s late but it took me a while to get going. Can I speak to you about that.

It was 7.30 pm and Alfie’s bag was empty. The continuous drone of words, going in through his right ear and passing out through his left, lulled him to sleep. Cold air rushed in through the open window and Alfie tucked his hands into his pockets to secure some warmth. It was dark and foggy outside and there was no natural light to illuminate the room, the flickering light just revealed the damp walls and cobwebs. Stood in front of a blackboard with scrawled notes on it was Ms Briggs, she was sad, depressed in fact, teaching here at Station Secondary School wasn’t what she had planned. Alfie and the other children of Station School were ‘lucky’, as they were told by Mr Williams in his weekly assembly.

Mr Williams was a short, fat, red faced and disciplinarian headmaster, he stood in front of all 600 pupils to address them every Sunday. He told them how fortunate they were that the school was an old powerstation and therefore, they were one of the few schools left with power worldwide. Mr Williams was increasingly nervous each week and he told all 600 pupils that the power was running out.

Alfie was searching through his bag for a pen, he couldn’t find one. Nobody had ever forgotten a pen for English before, and Ms Briggs was in a particularly bad mood today. Alfie timidly raised his hand and 20 bored teenage pupils looked his way, hoping for some drama. Sat next to Alfie was Michael and Michael nudged him to see what the problem was. Alfie was lucky, Michael had a spare pen, and he was safe from the wrath of Ms Briggs.

Ms Briggs turned to the class and told them that today they had to write a short story. Alfie already knew what he was going to write. He was going to write about the power running out. Everyone began writing and Alfie began ‘Station: The day the lights went out’. After 20 minutes of solid writing, Alfie had finished. He set the pen down on his paper and looked up. Alfie shivered as the wind blew harder and he raised his hand again. Ms Briggs walked over to him and read aloud ‘… the lights went out…’ The lights went out.