Once a month, we stop practicing and invite you to show off your best work.
This might be for you if:
- You want to be published (in print)
- You want to improve your writing
- You enjoy a little competition
- You like the Write Practice
Interested?
Photo by Neal Fowler
Show Off Your Best Work
Here’s how this writing competition works.
You will submit a longer piece, between 500 and 1250 words, based around this month’s theme: Spring. You can submit as many pieces as you want. After one week, on April 9, 2012 at 11:59 pm EST, submissions will close, and we will choose a winner.
Here’s the exciting part. If your piece is chosen, I will work with you on making it the best it can be. We’ll work on making your images shine, your prose sparkle, your dialogue sing, and your grammar… not suck.
Then, at the end of the month, we’ll publish it on the Write Practice where hundreds of people will get to read you at your very best. For example, read last month’s winner, Nancy Vandre's story, A Place to Call Home.
It gets better though.
We’re going to do this every month for the next year, and in December 2012, we plan to collect all twelve of these pieces and publish them in a book. Real paper, real cover, real ink. So if your piece is chosen, you will be able to consider yourself a published author.
Ready to start?
SHOW OFF: RULES
The Theme: Spring.
Guidelines
- It should be a finished work. A complete story.
- Non-fictional and fictional pieces are both accepted.
- I’m looking for pieces between 500‑1250 words. I will read every word, so please, nothing over 1250 words.
- You can post your completed piece in the comments of this post. You can post as many times as you want!
- The deadline is Monday, April 9 at 11:59 pm EST to post your piece. That’s a week, but start today!
And, of course, if you submit your work, you agree to let me publish your piece exclusively on the Write Practice and in a physical book.
Best of luck to you!
It was a routine operation, so they said and then followed it by lots of legalise but the bottom line is, the peaks and troughs in my life are gone. The things I considered routine all disappeared with the cut of the surgeon’s knife. Waking up with the musky aroma of my husband next to me; taking up too much space, snoring quietly. I would then nudge him gently to wake him. We would talk about our day ahead, argue about who was going to dip their toes into the cold air first, who’s turn it was for breakfast. I usually won and I would sink back into the pillows listening to him pad down the hallway to the kitchen.
The tinny sounds of spoons on cups would be replaced by clatters as bowls and plates were brought forth, all our crockery had chips in from Séan’s hamfistedness. I loved him for it. Each time I went to find a pair of tweezers that were buckled out of shape, forks and knives used as screwdrivers, screwdrivers used as hammers. For the twenty five years we have been married I have mended or replaced all the tools over and over again. I bought some pink secateurs so he wouldn’t use them but eventually I found them with gouges out of the blades – they had been used for cutting wire. And the wire cutters, well they had been used to hold the aerial in place at the back of the television and are probably still there.
Séan would sometimes come down and drag me out of bed, if I had a vital meeting but usually he would bring breakfast down to the bedroom and we would perch on the bed eating our porridge and chat some more, shall we paint the hallway, bottom the front room, when was the nurseryman coming with the trees, did the dog take his worming tablet. The usual, the routine, the monotonous. But I wouldn’t have had it any other way.
Those precious minutes together first thing, on our own before the world invaded; kids jumping all over us, jobs to go to, lunches to prepare, meetings to pitch, soccer training, friends to visit, neighbours to check on, families to ring. That reminds me I must ring Séan’s mother she will be devastated, her first born, her eldest son, gone at only forty seven, what’s routine about that.
The doctor has returned and is giving me more information but still reiterating that it was a routine operation. I have a sarcastic retort that for now is being held in but I swear if he says routine one more time. Séan would’ve stopped me, I would give him my acid retorts, the ones I would say if I had more gumption or less sensitivity. He held me in check. He held me.
Oh Séan why did they have to mess up your routine operation. Why are you dead? I need you to help me organise your funeral, I need you to tell your mother. I need your arms around me when I tell the children. I need you. Nothing will ever be mundane again, no comforting cooking together you chopping, while I stir. Everyone said we were two halves of the same coin, well I feel half a person, we slotted together so well.
I loved our boring, routine wishy washy life and now I am going to have to do it by myself. When we said till death do us part I thought it would be when we both had plastic hips and knees and hearing aids, I thought it would be forty years from now. Did you know how much I loved our humdrum existence, we could chat for hours about nothing, we laughed together, we cried together, you laughed when I cried at movies and I laughed when you cried at reality shows on t.v.
The doctor arrives again to explain the procedure for your body and again he starts with the it was a routine operation and I am sorry Séan, I know he is only human but I reply, “routine? So all your patients die?” and I walked out into the Spring sunshine to the car and bawled.
Wow, that is powerful and resonates within.
thanks, I enjoyed writing it
I love the way you contrast how “the routine operation” has removed the “peaks and troughs” of you life… which wasn’t that boring … because it had love in it. Very poignant. Wonderful
Thank you Oddznns, I pondered on that “peaks and troughs” for a long time, actually it was “peaks” only to begin with. It seemed like I was calling routine anything but mundane, but then I thought no matter how ordinary a life is there are peaks and troughs in a spousal relationship.
Such a beautiful, poignant story. I love that you contrast the routine operation with the routines of daily life. That those things will be missed is felt, though you didn’t say so. Exquisite. And, finally, the comment to the doctor at the end was spot on.
Nicely done. Thank you.
thank you for your kind comment and yes, no matter how ill, no matter how long you’ve been married, husbands need a kiss and a hug, they don’t need the words, they just need the little things, a quick squeeze of the hand in passing.
This is beautiful and sad. My husband and I have been married a month today. Right now he is sick, asleep in the bedroom down the hall from me, but I can hear him snore all the way out here. I think I want to go give him a kiss now…
thank you Gabrielle, yes, hold your husband. I have discovered that it has kept us through the bad stuff for 25 years!
Wow. That was very moving,
thanks Dave, much appreciated, I loved writing this, not because I wanted to imagine my husband dying, but he was and is so annoying in the little things, but they don’t matter in the scheme of life, do they!!!
Powerful story, Suzie. Loved how you said this…”He held me in check. He held me.” And, there is just something so beautiful about the day to day routines of life.
thank you Eileen for your lovely comment.
How powerful. As a nurse I take for granted the “routine”. Thanks for reminding me that I shouldn’t.
You are welcome Kathryn, thank you for your comment.
I enjoyed this short story. It was very well-written and the plot was full of substance.
Thank you Daron, for your very kind comment
That was well told Suzie. I will be a little nicer to my husband now, not too much just a little. I particularly like how you talk about telling his mother and the children. Doing those things without the support of the most irritating man in the world would be difficult.
Thanks Marianne, no matter how irritating, I chose him 25 years ago and consider this piece an homage to creatively dealing with the annoyances and remembering the love. It is fiction though, he isn’t this bad, honest!
Suzie, what a strong ending. “I reply, “routine? So all your patients die?” and I walked out into the Spring sunshine to the car and bawled.” I love the rhythm to it, the emotion, and even the strength. That and this, “Why are you dead? I need you to help me organise your funeral,” made the whole piece for me. There is a wry, morbid humor in it that I love.
thanks
“One. Two. Three”
His thick full hands lift from my eyes.
I blink,
still nestled in my sleeping bag, laying on my prescribed left side in the den.
Our bed had not yet arrived, but such formalities wouldn’t keep
me from resting my head in our new home.
There they were. Two tiny planters.
The lilac bushes I always dreamt would be beside my house.
“I got you two. One for this baby, and one
for the future child we hope will come.
Happy first mother’s day.”
My eyes brimmed.
I was carrying this child for us,
but he was nourishing my deep need for roots. Permanence. Family.
Barefoot and jammie-clad,
we plotted for a place to settle down. To spread our life out under the soil.
The shovel catching the rising sun in his work worn hand.
Mine, worn smooth from the absent-minded circles I traced across the swell of 7 months.
He broke ground in the back V of our yard,
a beautiful pin to hold up a corner of my world.
I waited.
And waited.
But those bushes didn’t bloom.
Yet, ever faithful, first sign of spring, I would go –
that second hoped for baby now nestled on my hip,
and check for signs of life.
These years ran hard on us both,
the she trees and I.
The dry seasons-
Finding ourselves in unfamiliar soil.
The wet seasons –
When it was hard to lift our heads in the face of the winds and weight of it all.
No. They did not even bud. But nor did they falter.
They kept root and held fast.
~~~
6 years coming…
the sun rising and setting upon me and this life.
Growing me softly and sometimes urgently.
The seasons changing and pressing themselves against me.
Now, a tangle of boy scrambled urgently to find me.
“Mama! Come quick!”
I ran out the door.
Breathless with the anticipation of danger to be navigated.
“What? What is it?”
My words catch in my throat as
I scan his body for signs of injury.
Count heads in the backyard, two. As it should be.
No danger appears.
“I found buds!”
His smile starting slowly and reaching his eyes.
His joy- It was what the stars in the sky are fashioned after.
And she was there, too.
Hair swirling, wild. picked up in the breeze…
Dancing and twirling as if to wrap herself in the very air.
Two pairs of hands,
smudged with jam and grace,
tugged me to examine closer.
There we stood. Then, like now.
taking in the back corner V with the same circling strokes of mother to child,
only now, across the head that stands mid-chest.
He, all limbs and branches. Steady. Strong.
And the silver-spun giggle of her beside me,
sweet as the fragrance and as life affirming as the bloom.
We stood face to face –
my mother lilacs and I,
and we laughed.
Me with my children; she with the wind.
Both standing tall where we were planted.
Drawing open in the sun.
i love the rhythm of your writing Tara, a lovely story.
Thank you!
I agree. It’s poetic — both the writing, and the idea of waiting for something nature gives in its own time.
Tara, the lyrical nature of this piece is so moving and the story absolutely beautiful. Thanks for sharing it with us.
Sherrey, you are so gracious in your comments, your encouragement. Thank you.
Beautiful and hopeful! I love your description of your daughter in motion and the relationship you have with the lilac bushes. My mom’s best friend has a lilac bush growing in her yard, once given to my mom by her father and planted in our yard, and then transplanted to her friend’s during one of our moves. I love that it blooms still thirty years later.
yes, this continuum of life through nature. thank you.
Oh my … reading these sparse beautiful lines, i felt my heart tangle and blow in the wind too. I especially love the 6 lines beginning with “the years ran hard on us, the she trees and I”
“felt my heart tangle and blow in the wind” – – this? amazing. thank you, friend.
I like this. I love the poetic feel to it. This was nice, “Two pairs of hands,
smudged with jam and grace,tugged me to examine closer. “
so appreciate your comments, Eileen.
All the submissions have been quite lovely. But this one, Tara… it still shines!
this is a great compliment. thank you.
Beautiful. I could feel so much of the hopes and dreams of motherhood.
yes. these hopes. all tied up in spring and in motherhood. thank you.
Yes, absolutely, the best. For those of us who lost family during the spring, the flowers that bloom for them reminds us they are still with us. For my family it is my father’s big red things that were in full bloom when he died, and they return every year at the same time.
I adore that they return year after year. nature that stands as memorial…
I love this. My favorite line is “And the silver-spun giggle of her beside me,
sweet as the fragrance and as life affirming as the bloom”. It that isn’t a little girl I don’t know what is. Beautifully done.
isn’t it amazing how all little girls possess this? they are just delicious.
There were so many beautiful lines in this. This stood out to me, “Me with my children; she with the wind.” But really, half the lines in the story stood out. I like this style of narrative poetry. Of course, it reminds me of Ann Voskamp, but you make it yours. This is your soul. I can feel it.
oh, Joe. thank you. when people ask me what style I write in, I always draw blank. and reply um. gulp. like I think? You make it sound a lot nicer 🙂
Ha! You bet, Tara. Narrative poetry, is what I’d call it. 🙂
Have you ever hooked the big one?
Big Black, Legend of the Pond by Don Ford
This is a tribute to my late Uncle Red, the greatest fisherman and hunter the sports world has ever known, I.M.H.O.
Fishing! It’s what I do in the Spring. It looked as if it were going to storm and get nasty, and me without my rain gear. My heart leapt out of my throat, as I watched him flop on the surface of the water. He was on my line! Somehow he had taken the bait.
Not twenty minutes ago, my brother had the same fish on his line. He too was excited to see that massive fish making such a splash in our neighbor’s pond. We all had heard stories, but lost our breath as the legend loomed before us. The monster of the deep, that others could only tell about had never been caught by anyone, and was within our grasp.
For the next several minutes, he struggled to get free of my line, but I had him by his bootstraps. He was mine and that’s all there was to it. The three of us could practically taste our prize. My neighbor, Phil, had hooked it the first time, and then it wiggled free of his line. My brother told the same story, as it gobbled up his worm. He thought for sure he was going to nail it and pull it in. But our smart fish got his line all tangled in the duck weeds, and he managed to free himself from that second encounter.
I recall the words of my uncle, who has since passed on. “Give the fish some room to bite and move. Wait until he is done playing with his food and your line starts to move straight away from you. Now, right now, is when you pull quickly and set the hook. He’s yours for sure.”
Uncle Red was a trophy hunter and fisherman, and though he has gone on to fish in that eternal pool in the sky, his words will continue living in my memory. I also recall a time when he took me on my first hunting trip for quail. After I was spooked by the flurry of feathers and the whooshing sound they made at take off, I managed to blow several nice round holes in the sky. One bird was not ten feet from me, and I fired right at him, but he just slowly walked away. I swore I heard him laughing.
I became known as Deadeye after those little episodes. So fishing is my game. And I usually get my man every time. This day would be no exception. The legend of the pond was securely within my reach. Hundreds had tried before me, but no one could bring him in. This would be my finest hour.
Was he as big as everyone had told us? Yes he was, all that and more. His big black eyes just looked right through me. I could hardly believe what was right in front of me. The folklore told about this bullhead had ended. No more legendary fish in Snooks Pond, just a trophy for my wall.
After putting up quite a show of force, my captured friend was secure in our bucket, hanging half out, while flipping madly about. He didn’t come close to fitting in this five gallon container. That’s how big he was. How were we going to get him home? This I asked myself. He would probably flop out on the way home, and then what would I do?
My brother then piped up. “Don, what are you going to do with her?” I was surprised at his comment.
“Her, what her?” He was right, this was a female and a mother about to spawn. Her stomach protruded greatly. Her young were alive and swimming inside her. We couldn’t possibly remove her from the pond. She was about to have her babies, and we would feel guilty if they all died.
Our neighbor said what we were all thinking. “She has to go back in the water.” We all agreed, and the next thing I saw, as my heart returned to its place in my chest, was the great fish going below the surface of the water. It never returned to even say thank you. The legend was still intact. Besides, who knows but what the little ones would some day grow to become legends of the pond too.
Author Notes
When a bullhead is on your line, you will know it. They put up as good a fight as any fish possibly could. It is such a rush to finally secure the fish that others could only talk about, but you have it to show. My Uncle Red took me fishing once to a stream near where we lived in Western, N.Y. We both fished this mile stretch of water to only yield one small brook trout. My uncle then opened up the fish to reveal what it was eating, and it wasn’t worms. It was crayfish spawning time and little pink babies were in the fish’s stomach. We then went down to the shallows and lifted up rocks to find the crayfish,removed their young, and fished the same mile stretch again, but this time using the new bait. We caught 22 more fish between us. I will always be indebted to my uncle for teaching me little secrets of fishing. I love my time spent along the streams and waterways, and for good reason. Thanks Uncle Red!
That is a great story Don! It’s a great honor to our ancestors when we keep them alive in this way – I can only hope to be remembered with such love. Your story is fresh and alive and your Uncle would be proud!
What a great story.
I think you meant Monday, April 9th… not Thursday. : )
Oh what would I do without you. Fixed. Thanks 🙂
Dancing Shadow
She danced her way around people and other things. She did not care what they thought of her, this was her time. The moon shone bright and full for her. She was after all, a child of the night. Ahead of her the park loomed in all its shadowy beauty. That was where she belonged, dancing among the shadows. Once inside the park her shoes were the first to come off. The soft grass was cool against her bare feet. She danced away from the street lights, into the deep shadows she called home. Her feet touched a spot of soft dry grass and she stopped, her body slowly coming to rest. Her muscles twitched, they were still dancing. She lay down, the grass a comfortable natural bed. It was simple and soft like life should be. The music faded in her ears. She was lost in her own world before the battery died.
She woke to the cool mist of the spring dew. It was much too cold. She tried to stretch but her body would not move. Her eyelids fought off the heaviness slowly wining sight. She always woke to a world of blur. She should have been able to see the reds and blues of the early morning sun but there were only blurry shadows. As her eyes won the battle for sight she realized her body had lost the battle of movement a long time ago. Her vision was almost clear when she realized someone was there someone was watching her.
“Well Good Morning Sleeping Beauty” The voice rung through her ears as the thick smell of whiskey hit her nose. She turned her face away just as her vision became clear. There was a pile of clothes lying next to her. Oh My God! She thought as she realized that in front of her lay her sundress and underwear. The pain and pressure ripped through her as she realized she had been cold because she did not have any clothes on.
The heat of the mid-morning sun warmed her bare skin. She opened her eyes and looked around. The shadows surrounding her were broken only by the beams off sunlight shining down on her through the leaves. Below her at the bottom of the hill, mother’s played with their young children, completely unaware of her eyes on them. She rolled over on to her knees and tried to stand, but her legs felt hollow and boneless beneath her. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she picked signs of her nightmare off her skin. Pebbles, blades of grass, and little black hairs fell in a pile at her side. Once again she tried to stand, stumbling into the nearest tree. She picked up her clothes, the Ipod was gone. The soft damp fabric sent a chill down her spine as it touched her skin, smelling of whiskey and piss. She turned her back on the sunny play ground, on the children racing and picking wild flowers. She turned to walk even deeper into the woods. She had been reduced to walking forever in the shadows.
great story, disturbing how the beautiful day belies the violence
You lead us almost happily deeper and deeper into the woods, into the story. We naively follow into the shadows, where we find coolness changing to cold, shadows dispelled by sunlight. It’s visual and lovely. Beautiful story. Nice work.
