Random thoughts from an older perspective, writing, politics, spirituality, climate change, movies, knitting, writing, reading, acting, activism focussing on aging.
I MUST STAY DRUNK ON WRITING SO REALITY DOES NOT DESTROY ME.
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore... We can use some or all of the prompts, and mixing and matching is encouraged.
Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined into this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
This month I have provided the prompts. Special thanks to Elephant's Child for hosting me for the first two weeks of May prompts.
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore... We can use some or all of the prompts, and mixing and matching is encouraged.
Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined into this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
This month I am going to provide the prompts. Special thanks to Elephant's Child for hosting me for the first two weeks' of May prompts.
Words for Wednesday will be here for the Month of April. All the way from Newfoundland, Canada, which has its own time zone - 30 minutes ahead of the rest of Canada. Thanks as always to Elephant's Child for keeping this feast going.
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore... We can use some or all of the prompts, and mixing and matching is encouraged.
Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined into this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
Here are the words for this week, In two batches with an image in the middle, use some or all of the prompts. Thank you so much for the opportunity to host W4W - I have enjoyed it immensely! I had fun with this week's prompts. The painting is "Back from Market" by Chardin. The prompts are from the poem that Eavan Boland wrote about it.
Claustrophobia was what she had to live with since she was twelve. It
rendered her a recluse - for being in a confined space was
impossible. Like now. Yeah, she had all the therapy, thank you very
much. But even Dr. Herzel's large office was torture.
Being told to stay with her feelings, let them wash over her, blah
and blah cubed. Her impulse to run away and out onto the street
always won.
Here in the small
church where The Disciples congregated every Sunday at 9, was
torture too, hemmed between her parents like a child. She was twenty one
for God's sake. Home for the weekend from college.
The sounds of the
Sunday Farmer's Market surged through the open church windows on the golden light
from the morning sun. It was calling her name and this time she obeyed. The
minister was pounding the pulpit in rhythm to her heart as she broke
free, pulling her arm from her father's restraint, not caring about
the hazard to his failing heart that he guilted her with every time
she came home, "You'll be the death of me, child,"
clutching his chest over her latest innocent exploit, like drinking a
glass of wine.
She flew outside the
church door, mingling with the heady mix of peasants and the
well-to-dos who stayed at a manageable distance from her, as they crowded the stalls of vegetables, fruits and meats.
She breathed in the
intoxicating smell of freedom as she moved around.
It was high time indeed to
deal with the undeserved punishment of her father locking her for five hours in the cellar's dark cold room for innocently kissing Albert in the school
playground all those years ago.
Words for Wednesday will be here for the Month of April. All the way from Newfoundland, Canada, which has its own time zone - 30 minutes ahead of the rest of Canada. Thanks as always to Elephant's Child for keeping this feast going.
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore... We can use some or all of the prompts, and mixing and matching is encouraged.
Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined into this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
Here are the words for this week, In two batches with an image in the middle, use some or all of the prompts.
Good luck!
From "A Moveable Feast" by Ernest Hemingway. Photo from front cover of book. (an annual read for me)
Roseanne pulled the
curtain aside and looked down at the colourless shell-shocked road
four floors below. The war seemed like yesterday, she still couldn't
get used to the silence. Normal life had not returned even though the
armistice was a few months ago now.
She sighed and
glanced back at the bed where Antoine was lightly snoring, his
grown-up moustache still strange on his face. He had changed in
uncountable ways. He had witnessed and participated in acts she could
barely comprehend, slaughter and wickedness which would never be
eliminated from his fun loving spirit, now gone forever.
Her deep love for
him was now jockeying with feelings of pity and revulsion for what he
had seen and done. The unknowable within him.
Words for Wednesday will be here for the Month of April. All the way from Newfoundland, Canada, which has its own time zone - 30 minutes ahead of the rest of Canada. Thanks as always to Elephant's Child for keeping this feast going.
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore... We can use some or all of the prompts, and mixing and matching is encouraged.
Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined into this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
Here are the words for this week, In two batches with an image in the middle, use some or all of the prompts.
From "The Book of Longing" by Leonard Cohen. Art by Leonard Cohen.
