Tag: #writingchallenge

Posted in Fiction

Coffee – #JusJoJan 2018

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She had spent some of the best times of her life in Jamaica. When she was sitting at her desk in their home on her beautiful island, trying to write, she found herself thinking of Jamaica. Not really about the times she spent there, but about the climate. The climate was always the same. Hot and humid around the coast no matter the time of year and cool as you went into the interior of the island. The Blue Mountains made up the interior, where the coffee plantations were located. Those mountains reminded her of her home in the Appalachian Mountains.

It was a hot November on her beautiful island. The daily temperature published in the media was always ten or more degrees lower than what it really was. The temperature hit 90F degrees every day. The air conditioning in the house had been damaged by Hurricane Irma and wasn’t cooling very well. It was hard to stay inside because it was so hot, but she felt the need to write. Creativity wasn’t coming easily in that environment, particularly since she felt she had a jailer lurking right outside the door.

He wouldn’t go anywhere with her and if she tried to leave for the day, taking one of the day trips she loved, she would see the look in his eyes when she left and when she returned. Barely concealed rage and anger. It just wasn’t worth it. For the first time ever, when she is on her island, she is missing her home in the Appalachian Mountains.

Thinking about the last two years, she slowly starts to realize the state of her marriage. She has tried valiantly to save it, but she is gradually realizing there is nothing to save.

The realization dawns on her that it is time to try to save herself. Is it too late?

 

This post is part of Linda G Hill’s JusJoJan 2018 Challenge. Prompt by Barbara. Drop by and visit her site!

 

Posted in Fiction

Pants – #JusJoJan 2018

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Soon after a major event in her marriage took place in the South and she returned home, she spent a lot of time at her kitchen table. A cup of tea and her computer in front of her, she would write, then cry, then write some more. She smiled when she thought of her tea. He had always laughed at her health obsession although it helped him too. Her tea was tumeric/ginger/lemon and was a detox agent though a delicious one. It helped her focus, but it seemed nothing could stop her crying. Talking to friends and family helped.

She thought back about him and their marriage this morning. She knew, intellectually, that he had committed fraud when he married her, only interested in money. Deep in her heart that was hard to accept, so she found herself examining their marriage.

Not long before their scheduled trip south, more than two months ago now, she noticed some real behavioral changes in him. Their relationship had not been good for a while, certainly two years or more. Suddenly, he began making remarks to her, acting in peculiar ways. She asked him to talk to her. She was met with stony silence.

One afternoon, a few months before the trip, she was washing dishes. The dishwasher was beside the kitchen sink and he started to unload it, even though she had not asked him to do so. He looked up at her and said, “I’d rather be living on the streets than with you.” She was so shocked that she just stood there for a moment. Then, she turned and walked toward the bathroom, her heart pounding in her chest.

She grabbed the edge of the bathroom sink, feeling as if she would faint. She looked up at herself in the mirror, her breath coming hard, in pants.

“What am I doing with this man?” she thought. She had no idea why he had just said what he did.

She had a gut feeling.

”Someday, he’s going to hurt me.”

 

This post is part of Linda G. Hill’s JusJoJan 2018 Challenge. Here is the challenge and the rules

 

 

Posted in Fiction

Room with a View – #writephoto

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The vines were growing up around her window. They were beautiful in their own, wild way. They were threatening to obstruct her view. She would send word to the gardener to trim them back, but only just a little. Not only were they pretty, but they gave her a modicum of protection.

The house was set back from the country lane, but her window looked out onto the lane. She had a good view. She could see her neighbors driving their cars, walking their dogs, walking with their children. They couldn’t see her because of the appearance of frosted glass. She liked it that way.

Her reclusiveness had started a long time ago and had worsened as she aged. Her house was wired so she could communicate with the outside world and do her work. She could order most of what she needed. She only had to get out occasionally. She enjoyed three friends she allowed to visit and she didn’t allow any family.

She became a recluse after she retired from her career. Back then, she still came and went, but only some. Then she stepped out of her comfort zone and allowed her husband back into her life. The worse things got between them, the more she cloistered herself. When he finally left her, her solitude was complete. Her embarrassment total. Her room with a view became her home forever.

Thanks to Sue Vincent for the #writephoto challenge.

Posted in Fiction

Memories – #JusJoJan

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She remembers the first time they met. What’s it been? Oh yes, 43 years ago. A lifetime of memories. They were very young. The first thing she noticed about him is that he was very kind. They started dating. No boy that she’d ever dated had been this kind to her. After several months passed, they moved in together. Living together was popular in those days. They decided to eventually marry.

They married and those were the halcyon days. Theirs was such a calm household. She’d never lived in a tranquil household. She’d grown up in a household filled with hysteria, yelling, upheaval. When she looks back, she thinks that’s the reason she married him the first time. Her search for love and peace. Her parents weren’t brave. They didn’t discourage her. His mother was brave. She took both of them aside individually and advised them against marriage. She knew they loved each other, but they came from such different backgrounds. His mother knew it would never work out in the long run. They didn’t listen to her and she was right. She died a year later.

