Finishing

My final writing prompt for my Creative Writing Degree.  It's nice to end on a fun note.

5 Star Review!

            My life has been forever and irrevocably changed by the amazing T-376 Commuter's Helmet from Narco Leptic Industries.  Never before and never again have I owed such a debt of gratitude to a five pound yellow gadget from Japan.

            My husband, Hal, was born with an unfortunate and debilitating disease.  While this disease has not yet been identified by the scientific community at large (the bastards), I am confident that someday a cure will be found and he will finally be able to live a normal life.  Until then, he is forced to suffer through the pain and humiliation of his condition.  We did not discover this terrible affliction until after our first son, Hal Jr. I, was born.  Soon after our beautiful child's birth, right around the day Hal Jr. I began to walk (two months early, the boy is a gifted and talented athlete, mark my words), Hal Sr. began to suffer from unexpected bouts of narcolepsy.  He would fall asleep at the most inopportune times.  My Aunt Patty's funeral.  My mother's 60th birthday extravaganza (which I planned myself.  It was a beautiful day.  Family flew in from all over the country - all over the world if you include cousin Connie from Canada.  There were live doves and an ice sculpture of my mother's bust.  The band was divine and the food came from a renowned catering company in upstate New York, Verma's.  I'm still getting thank you notes from the guests.)  He even fell asleep once while we were watching Nicholas Spark's epic movie, A Walk to Remember.  His kleptonarctic bouts seemed to be intensified by particular brands of beer.  Bud Light didn't seem to affect him too much (he didn't like the taste anyhow and dumped a bunch of it into my flower garden before I realized what was happening.  Poor begonias), but Guinness Stout knocked him right out.  His symptoms seemed to be even worse in the afternoons when Hal Jr. I liked to be at the park.  Hal Sr. would just drop off right in the middle of anything and I'd have to take Hal Jr. I alone. The only time he didn't really seem to have a problem was in the evenings after watching Game of Thrones.  He had plenty of energy then, if you know what I mean. 

            Well, after about a year of this, I began to get really desperate.  Poor Hal Sr. was just so miserable.  His afternoon naps stretched on and on and I was worried he might fall asleep at the office.  We certainly couldn't afford for him to get fired.  I mean, I'm a SAHM (stay-at-home-mom) and I can't imagine parting from my little cootchy-coo.  One day while I was surfing the internet and Hal Jr. I was playing Jeopardy on his iPad, I came across this product.  It was like fireworks went off in my brain.  Finally!  Hal Sr. could nap and still be part of the family!  He could use this handy invention at work, too!  As long as his desk was facing away from the door, it would look like he was awake and working hard!  Of course, it is a little odd that the  T-376 Commuter's Helmet from Narco Leptic Industries resembles a construction helmet.  But some double stick tape and scrapbooking paper I had leftover from Hal Jr. I's baby album fixed that right up.  Now Hal Sr. has a stylish and functional treatment for his unfortunate condition.  Thank you T-376 Commuter's Helmet from Narco Leptic Industries!  You've changed our lives!

(Here's the link the real helmet that inspired my fictional review http://tech.ca.msn.com/holiday-guide/photogallery.aspx?cp-documentid=26213455&page=7 )

Perfecting

Call it a product of lots of work and little time, or maybe classes which all seem to share threads despite being almost wholly unrelated, but lately I've been thinking a lot about how powerless I am in my own skin.

I talk too much.

Or maybe it's powerful.  I am powerful in my own skin.  I can do things, be things, try things.  I don't have to do it for anyone but me.  I don't have to do it unless I want to.  I can look at the map and choose the road and see where it goes.  And be okay even if I get turned around.

I am a bonafied know-it-all.

It's funny.  I haven't noticed myself getting older.  It just sort of happened.  Snuck up while I was napping.  Little spots on the back of my hands, wrinkles around my mouth, gray hair.  I've settled into my thirties, somehow, just in time to get ready to leave them.  Mid-way, mid-life, mid-me.  I'm not excited about forty in four years, but it's coming anyhow.  Coming quick, filling up the blurry lines between hours.  So I guess I better get used to it. 