Canopy*
Thorn*
Machine*
Charity*
Limp*
Aisle*
Nothing*
Sneak*
He'd been a thorn in
her side for so long, she'd lost track of the times he'd teased and
belittled her. And now here he was, all grown up, she sneaked a look,
the slight limp from the long ago motorcycle accident giving him a
roguish slant. Their childhood battles all but forgotten, falling
away into nothing.
He'd come back into
her life installing a machine - the new printing press for her
company that ran the children's charity.
And incredibly, here
she was, walking down the aisle, moving under the white canopy,
leaning on her father's arm, smiling up at Luke her childhood enemy,
as he held out his hands and grasped both of hers, smiling, solid, as
if he'd always been standing there. Waiting.
Elephant's Child is hosting this week's Words for Wednesday. I'm participating again this week after quite a dry spell, as I need a bit of a jog to my imagination and writing as it's all falling to the wayside these days. Using all the words was a challenge but very enjoyable. I encourage everyone to participate!
She didn't catch a wink of sleep. The gathering the night before was a disaster, the sea was so rough the chandelier in the dining room danced a pirouette over their heads. Her beloved dog, Teddy, must have been frightened in the canine quarters below deck. She sat up suddenly in her small cabin, staring at the elastic band on her finger and snapped it. What was it she had to remember?
Police department? The stable at the farm?
Ah yes, the prose was all falling into place now for her latest book. She scribbled the notes down quickly before they evaporated and glanced at the port hole.
They would soon be in harbour. She would treat herself to a coffee and a tour of the botanical gardens this afternoon
The prompts are hosted by Elepant's Child this week. Go visit her blog and see what others are doing with these prompts and maybe have at it yourselves.
This week's prompts, use one or all.
You can't judge a book by its cover;
She repeated the ad she placed on Kijiji to herself and snapped a quick picture. A bargain, but she needed the money now.
If she'd heard them once, she'd heard them a thousand times, all those tired old cliches.
Book and cover, more recently used by granny who was bolstered by Isabel's mother, granny's daughter.
But it made her all the more adamant in pursuing Stan, the glamourous and handsome new sales guy at the car dealership where she worked. He charmed the pants off her, literally and figuratively, and she totally understood how he needed to bolster his sales to be kept on so she gladly assisted him, turning over some of her nearly finalized deals to him. Especially that truck deal she had worked so hard on with that new trucking company, a fleet of six trucks.
But she and Stan were getting married after all and it was all one pot anyway, he'd said. A huge commission cheque but he'd said he's use it for the down payment on that little cottage on the water she'd had her eye on. And then there was the discounted sports car he'd wheedled out of her. For his "image" he said. He'd pay her back. He made her head spin did Stan with the promises and the honeymoon he'd planned in Italy. She'd never had this kind of attention from any man. Granny and mum didn't like him and it was so evident it made her heart hurt when Stan came over the one time for dinner to meet them and then said he felt so unwelcome he didn't want to come back.
At the table, he wouldn't stop bragging about his sales even though basically they were hers. Saying to them stuff like "the squeaky wheel gets the grease" "all's fair in love and war" "it ain't over till it's over" as if he won a battle every day. She saw it all so clearly now and her cheeks flushed red as she looked at the ad, remembering she'd invited the whole dealership to the wedding, she'd paid deposits on the hotel and the catering and spent so much on the dress, it was so lovely.
It was her boss, the owner, who told her Stan had scarpered two days before the wedding. Left his apartment with 3 months rent overdue, no forwarding address, and apparently a couple of wives were suing him for child support.
Her boss looked so sad as he shook his head at her, offering up another cliche that made her scream internally:
Along with a photo of a trail which River herself has walked.
George, I'm getting fed up with Mother. You know how that is. She keeps reliving the glory days of the one time she completed the 100 metre dash in the Olympics for France. She didn't even place, but it made her an expert on all things running, hiking, walking and marathoning.
Let's face it, George, I was a disappointment to her. I was the type of athlete that fell over her own shoelaces. I tried, of course, in my teenage years, but I'm more the intellectual type as you know. The fact that I'm a physicist Mother finds so amusing. She's always apologizing for the way I've turned out.