This is almost like a modern day fairy tale. Well done.
Though her memories are sparse, she struggles to remember. She finds spring 1973, the year she turned 4. In a rundown Highland Park neighborhood, a Southern California sun beats down without warmth on her grandmother’s peeling clapboard house. Without her noticing, her father had left, and she and her mother came here to live.
Inside, musty brocade drapes hang taut against the light, relegating scraped, pitted floors and old tapestry furniture into the shadows . Rickety tables lean on loose, broken legs under dim overhead fixtures that illuminate dried-to-dust moths, crisp in the heat of enclosed bulbs. She sleeps with her grandmother in a tiny cluttered bedroom, smelling of overripe fruit; her mother, not always alone, in the other one.
The grandmother, a domestic, takes her along while she works, and tells her not to be afraid. I watch her. She spends her days alone, wandering the hallways of her grandmother’s employers and lives in her imagination, pretending normal, and recoiling from the shadows cast by her loneliness.
Her mother, a 20-year old cocktail waitress, works nights, sleeps days, and vanishes into the back depths of the house, swallowed up by the double bed in the corner. Memories of her mother are splintered – like playing a quick game of peek-a-boo from a distance. She recalls no maternal tenderness, touch, or soothing voice. The voice she knows is not that of a young woman, but of the cruel tortured soul her mother has become, after alcohol robbed her of her humanity.
Weeds, taller than she, overrun the yard behind the house and provide hiding and dreaming places, escape. Glorious towns and roads emerge from the hearty Calla lilies, neglected daisies, a splintered ladder with rungs missing, and dry beds of forgotten shrubs. These and the front porch nook are her havens, her hidden world – a world that plays with the pictures in her head.
I watch her. She pushes her squat toddler thighs down hard onto the porch and scoots into the safety of the nook. It’s where the porch ducks sharply behind the door frame, forming a space hidden on three sides by ragged Honeysuckle vines hung heavy over a sway-backed trellis. It’s a vantage point to watch Mrs. Barrington pick up her mail or Charley mow his parents’ lawn, to hear neighbors laugh – you know, pretending normal. It’s dark now; she stays in the nook. No one knows but we are watching her disappear.
I watch her, presenting an objective, detached account of her hiding places. From that perspective it’s easy to note the details and recount them. Yes, objective and detached, and pretending that she wasn’t, isn’t…me.
Really like this tale, love the phrase “you know, pretending normal. “
Thank you for your kind words. I’m loving this site.
I like the POV switches here, they work really well with this subject and with your amazingly detailed and compelling descriptive passages.
Diane~
I loved your descriptions of the Grandmother’s house. I could picture it and felt like I was there. The melancholy is palpable. Thank you for sharing.
Lost in the Gardens
I walked with my friend Amalee through her beautiful gardens. Amalee’s father happened to be a multi-millionare and they lived in the most exquisite, magnificent mansion in all of England.
The roses, tulips, daisies, and every other flower in the maze of plants were in full bloom as it was the beginning of April. As they say, spring had sprung and I was enjoying every second of it.
I picked a delicate rose, being extra careful not to touch the thorns, and sniffed it. Amalee smiled at me and tucked a sunflower into my hair.
“I love this time of year,” I gushed.
“Everything is so beautiful,” she agreed. “I love all the colors.”
I watched a monarch butterfly flutter around us. Its orange and black colors stood out brilliantly against the white stone walls that rose high above the gardens, twisting and turning in an endless maze of colors.
“Katelyn,” Amalee began cautiously. “Do you believe in magic?”
“Not really,” I answered her honestly. “Why?”
Amalee picked the petals off of the flower she was holding absentmindidly.
“My grandmother used to tell me these grand stories of fairies that came and danced upon the petals of the flowers every spring and sprinkled magic dust that made our garden grow. She said they lived deep under the ground in the morning and came out at night when the sun went down. I used to love hearing those stories. They helped me to fall asleep every night.”
“She was probably just making up fairy tales for bedtime stories,” I answered.
“But what if it was true?” Amalee’s blue eyes sparkled. “What if there actually were fairies in our gardens?”
I pushed my red hair back behind my ears.
“It’s a wonderful story,” I said. “But do you really believe that fairies dance in your gardens every night? Have you ever seen them?”
“Of course I’ve never seen them.” Amalee kicked a pebble aside with the toe of her boot. “They come when it’s dark. I wouldn’t be able to see outside of my window.”
“I guess there’s no proof either way.” I shrugged my shoulders. “But I don’t think it’s imaginary fairies that make your garden so beautiful.”
Amalee frowned and picked a tulip.
“I’d just like to believe that there’s something magical in our gardens,” she said quietly.
“So would I!” I said quickly. “But there’s no proof.”
“I guess you’re right,” she sighed.
“We should go back,” I said. “My mother’s expecting me for dinner.”
Amalee nodded and we turned around to face a fork in the road. I realized I had no idea which way to go. I’d been so wrapped up in Amalee’s story that I hadn’t paid attention to which way we went.
“What now?” Amalee asked me. She looked nervous.
“Why are you asking me?” I snapped angrily. “Just because I’m older than you doesn’t mean I know everything! It’s your garden.”
Amlee’s lip quivered and her eyes filled with tears.
“I’m sorry,” I apologized imediately. “It’s my temper. You know how horrible I am at keeping it contained.”
Amalee laughed lightly and gripped my hand.
“I think we go that way,” she said pointing to the right fork.
I followed her down the road but quickly realized this was not the way we came. We didn’t pass any towering trees. There were no nightshades in the rich soil that lined the cobblestone roads of the garden.
“I’ve never been to this part of the garden,” Amalee said in a whisper.
“It’s spooky.” A shiver ran through my body. The many trees blocked the remaining sunlight.
I turned to go back, but saw a gate swing shut on its own. I squealed.
I ran for the gate and shook it hard. It was locked.
“What do we do?” Amalee wrapped her arms around herself. All of the warmth the sun gave us earlier was gone.
“I don’t know.” I stuffed my hands in the small pockets on my dress and kicked the gate so it rattled.
“Maybe we could climb the gate?” Amalee suggested nervously.
“But what if we slipped?” I pointed out. “We’d smash our skull!”
Amalee bit her lip and looked away.
“It’s getting dark.” I looked up at the sky and tried to think of a plan. “Maybe there’s another way out.”
“Let’s keep going.”
I followed Amalee down the winding road, trying to ignore the ominous clouds in the sky and the trees that blocked the moonlight. I had to stop myself from shrieking when a branch snapped off of a tree and landed in front of us. It felt more like winter than spring.
“I’m so c-cold,” Amalee stammered. I put a comforting arm around her shivering body and squeezed her tight.
“Just try and focus on how warm you’ll be when you climb into your bed tonight.”
Amalee tried to smile. My stomach growled. I hadn’t eaten a thing since lunch and I was starving.
Snap! A branch broke from behind us. Amalee gasped and clutched my arm so hard she left nail marks.
“What was that?” Amlee breathed.
“I don’t know,” I whispered back. “Let’s keep going.”
Amalee was breathing hard and fast. I had to stop myself from breaking away from her. My wrist was starting to hurt from Amalee’s tight grip.
“Katelyn. There’s something ahead of us.”
I squinted ahead of us and saw a soft glowing light.
“It’s probably a lantern,” I reassured her. “Maybe your father’s come out to find us.”
Amalee and I both screamed as the light came up right in front of us. It was a tiny person with miniscule features. It was a fairy.
The fairy had a purple and black dress and small pointed features.
“I knew they exsisted,” Amalee said with a harumph!
The fairy crossed her arms.
“What are you doing in the secret fairy garden?”
“Secret fairy-?” I broke off.
“Go away!”
The fairy raised her hands and muttered something in an unknown language. A mysterious forced pushed Amalee and I together and rope appeared out of nowhere, binding us.
“Let us go!” I yelled angrily.
“Never!” The fairy shrieked in a painfully high-pitched voice. “Humans aren’t supposed to enter the gardens of the dark fairies! You shall remain here for eternity!”
I struggled against the rope and looked around for any sign of Amalee’s parents.
“Look!” Amalee suddenly shouted.
Five more bright glowing lights came into view, overpowering the evil glow of the fairy. Five fairies replaced the lights, but they wore beautfiul pink ballgowns and there bodies were soft and round.
“Let these innocent humans go,” one of the fairies demanded.
“No!” The dark fairy argued. “They tresspassed into my area of the garden and I shan’t let them go!”
The other fairy sighed.
“Very well. I shall have to force you to release them.”
The fairy in pink raised her hands and whispered something in the same language in which the dark fairy had spoken. The dark fairy shrieked with all her might and exploded into a shower of rose petals. The ropes around us disappeared.
“Thank you,” I said breathlessly.
The fairies smiled and before I knew it they had all raised their hands and Amalee and I disappeared and reappeared outside of the garden.
Amalee smiled at me and we hugged. I decided that even after all we’d been through, I still loved spring.
Themagicviolinist, what a delightful tale, well done.
Thanks so much! 😀 I enjoyed writing it.
That’s lovely. You should write it as a children’s book. You are really very talented for someone so young. Good job!!!
Just Lovely. Your explanation of the two girls’ friendship is endearing and sweet. It caused me to remember how I felt about my best girlfriends when I was little. Nice touch on making the dark fairy explode into rose petals!
All of your stories are so great! 😀 I can’t wait to see the winner! 😀
My mom was born in the spring of 1952. March 9th, to be precise. It’s no wonder she loved growing things so much.
I’m not sure when Mom found her love of roses. She was enthralled with them ever since I can remember, but I’m the youngest in the family- a lot of life happened before I came along. What I do know is that roses meant something special to Mom. She had bushes everywhere in the yard. When I was twelve Mom declared vendetta against the grass in the yard, transforming all the green space into ponds, patios, herb gardens, flower gardens and vegetable gardens, but in all of that, her roses held a special place in her world.
Perhaps it was because many of them had been gifts from my father. Every year, perhaps for her birthday or maybe Mother’s Day, he would buy her a rose bush and tell her there was a hole to go with it. And then they’d take it outside, she would show him where she wanted it and he would dig her a hole. We would all wait to see what color the blooms would be, what scent they would add to the garden.
If you knew my father you probably wouldn’t think him much of a romantic. He is a stable man, not given to many flights of fancy, though that has changed in recent years. He was an important balance to her artistic nature, the rock our family stood on. We knew we could go dancing in the rain with her because he would be there, steady as always, when we got back. Dad’s romantic gestures were more of the practical sort. She was allergic to grass so he mowed it short every Saturday. That kept both the grass seed away and the bees, which she was also allergic to. I see it as a gesture of love and care, but no, not really romantic. Except for the roses.
It was about a month before my oldest sister’s wedding, the summer of ’99. Mom, my two sisters and I were in the kitchen making food for the reception when Dad came home early. We looked up to see him standing in the front hallway, a single red rose in his hand. Then we girls looked at Mom. She was about elbow deep in a huge bowl of meat that was in the process of becoming Swedish meatballs. She was in her worst clothes, those usually reserved for painting or mucking out the pond, because she was also midway through dying her hair. Her entire head was wrapped in plastic and smelling like we’d left the meat out too long. She looked from herself, at a record low in the looks department, to her husband standing in the doorway, holding a rose and looking at her like she was the most beautiful thing ever. She cried; I probably did, too.
When I was sixteen a boy gave me a rose on Valentine’s Day. It didn’t count for much because he’d really wanted to give one to my friend so he’d bought roses for me, my friend, my married sister and my mom at a time we were all together at the house. Normally I would’ve taken my flower up to my room so I could enjoy it. This one felt like a cheat, like it meant less than nothing, like I’d just been used to camouflage him giving a rose to my friend. I left mine downstairs in the vase with Mom’s. She loved them because she loved him. And because they were roses.
My mother died when I was seventeen. On July 19th, 2003, she was out in the garden she’d loved so much when she was stung by three bees. She wasn’t old, just fifty-one, but her body had been fragile for a long while and couldn’t handle the strain. The doctors at the ICU told me she was in anaphylactic shock, that her body was shutting down slowly. I’d said goodbye to her at two that afternoon to go rollerblading with my sister and brother-in-law; she was dead by midnight.
The family gathered from where they’d spread, coming to the house and being with each other. I sat on the floor as my father told us the plan for the funeral. He was calm, steady, a tight grip on his emotions. Then he started to say how he was going to go buy a rose for the lid of the casket. He started crying and we all of us joined him. Then he went and bought the very last rose he would ever buy her. It sat on the closed lid of the casket through the funeral, rode out with her to the hearse. We took her to the place of the sleepers and planted her in the ground. As we started to leave it began to rain, a light sprinkling rain- the kind she’d always loved to dance in.
I got married this March. March 3rd, to be precise. It was supposed to be a spring wedding, but was actually cold and wet and snowy. I wanted to have as close to a flowerless wedding as possible because flowers have never really meant much to me. Yet, my bridesmaids each carried a red rose and I carried three. And before the wedding, we laid one on the first seat of the first row, bride’s side. A single rose laying on an empty chair. My father, calm and steady as always, walked me down the aisle to where my husband was waiting. Somehow he held steady through the entire ceremony, performing it like he had my sisters’. After we and the rest of the bridal party had recessed, my dad stepped down from the stage. Then he picked up the rose and carried it out with him.
My husband and I are saving money for a house. We both want a yard, to play in with our kids someday, maybe set up a volleyball net, maybe someday a pool. I think I would also like to plant a rose bush. Just one, of bright, red roses to bloom in the spring.
sweet, bittersweet, and sweet. A lovely tale of romance, of non-romance. I think of the father, a man for whom romantic displays were not common and therefore all the more powerful when demonstrated, a show of deep love. When bees were first mentioned I got an inkling of how the story would go. Lovely to see the flowers interwoven with Spring and the tale. Lovely.
What a beautiful story, Gabrielle. It brought tears to my eyes. I loved the kitchen scene. I could see you all standing there. Nice job.
Oh dear, I’m crying again. The red rose on the seat where she would have sat in church did it. Well it sounds like she was a beautiful woman and you do well by her to write such a lovely story. I hope you get your red rosebush and that it flourishes.
Spring is a coil of blame in a mattress, waiting to strike through a tear in the covers; spring is a panther leaping from the corner of a room, its teeth flashing white … Spring is when the ground thaws and things start again – the tulips from their landscaped plots at Keukenhof, your nightmares on sheets beaten white and starched stiff in this room, your boyhood eyrie.
We first climbed the forty six rickety steps up here when you were twenty five and I was eighteen, on our wedding visit home to your parents. There was a spring chill in the room. I went to close the window, and saw the narrow building across the canal.
“Is that Ann Frank’s house?” I asked, pointing to the narrow building across the canal.
“Yes,” you nodded huddling deeper into the feather comforter.
I wondered why then. I look at it now, Ann Frank’s house where she hid for two years and then was dragged out to die, Ann Frank’s house where your nightmares began.
>>>>>
You are five and it’s a funny noisy time in your life. The air’s filled with clacking boots and the sound of pops and bangs in hidden corners. Sometimes you hear people scream. There’s a metallic smell you recognize as fear on your daddy and mama. Not a safe time to leave a child alone, your mama whispers. When she goes off to clean for the Germans, you must go with your daddy to the offices across the way, she tells you. Be a good boy, she reminds you. Don’t get in anyone’s way.
You’re not in anyone’s way, except for the geest who click and clunk and whisper from the walls, running water down the pipes where none should be. They don’t want you there, you tell your mama. And you don’t want to go back either.
Your mama sighs and takes you with her to the Germans. Be a good boy, she reminds you as she sits you in the back cloakroom. Don’t get in anyone’s way.
There’s no one to get in the way off except the sleepy-eyed lad guarding the door, who for want of better conversation lets you prattle on about the geest who want you away. Arranging and re-arranging the boots on the floor into armies and battalions, you don’t see the lad’s sleepy eyes light up a shining spring blue as you talk, as you wonder about how much milk and bread the geest eat, how the packets of butter disappear from the warehouse shelves overnight. You don’t know that he clatters upstairs to his superior after your mama’s done and the both of you walk away hand in hand into the bright spring night.
You’re at this window wondering why tulips shrivel in the summer sun when they come to exorcise the geest. You watch as they drag out the dark hooked nosed Jude geest, as your friend the young soldier gives you a jaunty salute before he drives them off, shackled, in his big green truck. You’re at this window again, wondering how tulips know to sprout once it’s spring. The Germans are gone. Daddy and mama have stopped being scared. You’ve swung the panes open to let out the winter mustiness, to let the spring breezes in. Spring … you sigh with pleasure, just before the morning’s broken by the sound of boots clacking. There’s a knock on the door. And then your father’s taken for questioning by the Political Investigation Branch. They let him come home, but now there’s a never-ending stream of strangers pointing at the house, taking photographs by your front door. Your father shrinks into himself. Your mother draws the curtains in the back and shutters the front windows, all of them but the one in the attic. Children need light, she tells you. Still you stop looking out from it. You know what you’ll see when you do. The Jude geest staring from the windows of the house across the water, accusing you.
>>>>>
Spring is when the giant storks come back to nest on top of the dormer windows and chimney stacks of the city. Spring is when you come home to the old man and old lady hiding behind their shutters. Spring is when the green blade of guilt rises and cuts into your dreams. Spring … my
Missed out the last word… it should end Spring … my beloved!