It’s been a long time and memories of that early time, those early years, have faded now especially since there are so many bad memories. But, she remembers the early years as good, fun, romantic. Something she only recently learned wiped away some of it. He told her he had an affair for the last ten years of their first 18 year marriage. She’d had no idea. She had been crushed and nothing had been the same since. He had persecuted her so badly during their first divorce for the things she had done.

Their second marriage to each other was a mistake. She had to walk away now from the good memories and the bad ones. The good ones broke her heart. The bad ones would make her old and bitter. She didn’t quite know how to walk away from the boy she grew up with and the very different man he had turned out to be. It had all gone so terribly wrong.

She hung her head and cried all night as the telephone remained silent.

 

This post is a part of Linda Hill’s #JusJoJan writing challenge for 2018.

 

Posted in Fiction

Passionate – #JusJoJan

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She couldn’t remember the last time she felt passionate about him. She was capable of such passion about so many things. Sex and love in her marriage used to be two of them. Her husband only cared about sex in their marriage and when she was ill and sex was not possible for a time, he became resentful. Without sex, he withheld love. Without love, the desire for sex with him died within her. She knew they were at a stalemate.

The longer the stalemate went on, the more resentful about sex he became and the more embittered about love she became.

Resentfulness turned into aggression and combativeness on his part. He became deceitful. Without love, she became contrary and morose. Feeling passionate toward him didn’t seem  possible any longer. They were estranged while living in the same house. He wouldn’t talk to her, wouldn’t communicate about their situation.

She tried to do things that would make him happy. It was late in life to divorce, but she couldn’t see how they could stay together. It was so uncomfortable. It took a shocking turn of events for her to remember the mental illness that plagued his family and the symptoms that he was exhibiting.

She was afraid and she ran.

 

This story is part of Linda Hill’s JusJoJan 18 challenge.

Posted in Fiction

Boisterous – #JusJoJan

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He spoke in a most boisterous way, telling her he was never coming home. Asking her where home actually was? Telling her he had no home. That home certainly wasn’t with her. He even emphasized it. He said he was never, ever coming home.

She had given him the run of the place since they had married. It had become his home more than hers. He did whatever he wanted. He’d changed it. With tools and carpentry, certainly, but also just with his argumentative, aggressive presence. Everywhere she looked, it was his home. She knew what he meant. She hadn’t made it official. She hadn’t gone to the courthouse. Put his name on the deed. She was afraid of doing that. One other time, he had essentially blackmailed her into giving up her home. Another city. Another house. In another time. She couldn’t take that chance again. She had never put any constraints on him here.

Now he was using emotional blackmail. With every word he spoke, it became too late. In his rough, tempestuous manner, he was killing anything that was left between them. He hung up the phone. It was done.

 

This post is part of Linda Hill’s Just Jot Jan Challenge 2018

Posted in Non-fiction

Drama – #JusJoJan

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Drama. What a word to start off the Linda Hill’s Just Jot Jan Challenge 2018 !

There are lots of definitions of the term “drama.” The current popular usage of drama is when emotional conflict is caused by a person or a situation or surrounds a person or situation, for whatever reason. Drama also describes the production of certain types of plays or television shows and branches of literature. It always involves conflict.

At this point in my own life, I like to avoid drama, but drama is not avoiding me. I am undergoing a change in my living circumstances that has turned into something fairly dramatic. Not of my own choosing. I find myself wondering why, at my age, can’t people just be adults as opposed to badly behaved children? Particularly when the change in living circumstances was their idea! I’m likely to think of the word “drama” pretty often in the early part of. 2018. At least I hope it’s only in the early part of 2018 and not in the later parts of the year. Going back to the definition of drama, I can be certain that conflict will be involved which I dislike even more than drama!

By this time in 2019, I hope all drama and conflict in my life will be long past and the future will be bright once more.