Now that she's in the wheelchair, I guess you could say she's sure in a permanent state of furious immobility. She always dresses in her favourite coral tracksuits and I have to wheel her out every day onto the rocky trail near the home. But not before she demands her "perils". Mother has never mastered the English language even though she moved to the UK long before I was born. So I fetch her pearls for her and place them around her neck. Incongruous really with the track suit. Then I have to make sure she wears that ridiculous lampshade of a hat, that huge purple beast, so that the sun won't damage her perfect skin. You could at least take your turn doing all this, George. Stop avoiding her. And me.
Honestly, George, it's a miracle I don't upend that wheelchair and let it slide down the cliff.
This week's words are hosted by River. Go visit her and see what others are up to.
Here are the words:
1. "then I was going to bed, where I planned to stay until Christmas"
2. "I'm always careful," I said calmly, stepping straight into a puddle.
And here is the picture:
I'd suspected he hadn't been paying attention to me for quite a while. When we travelled to Lucezia, his idea, backpacks, keeping it simple, hostel staying, his ignoring of me got worse. He was preoccupied. But not in an attractive, intellectual way. More like his face wore a permanent 'I'm not with her' grimace walking way ahead or way behind me. I thought he might be going deaf. I began to test the waters, so to speak.
Like walking along Gallery Lane, I started talking away to him.
"I think I might be six months pregnant," I announced.
"If you insist," he responded, in this dead flat voice, and stopped in front of the ice-cream booth, not looking at me as usual.
"I'm always careful" I said calmly, stepping straight into a puddle, deliberately splashing mud and petrol all over his fine khaki pants. He didn't even notice.
He bought himself a gelati and started licking it absently as he walked away from me. Like I wasn't there. Like I never had been there.
"Stop!" I screamed after his retreating back, his muddy pants. He ignored me. As always.
I ran to catch up, it wasn't hard, slightly uphill.
I wasn't through with him yet. Not by a long shot. For now, I would try once more to connect with him, then I was going to bed, where I planned to stay until Christmas.
This month's W4W are being hosted by River. Thank you River! You can find her here. Please visit and see what others are doing with the words and maybe join in yourself. It's a lot of fun cranking up the writerly wheels.
He left the building and discovered his legs couldn't quite hold him up. The day had been so full of promise and expectation and now this crushing disappointment. So he sat down abruptly on the bench outside, throwing his portfolio underneath and fishing a used drink-cup out of the garbage can next to him so he would look like he was busy and not seething and shaking internally. He glanced upwards again at the fourth floor of the publishing house and found the peppermint coloured ornamental blind he had sat next to as the two editors sliced and diced his work.
Maybe the publisher was unfamiliar with his type of manuscript? Surely Gothic-Crime-Romance-Anime was a recognized style? But to be met by derision and a plethora of vaguely hostile narrow-eyed expressions? What was all that about?
His head was spinning. He was grateful to his uncle for setting up the interview with his college friend the publisher. But he hadn't anticipated such mendacious behaviour.
He sighed deeply and collected his portfolio from under the bench.
"Grant? Your name's Grant?" Her voice was low and gentle. Ah, the pretty receptionist from the lobby. He nodded.
She looked around her carefully and then sat down next to him.
"I was the first reader of your work cos I'm training to be an editor," she whispered in a rush, "And I believe you have terrific talent. These guys you met today? They steal a lot of ideas from young writers like you and pass them on to TV studios for production and compensation. But," and here she stopped and handed him a business card, "Here's the contact info for my sister, who's a literary agent. You call her and tell her I sent you. You need to be published and stop this thievery!"
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, what have you. We can use some or all of the prompts.
Some of us put our creations in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog - please provide the link to your blog in the comments. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined in this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
Huge thanks to everyone who joins in the fun and/or comments.
First of all, a clip from one of the greatest Irish fiddlers.
And then two lists of 4 words each.
Subway*
Question*
Library*
Bench*
Voice*
Organize*
Fishmonger*
Horizon*
-----------------------------------------------------
Before I read anyone's story I post my own:
-----------------------------------------------------
THE DUET
Her head was down, already full of the pressures of the day as she stepped off the subway train. He stopped her in her tracks, what time was it, seven in the morning. And there he was, no question, playing the fiddle on the platform, sitting on the fancy wooden bench with the dedication plaque to some long dead commuter, his worn leather hat turned upside down to catch the coins.
