wintered

readers & writers, welcome! a wonderful wednesday to you... hope that hurdling the hump is not half as harried as heaving yourself through the heights of monday and tuesday.

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it sounds like most of the u.s. is blanketed with snow or infused with freezing temperatures today. if you're home on a snow day or frozen inside your house because the door won't open, maybe today's a good day to come write with me! share your poem, creative non-fiction or short story response to the photo by clicking on comments below. here's my contribution:

5.7.5.

beautiful brambles ~

limbs bared to a keen blue sky

devotees of sun

torn

welcome, readers & writers! thank you for stopping by - and a good monday to you. i hope (for all of us!) that this week is filled with good things like productivity, peace, rest & play. 

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writers, care to join me in a writing warm up on today's photo prompt? see below for my spin on it. if you'd like to share your short story, poem or creative non-fiction response, click on comments below. readers, comments are open to you as well!

Patrick wondered whether, if he made a personal donation, the construction company would fix this blasted fence. It disturbed him deeply to see these holes, so jagged, so unsanitary looking, as if the fence had been chewed through by a rodent; though he supposed that logically a rodent wouldn't be able to make such a big hole while hanging off the mesh with its scritchy little claws. These hole-y eye-sores threw his whole darn day off. If he didn't want to see them, he had to go a block out of his way to get to work. That meant leaving the house four and a half minutes early. That meant waking up at 5:56 instead of 6:00 a.m. And who could put in a productive work day knowing they'd been required to wake up in the five o'clock hour? So usually he'd go ahead and take the direct route, passing the fence while trying very hard to avert his eyes.

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When he'd phoned the borough office to ask how long construction on the sidewalk would last, they'd promised him it would only be another week or two. That was the day before Thanksgiving. Now his New Year was tarnished, the whole of January 2011 would forever, in his mind, be wobbly, or maybe warbled, or was it warped?

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This morning he couldn't help himself again. He looked. And then he looked again. The biggest gash, the upper one, had become a frame for the most beautiful woman he'd ever, ever seen. She was standing near the door, talking on her cell phone. He paused, secure behind the veil of green plastic mesh; thinking how, if she could see him, she might dismiss him as uninteresting. If she were to look at all, though, thanks to the fence, she'd only see his eye. Looking. Blinking. Thinking. Wondering. How long had he been standing here, anyway? Would he be late for work? And asking himself... would he look again tomorrow?

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opened

welcome readers & writers! i'm so glad you're sticking with me through an erratic posting schedule. i'm back in school now, and working part time. but i love to write and i love to read your work - so i'm committed to posting three times a week. and speaking of writing, i'd love to see more of it on this blog. please consider writing with me. no pressure for it to be perfect - just for us to share together in a creative endeavor we all love...

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so here is today's photo writing prompt, taken by me on a chilly, sunny day in san antonio in the first few days of the new year. see below for my non-fiction spin on the photo. writers, if you'd like to share your poetic, creative non-fiction or short story response to the photo, just click on comments below. readers, you are welcome to comment too :)

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In a few short months I'll turn forty years old. Surprisingly, it's not a usually a crisis for me. Mostly I find myself glad to be alive, in awe of what my life has been so far, thankful for for all I've learned and kinda proud of myself for the ways I've grown - emotionally and intellectually - over the years. I am deeply grateful for the abundance of gifts around me. 

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Sometimes, though, I do feel sadness over how quickly it's all going, and that (as far as I know) you only get to go around once. I look at students just entering college, or couples joyfully, hopefully, tossing their hat in the marriage ring, or young moms (this one gets me the most) just absolutely enamored with their first babies - and I feel a little jolt of regret that I've already taken my turn on those rides. I've passed those landmarks in my life and will not travel that way again. Obviously I know that learning never ends, relationships and new relationships are always to be found, and that I'll always be a mama to the wonderful boys in my life and - hopefully one day a long time from now! - grandmother to their children. 

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Just every once in awhile - even though I believe that old age is a state of mind, that people can have a positive, youthful outlook on life until the day they die - sometimes I feel a little bit wilted. Read o-l-d. Apologies to my friends over forty! I do know that forty isn't old at all. And I know that with age comes wisdom, strength, openness and a kind of beautiful depth that can only be achieved through experience and perseverance. I know that the gorgeous, older, open flower in the photo above is just as beautiful as the buds behind it. It's just that I can't seem to forget now that the older flower is much closer to the dropping petals, ashes to ashes phase of life...  

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Depressed much?  

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Rather than get lost in sadness or overwhelmed with regret, in these moments I try to focus on the gratitude, to stay present in the gifts each day has to bring, and to revel in the joy of LIFE and - this is key for me - "the afterlife."  In my faith tradition, what comes next will be even better than this; it is more awesome than a person can even begin to imagine...  Though many folks claim to understand exactly what heaven looks like and precisely how to make it happen, I confess that I don't really know. But I'm okay with that. I love a good mystery. And I love the one who, mysteriously, gave me this life to live. 