Rules for the #JusJoJan 2018 Challenge

Here are the general rules to follow for Just Jot it January:
1. Just Jot It January starts January 1st, but it’s never too late to join in! Here, we run on the honour system; the “jot it” part of JusJoJan means that anything you jot down, anywhere (it doesn’t have to be a post, it can even be a grocery list) counts as a “Jot.” If it makes it to your blog that day, great! If it waits a week to get from a sticky note to your screen, no problem!
2. I’ll post the daily prompts at 2am my time (GMT -5), every day except for Saturday’s Stream of Consciousness (SoCS) prompt–you’ll find that one on Friday morning at 9:30am. That daily post (i.e. this one) will be where you leave your link for others to find in the comment section. There will be a prompt for every day except Wednesday, when the prompt is simply my One-Liner Wednesday.
3. As long as your blog is on WordPress, you’ll be able to link via pingback. To execute a pingback, just copy the URL from the daily prompt post, and paste it anywhere in your post. Check to make sure your link shows up where you want it to, and go back occasionally to see other bloggers’ entries – the more you visit others, the more they’ll visit you! If you’re participating from another blogging host, just drop a link into the comment section. Note: The newest pingbacks and comments will appear at the top.
4. Tag your post JusJoJan and/or #JusJoJan.
5. Write anything! Any length will do! It can even be a photo or a drawing – you’re going to title it, right? There’s your jot!
6. The prompts are here both to remind you and to inspire you to write. However, you don’t have to use the prompt word of the day. You can link any kind of jot back here. Note: If it’s 18+ content, please say so in a comment with your link or close to your pingback.
7. If you’d like to, use the JusJoJan badge so that others can find your post more easily.

Posted in Fiction

Another World

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”Daddy, what are those whirly things sticking up toward the sky?”

”Daniel, those are a new kind of antenna to listen for signs of life on other planets.”

”You mean like when you found life on Mars, Daddy?”

”Yes, Son.”

Daniel was twelve years old and his Daddy was an astronomer at the U.S. facility in Flagstaff, Arizona. It was 2030 and they had just finished transporting people to a facility they built on Mars after receiving permission from a small colony of Martians they discovered.

”Remember what I explained to you, Daniel? See the funny color of the sky? Our air will not be breathable very soon. We’re trying to transport the people of the Earth to other planets. Mars can’t hold them all. Here are the listening devices that go with the antennas. Do you want to listen?

”Yes!”

Daniel placed a set of ear buds in his ears. He watched the display. He heard a screech and jerked the buds out as he called his Daddy over.

“I just heard a loud noise.”

Daniel’s dad grabbed the ear buds and started looking at the data. A planet was trying to contact them!

Posted in Fiction

Blue – #writephoto

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The old man ran up and down the streets of the village calling for everyone to come to their doors and look. The village was built on the edge of the ocean and, as the sun rose that morning, the old man saw something he had never seen before. He wanted to share the magic.

“Come, come,” he called, “You must see the sky and the waters.”

As he called out and the villagers gradually awakened, they came to their doors, then to the street, and looked out. Gasps could be heard up and down the street and they started spilling out their doors to go to the water’s edge.

The sky and the ocean water, right after sunrise, were the most brilliant blue they had ever seen. Both, the same vivid, compelling blue. The villagers started wading in the shallow water and they felt the magic in the water.

That was in 1960. The event was a legend in the history of the island village. The elders of the village told the young people how it had changed them. They were never concerned about material possessions again. They were forever after only concerned about the island and its people.

Posted in Non-fiction, Uncategorized

#SoCS – 12/30/2017 – Resolution

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When Linda asked us to respond to the prompt “resolution” for this weekend’s #StreamofConsciousness challenge, it was easy for me to instantly know what I would write about and I decided to let my consciousness just go ahead and stream.

For the first time in over nine years, I will spend 2018 living alone, except for my little dog, Hanna. This coming year, in fact, will be only the second time in my life I’ve ever lived alone, the other time being from 2000-2007. It’s been a long time and, in the month I’ve lived alone so far, it’s been a big adjustment. Just finding out I would be alone was the result of a shocking turn of events in my life. I doubt that I’m over that shock yet. I don’t think we know when shock goes away, do we? I think it ebbs away from our subconscious minds, and perhaps our conscious minds as well, very gradually.

Since I lived alone for a few years in the past, I do know a bit of what to expect. From a practical point of view, I have to get back to taking care of my home on my own again which is no small feat. I’m used to sharing chores and now all the chores are mine, both indoor and outdoor. The first week was hard. Then, I remembered how I’d done everything in the past and, since then, it has become easier by the day. I still have a lot to remember. Things that just haven’t come up yet.

I have business I’ve had to take care of and, of course, I want to continue writing. Blogging, magazine articles, website articles and copy, and finishing up some long form writing projects I have going. A novella. Two actually. Maybe another novel. I want to also work on a serial. I may go back to online teaching in a semester or two.

Besides the practical side of life, there is the emotional aspects of living alone. I don’t really get lonely, so that’s not much of a problem for me. As an only child, I learned to entertain myself and those skills carried over to adulthood. I work from home a lot. It takes time to take care of my home, both inside and out. The business aspect of life takes time. I also have excellent friends. Then there is Hanna, my dog, who definitely takes time. I’m training her to be a good companion dog. By the time I accomplish all this in a day, the day is done.

I do still have to deal with the shock and emotional trauma that precipitated my change in living circumstances. That’s not going to be accomplished overnight. In fact, it will take a long time, if I ever feel free of the events of the past two months.

So, my resolution for 2018? Quite simply, survival. I don’t think it’s a resolution that will be forgotten the first couple of weeks of the year.