She rooted in her purse, stirred by the melody, the voices of her grandparents coming back in such a rush that tears sprang to her eyes. On a sunny day, when business died down in mid afternoon at the fishmonger’s in Ballydehob, Granda would sit outside on his chair tuning up his old violin, his eyes fixed on the distant horizon in the harbour in front of the shop. Playing for all the emigrants in Americay, he’s say, all the ones that were starved out of here in The Great Hunger.
The fiddler stopped and smiled and thanked her for the couple of toonies she threw in the hat. Can I ask you a question, she said. He nodded. I’m organizing my ancient music portfolio for publication, she said, I have quite a library of these old Irish melodies, can you tell me the name of what you just played, I don’t think I have it in the collection.
Lord Mayo’s Lament, he said, it’s been in my family for generations. Do you play?
Oh yes, she said, I’m in the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, we’ve got five hours of rehearsals starting early this morning. She hesitated. But..... and she stopped again and gulped and looked at him as he started to play. Carbery’s Reel
Without thinking, she laid her violin case on the bench beside him and withdrew her beautiful violin.
Carbery’s Reel tingled in her fingers. And she tuned up and played alongside him as her grandfather had taught her, the wild music of West Cork coming alive in her very bones.
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, what have you. We can use some or all of the prompts.
Some of us put our creations in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog - please provide the link to your blog in the comments. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined in this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
Huge thanks to everyone who joins in the fun and/or comments.
I've stuck to the picture and eight words prompt format. I used a word generator for the second list and I think the results are pretty challenging, but have at it. It should be fun!!
(1)
Mountain
Scrabble
Traffic Lights
Insane
(2)
Arrival
Lasso
Wonder
Gadget
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted Later - my story.
------------------------
It was good to leave the traffic and lights and noise of the city behind. How long had it been since he had seen the clear night sky? Light pollution was everywhere.
He had his life packed into one over-sized duffel-bag. It had taken him a week of brooding. Stella had been insane with rage, her eyes blazing, her mouth spewing language he hadn’t heard since his stint in the marines. She demanded he leave. She shouted his PTSD was his problem and not hers and he needed help, why wasn’t he getting help? She couldn’t live with him anymore. She had packed his bags and tossed them onto the driveway.
He knew if he opened his mouth she would be in danger as he could feel the burning in his fists. He loved her. He would not hurt her. He turned and left, picking up his belongings from the driveway, throwing them in the jeep, screeching off, pounding his angry fists off the wheel.
He checked into a Super 8 after 100 miles of savage driving and phoned his employer and said he needed time off as he wasn’t well and he hung up before Jim could respond. He lay on the bed for a prepaid week, getting up to use the bathroom and eating rubbish purchased in two bags from the 7-11 next door following his arrival.
On day seven, he remembered Scott, his buddy from Afghanistan. Scott and his cabin up in the mountain. They would play Scrabble every chance they got in the safety of their tent in the desert. He smiled for the first time in what seemed liked years. He needed to lasso the remnants of his former life. Scott had extended an open invitation last month when he called from a payphone in his local village up in the Appalachians.
“The wonder of my mountain,” he said, “Is all yours, buddy. Come and be still. But leave the gadgets and devices. You need to spend time with my pet fox, Maggie.”
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, what have you. We can use some or all of the prompts.
Some of us put our creations in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog - please provide the link to your blog in the comments. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined in this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
Huge thanks to everyone who joins in the fun and/or comments.
This week's prompts are a photo followed by 2 lists of 4 words each:
(1)
School
Highway
Redhead
Crow
(2)
Yarn
Spider
Knife
Beer
Have fun!
Posted later - my story using the picture and all the words.
__________________________________________________________________________
Mrs. Martin, widow woman, had run the private school there. A faded redhead, she would have been in her late fifties then, Caroline reflected. The curriculum had been excellent with the emphasis on the arts. The tower had been a well stocked library, another room was an art studio, yet another was for needle crafts, the colourful yarns seemed to dance on the walls in the morning sun. All so long ago, now Caroline was the same age as Mrs. Martin was way back then. Nearly fifty years ago.
Mrs. Martin would have been horrified at the new bypass from the highway that ran across the house grounds, obliterating all that had been there, the trees where the morning crows would gather, the lavender bushes and the spring bulbs and those intricate pathways. And the fountain!
