FlashNano25 Day 17: Served

 FlashNano25 Day 17

Prompt: You are served something unexpected for dinner 

 

“Here’s your dinner,” she said, as she placed his plate at the head of the dining room table. 

She left the room, heels clacking. 

He was expecting the usual Thursday night fare: two steamed hotdogs, a half can of beans with molasses, a side of homemade piccalilli, two squirts of ketchup, and a couple of slices of generously buttered brown bread fresh from the oven. 

“What’s this?” he said, holding up the fat business envelope that lay on the faded Corelle instead.  

She reappeared, dragging behind her two suitcases. 

He asked again, his voice more strident now. 

The luggage thunked as she descended the carpeted stairs. She stopped at the front door, opened it, and pulled the bags behind her. 

“Where are you going? What are you doing? What on earth is going on here? For God’s sake, Millie, get back here. Answer me.” The plastic centerpiece shook as his hand slapped the table. 

From the front yard, she called to him. “Come on out and see.”

Still holding the envelope, he emerged onto the front stoop. 

His luggage was at the curb, next to a Yellow Cab with exhaust spilling from the tailpipe. 

With Millie was their neighbor, Sue. He’d told Millie to stay away from that woman, a bad influence, one of those civil rights lawyers. Mouthy. Opinionated. Had a Mondale for President sign on her front lawn. 

Straightening his tie he approached, his polished Oxfords clomping on the cement sidewalk.

Sue held up her hand, indicating for him to stop.

“You’ll want to look at the documents,” she said.  

He clenched his fists and wondered who was watching from behind the curtained picture windows of the other split-level homes in the cul-de-sac.

Millie stepped back and opened her mouth as if to speak. Then she shook her head. Biting her lip, she linked her arm through Sue’s and walked around him back toward the house. 

“Read the notes,” Millie said. 

“See you in court,” Sue said. 

The front door shut. The lock clicked. The deadbolt snapped into place. 

FlashNano25 Day 19: 19 word story

 FlashNano25 Day 19

Prompt: Write a 19-word story

Persistence or This is Some Bullshit

I came, saw, failed. 

Fivepeated.  

This is some bullshit. 

So stop.

Months, ready yet?

Weeks, set? 

Day? Yes, go. 

*A favorite Resident Alien quote

FlashNano25 Day 18: It hasn't snowed for 213 days

 FlashNano25 Day 18

Prompt: It hasn’t snowed for 213 days

 

The room is always quiet. 

The murmurs constant. 

The monitors – they beep.

The air – how I long for fresh pine breezes or the perfumes of lilacs and roses or even the grit of car exhaust. Anything is preferable to this processed stuff sanitized with soap, rubbing alcohol, medications.

Sometimes there are grunts as they shift me from back to left, from left to back, back to right. 

The blinds are always open and from my pillow I see a narrow strip of sky above the encroaching roofs of this foreign metropolis. 

When they brought me here after the surgeries after the accident during the squalls after the party following the hours of meetings, phone calls, endless ennui, and the office banalities that once seemed so important, the sun was strong, the nights starry. Or at least that’s how it seemed. 

One day fades, blue, gray, black. The machines tick.  Another day begins. 

Sometimes there are clouds. Sometimes rain.  Sometimes there are faces that say we did this, and we did that and they show me pictures of beaches, babies, and once a photo at the mountain where they say we skied just days before the awful crash during that storm that came out of nowhere, the last of the season. But hopefully we’ll be on the slopes soon. Politely, they include me in this.

Supine, I blink and attempt to nod as breath whooshes through my tube, this two-bit piece of plastic pinning me to this prison, purgatory, half- life.

If I could speak, I would say I know better. The time for miracles has passed. It hasn’t snowed in 213 days. 

 

 

 

NanoFlash25 Day 12: The errant charge

FlashNano 2025

Day 12

Prompt: You find an unexplained charge on your statement 

 

The first time you read your credit card bill, the unexplained charge didn’t register. Maybe because it’s a little overwhelming, this pile of magazines, envelopes, catalogs, postcards, and ads, cascading edge to edge on top of your kitchen table. 

You are energetic enough to work full time and hit the gym five days a week but apparently haven’t yet figured out how to gather the life force you need to take those simple, mindless really, steps to retrieve your mail from your association mailbox five houses away more than two or three times a month. 