I love stories that make you think, and this is one of them. Thank you Oddznns for sharing this poignant tale
thank you Suzie
I read this both hear and in the section on mystery stories and I think I like the one in the mystery section better maybe. I like the portrayal of how the guilt that he feels comes out in abuse toward his wife later. It is a much more chilling tale but brings the horror that he has both seen and wrought home more clearly I think. Your writing in both is excellent.
Thanks Marianne. This was the first version. Then between the “mystery” submission and this one, Joe gave us a prompt on how to write “stream of consciousness” and I did one on a red string of silk! Finally, it all jelled together in the murder mystery. IT JUST SHOWS WHAT GOOD STUFF CAN COME OUT WHEN ONE IS SIMPLY DOING THE WRITING PROMPTS. As I said, Thanks Joe, Thanks Community.
Spring Waltz
Spring slowly glides in on a slippery mix of winter weather. Gray skies, falling rain, intermittent snow and hail, and damp, foggy days refuse Spring’s entrance. Attempting to display her palette of colors, Spring swipes patches of color into the fields and gardens anxious to come to life. She applies reds, blues, pinks, and yellows for the bulbs that have pushed through cold winter soil. Her gifts are seen in pale green buds on trees that will bear fruit in season and in gardens where the arms of seeds push their way through dirt.
High In the sky Spring makes an effort to paint earth’s ceiling a brilliant blue interrupted here and there with clouds puffed up like bed pillows. Some days, if we’re lucky, Spring takes her yellow paint brush and dots the skies with sunlight. It falls on the growing trees and flowers, making them reach higher and higher.
Then Spring, like the joker she can be, pours buckets of rain down on the earth. The hyacinths that have bloomed out hang their heads low and touch the dirt. The hellebores bow down as if in prayer, and instead of the earth producing yield, the moss grows heavy on the patio and drive. What is Spring up to?
Rains continue to pour from her resources, and now the creeks and rivers are at flood stage. They threaten people and homes along their banks. Although they’ve been through floods before, the fears come anyway. Should we be afraid of something as beautiful as Spring?
But then a clear day comes along following the storm, and we rejoice at the new things we see sprouting. Something different than before. New life. Abundant all around. Yet it lasts only a day and heavy rains come again threatening and flattening out plants and grass.
Spring has a difficult temperament to predict. At once, she can be filled with joys and delights, and the vicious fingers of storm reaching into our lives. It is understood the rain is needed to grow the goodness from the earth, but so much?
Even though the first day of Spring has passed us by two weeks ago, the gray days of winter filled with rain, fog and even snow at times still linger. Looking for bright spots amid the light snow, we find purple petals seeking a way out. Crocus didn’t have a chance this season – they didn’t bloom. Spring was not kind to them for winter pushed her aside. The elements too harsh. Other eager shoots somehow survived, and the native trillium stand tall and starkly white against their deep green leaves.
Another day with sun arrives, and Spring has a show in store. Driving west to east, I spy her off in the distance. Regal and royal in her bearing. Wearing a cloak of ermine flowing down her sides to touch the snow-covered ground. Majestically she rises toward the sky, reaching ever higher for that crowning blue and bright sun. A reminder that the season is divided between here and there.
Here in the valley – where things grow green and lush – we hope for Spring to succeed. Yet there atop Mt. Hood rising above the valley winter rules. The mountain reminds us that indeed it is still winter on her slopes. Snowfall each day with perhaps a record for this season. The mountain looks down on us as we struggle to push spring into being – planting too early creating a replanting around the end of June. Both Spring and the mountain laugh at us about our lack of memory when it comes to planting time here in the valley.
Soon the mountain runoff will add to Spring’s rains in the rivers and streams. Together they will likely wreak havoc on some areas. But together, they will soon step aside and allow Spring’s best efforts to prevail.
Lambs will be springing through flower-dotted fields. Calves will follow their mamas from pasture to pasture feeding on grasses turned bright green by sun and rain. The geese will return from Canada for a while and show off their new broods. All these babies remind us of the gift of new life and the cycle that occurs with changing seasons in worlds other than our own.
Spring’s delays disappoint. But the vibrancy of her palette does not once it comes to fruition. The waters she sends pouring may frighten, but their nourishment to growing things is out of necessity. Spring may battle from the valley to overcome the winter that remains on Mt. Hood, but for decades they have combined forces to make our valley one of the most beautiful and satisfying places to raise our families, grow our crops, live out our lives and be consummately happy.
Ah, Spring, we’re waiting patiently! You never fail us. You always show up, maybe in June, maybe July, but you show up. That’s what we love about you — your faithfulness to our valley.
@ Sherry – Your story “Spring Waltz” is very well-written. I enjoyed your metaphoric portrayal of the change of seasons. The artistic design of the story is also stimulating.
Thanks, Daron! I appreciate your thoughts and comments.
I like how you make sping a joker here or an erratic sparring partner for winter. I think what stands out is the unpredictability of the weather despite the four seasons, or maybe it just depends on where you live.
Hi Sherrey! Hello from a fellow Northwesterner. I enjoyed the references about Mt. Hood and the spring weather we’ve been experiencing. LOVED this sentence: “…arms of seeds push their way through dirt.”
I appreciated reading about spring as a person and her moody whims.
I was going to mention Mt. Hood too. Makes me want to visit Portland!
It’s well worth the trip. 🙂
Title: A Time for Bluebonnets
Day 211 of the Occupation
Bluebonnets herald the spring in Central Texas.
In a region that lies along the same latitude as the Sahara desert, no melting snow or dripping icicles greet the change of our seasons. Instead, the bluebonnets appear – at first by ones and twos and then in great masses. They spread along the roadsides, down through the bar ditches, and across the greening fields like God knocked over a heavenly paint bucket. The bluish-purple flowers nod cheerfully among the blowing stems of grass, their small white tips glowing like tiny stars.
Orange Indian paintbrushes weave a secondary color palette among the patches of blue. Scarlet clover, yellow Texas star, and winecups in shades of burgundy and pale pink are sprinkled across fields and yards. Small but determined, the winecups pop up even along driveways and in hard patches next to pathways.
Trees that only a few weeks earlier wore feathery promises of life now break out with pale green leaves like a lady’s lacy shawl.
For just a moment, spring softens the scarred land and reminds us of happier days…
A patch of bluebonnets nestled against a barn, once the subject of countless photos and paintings, can bring a rare moment of peace. They allow us to forget that the wall above them is splintered and torn, blown apart by missiles or pockmarked by the 5.56 mm rounds from standard issue M16’s.
Winter has carried away with it the chance of “blue northers,” those sweeping masses of cold air that drop our normally mild temperature like the sudden plunge off a cliff. It has been over a month since the last norther; it has been at least two since the last time the air raid sirens on the old courthouse sounded. We can cautiously open our windows now to catch the passing breeze.
The warm smell of damp earth and morning dew rises up with the dawn, ushering in one more of the brief, pleasant days of cool winds and soft sunshine. Far too soon, summer’s lingering heat and humidity will set in. We will not see weather this gentle again until October or November.
I know we are all dreading the summer. No electricity means none of the air conditioning that we once took for granted.
The same carpets of flowers that turn the fields into a watercolor painting also wash up and across the graves we dug last summer, blurring their outlines. The stark brown mounds are already starting to flatten, settled by a wetter than normal winter. Some who buried their dead too shallow had to bring in more soil to cover them. The rain kept washing the dirt away, leaving limbs exposed to the packs of feral dogs and the coyotes.
Walking the roads in search of items we can scavenge, our eyes are drawn to the glories of spring and away from the pitted and shattered asphalt, the hulks of burned out semis and SUVs overturned along every major highway. At least the wet winter washed away the stench of burned and decaying flesh. Now the air bears the sweet perfume of the yellow and white honeysuckle climbing along pasture fences in place of the sickly sweet odor of the dead.
Spring used to mean farmers plowing and planting cotton, maize and corn – staple cash crops across the Texas Blackland and eastward into the Brazos and Navasota river bottoms. It meant trimming roses, and trips to the home improvement store for new plants to spruce up our flowerbeds. Now, we struggle just to get enough seeds to plant food crops, trying to convert our flowerbeds into vegetable gardens.
So few of us really know how to grow what we eat – and how many of us remember how to preserve it through the winter? How many know what to plant, and when, or that Texas has two shorter growing seasons in place of one long one? Thank God for the older folks and the back-to-the-earth types that we used to think were mildly crazy. They just kept growing and canning, while the rest of us ran to the grocery store and picked our food off the shelves.
In the bigger cities, there are no wildflowers to soften the reality of their existence under the iron fist of the invading armies. Rumor says every major town is occupied territory. The people there must stand in line for the meager amounts of food their masters see fit to give them. Here at least, in towns too small to be worth occupying, we can dole out our precious seeds. These little handfuls of hope were given by those smart enough to see what was coming – and kind enough to share with those of us who weren’t. There are enough seeds to go around only because there are so few of us left alive to need them.
This brief season of blooming is almost like a bridge linking us back to the kinder world of a year ago. Between one spring and the next, multi-national armies crossed over our long southern border; they marched across our towns, our homes, and our lives. Other invaders swept in from Canada, and still more along the coastlines where our defenses were thin. We were too busy fighting among ourselves to see what was coming until it was too late.
In the heat of the endless summer, with the relentless thunder of gunfire and rockets, the issues that used to divide us disappeared like morning mist. It mattered little to any of us if we were Black, White, Hispanic, Asian…we stood shoulder to shoulder to fight together, and we fell together as well. Bullets do not care for race or ethnicity, only targets.
For now the fighting, like the winter, is over. In this springtime lull of the occupation, among uncertain days, we hold a little space to pull together our shattered lives, mourn our dead, and take time for bluebonnets.
Reading this was like strolling through an art museum, then having mint tea in the garden, all the while breathing fresh air. I loved it! So much in such a little piece. It makes me want to come to Texas before history sweeps it all into the past.
Thank you, Nora. It really is lovely in the springtime!
It sounds like Texas is a beautiful place in spring. I looked up the flowers and now I want to go see them.
For a brief time between winter and the long summer, the roadways are alive with a carpet of color. Like idiots, we go out every spring and take pictures of our kids sitting in patches of bluebonnets! I was standing by the side of the road just a couple weeks ago, taking pictures of bluebonnets with my iPad while traffic rushed by at 70+!
A Day in the Bahamas
By
Daron Henson
He awoke to a crisp spring morning. The clean ocean air invigorated his senses. He rose early from his slumbers. As he enjoyed his morning cigarette the aroma of his fresh, brewing coffee welcomed a new day.
After showering, he went back to the balcony to enjoy another cigarette. With The Beatles Abbey Road album playing in unison to the tranquil atmosphere of the spring morning, he drank a cup of coffee, relishing it with another cigarette.
For breakfast he made himself an egg sandwich on an English muffin. On the side he had homemade hash browns with four slices of avocado. A glass of orange juice and another cup of coffee completed his meal.
Accompanied by a mass of young college students, he walked towards the home room of his philosophy class. The friendly aura of the day seemed to be shared by all. He walked towards his class, immersed in the beauty of the college co-eds that surrounded him. Halfway through the walk, he noticed an attractive, young blonde college girl. She, as was most of the campus, was probably in her early twenties. He gazed upon her briefly, appreciating her soft, long blonde hair and her perfectly toned body accented by a halter top and a tight pair of cut-off jeans. A girl of such beauty coming into view was not rare in this college setting, but he savored each occasion.
He continued through campus to his classroom. He sat down about five minutes before class was to begin. The conversation which was led by the professor was fascinating. That is why he chose to study the subject of philosophy.
The professor began the lecture. The topic of the class was the philosophers of The Renaissance. The argument by Descartes on “I think, therefore I am” was the topic for today’s class.
The professor began his lecture, but always welcomed participation from his students. After beginning the lecture, briefly restating Descartes’ thoughts, a large collection of the students joined in.
One student, not highly enamored by what he considered to be the trite nature of Descartes’ argument volunteered. In a polished and scholarly manor he stated, “The problem with the philosophy of Descartes is that the trivial nature of his synopsis doesn’t amount to anything substantial. Through the course of his argument he does little to enlighten his readers about anything intriguing or even interesting at all. It is simply an exercise in philosophical discourse.”
The professor, not distressed with the disinterest of his student’s protest, said, “Your argument is completely valid. However, this is characteristic of the philosophers of The Renaissance. They do not intend to provoke thought on pressing moral or political issues; rather, they attempt to exercise the intellect wherever it may lead.”
A young college co-ed, in her fourth year of education and a major in philosophy contributed to the conversation. “Descartes, as espoused in his similar discussion of ‘what makes a ball of wax a ball of wax,’ participated in the same intellectual exercise. Through challenging the intellect, liberation of the mind can be achieved.”
The class was fascinating and it stimulated Jonathan much more than most of his other classes did. The classroom discussion ended an hour and a half after it began and the students dispersed to whichever was their next destination.
He did not have any more classes today, so he went about to the chores of the rest of his day. Once again, he enjoyed the beauty of the college co-eds and felt exhilarated when one caught his eye and smiled in his direction.
As typical on a Monday, he stopped by the library on his way home from class to take in a couple hours of studying. Although he enjoyed the trivialities of college life, he managed to maintain the focus on his education. The day was uneventful. It was spent by time in the library studying and by the forty-five minutes he spent at the coffee shop catching up on reading in his medieval history class.
The day was now over and another night in the college town which transformed itself into a resort every evening was ready to begin.
He went back to his apartment after a mostly solitary day. He showered and put on clean clothes to meet up with his friends. Although he lived alone, his friends were plentiful. He was friends with his neighbors as well as with a large gathering of other college students. On many afternoons he shared a couple of beers with his neighbors in light-hearted camaraderie. Tonight he would meet with a collection of his friends and they would test their fortunes on picking up college girls.
Two of Jonathan’s good friends, Brian and Justin, met up with him at his apartment for a pre-party before a night of revelry which was about to begin. From the wide selection of Jonathan’s CD’s, he chose a Credence Clearwater Revival CD. They all stood on the balcony enjoying cigarettes and premium Budweiser lager. After shot-gunning their third beer, they made their way half a mile through the small college town to their favorite bar.
The exercise in which they engaged brought excitement simply in light of the beauty of the college girls by which they were surrounded. They picked out a table and began sharing a pitcher of beer as they submerged themselves in the atmosphere of the billiards club.
Instead of making a rash attempt to pick up a particular girl, the friends knew it best to let the evening evolve into what it would. After a few more beers, Jonathan, Brian, and Justin went to the back patio to light up a cigarette.
Upon entering the patio, Jonathan saw a girl that he had seen a week before and immediately walked up to her as she gazed in his direction. She was the one to initiate the conversation, “Can I have a cigarette?” She asked him.
He happily obliged. After a few minutes of conversation, Jonathan invited her and her friends to meet them at the pool table. Brian and Justin were perfectly happy with this turn of events because it brought them into the cusp with the girl’s three friends.’
The night went along as all nights did. They all drank, but began to slow down after their fourth or fifth beer. The night of frivolity was not lost upon them and Jonathan and Brian each went home with a girl’s phone number promising to meet up with them later in the week.
A day at The Bahamas is always a nice distraction from college life.
Season of Betrayal
“I’m not kidding”, Linnie repeated, the frustration evident in her voice. “If you’re not here in ten minutes, I’m leaving without you”. She snapped her cell phone shut to end the call. Even with a month’s advance notice, he couldn’t be on time. Tonight was her parent’s 40th anniversary dinner and she’d promised that she and Mike would both be there. It was a half hour drive to Antonelli’s, her parent’s favorite restaurant, and traffic would be heavy this time on a Saturday evening. Over fifty people were invited to the celebration, among them her two sisters and her younger brother, their families, and assorted friends and associates closest to her parents. And now she and Mike would be walking in late.
“Dammit”, Linnie muttered to herself, “where the hell are my black heels?” She dropped to her knees and threw back the comforter. Under her bed was more or less a no man’s land, the place where anything that happened to land there stayed there, most likely never to be seen or heard from again. A couple old issues of Cosmo, one fuzzy pink slipper, several empty diet Coke cans, a crumpled Doritos bag and a television remote were just a few of the items Linnie discovered keeping company with the dust bunnies when she got down eye level with the floor.
“Oh, there you are” she remarked, as she grabbed the TV remote and tossed it up onto the bed. Then, “Aha”, she exclaimed, pulling out two matching black shoes, the 3-inch heels she was rooting around for. She stood and slipped her feet into them, smoothed her hands down over her little black dress and walked over to the dresser to find her silver hoop earrings. The clock on the bed stand read 7:15 and still no Mike. It wouldn’t be so irritating if he only did this occasionally, but lately it seemed she couldn’t count on Mike for much of anything. He’d pulled this too many times. No call or even a text to say why, which didn’t actually bother Linnie anymore, since she really didn’t want to hear another lame excuse anyway. They’d have arguments about how inconsiderate he was getting. Not loud or abusive arguments, just frequent and becoming tedious. He’d accuse her of wanting to keep tabs on him, of treating him like a 5-year old. And Linnie fired back that if he wanted to be one half of this relationship, he should act like it, instead of pushing her buttons, especially when he knew exactly which buttons not to push. The arguments usually ended with Linnie going to bed alone while Mike settled on the couch for a couple hours of Sports Center.
She glanced at her watch. 7:30. That did it. Linnie grabbed her coat, purse and keys and opened the door to their apartment. No sign of him coming down the hallway, in either direction. She locked the door behind her and turned towards the stairs. She wasn’t even that angry as much as ambivalent. What she wasn’t looking forward to was explaining to her parents and everyone else why she was showing up alone, again. She shrugged her shoulders. Shake it off, Linnie, she admonished herself. It was a beautiful Spring evening, clear skies and pleasantly cool. Everything had turned green, the grass, the leaves on the trees, and there were already tulips blooming in all their glory in the large planters in each corner of the parking lot. Linnie loved this time of year, everything clean and new, a season of starting over after months of only cold, gray and bare. Despite her annoyance with Mike, she felt lighter, a little more relaxed as she climbed into her silver Lexus and inserted the key into the ignition.