On impulse, Caroline stopped the car and pulled over. She knew she shouldn't but she grabbed a can of light beer from the six pack on the floor beside her and cracked it open and made a toast to long gone Mrs. Martin and her encouragement of her students. She let the warm liquid slide down her throat and feeling fortified, exited the car and went up to the house. Gosh, sadly, it looked fated for demolition.
She took a pocket knife from her purse and brushing a spider and its web off the door, twisted the blade into the old lock and popped the door open.
This is where it all began, her successful life as a sculptor. Perhaps there was some way of saving this building and making it an art gallery?
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, what have you. We can use some or all of the prompts.
Some of us put our creations in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog - please provide the link to your blog in the comments. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined in this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
Huge thanks to everyone who joins in the fun and/or comments.
This week's prompts are a photo followed by 2 lists of 4 words each:
(1)
Iceberg
Gas Pump
Cellar
Painting
(2)
Blackboard
Carrot
Doorbell
Cheese
Good luck!
Posted later - my story. All words used and the picture.
They managed to get a fire lit from the driftwood on the beach. A complicated process involving shaving some of the wood off the larger bits. Boy, but it was cold. Through the broken door, the small town outside looked forlorn and deserted.
But they were lucky in their survival, the iceberg had been small but the boat had taken a beating alright with a small hole in her side and water gushing in. It wasn’t time to make Titanic jokes, thought Cindy as she warmed her hands on the measly flames. They had barely tacked into the small harbour, an old settlement off the northern coast and all five of them jumping on to the shore. She looked out the broken window and saw their boat now crashing to pieces off the rocks.
It’s an old schoolhouse! said Kevin, there’s the remains of an old blackboard of the wall! And he brushed off the cobwebs from the flaking black painting.
Peter just then emerged from the cellar holding a few dusty jars of food and an old school bell, displaying his cheesy, fearless smile. They all rolled their eyes at him.
There are some really ancient carrots down there too, he grinned, if we get desperate. But the good news guys?
They all looked at him, in a mixture of shivering despair and overwhelming gratitude, yes they were alive.
He pumped his fist: There’s gas in our sat phone! Search and rescue is on the way!
This meme was started by Delores a long time ago. Computer issues led her to bow out for a while. The meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast.
Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write. Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image. What we do with those prompts is up to us: a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore... We can use some or all of the prompts.
Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. I would really like it if as many people as possible joined into this fun meme, which includes cheering on the other participants. If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
The prompts are here this month. Huge thanks to everyone who joins in the fun and/or comments.
This week's prompts are 2 lists of 4 words each:
Paddock
Bridge
Cane
Moss
and/or
Lilac
Espresso
Fountain Pen
Peroxide
You can use some or all of them.
Thanks and good luck and above all have fun!
Added later~
This is mine.
She hated it but Mother still demanded she dress in the old lady colour of lilac and purple and mauve. Fighting with Mother was distressing as she invariably cried. So she put up with wearing these awful colours. The doctor (and how lovely was he?) had said not to challenge her, just to roll with her desires, the dementia would soon take a further toll.
Twice a week she'd leave the horses after their morning gallop in the paddock, drain the full espresso pot of coffee in the kitchen to fortify herself for the long journey to Mossville where mother resided in her lilac room at the expensive Sunset Lodge. The home for those with dementia was luxurious. Mother was fixated on the colour and had been for some years. In the early days she sometimes forgot to wear it in her rush to make the long trek from the country and then Mother would refuse to see her or cry incessantly. With her Mont Blanc fountain pen she left a note for Paddy the horse trainer as she normally did when she left on errands and then took her cane from the hallstand as the dampness in the air was boring into her arthritic knee and climbed into her car, her mauve silk dress cool on her body.
She drove over the rustic bridge by the road, glancing at herself in the rear view mirror. H'm, not a great shade of blonde there, girlie, she told herself, the peroxide treatment was a little too harsh yesterday. She'd have to speak firmly to Maxine at the salon at her next weekly root touch-up. She sincerely hoped Doctor Cameron thought her hair was naturally blonde and wouldn't look too closely at it today.
This meme was started a while back and this month it is hosted by Elephant's Child. Join in the fun if you wish and check out her blog to see what others are doing with the prompts.
This week's prompts are, first two phrases:
Bitten off more than he can chew (taken on a task which is too much for him)*
Diamond in the rough (a person who is generally of good character but lacks manners, education, or style)*
Some people should come with a trigger warning. Seriously.