You read through the bill again, but the extra charge still doesn’t register. Nothing registers, not the electric bill, water notice, pizza coupons, leaflets from four different gyms telling you why they’re the best and if you’re truly serious about losing that weight, gaining that muscle, staying young forever, you won’t ignore them.

None of it sinks in because you’re remembering the real reason why you avoid the mailbox, dread that small walk. 

It’s easy to drive by the mailbox and those houses, particularly that house. You do it every day, three four times a day. You’re protected by metal and glass. You can turn up your music, pretend to sing along. Simply stare straight ahead because you ARE driving after all and should be focused on the road.  

But when you walk it’s just you, your legs, arms, skin, with only the flimsy protection of your wool sweater, cotton jeans, as your panting breath whispers hurry hurry hurry, your key fumbles with the mailbox lock and finally after what seems like hours but is maybe five minutes you stumble home, holding your mail tight to your chest because. . . 

What if an envelope drops, creating the unthinkable opportunity as you retrieve it, for that neighbor to harm you, the neighbor who is a grandfather with children and grandchildren who visit every weekend and play football with him in the street in front of your house. Who cuts his House Beautiful lawn four times a week and hoses down his Architectural Digest front porch on Sundays. Who complained to the association about you once because when you watered your lawn, rivulets formed in the gutter, harming no one and nothing but he didn’t like the way it looked. Who when you first moved in you used to shovel out after snowstorms, until you noticed that when he was the first one out in the morning pushing his mega snowblower he’d take care of all your neighbors and stop short at your property line and turn his machine around, even that time it snowed two feet. Who hosts neighborhood parties that you’ve never been invited to in his garage, and who has a Confederate flag pinned to the wall next to his big screen television. The neighbor with the flashy red sports car that he only drives in summer, and the truck on oversized wheels, with the bumper sticker that says, “Your body my choice," and the other: “Celebrate Diversity” which has pictures of six – you know it’s six because you’ve memorized that horrifying, stupid sticker -- six different kinds of rifles. 

How can you be expected to notice that suspicious credit charge right away? How can you be expected to focus on anything other than how soon can you sell this place and other thoughts related to your own survival, when every time you visit the local supermarket, jog on a nearby trail, and even walk to your mailbox a paltry five houses away from the safety of your own home you’re facing the fact that your very right to life hangs in the balance, dependent upon the whims of others and how they choose to act?

 

 

FlashNano25 Day 11: A magical story

 FlashNano25 Day 11

Prompt: Write a magical story

 

The day after the Election 

In the dark hours after the polls closed, the land was silent. While many slept the deep sleep of the ignorant, content and calm, those attuned felt the tremors, the inexorable shaking giving heed of what was to come. 

Like others of her kind, the woman startled by this shifting of the firmament, awoke from sleep and threw off the covers, panting, sweaty, heart palpitating to a beat so insistent she had to wonder if this was to be her end. 

Bits of the dream but not dream --in truth reality that had pushed her into consciousness, came back in flashes. The sunny start to the day, then too soon dark clouds, dissipating optimism followed by stark predictions and finally the realization of what this all meant, for her, her daughters, women everywhere, their children and beloved ones, and her body knew, finally in understanding, demanding consciousness and forthrightly calling her to arms. 

She checked her phone, which confirmed what in her soul of souls she now candidly knew, once dreaded, had earlier trustingly naively thought impossible. The beast was king, elected to the highest office in the land by a hate-filled, uneducated mob who, too lazy to research the facts which were obvious and overwhelming, and too self-centered to consider the general good which when taken into account always lifts them all,  would soon find themselves, like her and the others who’d stridently repudiated his profoundly demented clarion call,  were also destined to suffering unto his unbending, murderous will unless something someone was brave enough to say that no, this is not who we are. 

He of the cloven hooves, goat horns, forked tail, smells of death, decay, fetid bowels, engorged devourer of young women, murderer of innocents, was now supreme ruler of all. Like the rest of her kind, she knew immediately, like breathing, hearts pounding, hopes crushing, what would come next if she stood by and chose passivity.  

More manipulations, blaming, outright lies, and the deaths of multitudes, at home and abroad. A repetition of history because already, first he came for the outliers, the ones on the fringes, those deserving the most of open hearts and arms. Thoughts and prayers? Useless against this onslaught of unspeakable, detestable, reprehensible evil. 