She pulled out of the parking lot of their apartment complex onto Nicollet Avenue. Traffic wasn’t quite as heavy as she’d expected. A couple blocks down, she passed the Starbucks she and Mike used to go to every Saturday morning. They’d start the day with a 2-mile run around the track at Washington Park, then end up at the coffee shop for a leisurely cappuccino. She’d always enjoyed their Saturday morning time together. She couldn’t remember exactly when they’d stopped doing it.
“Oh, crap”, Linnie said suddenly. “The flowers!” She just remembered she told her sisters that she’d stop by the florist and pick up the two centerpieces for the head table, since she drove right by the shop on her way to the restaurant. Damn, she’d have to double back a few blocks and she was already over half an hour late. Linnie turned at the first left she came to and did a loop back towards The Flower Cart Florals & Gifts. She pulled the car into a spot near the shop, which, as luck would have it, was still open. Linnie grabbed her purse, reached for the handle to open the door, and stopped – – her hand in mid-air.
Her car was parked right in front of a small café called The Handle Bar. Several small tables and chairs were set up out front for patrons to sit outdoors and enjoy their drink or coffee. But her eyes were fixed on one couple, a man and woman seated at one of the tables, their heads close together, laughing. The man was medium build with a tan complexion and sandy blonde hair, long enough to fall casually over his forehead. He wore a navy blue polo shirt, khaki slacks and a silver Armani watch, the watch Linnie had given him for his birthday last September. Mike. She felt her face flush, hot and fast, and her palms instantly started to sweat. The young woman sitting with him was lovely, with shoulder-length dark hair and pale, porcelain skin. She was smiling, her full attention focused on Mike. As Linnie watched, transfixed, the woman reached across the table and gently brushed the hair from his forehead. Gently, lovingly. As much as she wanted to, Linnie couldn’t seem to take her eyes off the two of them. She was watching something meant to be very private, but yet was so public. She stared, frozen. All this time, the inconsiderate behavior, the lame excuses, the lack of interest in spending time with her like he used to. He was seeing someone else. Seeing her.
Linnie sat in her car, emotions washing over her like water pouring from a waterfall. Anger. Hurt. Humiliation. Resentment. She felt betrayed and cheated and – – relieved. In that moment, her heart was hurting, but it wasn’t broken. She should be hysterical right now, out of the car, in his face hysterical. But she didn’t move. It was then she noticed the dogwood tree standing tall across the street, in full bloom, a mass of beautiful dainty pink blossoms. Spring had come, setting off a chain reaction of new life, a fresh start for every living thing that needed light and air in order to survive. Linnie put down her window, breathing deep, breathing in the fresh night air. Renewal. New life. Linnie wanted these things, wanted them now. She glanced over then, only to see the couple leaving the café, arm in arm, completely oblivious of the woman sitting in the silver Lexus. “Good-bye, Mike”, Linnie said aloud. “Good-bye.” She lifted the handle and stepped out of the car. She had flowers to pick up and a party to get to.
This story perfectly fits the theme of spring. I could tell at the beginning that she was ready to move on. So glad she’s doing it! For me, the detail felt real, but every once in a while the dialogue tags got in the way. I could tell what you were writing without them. I wish you (and Linnie) well!
Thank you for taking time to read my story and for your suggestion. 🙂
I agree with Nora, it does fit the topic. New beginnings and a fresh start. Good job.
Thanks so much for reading my story and for taking time to comment. Much appreciated. 🙂
You nailed the topic. Renewal and rebirth, and a new start for Linnie. Very nicely done.
Thank u for reading my submission and for your comments. Much appreciated. 🙂
Well she is more composed than I would have been, good for her.
It might have been more fun to have written a scene where Linnie let Mike have it. 🙂 Thank you for reading my submission and taking time to comment.
I like how her emotional life parallels the way spring’s behavior. I felt sad that her relationship wasn’t working out but admired her strength and staying true to what she needed.
Garden of the Month
The Simoneaux sisters lived down the street from my family for as long as I remembered. The two lived in the house after college and became teachers. Miss Claudette went to France and studied at the Sorbonne. Miss Anjenette preferred home to traveling across the ocean.
I spent many afternoons with the Simoneaux’s. They never seemed to mind me around. One spring Miss Anjenette invited me to help in her gardens. She had a flower garden in the front and a vegetable and herb garden in the back. “The amount of sunshine is important, Katrina. The front of the house gets the morning sun and the back gets the afternoon,” she told me. I tried to look like I knew exactly what she meant; I didn’t have a clue. Every year the Simoneaux yard boasted the “Garden of the Month” with the black and white sign in their front yard.
Miss Claudette started my love affair with France when she taught me to speak French. I drove my parents crazy. “Comment allez-vous? Comment vous applez-vous?” Following my lessons with Miss Claudette, I helped Miss Anjenette in the garden. The sisters often invited me to dinner and enjoy the harvest. Miss Anjenette may have grown the best produce, but Miss Claudette made them tasty. While studying in France, she took cooking lessons. What that woman did to squash made “you want to slap your mama”. “C’est magnifique!” I told Miss Claudette with every dish. “This is the best you ever made.”
“Thank you, Katrina. I’ll give your mamma the recipe.”
“You should give it to Daddy. He cooks better than Mamma.”
Years later with a daughter of my own, we spent afternoons with the Simoneaux sisters. Claudia loved the two ladies as much as I did. We helped Miss Anjenette with her garden. She moved slower and was glad to have help weeding. Claudia loved feeling the cool dirt under her feet. We watered the plants, we made mud pies. Claudia gave them a fancy name and served them to the Simoneaux’s. The sisters laughed and pretended to eat the pies, telling the child the “Gateau Chocolat est tres delicious!”
Claudia squealed in her best French accent, “Merci, beaucoup. It is a pleasure to serve you.” She brought joy to the sisters Simoneaux. It pleased me that I could give back to them the pleasures they had given me. I am sure they wanted to rest after a tiring day. But they never let it show.
One day Claudia noticed a painting of a girl holding a watering can. Claudia asked Miss Claudette about the picture.
“This is a print of a painting by a famous French artist,” said Miss Claudette. “She reminds me of you Claudia, don’t you think?”
“I love her dress,” said Claudia. “Momma, can you make me a dress like hers?”
Living in an apartment, Claudia and I tried to grow plants indoors. Unfortunately our green thumbs had turned brown. The sun never came from the right direction. I wished Miss Anjenette was there to advise me. Alas, Claudia and I spent our lazy afternoons in the park. There we enjoyed a variety of plants learning new names. Claudia questioned the ground keepers on their techniques and how they grew such lush foliage in the middle of the city. Amazed at her interest they explained the intricacies of each species. I knew Claudia would be a botanist one day.
The spring we returned to Louisiana, Claudia and I chose not live in an apartment. Claudia desperately wanted things that a house provides, such as a dog, flowers, vegetables, and more. During the time we lived away, the old neighborhood changed. Many of the older residents had either passed away or lived with either family or nursing homes. Miss Claudette passed not long after Claudia and I moved, and Miss Anjenette moved into the Shady Oaks retirement home.
One afternoon Claudia and I visited Miss Anjenette when Claudia said older lady, “I was looking around your property the other day and noticed this man mowing the grass. I asked him if you knew that he was on your property. He said you did. I asked him if he was going weed the garden, too. He told me he was not. I wanted to ask him why not, but changed my mind. I went back later to make sure he hadn’t broken into your house. or The house looked okay to me.”
“I appreciate you looking after things, Claudia,” Miss Anjenette said, her eyes twinkling.
“So I started thinking to myself.” Claudia put on her serious face; the one she uses when arguing. “I am looking for a house and yours is sitting there. The gardens need tending something awful. You would cry if you saw the weeds. Mamma and I want to live in a house and yours is perfect for us. So what do you think?”
I looked for the hole in the floor. Miss Anjenette simply smiled at Claudia. “Claudia, would you like to buy my house?”
My only child searched my face. I nodded to her. “Yes ma’am, that it exactly what I am saying. Mamma and I want to buy your house.”
“Why don’t I have someone meet with your mother and me. We will work out all the details. It will be nice who loves the gardens and home as much as I do will live there.
I never realized how difficult it was for Miss Anjenette to give up her gardens, her independence, and the full life she had lived in that simple house. As she dabbed the tears, she smiled up at me. We had previously discussed what she wanted to do with her home. Miss Anjenette had no family that wanted the property. I made an offer, and she accepted. Claudia surprised us.
Claudia and I lived a happy life in the Simoneaux house. Our possessions made it ours, but the sisters were with us. We renewed the gardens in spring following Miss Anjenette’s guidance. Miss Claudette’s kitchen windows sent fragrances throughout the neighborhood. The face of the neighborhood changed. A French family lived across the street. Claudia became fluent in French. Miss Claudette would have been proud. We had two poodles named Claudette and Anjenette.
Shopping in a friend’s antique shop, I saw a copy of Renoir’s “Girl with the Watering Can”. She told me she acquired it through an estate sale. I knew it was Miss Claudette’s print. Miss Anjenette sold everything before moving. I wanted something to remind me of Miss Claudette. I missed her and valued what she had given me as a child. The picture hangs in the same place.
When Miss Anjenette died, she left what remained of her estate to the school where the two sisters had taught. Her gift had instructions; the money was to build gardens for the children. Gardeners from the community developed a curriculum for gardening skills. A landscape architect helped with designs. Children worked in the gardens proud of their results. Claudia became a teacher at the primary school dividing her duties between teaching French and botany. Every spring the new plants peak out of the soil and the flowers burst open with colorful blooms. Students harvest the produce and host a community dinner to share their abundance. Two women who had no children of their own, but made a difference in the life of every child they taught.
What a sweet story of friendship and renewal. I enjoyed the colorful description of the interesting sisters and their blossoming friendship with Claudia and her mother.
Thank you; they were quite a pair.
What a happy story. It turned out well for all concerned. I really like the descriptions of the French sisters and the sprinkling of French conversation.
Thank you. I loved those two dearly.
Well you brought them to life again, and now we love them.
A MAN AND HIS DAFFODIL
Searching the ground for signs of life, his eyes slowly catalogued the dirt and last year’s leaves. The last of winter was gone, but spring had yet to make her full appearance. He pulled his red flannel jacket just a little tighter as the brisk wind rolled by.
He had never before been so impatient for spring to come. He had always enjoyed it – the warmer days, the joy of outdoor yard work and endless excuses to run his tractor around the property. But it had been a nagging list as well – expectations that had to be threaded through the tedium of 50 to 60 hours a week. There was never quite enough time to do it all, and the necessary consolation at the end that there was just too much to do.
But now the grand season of retirement stretched before him, and it smelled wonderful. It smelled of deep, dark soil being overturned in time for planting. It smelled of fresh white paint on a newly fixed fence. It smelled of cold iced tea, and hot cow patties in the pasture. And it sounded like the giggle of a grandson, just reaching the age of three, so joyous to explore it all.
How much time had he spent busy, working? Now that he stopped to count it, the span of time between the retreat of the snow and the blooming of the first flowers seemed an eternity, where it had always seemed so quick before. He longed to see the beauty of spring appear.
Many things in his past were not beautiful or pretty. There were many shadows and dark places that he could not go. But daffodils were glorious. The way they caught the sun and trumpeted out the arrival of spring always made him smile. The same way his grandfather had smiled when they went fishing, and to baseball games – and planting daffodil bulbs in the fall. The image of Grandpa with his trademark red handkerchief in his pocket always brought back bright, wonderful memories of his childhood, and often a few tears.
Were the daffodils coming up yet?
Not today. Not yet.
————————————————-
As he gently scuffed the dirt, his mind wandered to last night’s conversation. The plane ticket had been purchased, and the dates were set. In a mere three weeks time, he would be face-to-face with his son. His only surviving son, and a face he had not seen in some thirty years.
Would they be alike? Would they be different? Would he see his own mistakes etched on his son’s face, and would his own faults be mirrored back? And could he gather the courage to forge ahead in a new relationship with an old ghost?
Life had been so confusing for him, and he was jealous of people with more straightforward beginnings. Who could have known the path from the thorns in his position? And yet the guilt and the doubt continued to plague him.
Maybe the daffodils weren’t coming up this year. They might have been eaten by moles burrowing underground during the driving snows. Or maybe he had planted them too late and they’d not had enough time to gather strength?
He decided to dig a little deeper, gently pushing the earth aside where he remembered digging the previous fall. And then he felt it – a little piece of moist silkiness pushing its way up, about half an inch from the sun.
It was going to happen. The daffodils were coming up – at least this one. And that was enough to lighten his heart as he wiped the dirt from fingers on his red handkerchief.
Not today. But soon.
————————————————-
Sickness had kept him from his daily inspections of the ground. It had become a more frequent visitor to his doorstep – a reminder that he was not all that he once had been. He used to be impervious to maladies and such. Nothing could touch him – at least not for long. But now it had been a week since he’d been able to eat a full meal and for the line of the horizon to finally be in its proper place.
He had always laughed at the prospect of age. It was all just a mindset really – that you were only ever as old as you decided to feel. But now age was doing a bit of catching up, and he was forced to reconcile his current reality with the haughtiness of his youth.
And cancer had been a bit of a surprise. He was alarmed that his body had betrayed him like that. Sixty-one years of working fine, and then one day it tries to kill you. Although he had made it through the battle and won the war, he did not feel the better man for it. He was slower, and less steady, and the rattle of his pill bottles mocked him.
With measured steps, he walked out to the familiar plot of ground. He was only halfway there when his eyes lit up. His stride lengthened in eagerness to confirm what he had hoped from afar.
Today.
Today the daffodils were in full bloom, waiting to be adored and celebrated – all seven of them. Today was the official beginning of spring, and it harkened in him the unofficial beginning of a new season.
It wasn’t a season that followed the weather, or the charting of the stars. It was a season of exploration, and of new growth. And it smelled wonderful.
I’m glad his daffodils finally bloomed and I like the writing. One part that I particularly liked was the rattle of his pills in his pockets mocking him. I like that his spring is really related to his renewed thrill in living stemming from his brush with death, more than with his retirement or his seeing his son again.
I really enjoyed writing that line. Thanks for the feedback!
I love the way you wove the hope and expectation of the daffodils through the painful and yet hopeful exploration of self that the man was going through. Beautiful.
Thanks! That’s exactly what I was trying to do – encouraging to me that you received it that way.
I think this paragraph is my favorite:
It smelled of deep, dark soil being overturned in time for planting. It smelled of fresh white paint on a newly fixed fence. It smelled of cold iced tea, and hot cow patties in the pasture. And it sounded like the giggle of a grandson, just reaching the age of three, so joyous to explore it all.
I like the sensory detail, and the way you suck us up into the simple contentment of his dreamed for life.
Thanks, Joe! I took my first stab at real story writing in awhile. I’ll keep working on it.
When I read your description of his discovery of the growing daffodil (under the soil) my heart felt physical lifting in my heart. My spirit breathed in the feeling of hopefulness. I hadn’t realized how much your narrative had hooked me in emotionally until that point.
Wow – that’s awesome. I was trying to show hope through the flowers, and I’m very happy that you felt that – thanks!
A New Beginning
by R. E. Hunter
Approx. 750 words
It’s spring. A time of rebirth. Of new beginnings.
The sun shines with real warmth. Not the cold, heartless sun of winter, too stingy to give any heat, or to stay in the sky for more than a few hours.
The ground thaws. The first flowers begin to poke up, reaching toward the sun. The trees come back to life, buds appearing on their branches. The songbirds return, filling the air with their chirping. The world begins to transform, the brown and white of winter supplanted by the green leaves and grass and the rainbow colours of the flowers.
People awaken from their hibernation. Children laugh as they splash in puddles, while their parents putter about in their lawns and gardens. Winter boots and coats are packed away. Everyone seems happier and full of energy.
This is my favourite time of year. All too soon the hot summer days will be here, when we’ll wish for cooler weather. But right now we enjoy the growing warmth of the longer days.
I ponder these things as I stare out the window, lost in thought. Suddenly my attention is drawn back to where I am. I hear the most disturbing sound, like someone having trouble breathing.
“That’s the death rattle you hear. He doesn’t have much time left now. But don’t worry, he can’t feel anything at this point.”
I turn to the voice. A nurse had come into the room unnoticed. “Thanks.”
“Are you okay?” she asks.
What can I say? How can I explain my conflicted feelings? I’m not even sure why I’m here. I just shrug my shoulders. She nods understandingly, then goes about her duties and leaves.
It’s quiet, the only sound his ragged breathing, the hiss of the oxygen mask, and the steady beeping of the heart monitor. The room smells of rubbing alcohol and bleach, with hints of various unpleasant bodily odours. The smell of disease and death.
He looks so frail, so small, lying there. So harmless. I can’t reconcile this with my memories of him. How can this be the same man, the one who made my life a living hell?
Suddenly I’m back there! He’s towering over me, screaming at me. My heart pounds. I can’t breath! I can’t move! I’m paralyzed with fear. I lose control of my bladder. I can’t hear what he’s saying through the rushing noise in my ears. I see his face turning red. He hits me! I stagger backward. He keeps coming at me. Time seems to stop. Then everything shifts. It’s like I’m watching a movie, seeing this happen to someone else. I cry for the little boy, unable to help him. Why won’t anyone help him?