I am a lazy housewife, a distracted mother, an impatient teacher.

I didn't think I'd be finishing my degree at thirty-six.  (At times I didn't think I'd be finishing my degree at all.)  But, here I am, ten weeks away - give or take - and staring down the barrel of what's next.  What is next?  New places?  New faces?  New houses?  New goals?  I'm not sure and the waiting is rough.  But, next is coming anyhow.  Coming fast.  I can't see it yet, but I can hear its breathing.

I am incredibly selfish.  And often pretty mean.

I've spent a lot of time - wasted a lot of time - not measuring up.  At least in my own mind.  It's really easy to be not quite good enough.  Not faithful enough.  Not pretty enough.  Not funny enough.  Not friendly enough.  Not smart enough.  Not skinny enough.  Not creative enough.  Not engaged enough.  Enough for what?  Enough for who?  These are questions I'm only just now beginning to ask myself.  Who set my bar higher than I can reach it?  Was it me?  Why'd I do that? 

I am not very good at finishing what I started.

I have only just begun to realize how empty my own promises are.  If I can just lose X pounds, everything will be perfect.  If I would just read my scriptures more, pray more, be more faithful, everything will be perfect.  If I would just take more time to look pretty, everything would be perfect.  But, even if I do all those things, everything won't be perfect.  More importantly, it will still be okay.  I will still be happy.  I will still be loved.  I will still have many blessings.  I will still be me.  Of course, I can always want more, work more, try more.  Not because I need to measure up, but because I already do measure up.

I am already enough.

Circling

How do you feel? 

Facebook keeps asking me that like it is a living, breathing person who cares.  Silly facebook, I know you're not real. 

But still.

I feel overwhelmed.  I have so much to do and not enough hours in the day.  If I sleep in (which I did), I scrutinize those minutes and wonder if they are wasted.  If I watch TV, play a game, do nothing, I feel like I'm running behind.

I am too busy.

But not too busy for facebook to keep asking me how I'm doing.

I guess that's ironic.

Or it's just that I need to sometimes come up for air.  For pause.  For full stop (like this weekend when I ran around California with my sister and ate lots of In-n-Out.  It was good, the burgers and the running and especially my sister.)

I felt refreshed, and then I pushed play.

And now - how do I feel?

Overwhelmed.  There are not enough hours in the day.  If I sleep - well, why don't we find out?

Realizing

Once, when Josh was still very small, my mother-in-law turned to me and said:

"You know, it's like he's always been here."

And right there, in those eight words, she perfectly captured my faith in God.

There are days, like today, when I look at my child and I can almost see eternity stretching backward like a long unfurling satin wing.  We've been on this path together for a while now, though we've forgotten the greater part.  But it was only just tonight, while I had my hands in a bubbly sink full of dishes, that I came to understand the significance of that.




I often think to myself: I am failing my child.

or

I am a terrible mother.

or

I can't believe I just did that, again!

or

What is wrong with me? These kids are making me crazy and they're not even doing anything wrong!

or

I should not be his/her mother. 

or

It's no wonder we don't have any more kids.  I don't deserve them.

or

Well, you get the idea.  I am always surprised when I hear other women express similar thoughts or feelings, especially the women who continually amaze me with their creativity, energy, and down-right awesomeness.  But, that is perhaps a whole other conversation.

Tonight, hands in the sink, right after I thought I am a failure as his mother, it came to me that no, I had it all wrong.  In fact, I wasn't failing as his mother - I was chosen to be his mother because I have some special skill or talent that he needs to get through mortality in one whole, healthy, happy piece.

I have no idea what tha skill is, mind you.  But, I feel like there is more truth in this idea than I've been able to recognize before.  And it's not that I'm somehow spiritually connected and so in the zone that suddenly God shined a light over my sink and the heavens opened and sang. 