 Action. Yes. That was it. Action called. 

In her heart of hearts she conjured the words, timeless and true that would calm her soul, gird her heart, and carry her forth from this day hence: If not me, then who. If not now, then when. 

Because her words spoke truth they were carried forth into a stream of other like words and the waters followed forth, gathering energy and becoming waves that crashed into rivers forming worlds of oceans that opened into the vast universe that is the collective consciousness, the infinite, blazing light from which all humankind is born. 

Their words echoed throughout the galaxy

If not me, then who. If not now, then when. 

Now a battle cry. 

If not me, then who. If not now, then when.

From within her and the others a great courage grew and with it the determination that the present circumstances would not suffice and would not sustain the life they all deserved. 

This is not who we are. This is not who we will be. We will go forth. We will succeed. 

These lone beings rose up and joined their counterparts. From across the lands, mountains, oceans they united and marched, hearts and arms opened wide, their anger a force for good, for right, infinite humanity. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

FlashNano25Day10: Happy wife, happy life

 FlashNano25

Day 10

Prompt: Write a 5-minute (or less) flash play

Setting: Elevator of swanky retail store

Characters:

TFS: Twenty-something female shopper dressed in designer clothing, flashy jewelry, high heels, overburdened with shopping bags. 

FC. Fifty-something female cop, in uniform. 

Random bystander. Dressed in regular streetwear.

Three police, in uniform. 

 

TFS is talking into cellphone, held in one hand while from other dangle several large shopping bags labeled with high end designer names.  She enters elevator and presses button. Door starts closing. 

TFS:  OMG it’s the cutest outfit. Top. Pants. And THE best jacket. (Pause) Please. I’m so worth it. You know what they say hon, happy wife happy life. (Giggles)

Door opens. FC enters, faces TFS, who, ignoring her, hits button again. 

FC (even tone): Ma’am. Excuse me. Ma’am. 

TFS (turns away): Of course I got accessories. It’s not an outfit without accessories. (Pause) Just some earrings, a necklace, two bracelets and the cutest leather belt. Got my hair did too, just for you my love. How cute is this? (She strikes a sultry pose, takes a selfie, sends it.)

FC is louder now: Lady. Lady. LADY!

TFS (obviously frustrated) into phone: Hold on a sec. Some THING here is bothering me. 

(To FC): WHAT? 

FC (all business): You need to come with me.

TFS (flips hair): As if. Who do you think. . .

FC: (puts hands to hip, where handcuffs dangle) Ma’am. Now. 

TFS: (Into phone): Oh my God it’s a mall cop. A mall cop is trying to talk to me. Can you believe it? Too funny, right? 

To FC: Sweetie a good moisturizer would do wonders for that crepey skin. (Continues talking into phone, ignoring FC) 

FC (hits emergency stop button): Ma’am this is serious. Ma’am listen. Ma’am. (Loud enough so person on phone can hear) Ma’am. You left your stroller in the accessories department. We’ve been looking for you for two hours. You need to come with me. 

TFS (looks at her bags, her surroundings, then into phone): It’s nothing, hon. These people.  . . (Her voice trails off as she listens on phone). 

TFS: Honey, you know better than to ask me that. Of course, the baby’s here with me. Give me a sec to deal with this mess. I’ll call you back. (Phone clicks off. Turns to FC) They couldn’t watch him for TEN minutes? God, these people are useless. Accessories department you said? (She hits a button on the elevator display.) Let’s go then. Wait until my husband here’s about this. 

FC: Ma’am, the baby’s downtown at the station. You get one call. If it’s to your husband, so be it. 

(Elevator door opens to three other uniformed officers. All four escort TFS out.)

TFS: (Angrily): Do you know who I am? Wait until my husband hears about this. 

Random bystander, watching her: What an entitled bitch. 

FC: Yeah, I think we do. 

 

 

 

 

  

 

Flashnano25 Day 9. I won the lottery

Ick this feels uncomfortably awkward and disrespectful to folks struggling with substance abuse and/ or mental health things. Plus it's just badly written. 

This whole flash nano thing is about stepping out of comfort zones. And sometimes stepping out of comfort zones means writing ick. Next time, fail better.  For now, I carry the shameful burden of self-conscious  ick on my shoulders. 