The images begin to recede, like I’m being drawn down a long, dark hallway. Then I’m back in the hospital room. I find myself cowering in the corner, clutching at the walls. I realize I’m hyperventilating. I cup my hands over my mouth, forcing myself to take slower, deeper breaths. My heart rate starts to return to normal. I wipe my forehead. I’m drenched in sweat, but I’m shivering. I sit in the corner, feeling the comforting cold of the floor beneath me. I’m still shaking, but finally I feel able to stand again.
I hear a steady high-pitched whine. I realize it’s been going on for… how long? A few seconds? A few minutes? I can’t tell. My sense of time is distorted.
A nurse rushes into the room, to the side of the bed. She feels for a pulse. She pulls off the oxygen mask and listens for a breath. She shakes her head. A doctor arrives. He listens with his stethoscope for what seems a long time, but must really only be a few seconds. He looks over at the heart monitor. He checks his watch.
“Time of death 2:38pm.”
He reaches over and turns off the heart monitor. The nurse turns off the flow of oxygen, removes the mask, then makes a note on the chart at the end of the bed. Other people arrive and go about their business. Someone pulls the sheet over his face.
I wander out of the room and down the hallway in a daze. Emotions flood through me. Part of me mourns. Despite everything, I still loved him. He was my father. But part of me rejoices. I’m no longer in danger. The monster is dead.
I wander outside into the warm, sunny spring day. I feel the warmth of the sun on my face. This is my new beginning.
Thank you for this excellently written short story. I very much enjoyed your “voice” and style of writing.
Thanks. I’m happy with how well it came out once I got started.
Nicely done. Loved your beginning and the shift here…”I ponder these things as I stare out the window, lost in thought. Suddenly my attention is drawn back to where I am.” Reminded me of how (in real life) beauty and pain can coexist.
Thanks, Eileen, that’s the effect I was going for. I’m happy it worked for you.
Well done R.E. and in so few words too. I like the structure, the description of spring after the stingy winter sun, the description of the hospital room and what is happening, then the shift to the childhood beating, then the death and spring. I wonder if it were longer though if the father’s death would be the end of winter, or if his feeling that it was over is just a brief respite.
Thanks, Marianne. Interesting idea. Maybe someday I’ll try to turn it into a longer form along those lines.
I practically saw the story play out in my head as i read it… Hakuna Matata my friend!
Thanks Ritika, I’m glad you liked it.
What Spring Means to Me
Upon awakening on the first day of spring in the year 2007, I moseyed to the living room, pulled up the venetian blinds and there it was. Snow! The forecast was correct, overnight it snowed six inches and the white stuff was still coming down. I despise snow!
That was my first experience of spring living in the rocky mountains of Colorado. Where did I move from, and why you ask?
My name is Donna and I was born and raised in a suburb west of Cleveland, Ohio. I’m the third of six girls in my family, no brothers.
When I was in the seventh grade, I befell upon the cutest boy in school, Brett Lively. It was easy to get lost in his sky blue eyes, Mick Jagger lips, and shoulder length blonde hair. I would wait by my locker between classes to sneak a glance of him. Soon, we shared smiles followed by hellos, before long we were buddies. I was not allowed to date until I was officially sixteen.
By the eighth grade, our friendship was stronger than ever. Even now, I found myself waiting for Brett at my locker. Like clockwork, I saw him descending the center hall stairs, books held in the crook of his bent arm. Ten lockers ahead of mine, he began moving at a swift pace, two lockers away, he started his slide. Wearing black leather, heeled boots, he slid by me, smack the armful of books from my arms, and continue sliding onwards, resulting in my books and papers cascading to the multicolored green hall floor.
“Now, pick them up,” I would command. Brett would come back, pick up my books and place them in my waiting hands, brandishing his devious grin.
It was during our eighth grade together, we shared each other’s first kiss. It happened when Brett and his best friend, Keith came to visit my best friend Lisa and me while we were babysitting Lisa’s niece. Keith and Lisa were an item. I gather it was bound to happen, with our middle school hormones screaming, and our friends kissing nearby. Leaning in towards me while standing near the open door, our lips met. Soft and delicate, we kissed, and then he immediately opened the door, said good-bye and walked into the darkness. There I stood staring into the night, gently raising my fingertips to my lips.
Brett and I never became an item, rather we remained great friends. I often pondered during our high school years, why he never pursued “us!” Thirty years later, the answer was revealed.
Brett joined the Air Force and graduated a year prior than me. We wrote and sent pictures while he was in boot camp. Eventually, we lost touch.
During my senior year of high school, I met a guy by the name of Jim. We both worked at the same establishment. Me working part-time as a cashier, and Jim in the hardware department, only because it was winter, and his work in home construction was sluggish, he often reminded me.
Jim was nice enough, but I didn’t think he was my type. Not that I knew what my type was at seventeen years of age, and he was the first guy I ever dated! For the next year, our relationship was on-again, off-again. During our on-again time, Brett, dressed in his full Air Force apparel, came to my parent’s home, unannounced. After meeting my ‘boyfriend,’ he quickly left and I would not hear from or see him for thirty years.
Jim and I married, had two children, and lived in an affluent neighborhood, in a house he built. Our marriage mirrored our dating cycle—on-again, off-again. When counseling wasn’t helping, after twenty years, I called it quits.
In the year 2006, and nine years after my divorce, I decided to move from Ohio to northern California to be close to one of my sisters. Later that same year, I moved yet another time, from California to Fraser, Colorado.
After thirty years, Brett found me, with the help of Classmates.com. Soon after he was out of the military, Brett moved from Ohio to Sacramento, California. He married twice. His second wife persuaded him to move to Fraser, Colorado, to manage a KFC/Taco Bell restaurant her brother owned. A few months after their move to Colorado, his marriage ended, which was not a huge surprise to him since like my marriage, his also was on-again, off-again.
With each of us alone, we rekindled our friendship and married in December, 2006.
In 2009, both worn-out from the brutal winters in Fraser, we visited the Western Slope of Colorado, loved it, and purchased a home. We continued to survive one more winter in the cold and snow of Fraser. In spring of 2010, we moved to beautiful Palisade, Colorado, and settled into our new surroundings and employment.
During the last week of November that same year, Brett woke me to tell me that he loved me. Instantly, I knew something was wrong, not because he told me he loved me, but because he knew I had to wake early for work and would never just wake me to say something like that. He shared with me that he felt as though he was having a heart attack, yet refused emergency help. I sat up the remainder of that night, watching him as he slept. The next morning, I scheduled a doctor’s appointment. When we arrived at the appointment several days later, we were sent directly to the emergency room. It was determined that Brett did suffer another heart attack, his third since the age of thirty-six. This one was considered massive.
Brett remained in the hospital the month of December, only four short years after our reunion. He had three surgeries in a week, including quadruple bi-pass. A few days after the bi-pass didn’t seem to be helping his condition, he had a pace maker/difubulator implanted.
His heart stopped beating twelve times, and he was brought back to me each time. His heart is severely damaged, he’s fortunate to be alive. At fifty-two years of age, Brett was told he could no longer work.
I believe we were meant to reunite after all those years to be there for one another. I failed to mention earlier, when I was thirty-two, and married to Jim, I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
Spring to me represents rebirth. I appreciate each and every spring I am able to spend with Brett. Whether it’s snowing, raining, or sunny, when the calendar reads its spring, I’m happy because my buddy since the seventh grade, and I are together. Neither one of us is in optimum health, but together, we’re strong. Happy spring!
Happy spring, happy Easter (if you celebrate) to you and your love. It’s a touching story. I wish you the best.
Donna may you and Brett be blessed with many more Springs together
What a sweet story. I hope you have a long and happy new life together.
One Palestinian Woman’s Spring (1250 words)
By midnight, Christine was burning. Half conscious, she tossed and turned, unrelieved. Finally, she startled awake in a melange of hot and cold. Her face and feet, protruding from the heavy covers, were flush, but the rest of her body shivered on the sweat-soaked mattress. The digital clock read 2:17 am. It was the 96th night in a row that she hadn’t bled.
There was nothing to do at 2:17 am. No familiar body to wrap around and drift back to sleep. No one to sit with in the kitchen over a cup of chamomile tea. She got out of bed. Looking out the window, little sprigs of weeds fought their way through the cracks in the concrete signaling spring for the rest of the world. But for Christine, there would be no new buds.
She scrutinized herself in the full-length mirror. Eyes: kind. Lids: drooping. Mouth: resting. Wrinkles: proliferating. There was a faint muddy spots in the shape of a cashew under her left eye. Her lips, chapped, had not kissed for a long, long time. Overall, many more negatives than positives. Christine felt like a slice of meat left too long in the refrigerator. She needed to be thrown away, uneaten, having failed in her mission to nourish life.
Light from the bedroom reflected off the mirror illuminating her breasts, big and only slightly sagging. They had never filled with milk custom-made for an infant that shared her weak chin. They had never overflowed with love and squirted an infant in the eye. Christine looked at herself sideways in the mirror. Her stomach was round from eating too much sesame-covered Jerusalem bread, but there were no marks. The marks that other women cursed, but that she had coveted. Down below, two or three grey pubic hairs glinted in the light. She stifled the urge to laugh and cry simultaneously.
It was only 2:30 am and Christine had nothing to do. She couldn’t shower. The gurgling sounds of the electric boiler heating the water would wake the neighbors downstairs. It wouldn’t wake the old man upstairs; he slept like the dead. Lucky man. So instead of showering, Christine decided to clean out the spare room.
Although it had never been used as a nursery, it had been used twice as a guest room. Once, a Norwegian girl sat next to her on the bus and confided that she had no where to sleep. Crazy tourists. They came to Jerusalem year after year looking for the Holy Land and found only a cursed land full of other tourists also looking for the Holy Land. Christine welcomed the girl in her virgin guestroom. The next morning she made a huge breakfast of fried goat cheese and onion ommelettes with sage tea heavily sweetened. The Norwegian girl was so grateful, she came back a year later and stayed for a week. Christine never saw her again, but she had gotten a letter saying that she was well. Married. Pregnant.
Christine was disappointed that the guest room was already clean and there was only one thing to get rid of. In the last drawer of the dresser there were three matching sets of knitted hats, gloves, booties and blankets. Christine had made hundreds of layette sets over the years and had donated them to the charitable society when they ran their annual Christmas bazaar. She could have rented a table and sold her knitted goods herself, and she might have made a nice sum, but she didn’t want to stand exposed in front of the community like that. They would gossip. Palestinians are skillful gossipers. They can excommunicate a person with casual comments and without a pang of guilt. Or they could attack with self-righteous judgment and lead a person to banish herself. Better to stay away.
Those three layette sets that lay in the bottom dresser drawer were special. They had been touched by the Bishop! According to the lady from the charitable society, the Bishop had come in with several priests and caused quite a commotion in the bazaar. He walked slowly through and looked at the crafts made so carefully by the old ladies who had nothing to do after their children and grandchildren emigrated. He bought several wreaths of plastic pine vines woven with flowers and adorned with small silver bulbs. When he got to the table of knitted goods, he touched them and praised them, but didn’t buy. The woman had given the ones touched by the Bishop back to Christine, and she had treasured them and all that they might mean. Till now.
Her chest felt heavy as she wrapped the layettes in a plastic bag with a piece of pita bread. It wasn’t a custom and didn’t mean anything, but somehow Christine needed something symbolic to make the ritual hurt more. If she could make herself hurt enough, perhaps God, the merciful, might let her die. She snuck down the stairs quietly and into the garden in the backyard where it was even colder than in her apartment. And still. So still.
Dew had made the ground moist and she easily dug under the mint patch in the far corner to bury her small package, and then she sat on the cold earth and tried to cry but couldn’t. It was the path God had chosen for her and she had no right to want something else, no right to feel resentful. But she did.
Why would God create such a world, a world where some children live unloved, while others, loved, are unborn or are born only to die despite their innocence? Why would God create a world where some people never love while others love deeply and are ripped apart from the only person who completes them? Christine’s head pounded while her feet were numb on the cold ground. Why couldn’t she cry?
Suddenly, Christine jumped to her feet. Energy cursed from the back of her legs up her back and through the back of her arms. She climbed into the olive tree that sat in the place of honor in the middle of the garden. “You have no right to live,” she hissed under her breath as she ripped a new shoot from the tree. “You have no right to be with your loved ones,” she spit as she ripped another. With each murderous motion, Christine stung as if she had peeled the skin from her palms.
It didn’t take long for debris to pile up beneath the tree, and when the sun peaked over the high garden wall, Christine saw the damage she had done. Once plump with new life, the tree was as sparse as a monk’s worldly possessions. She mourned more for the new shoots left behind to live lonely lives than for the ones she had relieved of their misery.
From the tree, Christine looked down on the garden seeing it–and herself–from a new perspective. Surely Satan had conquered her. Surely there was no redemption. Tears released down her cheeks as she dug up the layette sets and buried the debris from the tree with them. She fought the urge to say a prayer, which she knew she had no right to utter.
Later that afternoon, Basel entered the garden that he had neglected and was struck by the tree. Who had pruned it? Who had so gently lightened its load so that it could grow stronger and bear more fruit? Who had given life so anonymously?
Beautiful Nora. Masha’allah.
Thanks so much, Casey. Christine is a main character in my novel. I didn’t mean to write about her for this contest, but I guess she’s on my mind. She’s a very special person I think!
What a lovely surprising ending. You brought us to it so cleverly too! Indeed, whether a glass is half empty or half full depends very much on our own state of mind.
I hope it wasn’t too abrupt. That’s something I often do with endings. Anyway, this is the first time Christine sunk to destruction, and she was so bad at it! I just want to hug her.
Nora, this is lovely, the barrenness of the woman finding redemption in pruning. Great story
I’m writing a lot about redemption these days. I wonder why. Hum.
Nora, what a raw emotional piece. I like the contrasts you drew and the connection of Christine and the tree.
Thanks, Beck. I feel like everything I write is raw, raw, raw and that can be good but too much of it is, well, nauseating. I need to cook at least some of my writing, put some dressing on, etc. Am working on that.
I meant the raw emotion as a good thing, I agree too much can be overwhelming, but I think it was powerful in this piece.
Thanks so much, Beck.
Nora, your words strike me – not as a slap, but as a wake up call. The contrast of Christine’s damage to what Basel saw as pruning was true. Frightening was Christine’s fighting the urge to pray, when she needed it most.
Yes! Poor Christine.
That was go good. I felt for her, although I disliked her for being so cruel to herself. A very odd character but probably more realistic than we like to think.
Well-said, Marianne.
And good piece, Nora!
Katie
Thanks so much, Katie. How amazing it feels to have someone like something I created. No wonder everyone wants to be a writer.
Now I’ve read the other comments and see that she is a character in a longer story. I’m glad of that.
Thanks, Marianne. Hopefully you’ll read the novel and you’ll like Christine!
The last line of your first paragraph was a very powerful opener. I also thought the imagery of the woman and the tree was very well done.
Thanks, Steph.
Wow, Nora. This was a great story. You really captured Christine’s pain and loss. Like everyone else, I wanted so much to hug her and share her grief. I spent some years barren before God gifted me with my daughter…I understand the longing for children.
I am so very, very blessed to have three.
If it weren’t for the ending, I would have thought this was a very well written, sad, story that ultimately fell flat.
But the ending.
Wow.
Wow to you!
Nora~
Poignant and beautiful description of the grief of dreams not realized. Yet, there is a hopeful tone at the end. Your story is my favorite.
Oh thank you! That makes my heart sing!
Until the car hit him and sent him flying backward into its windshield, Kim had been content in his loneliness. He worked and checked his mail. He ate microwave freezer dinners of fettuccine alfredo because he didn’t cook and had no one to share his cooking with him. He watched the six o’clock news with anchors Madeline and Ed for company, and played online games afterward. Then he would go to bed to begin the day over again. It was a quiet life, and uneventful. In later years he would remember it as purgatory.
Then he got hit by the car. The crash of his head through the windshield bloodied his face and kept him two days in the hospital under observation for a concussion. He was alive and otherwise unharmed. But now he found himself conscious of an intrusion into his previously well-ordered and predictable existence.
The stitches that the lacerations on his face required pinched even under the influence of anesthetic, and burned and stung for days afterward. His face swelled until he became unrecognizable to himself. His eyes were sensitive to light. The quality of it was magnified, so that even on a dull rain-washed day the people around him stood out in stark relief against their background. He became aware of the loudness of the people’s voices around him, insistent and demanding and impossible to ignore. It was as if he’d had earplugs removed.
His body, he discovered, was not an insensate lump of clay that insulated him from his surroundings. There were others–people–who demanded a place in the realm of his existence. Now that his world had changed–had come barging in on him with the rudeness of birth–what was he supposed to do with it?
***
A little girl stopped beside the table at the food court where Kim sat reviewing employee schedules and inventory reports. She wore a pink scarf tied around her head, and he could see that she didn’t have any hair underneath it. She couldn’t have been more than five, and she was looking at him with the frank curiosity young children reserve for the aberrations of their world. He could feel anxiety curling itself up in his gut.
“Why are you so sad, mister?” she asked, her head tilting to one side as if trying to catch his evasive eyes. The question had the effect of cutting away what remained of the shroud covering his soul, the desperate unease he’d been carrying around since his accident. His stomach unclenched at her question of concern, and the corners of his lips began to curve upward. Before he could reply, her mother whisked her away. Kim was left staring after her, unexpectedly lighter of heart.
Instead of going home that night, Kim drove to the animal rescue shelter. The first cat that he saw was a three-legged male tabby that growled as he approached. When Kim put his finger through the bars to stroke the animal, the cat spat, and a sharp claw sliced Kim’s finger open. He laughed. Caring for a crippled and disgruntled creature might be the best way for him to move beyond his own narrow life. It was a small start, anyway. Kim adopted the cat, and named him George.
That night he shared shredded bits of his rotisserie chicken with his new pet, as George alternately growled and chewed, and Kim thought of the little girl at the food court. He’d been in an accident and was, by some lucky chance, still alive; and the little girl was struggling just to stay that way.