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met

hello, readers & writers!  it's monday again, the start of another week on write away every day; hope we can spend some of it writing and reading together : )

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today's photo writing prompt is another in the, ahem, san antonio series. (gee that sounds so important and official.) enjoy! writers, i'd love to read your short story, poem or creative non-fiction response to the picture; click on comments below to share it with us. readers, comments are open to you as well. see below for my poetic spin on the photo...

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was that you on christmas eve?
a blink and a double take
and you
- or maybe not you - 
were gone
lost to me in a crowd three deep,
brushed past on the path
in your wool coat 
going the other way 
again.
are we perpetually bound
to pass each other 
going opposite directions?

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indeed we are -
bound.
or don't you recall?
one to the other,
though of course we would 
never make it;
james bond be damned.
not the way we intended to,
longed and hoped and planned and prayed to be.
but a person doesn't make vows like that
with all her might
only to walk away scot-free.
those bonds are cast 
in heat, 
and when taps sounds at the end of a very long day,
in the cool they turn to steel.
they become chains
and, together or not,
we two are bound.

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our lives - if not intertwined -
intersect
at times.
and always in a crowd
on all saints day or
the end of may
or new year's eve 
we are bound
to blinking and staring
and double takes.

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and then, well... so what?
so what if that was you
in your wool coat
brushing past me
on the path
going the other way again?
just, so what.

found

readers & writers, welcome! hope your week is unfolding gracefully (or at least quickly -- the weekend is on its way)! 

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some of our best stories on write away every day have come from mundane photos of found objects like this one. come write with me! share your short story, poem or creative non-fiction by clicking on comments below. i'd love to read your take on the photo. here's my fiction spin on it:

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"Already? You're flipping kidding me," Sarah thought as she watched the styrofoam cup leave her hand and land in the garden outside her office. It was always like this on the down side. The simplest task - like brushing her teeth or reaching over to turn out her lamp at night - became overwhelming and complicated. Even throwing away a stupid paper cup felt too hard, and her body was prone to acting without her brain's permission. That's always how she knew it was time to be extra vigilant about taking her meds, seeing her counselor, not taking on extra projects at work. It felt like she'd just come out of a depressive cycle, and yet here she was again. That's how it was. 

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The highs never lasted long enough, but they were awesome. She could stay up half the night cleaning house or writing letters and still bounce out of bed in the morning. Granted, it was hard to sit still or focus on reading or relax and watch a TV show. On an upswing, she wouldn't have bought the cruddy vending machine coffee anyway. She'd have ground the beans fresh and brewed her own, adding a splash of soy milk and a dash of cinnamon to her favorite to go cup.

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She sighed, bending over to pick up the cup. "And here we go again..."

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drenched

a good monday to you, readers & writers. and, for those of you who live in the united states, happy Martin Luther King, Jr. day! may his legacy live on and inspire us to goodness, peace, justice, and equality. many thanks to all for your kind words about my first published story... saturday was one happy day for me :) 

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today's photo prompt is another from my trip to san antonio. writers, please join me in writing about it! i'd love to read your poem, short story or creative non-fiction reflection on the photo; just click on comments below to share it. readers, comments are open to you as well. Here's my creative non-fiction spin on the photo:

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In the time it takes a penny to tumble through the air and belly flop onto the water, sinking to its new home, a thousand wishes leave me and telegraph themselves to the heavens. The wishes I wish are between me and the fountain; if I wrote them here they might not come true. And, let's face it. They might not come true anyway, but that I still believe in "making a wish" means I have faith in something.  Someone shrouded in mystery and love is listening, and it's okay, good even, to want something - to have words of hope leave me and join the uneven melody of water meeting water, meeting ceramic. 

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I always cheat when I toss those pennies - loading way more than one wish onto the tiny copper surface of a coin that doesn't buy anything anymore. And when I do, the same thing happens time and again. In the time it takes the penny to tumble through the air and belly flop onto the water, sinking to its new home, one wish rises above the rest and telegraphs itself to the heavens. And in that moment I know myself better than the moment before.

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published

welcome, welcome readers & writers. today's photo was taken by my oldest son. it goes well with my story - which is not here - but in an online journal, The Rose & Thorn!!  Yes, my friends, as of today i am a published author. i submitted a short story, Song of First Light, to the R&T and they accepted it for their winter issue. i'd love for you to read it. click here to go to their site. (when you get to the site, click on the cover artwork to get to the index of stories and poems).  

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writers, please feel free to use the photo for a writing exercise; submit your poem, short story or creative non-fiction piece by clicking on comments below. i love to read your work! readers, comments are always open to you as well.