She'd been hired by the HR department to assist me in my increased responsibility due to the expansion of the corporation.
An essential component for the job would be the expectation of expertise in software management and public relations.
She was taller than normal, a whopping six feet, so she towered over me. It is challenging to instruct someone when you are looking up at them all the time. Add to that an unwelcoming demeanour in her slouched shoulders and nail chewing.
When I outlined more of the details of the job demands, she kept moving from foot to foot adding to my annoyance.
"You are familiar with power point and spread sheets?" I finally asked her.
Oh boy, I think she'd bitten off more than she could chew judging by the blank stare I received from above.
"Well, no, um, what are they?" she said, bored, disinterested.
"I think I might have to call HR," I replied, frosty, frustrated. She was a diamond in the rough, for sure, and not one I wished to polish.
"Oh, I wouldn't do that," and she yawned right in my face, "Mom is the vice-president of marketing, Cheryl Manning, recently married to the president?"
This week we have images from Elephant's Child who is hosting W4W for the month of June. Please visit her to see what others are up to and perhaps be tempted to participate yourself.
She insisted she had seen it flying overhead, an odd shape, the size of one of those motorcycle sidecars but with an energy pack at the back of it and a person sitting inside with a huge helmet, just zip, zip, zipping around, calm as you please. She'd been eating her lunch by the side of the fishpond and reading her book, and had looked up when she heard a kind of a buzz and there it was. A small, well, aircraft thing with no wings. A personal jet of some kind. Like the ones you'd see in those comic books of the fifties. A future world type of contraption. Individual flying machines like in sci-fi films.
"Then it skimmed the water, it had a kind of ski underneath it, and then it hit that fish fence and sank like a stone," she repeated slowly for the young cop and the paramedic who emerged from the ambulance. She was getting tired of this recounting.
"That's when I pushed 911 on my phone," her voice trailed away as she saw the disbelieving looks the cop and the paramedics were exchanging.
"No bubbles? No wreckage to the surface? Are you sure you weren't day dreaming?" asked the cop who was looking across the water at the freshly emerged diver who was shaking his head.
She looked behind him at the sky and pointed.
"I just saw it now - look! it's shoving those clouds aside as it streaks through the air. It must have resurfaced elsewhere and taken off again!"
"OK lady," said the paramedic, "I think you'd better come with me. We're going to take you to your friend Mister Jetski."
Erla took several deep breaths, and found her warrior resolve hardening inside her. Trilby and Merlin swathed between her feet immediately, no longer casting dubious glances in her direction as they never had seen her cry before. It was like a lever had been thrown and poison had entered the parlour. As one, they moved off to the fireplace and sat on their feather cushion together and stared at Daddy who was looking down at his hands, quiet and reflective.
"No. I need to say a few things, Daddy," she said, "And please don't interrupt me, OK?"
He nodded.
"Mama has done her best, really Daddy. I know she's not like other mamas as she always feels so, well, so rotten. I want her to be well, to be like she used to be, playing with me in the sunshine, baking cookies in the oven. But you left us Daddy, you left me and her. And all I had really, were my friends here Merlin and Trilby."
Erla stopped and gulped.
"But weekends?" interrupted Daddy, looking very upset, "I saw you weekends?"
"I could have spent weekends here with my friends, I don't like your condo or your friend who wants to become my Mama."
Daddy put his head in his hands.
"But you have to move in with me!" he said.
"And school Daddy? Where am I going to school now? I like my school."
"I thought you would go to the school near the condo, it's a good city school....."
"I don't like the city! What about Merlin and Trilby? I don't want a new Mama!"
Erla felt close to tears, she didn't want to sound whiny, she needed Daddy to pay attention to her, to stop arranging her life into this frightening picture. And what about Mama?
"Matilda doesn't like cats." Daddy said firmly, standing up and picking up her knapsack from the floor,"We will arrange for the humane society to take them, alright?"
And he took her hand and tugged her towards the door.
Erla struggled with her rage. It came roaring to the surface but she knew to keep it hidden from Daddy. She followed him out to the hall and as they reached the door she told him she'd forgotten her book.
She turned to go back to the parlour and when Daddy stepped on to the porch she rushed forward and slammed the front door closed and with effort turned the deadbolt.