He thought to himself that maybe he didn’t have to be lonely anymore.
A touching example of how an unforeseen event can change our lives– if we let it.
Thank you, Nora.
His body, he discovered, was not an insensate lump of clay that insulated him from his surroundings. There were others–people–who demanded a place in the realm of his existence. Now that his world had changed–had come barging in on him with the rudeness of birth–what was he supposed to do with it? …. In my novel, I have a character who experiences this same awakening. But I didn’t write it half so well!
Thank you, Oddznns. This was actually a line that I was rather proud of, and I wondered if that meant I should take it out. 🙂
An awakening, whether it be a car hitting you are something less violent is good, I really like your prose, it is gentle and readable. It resonates of ‘the unrest cure’ by Saki, not the same just resonates.
Thank you, Suzi. I’ve never heard of Saki. This is something that I will have to check out.
I think this is a great illustration of how we can undervalue life. I’m glad Kim got shaken out of his complacency before he missed even more of life. Your writing is so smooth that it never gets in the way of the story. I like the descriptions of his life before the accident, frozen dinners and email; the little girl, with her pink scarf and bald head; and the cat, what a character. You intertwine all of that with the idea of his life becoming more important to him, so important that he thinks maybe he will share it and you do it without any break in the flow. Well done.
Thank you, Marianne. I appreciate it. I love re-reading your comments, especially when I’m having a bad writing day. 🙂
Casey, you’ve given us an eye into the world of being alone and then being launched into an awareness of the rest of the human race, animals, objects, etc. that move and have their being around us! A perfect example of a new awareness of the value of life itself.
Thank you, Sherrey.
Casey, great job with this story. I especially liked the description you used to show Kim’s loneliness, and his inner feelings. “Looking at him with the frank curiosity reserved for the abberations of their world.” “His stomach unclenced.”
With imagery like that it was easy to see the scene you wrote.
I love getting comments from you, Angelo. I always feel like I wrote something worth noticing when you comment on piece of mine. Thank you. 🙂
I love the cat. I actually used to have a cat named George. He was not as mean as this one, though.
Also, I like how this one fits the theme. A man slowly waking up from the winter of his life. I wonder what his summer will look like 🙂
I like how the car accident and the little girl remind him to show up for his life. His resolve to transcend the ache in his soul and give love to the unloveable (George) is inspiring. Thank you.
Ice, Custard, Happiness, Amen. — by Dominic Laing
House faces West, so early-day Sun climbs up back, and late-day Sun tumbles down front.
No one stoop-sits in cold months. Hands buried deep, hoodies and mittens pulled tight; Monks passing between prayers.
But sun re-shines and Vibrance spreads anew. Roy G. Biv comes out of retirement and clear-cool-blue rends Winter’s tabernacle veil as far as Eye can see.
Eyes see further when Sun re-shines and Wind kicks out the bullshit. Blue be clear and cool, and brick be red.
Long morning. Slow. Funeral tomorrow.
II
Banshee Block. Where I live.
Young bucks rolling up, popping on two wheels like they hot shit. Four wheels, look like tanks, like they oughta be doing some off-roading through Fairmount or somethin’.
They rev their motors, each one-by-one. They blow by each block in the hood, scaring all the old folks, making all the kids think the Banshees are the baddest. They don’t care ‘bout the neighborhood. Masks and hoods, splitting my peace and quiet with that revving and rippin’.
Don’t sound like no big engine. Don’t sound like no lion to me. Don’t sound like no cub neither. Sounds like a Jackal or a Hyena, like some punk in puberty. All squeals and squeaks. Ain’t no roar to be found from any of ‘em.
Hyenas, one and all.
III
Sitting at the service. Everyone looks smaller in coffins. No one looks like they did when they lived. I have a picture of her in my pocket. That’s how I’m going to remember.
“She looks great.”
“She looks nice, man.”
“She’s beautiful.”
Dead, what she is.
We asked a friend to sing.
“There was a woman,” he said. “Sick for years; vomiting, bleeding. All these men trying to heal her, but she doesn’t get well. Then she hears Jesus is coming to town. And she fights the crowd because she believes if she can just touch him, she’ll be healed.”
He looks at my aunt, and smiles.
“So Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers hear about this woman, and they go into the studio to write a song about her. And it’s a hand-clapping song, so I’m gonna need your help.
And it goes something like this…
OHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
There was a woman, in the Bible days,
she had been sick, sick so very long
but she heard about Jesus was passing by
so she joined the gathering throng
And while she was pushing her way through
Someone asked her ‘what are you trying to do?’
She said ‘if I could just touch the hem of his garment,
I know I’ll be made whole…’”
Later, the preacher preaches.
“She’s been changed. She’s not in a better place. No sir. She’s not in a better place. That’s how lies get spread, and we’re not gonna spread lies. She’s not in a better place. She’s in the best place. The best place. And you couldn’t convince her to come back here, not for one second.
She is now changed. From the temporal, to the eternal. From the corruptible to the incorruptible. From the decrepit to the intrepid; lost to found. Glory to God! Glory to God!”
“Make sure,” the preacher says, “make sure the love in this room doesn’t stay here. Make sure you carry it out with you. Make sure it resounds.”
I don’t have any idea how there’s love in this room. I don’t feel love. I still feel loss. And pain.
The preacher’s right, though. She can’t get sick anymore, she can’t break any bones, and she’ll never have to see anymore doctors.
And she’s unreachable by phone. She has no permanent address, and I’ll never be able to visit her on a Saturday again. I’ll never be surprised by the presence of freshly-made dinner.
Never an unannounced visit. All visits from now until I die will be announced and planned. I’ll always be going to visit on purpose and it’ll always be to pay respects.
IV
First day of spring. Clear cool blue. Roy G. Biv out doing his thing. Looking fresh.
First day of spring means free Water Ice at Rita’s.
I get the Mango flavor; doesn’t leave your mouth red like some damn lipstick. Sweet.
One-thirty; before school lets out, line’s still shot enough. You gonna wait, but you always gonna wait for free Water Ice, and it’s worth it.
I glance up at the sign. Under the name it reads, “Ice, Custard, Happiness.”
All’s I’m thinking about is how much I wish she were here, and how much I wished those Banshees didn’t come ripping down my block, and how much I wish I could call her.
Two old ladies behind me.
“Whatchu doing tomorrow?”
“Some of the grandkids are coming over.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Gonna make cookies.”
“Alright.”
“Easter’s in two weeks.”
“Really?”
“MmmHmm.”
“Shame; Jesus is gonna miss His free Water Ice.”
First day of Spring. Me and the Garment. Make me whole.
This is fabulous, Dominic. You must publish this and more!
Whoa! Awesome rhythm.
Dominic, loved it, the rhythm was awesome
Awesome dialect. Great Stream of consciousness. I was transported to a new and different type of life.
Very transporting, creative, and interesting. Nicely done!
Wow!!! That was very cool. I felt like I was in the hood, a rare feeling for an old white southern woman. I enjoyed that. Thanks
This was an amazing piece, Dominic. I loved the way changed language as needed to shape the mood and moment of each section; your creative play with words created imagery and transported us into each moment.
Amazing writing. Rhythm and visuals are stunning. Your words transported me to a setting strange to me, and I felt led into the setting. Nicely done. Thanks a bunch.
I have been reading The Write Practice for months but have not had the courage to submit anything until now… but this idea came and I wrote it and I am just going to jump in… 🙂
The Garden
Her young hand held the wrinkled hand of her Grandma as they wandered down the path that led to their favorite spot in the garden. The smell of wisteria clung to the breeze as the new leaves of the trees swayed with gentleness.
Spring.
It had come.
With it came walks like this one to the bench they had claimed as their own in the small community park. The wooden path through the park was filled with others wandering around enjoying the delightful day. Yet it seems as if it were just the two of them. Grandma and granddaughter. They walked hands entwined, in silence, taking in the refreshing day after a long dreary winter.
They made it to their spot, the wooden bench weathered to a dull grey, surrounded by trees with pink flowers, it was the perfect mix of shade and dappled sunlight for their long afternoon of lunch and chatting.
As they sat surrounded by all that spring had to offer, she asked, “Grandma, what do you think beauty is?”
For long moments all that was heard were the birds chirping and the leaves moving in the breeze.
“I think you ask interesting questions, Granddaughter.”
“Beauty is seen, yes, but it is also felt in a touch, like when we hold hands and heard in unexpected laughter. It’s the fragrance right before a rain shower. It’s the taste of your favorite chocolate dessert. More-so, it’s what touches your heart. It’s what you can’t see, hear, taste, or smell but what your heart feels when it has been touched so deeply by a moment you can’t remember that moment ever not happening.”
“When was the first time beauty touched your heart, Grandma?”
“That would be the spring, just like this one, in 1943. I was preparing for a dance being held at the USO center. I just knew it was going to be the highlight of my week. My friend had invited me and I had gotten a new dress for the occasion. I still remember that dress. It was the deepest purple and the material was so soft I felt special when I wore it. We got to the dance fashionably late and giggled like girls do at the sight of handsome young men in uniforms and a late curfew.”
Smiling, she continued, “The music was meant for dancing, the crowd loud, and the mood decidedly lively. A young soldier, maybe a year or two older, asked for a dance. The music slowed and he lead me to the floor. We danced. His arm around my waist, our hands twined together, his voice in my ear as we swayed to the tune. There was a connection unlike anything I had every experienced.”
She paused and stared in front of her as if the scene was playing out right there in the park. “It wasn’t how he touched me as we dance, or how he sounded when he spoke, or how wonderful his cologne smelled, it was how he made my heart felt.
As we glided across that floor it was as if we were the only two there. The world had stopped and it was just us, this dance, our conversation. He had a great sense of humor yet when he talked of his family I could feel my heart breaking with his loneliness. He was preparing to go to war. To leave his home and all the he knew. We both knew this dance was more that just a simple friendly dance.
It was a magical night and we promised to write…..”
“I didn’t know that was when you met grandpa,” the granddaughter exclaimed.
She took her granddaughter’s hand, “Oh dear heart, that was not your grandpa. That was my first love. He died in the war. Just 6 months after that night.”
“You still find that moment beautiful?”
“Yes. For the heart does not discern the beauty from the tragedy. It remembers them separately. Tragedy does not have to mar the beauty if we don’t let it. Beauty lives forever in our hearts, in those moments.”
For long moments they both sat looking over the park lost in their thoughts. Then hand in hand they left their spot and walked quietly down the wooden path. Beauty surrounding them.
Beautiful word pictures. Nostalgic and lovely. You transported me to that garden where I recalled special walks with my own Grandma oh so many years ago. Nice work.
Thank you so much Diane. I think this was a combination of missing my Grandma and being thankful for the time we did have. 🙂
Congratulations on your first submission, Christy. Keep it up (although in my experience, it doesn’t get less intimidating)! I enjoyed reading your piece and especially the twist!
Thank you Nora…. I am not sure about that less intimidating… I will just have to try it! haha!
That’s a nice story. I’m glad you got up the courage to submit it.
Thank you R. E. 🙂
Good for you Christy! It’s a horrible feeling to have your stomach crawling out of your throat, I know. 🙂
Thank you Casey! It is nerve wracking to say the least but I am learning to just step out and do it. 🙂
Christy, well done on taking the plunge, well worth it, lovely story
Thank you so much Suzie! 🙂
Good story. Even better conquering your fear and hitting the “Post” button!
Thank you Barb. Yes…this fear thing is hard but I am working on it!
That was lovely. I like the how you emphasize the beauty of the moment. You write well, you should enter more often.
Thank you so very much Marianne. Y’all have been so encouraging and welcoming! I will definitely be trying to put myself out there and enter again 🙂
Your work reminded me of cherished times with my Grandma. Thank you for the comfort of those memories!
I am so glad it reminded you of your Grandma Holly-Marie. It reminded me of mine too and it was nice to remember similar times with her. Memories are a beautiful thing. 🙂
In Search of Spring:
If earth is supposed to be our mother why does she so often eat her young?
It was the spring of life when death walked through the door. The two were trapped and there was no going back. The golden day, tinkling with liquid joy, ended, a dark red gash across it’s breast. How could it have happened?
Young and new, the air smelling of yellow-green so fresh you could taste it, the world had been full of promise. Eternity had stretched out blissfully on the horizon. Into that golden day evil had crept, casting an icy, ominous shadow across everything in it’s path. As unwelcome as a thunderstorm on a wedding day the black cloud of grief blotted out the sun. Rebellion had driven peace from paradise, shattering unity, enforcing an exile.
Ever since that moment the sons and daughters of the first doomed couple have wandered in search of a garden, longing for the full bloom of spring’s dawn. All to no avail. Each whisper of perfection an echo of that moment when the dew of truth lay fresh across the world’s mossy skin. Each sigh, escaping for an instant, hangs hopefully on the wings of a spring twilight. It lingers in the rumor of another morning. The promise of rebirth.
The sigh endures for a moment and then dies. With the telling of each newborn’s death, each outbreak of war, each lonely widow, each forest fire, each deformed limb, each injured pet, blighted crop, burgled home, each broken trust and stolen innocence we move another step away from spring’s ancient beginning; winter’s icy clutches freeze the blood in our veins.
And yet the human heart leaps as forsythia unwraps her gilded heads, shaking loose her bonds and trumpeting spring’s arrival once again. Bluebirds make love with the sky and, flashing wings in a wild splash of hope against the clouds, set expectancy in the air. Wisteria droops her head demurely. Wooing us to believe against all reason that this will be the year spring makes it’s home among us for good. But as always the blush fades from the rose’s cheek and she lays down her head once again to sleep the enchanted slumber of broken promises.
The march of earth’s children searching for rebirth, traveling toward their lost home, remembering Eden, at times drowns out the gentle call of Love redeeming. Lean in close. Can you hear it? Anthem of lovers and believers, seekers and finders, calling out from heaven. The “it is finished” echoes in our dreams, a reverberation across eternity. The tide was turned on a Friday that was as good as it was brutal. Now each spring not only remembers a garden, pristine and pure, but is a promise of “all things made new.”
Opening my eyes to the world washed fresh by a spring rain, trees tossing their limbs and scattering emerald light, I imagine the splendor of this world restored to the glory of that first spring. My own rebirth begins spring-like in my heart, little fronds of love unfurl in a freedom to serve others. Joy bubbles up as the scars of this world lay, for a moment, hidden beneath the gaze of compassion.
Haunted still by my ancient mother’s banishment from her perfect garden home I shake off the stupor brought on by lazy warm days perfumed with dreaming. Spring is not here to stay. At least not yet. But Love, having visited this marred garden once, will come again, one day to stay. For now I wander, a sojourner, on my way to eternal spring.
Beck, what a great way to tell the story of Eloi, thank you
Thanks for your comment Suzie! I’m not sure what you mean by Eloi, if you’re referring to a different race of beings or artistically to man. I wrote my narrative, if you can call it that, in the context of Genesis 1-3 and Revelation 21 from the Bible. I believe this story affects all mankind and speaks of a longing we all have, whether we choose to embrace it in Jesus or not is another story.
Alleluia! A true Easter story.
That is beautiful! It gives me great hope. I don’t have as much faith as you but I will feel what hope I do have become a bit stronger when I look at spring from now on. Thanks Beck.
Marianne, your comments are better than winning the contest! If I may share with you a verse from 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! ” It isn’t only the world God wants to recreate it’s us as well. Isn’t that exciting! My favorite picture of this old world recreated, including mankind, is found in Revelations 21. From Genesis to Revelation God tells the story of his relationship with man past, present, and future. But you don’t have to take my word for it, dive in and let the very words of life stoke your hope!
Thanks Beck, I’ll check it out.
It was two years ago when our friends gathered together. Our friends rallied beside us that Easter weekend. It was the traditional egg-dying extravaganza held each year. But this time, we were in the midst of being new parents to our 8-month old. This should be time of pure joy. The flip side was nothing short of purgatory – waiting to be cast into the flames. My parents were suing us – my wife and I. I could go into all the details but suffice it to say generations of lies, of greed had finally reached a climactic stage and we – my wife and I – were the sheep being led to the slaughter. We never expected this – this utter betrayal of trust. Our family had turned on us and ripped our hearts from our chests. For the business, for the money they wanted us in court. They wanted us to pay for the generational untruths. They wanted us to give up everything.
On that day, I dyed eggs. My hands stained in reds, blues, greens. We cheered our son in his first experience of dying eggs; we all covered in dye laughed at the messiness of the occasion. I couldn’t help but dwell on our stained hands. It reminded me of the holy week. It reminded me of the situation with my parents. All streaked and stained. That Easter was an automatic routine, going through the motions. And my heart wept, if hearts could weep. I attended the Easter service the next day with my wife and my darling son. And tried to be resurrected and renewed and all those associations with Easter and its true meaning. My heart, my soul, my spirit were tired. I didn’t understand. I couldn’t understand my parents’ quick rise to lawsuits and defamation and brutal attacks. I could not resolve this with the reality of a God who is known as unconditional love. My parents hated us, abhorred us, and disowned us. Everything I had been taught and raised in was a giant lie.
Today, two years later, it’s Easter weekend once again. We survived the lawsuit. Barely. We lost our home, our business, our blood relatives. My mother and father have since tried to be around us, but how can I believe they will not do this to my two sons one day? The relationship died and that I don’t completely understand why or how it’s come to this. It’s better they are no longer in our lives, but it sounds wrong and yet it is better. It truly is. Now I have two young sons and I watch them grow and thrive and wonder how my own blood could turn me out. I could never imagine doing that to my own sons. My oldest is hanging tightly to my neck, sitting on my shoulders, the other son resting in the crook of my arm. My wife has her hand looped through my arm. This is how it should be. We are one. We meet with our friends. We meet with our family and dye eggs. Tomorrow we will lead all the children out to the greens across the street and hunt eggs. I never knew family like this – not by blood, but bonded in spirit instead. Out of the wreckage, out of the betrayal, out of the stained hands we do have new life, new family – an emergence of new life springing forth.
sounds horrible for you, at least you found love in all the betrayal
It wasn’t about me, but I’m glad that it sounded very personal. Thanks for the feedback!
