Day Six: A Character-Building Experience Today’s Prompt; Who’s the most interesting person or people you’ve met this year?
Do you prefer an open book or a mystery?
The most interesting person I have met this year is only what I have made her up to be. She prefers to play hide and seek, not only with who she is but with her words. If you read them over and over again, like any good book or movie, you can gather up pebbles she has dropped along the way.
The life she describes behind the screen as a wife, teacher, and friend looks nothing like the words she writes of a life of love she walked away from many miles down the road, and now is nothing but a hologram over her shoulder. She projects words out to her audience like an eagle gliding on an invisible air current.
My eyes fill with water enough to blur my vision, my throat tightens, and my heart goes out to her every time I read her words. I’m left wondering where she’s hiding, who she is, and how or if I should throw her a life jacket to help her out of the deep rough water she seems to be in.
I’m typically drawn to people with wounds.It’s my nature to pick them up and cradle them in my arms, swaying back and forth or side to side. I wish I could crawl inside the screen to figure out a way to help her go back to the era of which she speaks. However, I don’t want to forfeit the fantasy I have created so, for now, I will take the quilt my grandma stitched depicting the milestones of my life and lay it down where everything is green. A small emerald creek bubbles over the mossy rocks as the animals relish the cooling water. Green saplings delicately line each side of the creek, forming a canopy from the beaming sun. I find a tree to lean against and quietly read her poetry worthy of rustic frame thickly lined with white leaves and the backdrop of the place I described to you.
Today’s Prompt: You stumble upon a random letter on the path. You read it. It affects you deeply, and you wish it could be returned to the person to which it’s addressed Write a story about this encounter.
I left the bar earlier than everyone else that night. My car was in the parking lot across the brick road. The air was muggy making it hard to breath. I swiftly looked both ways mainly using my Peripheral vision, there were a few street lights but no soul in sight, My keys were in my hand as I galloped across the road I worked on finding my door key so when I got to my car I could hurry up and get in. I walked up to my door and unlocked it. I climb inside, put the key into the ignition, look up to see a letter on my windshield. I wrestled with my thoughts before grabbing the letter off my window.
Hey Which,
I saw you hit my car. I took down your plates!
Reread
phew wee, this isn’t my letter. I crinkle it up and give it a toss!
Today’s Prompt: Write about a loss: something (or someone) that was part of your life and isn’t anymore. Today’s twist: Make today’s post the first in a three-post series.
If you had the power to change one thing about this world what would it be and why? Please feel free to leave your answer in the comments.
In my last post we talked about songs that had important meaning in my life. In which I told you Phil Collins, In The Air tonight: reminded me of my friend Nikki and her mom. She was the first friend in elementary school I ever had. She is my lost someone who isn’t anymore.
“God has a habit of picking up nobodies and making them sombodies.”
The school we both attended at the time was predominately all white. She was the color of a Snickers Bar and I was a bit lighter like the background of a Cheerios box. We both had coarse curly hair, only with hers you could see her curls, since her mom knew how to manage it. My hair was just a thick, short, frizz ball of fuzz that stood straight up.
My friend and I would have sleep overs. We would always play with each others hair especially when our hair was wet. We would have competitions about who’s hair was longest. She would always win. This did not bother me. I was just glad to have a friend who was like me. She didnt stare at me, she didn’t ask me questions about my dad, Why he had red hair and was white and I was dark with hair that didn’t necessarily add up! She loved me the way people should love regardless of color, gender. size, age and anything else that will fit into this category. She was the only black girl this “black girl” had and I’m not black, but it was the way kids and adults seen us, from the “outside.”
I lost understanding and equality when she vanished from my life.