Flashnano25

Day 9

Prompt: Start with the end

I won the lottery. Not being a smart ass here. I’m not talking about a one buck scratchie. I’m talking big stuff. Yeah. The fifty thou for twenty years. It will be life for me, the way things are going. Not complaining. Just being real.

I know what some folks are saying. That I have no right to the money. Fuck that shit. 

Listen, wait. Don’t walk away, okay? 

I got the ticket fair and square. Not my fault that the loser who bought it didn’t double-check. Who doesn’t double-check?  An ungrateful asshole that’s who. And you know, he littered. He crumbled it up.  Dropped it in the parking lot right outside the packie like it was nothing. Believe that?  Right next to his fancy ass Lexus. Fancy ass Lexus. I want a fancy ass Lexus. 

Yeah, I got his license plate. One of those vanity ones. Hard to forget. No, I’m not telling you the license plate. I know you people can trace these things. 

I may prefer my refreshments in liquid form, that is true. Doesn’t mean I’m stupid. Not at all. Not one bit stupid. 

And it’s not like he signed his name to the thing or anything. I signed mine. So, you know, finders keepers. 

What will I do with all that money? I’m not giving you any of it. Don’t even ask. Don’t even. 

Maybe buy a house. Get a coat.  Donate some. 

Huh. Who am I kidding. Donate some my ass. 

Though there’s this soup kitchen. You know? Down near St. John's? They’re real nice even when I’m, how shall I say, under the weather. They treat me normal, like a human. With dignity like. I used to have dignity you know. Did you know that? I did. 

Maybe I’ll talk to the soup people. Maybe I can help them. Maybe they can help me.  

Here, you want a sip. Want some? It’s good, really. Warms me up just right. Don't worry it's not the hard stuff. Doc at the free clinic. You know the free clinic in the valley. Says the hard stuff will kill me. So now I drink this Mad Dog mostly.  You know Mad Dog? Burns like a sonofabitch. I mostly drink it. But sometimes I have the hard stuff too. You can have some if you want. I got money now. You can stay. I’ll get more. No. Okay you gotta go. I know. You go. I'll be here. I'm always here. 

Except when I'm at the soup place or the valley or once my son came and took me out to Olive Garden. You know Olive Garden. All you can eat at the Olive Garden. That was fine. Fine times. I gave him the lottery ticket. He's going to get cash for me. Get me set up in a nuity. An uity. Annuity. Coming back soon. Real soon. Waiting here so he finds me soon. This is where we met. He told me to wait here. So I do. I wait here. 

Geez it’s cold out. So cold so cold so cold. Alone and cold. So cold. 

Hey you. Yeah, you. 

Want a sip? C’mon. Really. It's good. Not the hard stuff. Just the Mad Dog. You know Mad Dog? 

Hey, did I tell you? I won the lottery. 

FlashNano25 Day 6: A story that takes place in a cafeteria - He's just a kid

 Flashnano25

Day Six

Prompt: Write a story that takes place in a cafeteria

Like I’m sure many other teachers, even retired ones like me, been dealing with nightmares while following in horror the Virginia Beach teacher shooting trial. 

Here’s one of those nightmares. 

He’s just a kid

Before the first shots rang out in the crowded cafeteria some students were already seated and nibbling on Friday’s lunch of cheese pizza, broccoli, applesauce, while others waited in line. Still more were walking into the cafeteria single file and silent per the elementary school’s rules though some were sharing silly whispers and a few jumped up and down. They were just six after all. Yet others, trays clutched close to their bodies because they were still learning how to balance, were meandering toward their seats. When the shooting started, some, startled by the sudden blasts, dropped their trays. As the firing continued, time stood still then sped up, as screaming children ran toward doors, windows, while some hid under tables and others stood frozen, their tiny nervous systems overloaded by fear. Some teachers on duty yelled, “Oh my God,” and rushed toward the doors, and others toward the screaming, crying hordes. More shots rang out and the three children seated across from the shooter fell backward onto the floor. The two on his left and right slumped forward onto their trays. The teacher closest, who’d been opening stubborn milk cartons and squeezing out ranch dressing, lunged forward, but her small charge, the one all the teachers worried about, the one with parents who scoffed at their concerns, the one the vice principal said was just a first grader and couldn’t hurt a fly so she didn’t even bother checking the backpack for the gun four students swore was in there, aimed too well and she was gone too. 

