welcome, readers & writers!
my new posting schedule is simple: mondays. do feel free to come back through the week and read what others have written, or to add another installment to your story, poem or creative non-fiction reflection on the photo :) over the summer i should be able to pick it up again, but for now i'm chained to my computer in other ways that don't involve creative writing - boo hoo!!! i am excited, however, about finally becoming an elementary school teacher hopefully sometime in the near future.
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i'm thrilled today to welcome a guest photographer and writer, Mr. Chuck Galle. Chuck, an actor and writer, has been a steady contributor to write away every day, and i'm glad to call him my writing friend. ahhh the wonder of the internet to be able to introduce friends across thousands of miles! Chuck has a book out, Stories I Never Told My Daughter which, at this very moment is winging its way from amazon to my house in Texas. it's been in my shopping cart for a few months now, and i can't wait to read it, finally!! Click here to visit Chuck's blog & website. thank you, Chuck, for such a lovely and intriguing photo and for it's written companion. I'll be back later in the week to write about the photo myself - I'm already feeling inspired! see below for Chuck's spin on his photo:
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So, what else would you do with a camera in hand, waiting for someone, wandering around in the atrium of the Institute of Contemporary Art with its new Wall Of Mirrors just put up last week, and the only person there is also trying to find how to handle this eye feast with her camera? We acknowledged each other, then set about our unique visions. Since there were only we two we couldn't help trying to not be the follower of the other, nor impose some competitiveness in our quests, picking "the" right angle. And yet, we found ourselves trading off each other's ideas. There was no flirting, perhaps she was waiting for someone also, but our exercises kept generating a bit of frisson here, a bit there. And then my friend showed up. The other photographer and I had jostled ourselves into the positions where we were obviously going to catch each taking each, but we both saw the potential at the same time. Joanne stepped across the floor, and serendipitously a guy, who turned out to be who the other photographer was waiting for came around the corner from the entrance and we both caught each other; I caught her directly and, along with my friend and hers in the mirror and she caught all three of us in the mirror she was aimed it. Voila!
Reflect
ReplyDeleteI never know when I’ll see her. I do think of her now and then but I’m always preoccupied with other thoughts when she decides do make an appearance. I don’t know her name or where she comes from or who she is. She is obviously there for me always showing up far away in a mirror or in a pane of glass if the light’s just right. I’m always alone when it happens so I’ve never been able to ask anyone else if they see her too. She’s not real, at least, I don’t think she is because she is never really there, always just as a reflection. I’ve turned around a thousand times with my heart pounding but she’s never behind me. She doesn’t look like me but she could be anyone else. She has medium length, straight brown hair and wears pants and a jacket. She never moves, just stands there motionless and stares at me. Sometimes I stare back and wonder if she’s a ghost or an angel, or maybe an alien. I try to figure out why she’s here but I also can’t help the feeling that I’m just going crazy. I hope I figure out what she wants before I go there for good.
Nice Brian. Sounds like a good kind of insanity, to me.
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ReplyDeleteI love this. I had occasion, twenty or so years ago to meet my adult daughter whom I hadn't seen since she was a year old. We met on the sidewalk beside the Boston Science Museum. We both burst into tears when our eyes met and we knew immediately who we each were. You captured the moment perfectly. That daughter, in fact, is the friend in my piece.
ReplyDeleteI think you can polish up from "vaguely familiar" on, because (although it may be my experience that tells me) from somewhere in there you've tipped your hand and we know who this woman is. Try to keep us from knowing until she says it.
Also, if I may - decide on whether you want to use "i" or "I" for FPS. Proof read before you submit. Great story.
Chuck-
ReplyDeleteHow beautiful! I am extremely moved. Thank you for the feedback. I am a young writer and all help is wonderful.
My writing mechanics are terrible, and I usually rely on all the auto-corrections on word. A habit I know is terrible. Thank you for reminding me I can't do that here.
Again thank you
February 24th, 2005. It is a day i will never forget.
ReplyDeleteI was walking through a window exhibit in the Institute of Contemporary Art with my mom, Maya. It was warm for February, I remember, and the warmth brought my spirits higher. I had just turned 13 and this was Maya's present for me. Mother daughter time. Well, step-mother, daughter time really. I had never met my real mother, you see, but Maya was the best mom I could imagine.
There was a time, I remember, when most people had left the exhibit to go have lunch. As a matter of fact, there was only Maya, myself, and a woman in her mid-thirties standing off a bit.
I didn't know why, but there was something about that woman the struck me, and was drawn to her. I slowly made my toward her taking as much time as possible so as not to arouse suspicion. There was something extremely familiar about her, but the familiarly was strange.
I looked back at Maya, who too, was looking at the woman, though she seemed to know who she was. At last the woman looked up and saw me. She gave a bit of a start, and then looked at Maya.
They looked deep at each other for a while. Maya was stern and strong, while the woman had a look of fear on her face, and she seemed to be pleading with my Step-mother. I was very confused.at last the woman spoke.
"Do we have to?"
"Yes."
The woman sighed and looked at me with a sad smile, then walked up to me.
"Kate," Maya said, "this is your mother.
Chuck- anymore?
You have a tough challenge here. I wish I knew more about teaching, I feel inadequate to this task, but I'm gonna do my best. Maybe Demery will get involved also. As I see it, when you are with a step-mother and there is another woman character introduced, I think most readers are going to put it all together right there. I don't know how to resolve that. I'm wondering if maybe you proceed by going internal, write from the inside where you really don't know what's happening although you are aware the reader probably does. Another may be to find a way to screen the other woman's identity, put her in the middle of a side story - maybe you see each other in the mirrors, smile, find yourselves playing some notice-not-notice game that is kind of suggested with those mirrors spaced out like that along the wall. Then some recognition. With my daughter and me, it was the eyes, we saw ourselves in each others eyes. Then, in the first fifteen, twenty minutes began to notice face shape, language similarities, gestural and postural mirrorings, the funny knowings of what each was thinking, it is phenomenal. Let the reader into you seems to be the common thread in these suggestions. Maybe you actually discover yourselves by playing in the mirror, and then step-mom steps in and affirms. You can do that by staying inside and reporting your affinity with this woman and then she becomes emotional recognizing how much you two are alike. It's amazing how much people are alike that they don't realize because it's so present in day to day living. I hope that is helpful. It's good stuff, but you have your hands on a great idea and you have the talent to bring out a lot more.
ReplyDeleteBrian, Chuck and Johnsons, thank you all so much for your contributions to write away every day this week! Each story does justice to this lovely photo. I've particularly enjoyed "listening" in to the dialogue between Chuck (an, er, older writer - no offense, Chuck!) and Johnsons, a very new, young writer. I know you both got a lot out of your conversation!
ReplyDeleteGreat I would change it again but...I don't think we need to crowd the place. I will write it on my own however and if it reaches a satisfactory point I will post it. Thanks
ReplyDeleteHi Johnsons... Let me just say that your story is more than satisfactory as it is, and I know Chuck would agree. This site is really for all kinds of writing - sometimes it's work that we take a lot of time with and polish up. But lots of times, at least for me, it's a chance to do a quick writing exercise - a boost of creativity - a warm up for the day or a diversion from stress. So please know that your story is wonderful just as it is. You might want to take it and work with it more b/c you've been inspired. If so, that's awesome. But I love to read all of your work regardless of whether you've taken five minutes with it or an hour :) Just keep writing!! I have a feeling that we're all gonna say "we knew her when..."
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ReplyDeletecheval reflections
mirror the beauty in her
we dance our hello