I never knew what she meant to me until the day before yesterday. My thoughts have come back to her all my life. Recently my dad sent me a message it was a link to her dad’s obituary, When we were asked to write about the songs that had significant meaning “In The Air Tonight” was the first song that came to the shore, now here I am writing this post about loss and yet she shows up again…
This is why I been writing. To get down to the nitty-gritty of all the things that have been laying dormant in my life for years. I won’t lie somethings have lingered especially the bullies but I’m pressing forward in hopes to forgive those who know not what they do. I have been held hostage long enough and I,m to old to be looking over my shoulder wondering why these kids treated me the way they did.
Steve and I have been looking for houses. This has been an ongoing battle in more ways than one. The more time it takes, I realize “What I am looking for is not out there its inside me” Helen Keller
Prompt: Write about three most important songs in your life- what do they mean to you? Today’s twist you’ll commit to writing practice. This is all free writing emty your mind onto the page. Don’t censor yourself; Let the emotions or memories connected to your three songs carry you.
I have never been one to be real attached to music to where I go crazy over artist or a song I don’t know all the names of songs on the radio or the bands I just listen and if it happens to be a song I enjoy then I play it until something else comes along
the songs that came to mind when I read this prompt was Paint Me A Birmingham by Tracy Lawrence I love the way he describes the outside of the house with the porch, swing, the edge of town i have it all pictured in my mind looking like a decent size cottage with more front yard then back not to many neighbors and just enough trees to where it don’t hide the house. I have lived in a Mobile home the majority of my life and ache for the day we find this house.
The next song that came to my mind is In The Air Tonight Phil Collins My first best friend ever was a girl I met in kindergarten or the first grade can’t remember she came right up to me in daycare and started playing with me the friendship took off from their she was the first friend I had and went to stay the night with she lived with her mother in an apartment her mom would have friends over and they would read to us, fix supper, and just include us in their visits for some reason when we all laid down at night her moms room was next door to my friend’s room this song would always play in the middle of the night at the time the song was erie I laid there while my friend sawed logs wondering if her mother was okay a few years later her mom died of a heart attack when my dad told me she died I was so young I kind of new something was different but not like the impact it has on me now in my older age my ears are aching, I can hardy swallow, and I’m crying not just for the loss of her mom but the friendship when grams and dad took me to the funereal she was quiet, shy, and withdrawn one point when I walked up to her she hid behind a relative and hung her head down staring at the floor I realize there was lots going on for her that I myself could not imagine since her mother was all she had but if she is out there reading this somewhere someday you have always been in my heart Nikki
The next song is silly and when the few people who know me especially my friend Christy will say give up woman but you all asked for it is by Bon Jovi Always the summer after high school the first guy I ever got to call my boyfriend for the whole month we dated plus got a lot of practicing kissing that is all we did was made out no more no less now so don’t let your imaginations runaway with you he had some things going on in his life that is not my business nor did he ever try to make it my business my mom says it’s a good thing and she was right since he walked away from the relationship before I ever got to know him we didn’t have any turmoil so the relationship was not crumbled the crush was left where it was and what I made it to be my mom says sometimes its good to keep it there because it’s not what you have made it out to be she also told me we were young and some relationships have to do with timing and it was not the right timing Shelley it had nothing at all to do with you!
P.s I’m way behind and my assignments will be discombobulated!
Todays writing 101 prompt: Unlock The Mind. Take twenty minutes to free write. It doesn’t matter if what you write is incomplete, or nonsense, or not worthy of the “publish” button.
Howdy-do!
I have to admit this first assignment for blogging 101 is quite nerve-racking. I’m hoping towards the end I’m better than I was. My English teacher told me on my last day of class “practice makes perfect”. I believe in the philosophy and also in myself. Like some, I don’t always look forward to sitting down with a pen and paper. I literally force myself, afterwards not only do I feel better but also accomplished. It’s the one thing I literally do for myself. Maybe that is wrong when you have a blog with followers? Someone asked me yesterday if having a following was a goal of mine? I sat down and thought about the question, and I can’t answer that right now. Maybe someday when the gridlock breaks, Yes. For now its all mambo jumbo. From most things I read it may stay that way…
Life In My Tin Can red rug 