Flashnano25 Day 8: Happy World Pianist Day except to you, Mrs. VG

 Flashnano25 

Day 8

Prompt: Write a story about one of these (choose from list of events celebrated on 11/8).

Happy World Pianist Day, except to you, Mrs. VG. 

Your stern voice, harsh words, and corporal punishment changed me forever.  

I was in eighth grade when we met, my seventh year as a piano student at St. Gabriel’s School of Music. Up until that year, all my piano teachers were nuns. They were kind, caring, and encouraged me. 

Once a year, gentlemen from Catholic University in Washington, DC would make special trips to our school and listen to us play. I was always praised. They marveled at my talent, my work ethic, my dedication. They wrote letters to my family that I had potential. That if I kept at my current pace, I’d likely be in line for some college scholarships. 

At our annual school recital, I received ovations. My parents were so proud. I was so happy. 

Then came you, Mrs. VG. You yelled at me if I slouched. You insulted the way I looked and talked. You sat next to me on the piano bench. And you hit the backs of my hands with a ruler every time I made a mistake. Every. Time. 

Funny how things work. The more you hit me, the more mistakes I made. 

I begged my parents to send me to a different piano school. Told them the teacher was mean. They refused, because my school was THE school for piano in the area. I was lucky to be there, they said. 

The Catholic University performance that year was a disaster. 

The annual school recital? Still to this day my face heats up thinking about it. I got on stage, and everyone was expecting I’d be one of the best. But I couldn’t play. My fingers, once trusty and strong, started trembling, then shaking uncontrollably. I played maybe three measures perfectly, then lost complete control of my arms. I kept stopping. Starting. Stopping. Restarting. When I finished, no one clapped. I ran off the stage in tears. 

My parents relented after that. The next year I started at a new piano school. The teacher was a former jazz performer who taught me chords so I could play popular music. I still learned some classical stuff, but in comparison to Mrs. VG, the pace was super chill. 

I never played in public again. The experience that year with Mrs. VG destroyed something deep inside. Even now, if I try to play with people around, I freeze up and start shaking. 

A few years ago, my mother and I were talking about my old piano lessons. I told her how Mrs. VG used to hit me. 

My mother, a talented, classically trained pianist, got upset. 

“I didn’t know. Why didn’t you tell me?” 

I shrugged. “Back then I didn’t know any better. I thought what she was doing was normal. I thought I was the one with the problem.” 

As an adult, I now know better.

When my youngest daughter was in second grade, like me she decided she wanted to learn to play the piano. Given my past, I made sure that her teachers were warm, kind, encouraging. Like a sponge, my daughter soaked up everything.  By the end of her first year, she was already playing complex pieces. Starting in high school, she regularly performed for crowds, playing the accompaniment in local stage productions. A bit of a savant, she majored in Mathematics and its artsy equivalent --  Piano Music, in college. 

And time moves on. My grandson recently started taking piano lessons. He’s obsessed. He draws his own staffs and creates his own compositions. He comes to my house and plays his songs. One of his songs is about a spider. It’s eight measures long. I’ve heard it now maybe sixty times. I’m sure I’ll hear it another sixty more. 

Sometimes he sings along and I join him, but only for a few minutes because he says I tend to sing offkey and he tells me to stop, which I do. He’s got a delicate ear. For him as was true for my daughter, bad singing is literally painful. I have no desire to inflict any pain on this kiddo. 

 His tiny hands are soft and delicate and still getting used to piano keys.  Sometimes his fingers trip and that’s more than okay. Me, his parents, his teacher, we all praise him for trying and learning new things. Mistakes are just fine. 

I think now about people like Mrs. VG who never learned that mistakes are part of trying. That mistakes can be a GOOD thing. She must have had a miserable life. 

 

 

 

 

Flashnano 25 Day 7: Sans even a clue

FlashNano25

Day 7

Prompt: Write a story in the form of a list. Use the number seven in the title. 

Sans even a clue

1. Let's have statewide mandatory student testing! What an awesome way to ensure that kids learn! It'll cost next to nothing but the benefits? Wowza! Yay for everyone learning. 

2. Oh boy. It's going to cost a little more than we think. A lot more, I mean. 

3. Oh, and we need to set strict guidelines. 

4. Third graders should be able to sit for four hour straight, right? 

5. Teachers say that's abusive. They're saying these standardized tests aren't helpful and shouldn't stand alone as representing who kids are and what they know. 