Spring
It was really not warm enough to go outside barefooted, but Jean did it anyway. The boards of the porch were almost hot where the sun had shown on them all morning, but when she stepped off of the porch onto the patch of moss which grew between the hydrangeas on either side of the porch, she felt shivery. The moss and dirt were cool and damp, alive again after being frozen for months. She stepped across the moss to the lawn of soft new grass, bugleweed and dandelions. She thought about how she and her husband John were too old to work on the yard themselves. They needed to get someone to help them. She was deciding whether to call her nephew or find someone in the yellow pages, when she got to the end of the driveway where the ancient rickety mailbox stood.
She stepped to the front of the mailbox to pull it open and stepped on something. It stabbed her right in the arch of her foot, causing such sharp pain that she almost lost her balance. She held onto the mailbox for support. She looked at her foot which was bleeding on a dandelion, the dark red blood running on the bright yellow flower made a dramatic combination that she would have found beautiful if he foot hadn’t hurt like nobody’s business.
She saw what she’d stepped on. It was the letter S in black metal that had fallen from the mailbox.
Jean limped back to the house and found some peroxide and alcohol in the medicine cabinet. She washed and peroxided the wound which was fairly deep and continued to bleed. She bandaged it and then, as it was still bleeding, she went to the porch to pu her foot up.
It was several hours later when her husband came up from his lair in the basement and found her asleep on the porch. She was lying on the wicker sofa, on the new blue and white striped cushions, with her foot propped up on the arm. She could see spots where blood had some through on the bandage but it wasn’t soaked.
“Jeannie,” he said, but she didn’t stir until he shook her shoulder gently. Then she half opened her eyes and spoke.
“A spring”, she said. “I stepped on a piece of metal.”
“Where?” he said.
“By the mailbox,”
“You’re diabetic for God’s sake Jeannie. You’re not supposed to be walking barefoot, especially not outside.” “I wanted to feel spring again,” she said.
“Did you clean it good?”, she heard him ask.
“Yes,” she said.
He sat with her on the porch. They talked about calling their nephew for help with the yard. They both knew that he would come out of a sense of duty and would not want to take any payment, but that just made it harder to call him.
The cut didn’t heal despite her keeping it clean and using an anti-biotic ointment which had been recommended by her nephew’s wife. They made an appointment to see the doctor, but before the day for the appointment came Jean had started to sweat and feel nauseated. She sometimes couldn’t tell if she was awake or asleep and her foot hurt like a toothache.
She was watching the spring rain from the living room window and thinking about how fresh, how rejuvenated the world seemed after a rain. She went outside to enjoy the rain thinking about how they had jumped though puddles when they were children. She was trying to spin around in a puddle when John spotted her.
There she was thin and old and frail, turning in a circle in the rain and getting her sore foot wet and dirty in a puddle.
He brought her in and dried her off. He took the bandage off of her foot and cleaned it thoroughly. He brought a light blanket to cover her and gave her some chicken soup, then he called the rescue squad. The foot had more than alarmed him. It was huge, hot and red.
Jean was in the hospital for months. There was a crabapple tree just outside of the window in her room but before she was strong enough for them to wheel her up to it, the crabappleblossoms had fallen and the iris was blooming. She remembered when, as a child, she thought the yellow beard that rans down the center of an iris petal was a caterpillar. She felt her father’s arm around her as he explained about the parts of an iris flower. He had told her that her great-grandmother had loved iris.
She thought about her great-grandmother a tiny woman with long white hair who had died when Jean was five. Jean had always wanted to pat her great-grandmother’s long white hair which looked to her child-self like the mane of a wild horse. She thought about how ancient her grandmother had seemed then. Now she herself was almost that ancient. It goes quickly she thought, and the years don’t seem to be in a line after you’ve lived them. They seem to swirl around and to step back and forward, shuffling around slightly so that you aren’t sure what came first in some cases. Was her nephew born before her grandmother died? She couldn’t remember. But in the end a hundred years, a thousand years do pass and someone else is left to look at iris or at wild horses in the early summer. Maybe there aren’t even iris anymore or horses in the future, and the people are looking at other beautiful living things.
She recovered and she came home.
“You have to promise to wear your shoes,” he told her.
“I want a bench to put out in the yard so I can sit there. I won’t walk barefooted but I want to just kick my shoes off and feel the grass when the yard wakes up in the spring,” she said.
And that’s what happened. They bought a wooden bench for the yard and they sat there together the next spring and watched the spring.
I’m glad she got better! I enjoyed the way you wrapped memories and her experiences together in the common bond of spring. I also appreciated the conversation of age and youth and time in the context of spring.
Thank you Beck.
It goes quickly she thought, and the years don’t seem to be in a line after you’ve lived them. They seem to swirl around and to step back and forward, shuffling around slightly so that you aren’t sure what came first in some cases. Was her nephew born before her grandmother died? She couldn’t remember. But in the end a hundred years, a thousand years do pass and someone else is left to look at iris or at wild horses in the early summer .. These lines are so beautiful. This for me is the turning point of the story, when I know she’s going to make it.
Thank you! Once one of my sisters was arguing with me about whether my grandmother had died before or after my nephew (not her child, but another sisters child) was born and I couldn’t remember when either event happened exactly but remembered seeing my grandmother holding him and smiling at him when she was very ill and frail. That’s what made me start thinking about that and maybe it’s just me but it’s really hard to remember things in order.
Wow, Marianne. Such a profound description of the passage of time. This will stick with me.
Thank Step!
You really captured the tension between what some elders want to do because they consider it living and what people who love them think is best for them in order to keep living. It’s universal, I think, but I’ve never seen it illustrated so simply and profoundly before.
Yes, I hope they don’t care for me to well when I get older.
I’ll be honest, I kept waiting for her to die. I like your ending better, Marianne.
Katie
It seemed like she would die, but I wanted her to have some more springs to feel the ground.
I liked the sentence ” But in the end a hundred years, a thousand years do pass and someone else is left to look at iris or at wild horses in the early summer.” Jeannie isn’t just looking back, like a stereotypical “old person” but wondering about the future – not just her future.
Thanks Barb.
Marianne, what a poignant tale you’ve woven around the word “spring.” Although I must admit, I wasn’t expecting such a sweet ending. I liked the positive memories that came out in Jean’s mind and the desire to look more forward than backward.
Thanks Sherry.
What says Spring better than a fresh growth of grass and cool, moist moss? Your story is filled with the words I think of when I think of Spring.
Thanks Angelo, I love spring, always have
My name is called, and the guys smack me one last time for good luck. The luck is already mine. Today when I cross through these cold, cement halls it will be for the final time. Today concludes my time served. The judge declared it months ago but today it comes to fruition: I am free. My past has been erased; I am given the opportunity to begin anew. I am given the spring of life these guys wish they had. I’ve always loved spring. I love the melting of the snow and the warming of the weather. I love the hard rains washing away the suffocating pollen and the first thunderstorm of the season. I love working in the yard, feeling the grime beneath my fingernails. Today I will be given that opportunity. It’s a gift I never deserved. Not with my past.
The smack of my flimsy shoes hitting the tile floor echoes as I’m led down the familiar hallways for the final time. For what seems like an eternity of years these bars have been my home, these men my family. Every day we’ve been prodded like cattle to eat in a room where the benches are bolted to the floor to prevent us from killing one another with them. Three years ago Chike used a tray for that same purpose, and now we don’t have trays no more. They don’t have trays anymore. I am no longer one of them. Today I am me, I get to discover what that means all over again.
Buck commands that I enter a side room. No cavity search, no interrogation. Instead I exchange my orange jumpsuit for a new wardrobe and real boots. They are not mine. Mine were confiscated by police as evidence since they were dripping with blood. These clothes barely fit but they will do. They will be the clothes in which I get to hug my wife. They will be the clothes in which I get to hug three of my four children. If they will have me. I have been but a stranger in their lives. Last year I got word that Cody, he’s my oldest, graduated high school. Loretta even sent a photo. I have never been so proud in my whole life!
Once I’m changed Buck leads me outside and towards the front gate where I hope my family is waiting. I don’t have time to be concerned about that. I am too busy inhaling the deep, fresh air, smelling the freshly-cut grass, and feeling the bright sun on my face. It is strange to feel gravel under my socks and shoes. I notice the new bud on the trees. There are no trees in the prison yard. They’re afraid we’d try to climb them to escape and rightfully so.
We turn the corner and there they are. Loretta has come, Kylie in toe. The other two are missing. My heart is once again ripped to shreds again remembering that I have four children but only one of them will claim me. Who knows if she will even claim me by choice of if she was too young to make the decision on her own.
I hold Loretta to my chest, breathing in her familiar yet foreign scent. It’s been too long. For years our communication has been separated by a glass window. Today I get to wipe her tears with my own fingers. Today I get to embrace her and for the first time we are able to mourn, as part of a family, the death of our little one. The death that separated us for so many years. The death that was wrongly blamed on me.
Today is my chance to begin anew. The first thing I will do is drive myself to the florist and buy, with my own money, Easter lilies for my Lily, and put flowers on the grave of a child I love dearly, a child whose life I wish I could have saved, a child for whose death I served time despite innocence. Today I am given a second chance. The opportunity to bloom and live as she would have: vivaciously and freely. Today begins a new bud on my life-tree, and I am beyond grateful.
This is good. I really enjoy your writing Katie. A suggestion … the new beginning would have been so much MORE new if he’d actually killed Lily… because his old self was mean and horrible.
I thought about that but couldn’t figure out how to spring a murderer from jail. If you’ve got a suggestion, I’m open to revising. 😉
manslaughter has a lighter sentence… maybe he drove into her when he was drunk coming home up the driveway … like the guy in “Eat pray Love.”
This is so bitter-sweet. I felt happy for him until the children didn’t all show up. I like this as a short piece but it could easily be the beginning of a novel, because it seems like there will be a lot for him to deal with on “the outside”. I like the clarity of your writing. I don’t have to guess what’s happening or what means what. Are you working on a novel?
Thanks, Marianne. Yes, I am working on a novel. I feel like you do: I like it as a short piece but it could develop into something more. We’ll have to see what happens.
Katie
Title: The Beauty of Oblivion
I have this problem. Well, to be honest, I don’t so much see it as a problem. However, a few other people have brought to my attention that I can be rather-often stuck in my own head and seemingly unobservant. Fortunately, I recently discovered an upside of this characteristic that some others describe as a “problem.” I often find myself surprised by things that other highly observant people saw coming from miles away. Sure, these aren’t always pleasant surprises but truthfully, I’d rather not trade even the unpleasant ones if it meant losing the others.
Occasionally I find myself lost in time, being caught up in the here and now. In those instances it’s almost as if the world, in whatever form I find it at the moment, has just always been that way. I begin to frame the whole world and especially my thoughts around the scene in which I currently find myself. As an example: if it’s raining, dark, cloudy, or whatever – the thoughts that come to me incorporate those elements as the way the world exists. When I wake up the next morning, or walk outside later when it has stopped raining, the clouds have parted and the sun is shining brightly, I am often amazed – as if I forgot those kinds of things happen in the world. The funniest reoccurring example is the fact that most mornings I wake up to an alarm clock completely alarmed that the world I was just a part of wasn’t real and that I still do exist on this earth. People seem to find this quite hysterical.
So, you can imagine if those brief events disorient my universe so completely, the seasons really throw me for a loop. I remember a time just a few years ago; it must have been March. I had spent the weekend about an hour and a half away from home and had to rise early to make the commute back for work. From what I mentioned before you can imagine the compounding factors of once again finding myself still in existence on this earth at about 6:00am. Devastating! I made it out with a cup of coffee in my hand and started the familiar trip back. I can still see the whole scene so clearly now, whether it was the coffee kicking in or just one of those suddenly alarming moments I occasionally find myself in. I suddenly realized the road I was cruising along had seemingly burst out from scraggily twists of brown into all sorts of wonderful shades of green! It felt like a conspiracy: last night while I once again temporarily exited the world and a few hours later mysteriously found myself transported back, the whole place had sprung back into life! Almost instantaneously I was reminded of a song one of my friends wrote years ago. The song builds on a beautifully woven analogy of leaves acting as a covering up of the less attractive parts of the trees.
The refrain states invitingly:
“Come now winter winds,
I want to see,
Evidence of what remains,
Permanently”
I remember in that moment of excitement singing out the rebuttal song.
It went:
“Come now spring,
I’ve seen what lies beneath,
Cover it all up again!”
The beauty of it all wonderfully overwhelmed me. The sudden spring of it all invigorated me. I remembered once again that the world has another expression, one that exists in a warmer, livelier version; one with exactly the same elements yet radically transformed.
I so covet these experiences and look longingly to the next unexpected surprise. I might just hang on to this unobservant “problem” for a while!
Jeremiah, I like the unreliable narrator unable to take responsibility for his/her problem and the confusion about reality.
Katie
I really like the song and I like the idea of this whole thing. It’s so positive in that the narrator is glad to see the different aspects of the world as breath taking and interesting rather then frightening. I wish I were more like him.
Otto tore open the envelope and started scanning the first paragraph:
“Thank you for your submission. We received many wonderful entries…”
He stopped there. It was obviously a rejection. Acceptance letters get right to the point; they start out with a hearty “Congratulations!” or something.
Rejection letters beat around the bush: “All three hundred million billion of you who entered were fantastic, you’re all winners, if we had our way we’d choose everyone to win, but it’s out of our hands, we swear, honest, and that’s why it’s the hardest thing we’ve ever had to do to say: You juuuuust missed it. You were THIS close. Seriously.”
He glanced over the letter again, and saw the kiss of death word:
“Unfortunately”.
Now it was one hundred percent official. No one ever sends a letter that says “unfortunately…for everyone else, YOU WON!”
Otto was profoundly disappointed. Usually, he was used to it; he entered contests all the time and never won. He knew that’s the way it worked. He knew winning was the exception, not the rule. He didn’t take it personally, and if he was being completely honest, he knew some of the things he’d entered over the years weren’t his best work anyway and didn’t even deserve to win.
But this was different. He really thought he had something special this time. The minute he’d read the prospectus, the idea came to him. It was just one of those moments of inspiration where he just knew he was on to something. It was like the contest was made for him. When it came to this contest, he totally felt like Beyonce, Kelly Rowland, and Michelle Williams: he was Destiny’s Child.
So when it turned out that a win was not, in fact, his destiny, Otto sulked. He didn’t get over it the way he usually did his other rejections, by looking for other contests to enter. He decided to stew over this one for a while. At least until the winner was announced. Then he’d have some closure; then he’d find out whose entry was so much better than his. He’d also find out if his entry was one of the honorable mentions, because that was something, at least.
A week later, the second letter—the one that was promised in the first letter, the one announcing the winner and honorable mentions—arrived. Otto tore that one open, too, and carefully read every word.
He was LIVID.
Not only had he been denied even a paltry honorable mention, but the winner of the contest?
“Spring”.
I KNOW!
Seriously? “Spring”?! “SPRING?!”
Otto actually shouted, “Are you freaking KIDDING me?!?”
I mean, why did they even sponsor a contest? Obviously NOT—contrary to what the call for entries explicitly stated—“To find the best, most creative name for the season that comes after the cold time of year, when it gets warmer but before the season when it gets really hot”, THAT was for sure.
Otto should have seen this coming. After all, the Season Council did choose “Fall” as the winner of their previous contest, the one to name the season that comes after the season when it gets really hot. But even then, they had the good sense to name “Autumn”—clearly the better, more evocative choice—co-winner.
But this time? “Spring”. And no half-decent co-winner to make up for that lame-o choice.
Unbelievable.
Otto angrily crumpled up the letter and flung it across the room.
Storming out the front door to take a walk around the block, get some fresh air, and calm down, Otto decided he didn’t care. He didn’t care what the Season Council thought was the best name: As far as he was concerned, the season that comes after the cold time of year would always be Bloomapalooza to him.
Happy Bloomapalooza! This was fun!
That. Was. Awesome. I hope you win!
Nice! Bloomapalooza’s a better name than Spring any day!
That was funny, I wonder what honorable mention went to?
That was great.
I’m too lazy to individually reply to all y’all, so I’m posting a separate comment to say thanks for the kind words! I really appreciate it.
Bloomapalooza – love it! Worth the extra keystrokes and the spellcheck nag.
Awesome use of the prompt “spring!” I love Bloomapalooza. 🙂
Bloomapalooza…I like it.
I’ll be honest, I didn’t care for the story much when I began reading it, but I’m glad I didn’t stop. Happy Bloomapalooza, Brian. Well done.
Katie
Spring Theme
It’s Spring! Why Don’t I Feel It?
Mild, idyllic and sunny – it’s a beautiful spring day in the Pacific Northwest. I am
grateful for the visit from the prodigal Sun and my favorite messengers of spring: cherry blossoms wafting in the warm updrafts, cheery daffodils nodding at me, my birthday, rotund robins and ambrosial Reese’s Peanut Butter eggs. These things nurture my spirit and remind me that kinder weather and the time of renewal is here. So why am I constrained with bouts of anxiety and melancholy? I thought it was just the tail end of my Seasonal Affective Disorder. But it’s more than that. I don’t trust what the season represents.