Trilby and Merlin stood in awe, mouths open, and she fell to the floor and embraced them, ignoring the hammering on the door, the yelling of her father and the pounding of her own heart.
Elephant's Child is hosting May's Words for Wednesday. Please drop in on her and see what's on offer from the participants and maybe join in yourself if you are so inclined. It's a lot of fun.
My story is a continuation of Erla and her feline buddies Merlin and Trilby.
Once Erla had finished reading the chapter and Merlin and Trilby and herself debated who the murderer could possibly be, they were all startled to hear a knocking on the front door. They looked at each other in consternation. No one ever came by here in the years Erla had been coming. Trilby had been grappling with his needlepoint - a lion, rampant, in heraldic form - and now he pushed the fabric and the perfumed pin cushion - another affectation - aside.
Erla rose on her tippy toes and tried to peer sideways through the parlour window at the porch, the human form she could barely see was large, male and impatient. The cats rubbed against her legs in solicitude. Oh dear, the knocking was getting louder and now, oh no, the person was shouting through the letterbox.
She ran to the door and opened it wide.
"Daddy!" she said, reeling slightly in surprise. Daddy walked in, looking around suspiciously.
"You had me scared half to death," he said, putting his arms around her,"Your mother hadn't a clue where you were, and then I remembered you staring out the car window at this house as we drove by every weekend."
"But this is not the weekend, why are you here?" asked Erla, confused.
"Well, generally I'm not here during the week," and her father absentmindedly started petting the cats,"but I had to go to court today, Erla".
"Were you in trouble?" Erla's voice trembled.
"Oh no, no,"Daddy said slowly, "I was in the courtroom to get custody of you."
Erla's mouth dropped open and tears filled her eyes.
"Temporarily," said Daddy quickly, "Mama is very sick, Erla. She needs to get well."
"But I don't want to leave Mama and Trilby and Merlin," Erla wailed, "They all need me Daddy! The cats are my little power squad, my friends!"
"As I drove over here, panicking a little I must say, my little pet," and here Daddy hugged her tightly yet again, "I had the most brilliant idea!"
This weeks WFW are hosted by Elephant's Child and they have a different twist in that participants are provided with two photographs and encouraged to weave an imaginary spell on them and see what comes through the pen. Go visit her blog to see what else is magicked and or participate.
An air of foreboding and neglect and disregard surrounded it like a cloud. There was no car to lend it any humanity. The grounds were overgrown and the nearby hills were encroaching stealthily with fingers of heather and gorse and marsh grasses. But the house was solid, made of beautiful stone with rich tiles and solid chimneys on the roof.
Erla watched it from her father's car, craning her neck around until it fell out of sight, drawn to it, fascinated, when he picked her up for his visitation rights on weekends and took her to his condo in town.
She recited an incantation on the first day of summer school holidays and then quickly packed a balanced lunch in her witch's knapsack. Mother let her feed herself - having the delivery man stock up the fridge when Erla left a long list on it, covering all the basic food groups which she had learned from the internet. Mother lived on cigarettes and bourbon, Erla did not like ingesting either although in commiseration she had tried.
Finally Erla, 9 year old warrior, was ready and dutifully left a note for Mother, who probably wouldn't get up until twilight, and hiked the five miles rapidly, approaching the building from across the heather, fearless as always.
As she neared the house, she observed the two tenants of the place on guard. One inside the house, the other vigilant to any approaches on the outside, with that odd dish of magic green stones at his feet.
"Merlin!" she called, "Trilby!"
They looked at her, then at each other. Trilby disappeared inside and then emerged from the cellar steps outside while Merlin approached her.
"Erla!" miaowed Trilby, who was far more talkative than the haughty Merlin, "We were waiting for you! We are running low on the kibble and the canned food is but a distant dream - that lack of opposing thumbs business! Not to mention those unopenable packets of fishy treats!"
"My dear!" purred Merlin, sliding his luscious fur around her bare legs,"We are fading away to skeletons, absolute skeletons!"
And Erla had to laugh, as around her she could see carcasses of field mice and some unfortunate birds. While the two tenants could stand to lose a pound or two each.
"Okay, my friends," she said, chuckling, picking up Trilby who put his paws around her neck,"Let's take stock of the situation in your pantry and I'll manage it from there. But no more bird murders, OK?"
