welcome readers & writers. it's photog friday again! i love photog fridays because i (and you, if you'd like!) get to be creative with the work of a professional photographer. the photos you see on my blog every other day of the week are taken by me. on fridays my rookie camera gets a break and we all get to contemplate a professional photo. to read stories and see photos from previous photog fridays, click here, here, and here.
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this week's photo is the work of photographer Laurie Millar. to see more of Laurie's work, click here. Laurie, thank you so much for this gorgeous picture! writers, i'd love to read the story, poem or creative non-fiction response that bubbles up in you when you look at this photo prompt; just click on comments below to share it. 250(ish) words or less. here's my spin on Laurie's photo:-
Everyone in town calls it the True Love Tree. Such a gorgeous birch in the center of town square, next to the gazebo. Its twining branches spill over into the gazebo, tear drop leaves whispering a new mossy groove in the spring, singing a deep throaty green in the summer, humming jazzy shades of yellow, orange and red in the autumn... silent and sleepy and knowing in winter. Under that tree countless moms have laid chubby babies on fuzzy blankets for kick n' play time while toddler siblings circle, gallop, and chase a few feet away, dripping ice cream and wiping their hands clean on the grass. On the bench nearby generations of old men thumb through countless pages of daily newspapers. Gaggles of teenagers gather there too, though later, after the last bell and before dinnertime curfews. ("Meet me at the TLT!") And let me tell you, more than one couple has shared a first kiss, held sweaty hands, even gotten engaged under that canopy. Who is T and where is L? No one knows, but the legacy of their love - chisled, rooted, generous and lively - still flourishes.
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come write with me!
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p.s. thanks to Jessica Lemmon, Brian Potopowitz, FilmGuy, Bess Weatherby, and Anonymous for your awesome "fluffed" stories yesterday. 'twas great day for writing altogether (and all together, too)!
Thelma and Louise
ReplyDeleteWhat does it truly meant to be friends?
In the first decade of the 21st century I am "friends" with everyone we ever worked with, met on a weekend retreat, went to school with 15 years ago.
The 1990s were a simpler time. I was "friends" with people with common interests. We were the band front geeks who were so jealous of the cheerleaders who got the dates, the swim team girls with hairy legs, the drama nerds who strutted across the stage.
But I only have one true friend who I love. Louise, my Louise. I've known her since I was 10 and she was 9. We've prayed together, played together, cried, laughed and sang, together. I was her maid of honor, I am her biggest supporter. I'm the one she watches Julia movies with, and eats Phish food. We have our own language, we know each other's thoughts. I'd do anything for her.
Now she's home and ready to burst emotionally and physically. Her marriage is tearing apart at the seams. Her "Good Bye Earl"y husband has moved back in with his parents after less than 2 years of wedded bliss. So she is alone (with Child). Every day she grows and grows and again its come time for me to leave home, again.
Before I go back to the city I take her for a walk at Museum park- where we used to play and show her the tree I've found. Scarred but marked for her and me.
Thelma <3 Louise
Funny the different connotations things have. In the thirty years of this work I had never walked by this tree again, although it had been so instrumental in my career. It's not a job one becomes sentimental about. One isn’t likely to return again and again to excite the old memories, linger over, savor particular details. Some keep souvenirs, but I prefer to simply disassociate myself from the product once complete, let all memories, especially ones that may trip me up fade as quickly as possible. There may be some who congregate and trade yarns of the trade for each other's amusement, but I think of that as sacrilege. An important part of professionalism is there is neither clue nor relic nor story. It happens, is if magically, and nothing palpable is ever attached. I take to the grave with me the only knowledge outside of the mere fact of it that exists in the universe. I need no praise, no cheers, no wine drenched gloating boasting. My social life is no way reveals ever anything about my true occupation, I am an erudite but yet unpublished poet, novelist, still working on the first volumes, the big chance. My friends know better than to feel sorry, they know I won't hear of it. My tidy independence, a modest inheritance, accounts for my occasional lavish affair. I'm fun but unrecognized, and well intended friends sometimes sic agents on me, but I scorn them away, and since no one has ever read a word, my potential continues to be assessed by my clever repartee and conversational insight. It was today, when I finally realized what was meant in those Tweets that used that symbol phrase, greater than 3, than I decided to walk down and look at this seminal, apparently innocuous carving. The tree had been a sapling then, freshly planted in a new park on the west side of the city. The coded message that I was accepted into the job, international assassin, would appear as a simple profession of eternal love, carved into a small new tree.
ReplyDeleteThank you for stopping by my blog today! Glad it could encourage you today with your first rejection. Honestly, they don't get easier, but it's great to have a community of other writers who understand what it's like!
ReplyDeleteI returned to the spot on the one-year anniversary. The day Luke carved our initials into the tree. "This means forever, you know?" Then he leaned down and kissed me so hard, it made me want to believe in forever too. I knew better.
ReplyDeleteHe dropped me off as he had for last six months, a block from my house. Luke knew my foster parents would freak at the sound of his motorcycle. I removed his helmet and placed it in his hands. I pressed my lips to his, long and hard, letting him know I didn't want our night to end. I never wanted our nights to end. But if I showed up later than my 11:00 pm curfew, I'd have to wait a whole week before I'd be let out of my prison of a temporary home.
He kicked the engine back on, securing his helmet to the bike.
"Put your helmet on," I nagged.
"I wanna feel the wind in my hair tonight."
I bit my lip and brushed a wisp of brown hair out of his eyes. And then I walked away.
As I reached the corner, I turned around and gave a little wave. He revved his engine, making a graceful arc away from me.
A few minutes later, I lay in bed and knew he was gone. Even though he was miles away, I could hear the ugly screech of tires and hear metal smash into metal. Luke barely had time to register that he'd been cut off before it was over.
Forever had just come to an end.