6.  Those teachers are so stupid. They really think we, the folks making six figures who got our jobs because we know someone, are going to listen to them? I have a more powerful job, therefore I'm smarter. They're citing Piaget? Erickson? Maslow? Their own experiences? Excuses excuses. 

7. Bathroom breaks during testing? Insanity. Not as a group. Make sure kids wait until the one monitor for their entire floor of like ninety kids or whatever can take them one at a time.  So what if they have to wait an hour or more. They can keep working. It's called discipline. Seig Heil! 

8. Forgot their glasses?  Grown ups can't bring them?  Of course those kids have to take the tests. No excuses. They can squint. Test away! Wheeeee! 

9. Sick kids? Just put a frickin' wastebasket next to them. Wusses. 

10. Yes, of course give them lunch. We're not animals. Hand deliver it to them in their testing classrooms. No they can't talk. What if they share test answers?  

11.We're going to need more money. 

12. Maybe we should shame teachers more. 

13. Teachers keep quitting? Good riddance. They're a dime a dozen anyhow. 

14. Okay, now we have more kids scoring advanced, but those inner city school scores are still shit. 

15.  Of course it's the teachers.  And the curricula. Let's spend more money on programs we don't need that don't work. And keep telling everyone the teachers are at fault. 

16.  Huh. Yeah, so we keep putting pressure on all those cities and towns with failing students. But the scores aren't changing. 

17.  OMG OMG OMG!!!! I have a great idea! Let's throw more money at the problem! Oh, and don't forget to continue that inner city teacher shame campaign!  Let 'em all leave!  They sucked anyhow. We'll get newer, smarter teachers. 

18. Wow. These young teachers don't have any mettle. They keep quitting. They don't make 'em like they used to. 

19.  Okay so things aren't changing as much as we thought. We're throwing money at the problem. Changing curricula. Shaming teachers. But STILL our inner city kids aren't passing these tests. 

20. Well, a lot of those kids are immigrants. They're just starting to learn English. And we have lots of kids with special needs, too. 

21. OMG so many excuses. 

22. We're giving the kids a WHOLE YEAR to learn English before we test them. I know.  It takes seven years or so for students to fully learn a language, and yes, some need more and some less. But if we only give them a YEAR and then start testing them? That's pressure. That's good. They'll rise to the challenge. They won't drop out of anything. They won't get angry and act out or anything, right?

23. Special needs kids are getting frustrated? Tough. No one ever said life was easy. 

24.  Sure, they won't get a high school diploma if they don't pass, but NORMAL kids don't give up. I mean, I never gave up. Like every human being on the face of this earth, I lived in a house that always had heat and electricity, was raised by loving parents in a stable environment, had tons of books, was read to constantly, always had nutritious food, music lessons, sports programs, had so many opportunities to grow in so many different ways. I grew up the same as every other kid who ever existed. This bullshit test failing? Damn teachers. 

25.  More money more money more money. Gimme all the money. Years and years of this. 

26. Hey, here's something. Someone I deeply respect because they make tons of money and might be politically connected so it's to my advantage to do what they say says there's a correlation between low income and low test scores. Huh. 

25.  You sure about that? Teachers have been saying that for YEARS and we know they're stupid. 

26. But we should respect and listen to people who make tons of money who have tons of influence and who can advance our careers. 

27. More money more money more money more money more money and test results barely budge. 

28.  Finally. Maybe it's not the teachers' fault. Maybe it's bigger than that. Maybe it's societal, economical, emotional. Maybe testing isn't the end-all-be-all of existence. 

29. So are we saying that teachers had it right all along? 

30. Oh please. Never. 

FlashNano25 Day 5: Running is a family trait

 FlashNano 25

Day 5

Prompt: Tell a family story. Fictionalize as needed. 

 

I tell people that I was destined to become a marathoner because the talent runs in my blood. I say my mother’s uncle was a runner. 

Like all my mother’s stories, the story about this uncle was heavy on emotional tugs, though a little light when it came to the facts. I’ve done my best to research the truth but haven’t found any sort of paper trail. I’ve asked cousins and most shake their heads at me as though to say, “What the heck are you talking about?”