Spring hasn’t always looked like hope and beauty for me. Sometimes it’s represented disappointment and unwanted reality. There have been little things like when I busted my tail to find the best prizes at the community egg hunt, but some undeserving punk kid got there before me. Or when I accidentally captured a photo of my husband (now my ex) doing a crotch package re-adjust while standing in between my picture-perfect cherubs innocently holding up their baskets. I had to completely cut him out of the picture to make it work in the scrapbook. Funny how I ended up literally cutting him out of my life. My divorce was final in April of 2005. Another life changing episode for me was at the end of March in 1989.
That was when my Dad succumbed to lung cancer just after began re-building our relationship due to his extended alcohol-induced hiatus. I was 23 and hadn’t known him as a consistent, stabilizing influence in my life for over 10 years. (2nd pic below.)
As a fringe benefit, he died 3 months before my wedding. I felt cheated. It was like the Universe wanted to remind me that it could enforce it prerogative to take away anything I desired. This is dangerous thinking because it hurts me. But the thoughts are compulsive and I’m stagnant.
It bothers me to feel this way when the season is about renewal. But, my feelings are tenacious and they say that if I haven’t attained certain goals I’m stuck – like finding my life partner. My therapist says I don’t recognize my progress.
I used to give myself away to unavailable (that means commitment-phobic) men. Now I give myself away to available men. That’s progress. The third pic below shows a time in my life when progress didn’t matter as much to me. It was more about how I felt.
I got the red Hippity Hop for Christmas and it was one of the best presents of my life. I rode that thing probably every damn day. I loved how energized I felt – free, balanced and weightless. My thoughts were how unstoppable I was and that I was going somewhere. I believed I could. Even the sound it made as I hopped was satisfying. Compressed air has such a soft clanging resonance. The combination of that plus the rubber scrapping (read: scrape + slapping) on the pavement was a dulcet tone to my ears. I didn’t even notice when I was tired. I was in the moment. God, if only I could make that feeling last consistently.
Creating my own consistency and stability is tough work. Sometimes I want to hibernate. The inward exhaustion creates fantasies about my only responsibility being to periodically look out from under the covers, weakly utter, “Meh” and go blessedly go back under. I’m jealous that spring happens without strain.
Spring happens without strain, but that’s nature. I’m jealous. I guess it’s just one of those times when I’m out of sync with all-that-is. The fourth picture shows a time when I wasn’t.
It’s the spring of 1967. I’m not sure of the reason for my grin, probably just happy to be alive and having my picture taken. I was only two after all.
Here’s another (fifth pic)…..
This is the spring of 1976. Interesting how the last two numbers in the year are the same. Maybe it’s a numerology thing. Anyway, I was excited because it was a dress-up-like-your-ancestors-day at school. My Mom sewed my costume. You can’t see it in the photo, but she had created complicated embroidery patterns on the vest. They were of teepees and other Native American symbols. Mom was white. Her effort to create something that was meaningful to me – although foreign to her – made me feel loved and special.
Awkward and foreign as it feels right now, I guess I just have to keep exerting the effort to show up for my life. It’s like going to a party where you don’t know anyone. But you know if you go, you’ll congratulate yourself afterward for rising to the occasion. Spring will ensue in my spirit eventually.
A Northern Spring
If we lived in a sonnet of spring,
You would race to me across a meadow new.
And a bouquet of wildflowers you would bring
Their petals sparkling with morning dew.
You would lift me toward the sun
And spin until we collapsed in an embrace.
Sonnets are not fit to describe the fun
We would have beneath my petticoats of lace.
Dragonflies dart, butterflies soar
As symphony of songbirds would sing to our coda.
Wouldn’t that be such a bore
Compared to springtime in Minnesota
Here, our springtime delights are fewer,
Like the rat you just pulled with your bare hands from our sewer.
Margot stabbed a hole in the paper when she punctuated the final line of her poem with a period. This was it: the end. She stapled the poem to the job descriptions she had printed off and tossed the stack onto Andy’s pillow.
#
When he finally came to bed, she pretended to be asleep.
“Technical writer wanted for fast-paced environmental consulting firm based in Fargo, North Dakota,” he read to quilt over her back. “You’ve done that job before, remember? You hated it. You hated it so much, in fact,” he pulled the corner of the quilt down and nuzzled the back of her neck, “that you took up with a lowly logger. A good-looking one, mind you.” He nibbled at her earlobe. She jabbed him with her elbow.
He replumped his pillows against the headboard, sat up, and read on. “Hmm, high school English teacher needed in Omaha. Omaha: where interstates intersect. No trees for me to chop down there. Guess I’ll just sit around and collect unemployment while you pull in the big bucks? First year teacher…heck, we might be able to rent an apartment. The kids will love it.”
She wrapped herself tighter and wriggled to the edge of the bed. She didn’t want to care that the children had their lives here in this desolate place. Hockey, fishing, bonfires with cousins. Andy was right. Not only were the kids happy, they were thriving. Yet she had arrived at her precipice, all she had to do was jump. They would adjust. After all, kids are malleable.
“Or did you plan to go without us?”
He had spoken the horrible words from her heart, and their heaviness smothered her breath until she could only choke and sob. He slid into their familiar spoon and put an arm around her. “You know I don’t want that. You know you don’t want that.” He stroked her bangs away from her wet cheeks. “Summer is almost here. Canoeing. Blueberry picking. Horseback rides. You love summer. Hang on for us, honey.”
He tried to join her beneath the quilt she had cocooned herself in, but when he pulled at the tight tuck beneath her hip, it was just enough to flip her over the edge and onto the braided rug below. It was enough to knock the next breath out of her, and when she caught the air again, it was all pine from the bed frame he had made them and wax from the old tamarack floors of the farmhouse and skunk wafting through the window Andy cracked because it got so hot now that it was twenty-five above zero rather than twenty-five below zero at night.
“Electrician. Did you see the ad for an electrician?” she asked.
Andy propped himself up on an elbow. The lamplight behind him framed his face like a halo. He was an angel. A brawny, hairy, freckle-skinned angel, who shook the bed laughing at her hanging from the quilt off the side of the bed. “You must be desperate.”
“I am,” she said.
“Then come here.” He lifted her back into bed and switched off the light.
#
The next night she wrote in bed using her old hard-backed dictionary from college for a lap desk. Andy, fresh from the shower, examined sections of his scalp in the mirror above their bureau. He plucked a wood tick from above his ear, flicked it out the window, and returned to his work of looking for more.
“How many today?” he asked her.
She tapped her pencil against the fingers of her other hand as she counted. “Two fell out of Jack’s pants when I took his boots off. Sadie felt one climbing up her back when she was doing her math homework and I found another latched onto Ella’s neck when I was shampooing her hair. I guess that makes four.”
“Need me to check you over?” He winked at her in the mirror.
“Weak,” she said in response to his innuendo, “very weak. No, but I do need you to read this.” She got out of bed, handed him her latest poem, and walked out the door.
#
Inside the ring of boulders that encircled the area they used to build bonfires, Margot started a small campfire and waited, warming her hands above the flames. The moonlight brought his shadow to her, and he followed, slipping between the rocks and wrapping his arms around her.
“I take it you’re a keeper after all?” he said.
She snuggled against him. “I couldn’t give all this up.” From the barn across the darkness, her daughter’s pony, Jelly Belly, whinnied, hopeful for a midnight snack.
“Sadie will bring your hay out first thing in the morning,” she called back. “I’ll make sure of it.” And with that, she pulled Andy down onto the bed of empty feed sacks she had prepared next to the fire. It was springtime in Minnesota, after all.
#
Jelly Belly In the Morning
Purple light blooms above the horizon to match the blush of apple blossoms in the orchard,
But my sun has not yet risen.
A white-throated sparrow sings a sweet-Canada morning from a fencepost,
But my sun has not yet risen.
Lights flip on across the back of the house – bedroom, bathroom, kitchen –
But my sun has not yet risen.
Sadie tromps to the barn and I smell the sweet break of a bale of hay.
Now my sun has risen.
I thought you had really lost it when I read the first poem, until I got to the end. I love this whole idea of the poems bracketing the story and the difference between the two poems showing her ambivalence. I went from wishing I could be there in the wilderness to thinking I would never live like that in the matter of a few paragraphs (the ticks did it for me although we have them here), so I can sympathize with her. I think the best thing about this is how alive the two main characters are. Thanks!
LOL!! Thanks for reading, Marianne. Good to know that I haven’t “really lost it”….yet….
Memory of a Firefly
If he could manage one more rock of the exacting shape he decided upon after the painstaking process of random selection the collection would be complete and he could move on to his next task. Like clockwork he toiled incessantly at the activities of building mountains, harvesting plant specimens, and excavating the occasional lost treasure from underneath the hidden pyramid that was the oak in the yard.
“All done, Tyler? It’s almost dinner time sweetheart” crowed the soft, rooster-like voice as it always did this time of day. About six o’clock, with the sun slowly declining. But again, like a clock, Tyler toiled and with no response to the rooster – hoping the crowing would grow tiresome. His large, round glasses ebbed and flowed as he aggressively dug for the absentee stalagmite. He grew excited though you couldn’t see it on his face; he always wore a tentative blankness about him that made it surprising he was only ten years old. With a thump of plastic he reached what could be the Holy Grail and he its sole protector: he raised it high to the sky to admire it after piercing his hands through the dirt and earthworms.
Another round rock.
If he wasn’t so diligent, so painstaking, and yet so innocently naïve he may start to perceive that something, or someone, was working against him: challenging his resolve albeit fruitless. He would press on, and for good reason too – it was one of the few things that made him want to smile in two summers. Night falling was unexpected for him, he’d spent all day wishing it wouldn’t come; wishing all year that this day would not turn to night but skip a few beats and land him in the soft bosom of another winter.
Winter was over.
“Tyler, I won’t say it again. Dinner!”
He didn’t budge. Instead, he pounded his plastic shovel at the ground vehemently but without cause or seeking an effect. The rooster’s mate came valiantly to the aid of the rooster who seemed lost to Tyler’s cloistered state, but simply repeated the crowing with a different inflection.
“Tyler. Buddy? We have to go eat now, OK? I promise you can come out and play with the rocks later bud, let’s get inside.”
Apparently mates of roosters were forgetful, because this one wandered too close. Far too close without noticing Tyler had stopped digging and started noticing the clamorous inundation of tiny lights no longer hidden beneath the freeing light of the sun. The clock was ticking, and the rooster mate had already run out of time far before the buzzer was to sound. With a simple touch of the mate’s feather, suspiciously resembling a human hand, on Tyler’s shoulder all hell broke loose.
Tyler whipped around, lashing and violently striking the air and the ground and the hidden pyramid oak before drawing his own blood – things were about to get much worse.
“Oh my god, Frank! Stop him, he’s going to hurt himself!”
Frank: what a silly name for a rooster mate. So silly, in effect, it sent Tyler dashing like a bat out of hell down the suburbian side walk screaming bloody murder. Frank ran after him but rooster mate legs were slower and less excitable in their older age than the fresh legs of fear Tyler wore. Tyler ran and ran and ran until running become redundant, as it does, and he had to renew his plight by looking for his pursuer. He saw no rooster mate and no tiny night lights so the redundancy could not continue – until he faced forward.
A night light.
Right in front of his face, barreling down on him like a tiny, annoying barrel. Tyler began to swing and cry and scream, awkwardly falling to the ground and shuddering all while still managing to not look away from his assailant. The pernicious flying light bulb fluttered and floated back and forth, keeping its obnoxious light flickering as to disguise its true intentions. Tyler was far beyond a normal episode and began reaching a critical mass, convulsing and twitching in a manner that could certainly be called a seizure. The symptoms worsened, and the bulb persisted until it hit a snag, or rather –
“Gotcha!” A cute smile and a go-getter attitude, along with agile reflexes, appeared
before Tyler. All guts and certainly all glory, this figure clearly had one mission in mind as the night fell – firefly hunter. Tyler sniffled and rubbed and finally came to as the firefly had been captured.
The rooster mate was nothing without the rooster: it returned to its nest to seek rooster council.
“Where is he?” the rooster bellowed, all caw and with a little doodle in between.
“He… Just give me…”. The rooster mate had to catch its breath: it’s tough work running with legs that thin. Finally he collected himself.
“He took off. Down toward the Masons, just call them.” The rooster wasn’t pleased. It gave a serious stare and broke for the door, gathering a jacket and violently searching for a flashlight.
“Frank, this is serious. You don’t think he remembers it was today?”
Tyler found his feet but not his courage. He stood unmoving as the heroic firefly hunter held his terror in her hands.
“Wanna see?” she offered, buck tooth shining in the moonlight. Tyler’s heart started to race and the panicking was a few seconds from a second performance a la rock band encore. But, the hunter was cunning. She darted away with hand clasped into her dark, cavernous lair numbered 24-25 on Crescent Street and emerged with the answer.
“Here, hold this!” She shoved a jar into Tyler’s hands, holding the menacing fly in one hand and a jar lid in the other. She shoved her hand deep into the jar and balanced her other hand close behind – this was a precision job you see – while looking Tyler in the eye.
“Presto!”
Then Tyler changed.
The cunning, buck-toothed, courageous firefly hunter – also referred to in the neighborhood as Connie Mason – trapped Tyler’s nightmare in the glass jar. He starred as it traced the jar but never could get free. The rooster couple – maybe, in some circles, referred to as Tyler’s parents Joesph and Matty Swanson – cautiously approached Tyler who held the jar of his nightmares. They filled with rage looking at Connie who clearly gave Tyler the jar, and desperately searched for how to keep him calm should he lose control.
Two summers ago, on this very night, Tyler loved fireflies. He chased and caught and reveled in their magic. This was all true, until a firefly flew for its life with Tyler in hot pursuit, nearly dodging a speeding mini caravan.
Tyler looked up at Connie, then at his parents and again at the jar. He twitched and curled and cried for joy – this was one less nightmare he was stuck with in his short life time.
Joe, I’d posted an entry last evening and I don’t see it here. Don’t know what happened.
I don’t see it either. Go ahead and submit it again. I trust you.
THANKS!! You’re a peach. Just got home from work so I just posted.
Yes, we agree! Joe is a peach!
No link to the Spring stories?
Hi Ian. They’re all here in the comments section.
Just realized pics posted in backwards order. 🙁 Didn’t look like that as I was editing.
This is kind of an illustrated memoir of spring. It’s nice to have the pictures illustrating the remembrances. It looks like anyone’s childhood from that time but your words make give it individuality
Thank you for reading it Marianne. This is the first time I’ve posted here and it was a gamble to see if the pics would work. I really wanted to try it as I respond best to a combination of pictures and words. Guess I’ve never gotten too old for picture books!
Spring came early, that year. It wasn’t the day indicated on the calendar – March 20. That year, spring came on February 14. That was the day she received her first romantic valentine. That was the day the icy loneliness that had encased her heart for so many year began to melt.
It had been an interminably long winter. The older she got the harder winters became, chilling her through and through. First her body iced over, then her heart, until finally the marrow of her soul was hardening. The tiny flicker of who she was, was frozen inside. The ice that encased her was painfully clear so she was able to see out. The view of all her friends enjoying spring and entering summer to weddings and motherhood played out before her. She was a spectator, never a participant in their seasonal fun.
But that small flicker had survived the bitter, Arctic cold and been fanned to a resurgent flame by small acts of warm fondness from a gentleman caller. A card, flowers, his taking her hand.
Like a bear emerging from hibernation, she lumbered out of the cave in which she’d been trapped all winter. As she came out of the dark hole, her senses were overwhelmed with the sights and sounds that met her. It all felt strange to her. It was unfamiliar, experienced only in her imagination. Blinded by the sunlight, she fought to keep her emotional balance. She didn’t want to fall and get hurt.
“Play it safe”, she thought. “Guard your heart”, she was advised. On their first date, she caught herself starting to look “googly-eyed” and shook it off, not wanting to appear stupid or too girlish.
But like that bear that hadn’t eaten all winter, she savored the nourishment of his affection. He told her she was pretty. He complimented her writing. He said she was articulate. She reaped in his praises like sweet berries from bushes, their sugars energizing her heart.
Spring was the Friday of the seasons; a reward for having endured the isolation of Monday through Thursday. It was filled with the expectation of rest and fun that would be had during the perpetual weekend of summer. Spring was like Christmas and New Years rolled I to one holiday; a gift of renewal. It was a chance to start over and to unload the heavy, scratchy woolens that had weighed her down.
But Spring is not without it’s inclement times and this was no exception. Before March 20th appeared on the calendar, the relationship had ended. And surprisingly, it ended by her choice. Mr. Gentleman Caller, kind man that he was, was seed on that had fallen on the path and was trampled over. She was looking for that seed that fell on fertile ground.
That spring was wet one, flooded with showers of tears. There were a number of cloudy days, as well. Some days were quite cool, but the frost did not return. That small spark that had survived the years of cold had been kindled by kindness and a steady flame of faith burned. That small flame was enough to keep the ice from returning until eternal summer came around. The same One who had breathed the breath of life in to her, was the same one who had blown on that flicker of ash with love and ignited her soul again. He would continue to tend her flames until eternal summer appeared. This made the colder days of spring more tolerable as they were warmed with hope.
I like the extended analogy here. I wish you had taken it further and said that the bear did not go back into hibernation that autumn, although when you exchanged the bear analogy for the seed falling into different kinds of earth analogy I guess you winded up with the same result. Well, anyway, I enjoyed this and think you write well.
Thank you for your encouragement. Sometimes I extend analogies too far and tangle myself and my reader up in them!
Linnie must have wanted change as much as Mike did for her to react that way. The way the story ended worked well with the prompt. The end of one relationship, now cold and emotionless, and a renewal of freedom for Linnie to find a warm friendship with someone else.
With her Saturday mornings now free, maybe Linnie can clean up that mess under her bed.