Back in the day, “runner” was another word for messenger. See the joke? See how, when I tell people that I have marathon blood gushing through my veins, because my great-uncle was a runner, I’m playing with words? It’s kinda funny, right? 

Here’s the tugging on your heart part that my mother told with much more emotion than I am capable of conjuring.

My great-uncle was a messenger for the Irish Republican Army for a few months, weeks, days -- I'm not sure, in the decade before World War I. He was a child, still a baby in some ways, only ten years old when he was caught by British soldiers, arrested, and given the awful choice of jail or deportation. I can’t even begin to imagine how terrified he must have been and how inconsolably devastated his parents were. 

Today, ten-year-old kids don't even go to the corner store by themselves. Yet 115 or so years ago, my great- uncle was dashing over bogs, fields, mountain tops, doing his utmost to help his family, friends, countrymen. 

My great-uncle's family chose deportation for him. He immigrated to the U.S., Massachusetts specifically, where some of his older siblings already lived, sent earlier, one at a time, by impoverished parents desperate to give their kids more than what they had. 

In Massachusetts, my great-uncle lived with my great- aunt, a housekeeper for a wealthy family, and then with my grandmother, a governess. Brutally torn from the aching arms of his mom and dad at such a pivotal age, my great-uncle died a spiritual death the day he set sail for America, my mother said. He spent the rest of his relatively short life mourning for home, a shell of who he could have been. 

And here I am, making it all into a big joke, each time I bring up that running is in my blood.  

 

FlashNano25 Day 4: Blonde Wood

FlashNano 25

Day 4

Prompt: Write a story using Home Depot Blonde Wood 

No. I don’t want to do this. 

Read this prompt yesterday and have been feeling annoyed ever since. Pisses me off. You want me to write about a color? A color? Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, you walk this aggravatingly boring, pathetically pedestrian bit of story prompt into mine.

Oh my God this is so stoooooooopid.

How am I supposed to escape from reality, indulge my fantasies, pretend I’m not doing anything other than using things like writing prompts to avoid dealing with the fact I’m barely treading water re: my hopes, dreams, goals, when you wave this dull piece of blech white bread in my face? 

And don’t even get me started on how this is not helpful not one bit when it comes to giving me a way out of avoiding confronting the existential dread that has shadowed me like an adjudicated rapist since last November’s election. 

It’s like you WANT to make me nuts. It’s like you’re FORCING me to face facts. 

And the facts are these. I don’t give a rat’s ass about blonde wood. My country is dying. My rights are rotting. My students. Oh my God don’t even get me started on how much I’m worried about those kids and their families right now. 

And you’re asking me to use my precious energy to write about

a paint color

flooring

the potential song

poem

book title

character name

plays on words

blonde would

Hi, My name is Wood, Blonde Wood

Elle Woods 

Norwegian Wood

Out of the Woods

What would you do if you had a million dollars

What would you do if you had... 

“one shot... or one opportunity...
To seize everything you ever wanted... one moment...
Would you capture it? Or just let it slip?” 

Yeah. That’s Eminem. 

My creative process is weird. 

I think I need a run. 

FlashNano 25 Day 3: Alone on an empty highway

 FlashNano25

Day 3

Prompt: You are alone on an empty highway. 

 

Being an American girl, she was raised on promises. Yes, every breath you take, she was told, can lead you to wide open spaces, where there’s room to make your big mistakes. 

Carefree highway let me slip away on you, she thinks, pedal on metal, from California to the New York island. And the cornfields, so many cornfields. Bright lights. Big cities too, teeming with life. Like me, wretched refuse yearning to be free. That’s some proof. If you build it, they will come.

Gotta keep rolling and must keep riding, even if sometimes feels like I’m on the highway to hell. 

I go to the mountains. Drink from the fountains. There’s more than one answer. But thinking in terms like roads and driving, lyrics and phrasing, those guiderails help frame my thoughts, while I move on from town to town. 

Every day is a winding road that brings me closer to feeling fine.  There are bumps, sure. Detours too. But if I waited for perfection, I would never write a word. 

So many stories of where I’ve been and how I’ve got to where I am. It’s a little overwhelming, but in a good way. 

It’s a truth, universally acknowledged by some women raised to want more, that an empty highway can be full of promises. 

I count the miles in paragraphs, race medals, tolls – and wow some of those tolls have worn me down. . . 

Still, I pick myself up. I want to go out tonight. I want to find out what I got. Stumbling, fumbling toward ecstasy, one word, mile, breath at a time. 

I fill the tank. Study the odometer. Check my compass. Then fingers to wrist verify what I already know. Pulse is still strong. Country roads, I demand, take me home. Where’s that though?  So many miles to go before I sleep. I’d walk 500 miles. Scratch that. I’ll run/ walk and drive 500 miles and 500 more, because I’m not dead yet and I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.  

 

 

 

 

(Mishmash of lyrics and quotes, some misremembered, from:  Tom Petty, The Police, Dixie Chicks, Gordon Lightfoot, Woody Guthrie, Ceelo Green, Emma Lazarus, Field of Dreams, Bob Seger, AC/DC, The Indigo Girls, Bad Company, Cheryl Crow, Margaret Atwood, Brandi Carlile, Jane Austen, Bruce Springsteen, Sarah Mclachlan, John Denver, Robert Frost, The Proclaimers, Monty Python, U2)

Flash Nano 25 Day 2: Something turns into something else

 Flash NANO 25 

Day 2 Prompt: Something turns into something else. 

 

Ugh. The alarm.  From under the covers, an arm. Alarm slaps off. 

You know what? I’m not doing this. I’m not getting out of bed. I’m retired. Sleeping in. 

The 300-pound orange cat has other ideas. He climbs on my chest, paws at my neck, then does a 180 so I can admire his substantial behind which is a breath away. 

I’m up. 

Stumble into kitchen, bathrobe on inside out.  300-pound orange cat threads through my legs. This is not helpful, I tell him. 

Defying all laws of gravity, 300-pound cat jumps on counter and glares at me as I throw a pod and a cup of water in the Keurig.  

“You are starving me,” his eyes say. 

When I open the pantry to get out his bowl and canned food, 300-pound cat jumps from counter – house shakes – and nudges me to move faster.

I submit the offering to him for his approval: Shredded Shrimp and Chicken. He headbutts the can. This is his people’s highest compliment. The headbutts continue as I fill his dish, so most of his foodums ends up on the floor, as usual. 

While he inhales breakfast, I gulp coffee. 

On the fridge there’s his photo, taken a few days before I trapped him last year. He’s peeking out from the drainpipe he called home for most of the first months of his life. A terrified baby then, fur matted, eyes wide, too thin. Claws like knives though. 

Finally, home safe with me, he got regular meals, a litter box to play in, a couch to shred, and a warm bed. Me? Tetanus shot, couple rounds of antibiotics, and a nice pharmacy bill for bandages and gauze. 

Patrick – yes, he has a human name and is more human than some humans I know – licks his plate until it sparkles then jumps into my lap with the gracefulness of a cat four times his size. 

My coffee spills. 

Who’s a good boy, I say.

He smiles. Can cats smile? Yeah. I think so.  

 

NANO25 Day 1: 14 Years ago

 Flash NANO 2025

Day One Prompt: 14 Years Ago

I don’t remember 2011. 

2011 was boring. 

Nothing special or awful happened that year, for me anyhow.

Like most of us, I got up every day and went to my job. I know this because my retirement records say I worked that year.  I don’t recall any one particular workday. 

I went to the gym five or six times every week and ran for at least two hours every Sunday. I know this because for years I kept to that schedule. I don’t recall anything happening that year to throw that schedule off-track. 

I know I saw my parents two or three times every week because that was my routine for decades and nothing happened in 2011 to interfere with that. 

My kids were busy living their lives and I was too. I don't know what that means though, because I don't remember anything about our lives that year. 

I’m sure during that year I had memories of loss, sadness, joy, triumph. Don’t we all, even in the most placid of times, occasionally get little jabs that take us back to our best and worst old days? That’s part of being human, isn’t it?  

I’ve got stories. Just not from 2011. 

Huh. I just finished writing down a bunch of years I DO remember. Then I deleted them. 

Interesting, how the simple act of writing down a random series of numbers can get your pulse racing, your head spinning, your heart breaking. 

Deep breaths.

One of the things my kids and I say to one another before any of us travel by plane: Have an uneventful ride. 

A boring plane ride can bring you to some interesting places. So can writing about an uneventful year. 

I think I prefer uneventful years. 

More on that another time. Or not.