No, it was quieter, softer, gentler. 

And that's why I trust it.

Exercising

My brain.  This is the short piece I started working on based on someone else's brainstorm image from class.  I am still trying to write every day, but some days my laziness is just too strong.  Like the force, only less cool.  Still, I'm writing a bit of something most days (and I am not short changing myself when that 'writing' is part of school work.  I have a LOT of it right now, and we're only two weeks in.  Last semester I got a bit lazy and paid the price with last minute rushing; this semester I want to go out nice and easy...if possible.)

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Safe Haven

In the milk aisle at Costco, Elise’s four year old daughter Candy announced that she had to use the restroom again. She bobbed on her little feet, knock kneed and bubbling over with all the urgency of her four-year-old full bladder. She pulled at the hem of her pink tutu and tried not to make eye contact with her mom. Looking down at the top of her daughter’s restless blonde head, Elise tried to hold back the irritation that churned in her stomach like bad yogurt. They had already stopped to use the restroom four times since they left the house, and that was only two hours ago. Once for Candy, once for her two year old brother Tyler, once when the baby in Elise’s belly began to push painfully on her bladder, and once when Tyler spilled a drink down the front of his frog-dotted green shirt.

“Are you sure you have to go?” Elise said.  It came out as something like a growl and split the word sure so that it had two sliding syllables. Shhurah.

Candy nodded, pigtail braids bobbing against her chest. The purple ribbons had come untied and flapped loosely against her white cotton shirt. She bit the bottom of her lip hard, turning it white between her small teeth.

Elise sighed and turned the cart toward the bathroom. In the little seat at the front, Tyler swung his legs haphazardly, his shoes bumping against Elise’s thighs. Candy skipped along beside, bladder momentarily forgotten because of the bright lights and bulk goods stacked high.

Back at the front, Elise waited with Tyler just outside the door while Candy tripped through into the women’s restroom.  Elise could just make out the pitter patter of Candy’s mary-jane shoes and then the silence that follows a closed stall door.  It always made Elise nervous to use this kind of arrangement, but it was easier than taking everything, including Tyler, out of the cart.  Tyler started to fuss while they waited and Elise had to strain to hear through the door. 

 After a few minutes Elise started to feel nervous.

 A few minutes more and she started to unbuckle Tyler from the metal cart.  She pushed the door open with her toe while she fought the buckle.

“Candy?  Candy honey, you alright?” she said.  Tyler slapped playfully at her face with his chubby hand and pulled the russet hair that spilled over her shoulder.  “Candy?”  Her heart seemed to be creeping up the back side of her throat with every ticking second.

“I’m coming, Momma,” Candy said finally.  “There’s hair on the floor, I’m trying to clean it up.”

“Ugh, gross,” Elise said to herself.  Tyler came free and they pushed in through the red bathroom door.

Inside, there was more than a little hair on the glossy tile floor.  Long black sections snaked down the whole length and Candy had her hands full of inky tendrils. 

“I’m helping, Momma,” she said smiling and holding up the hair like an offering.

“You’re a good helper,” Elise said, but distracted and hurrying over to take the hair from her daughter’s hands at the same time.  “Don’t pick up anymore, come over and wash your hands.” 

Tyler bobbled against her side and reached for the hair Elise had taken from Candy’s small pink hands.  The smile fluttered on Candy’s face and fell from her cheeks.

“Are you mad, Momma?” she said, sliding her hands down her shirt to wipe off the hair.  “I’m sorry.”  Her rosebud lips trembled, her blue eyes wide. 

“Don’t do that! No, honey, I’m not mad.  Where did this all come from?  Was it on the floor?”

“The crying girl behind the big door, she was cutting it off and throwing it on the floor.  I told her she’d get in trouble, but I don’t think she could hear me because she’s so noisy.”

“I don’t hear anything,” Elise said, growing more alarmed.  She pushed Candy behind her and edged toward the gray metal door at the end of the row.  It stood slightly ajar, unmoving on its hinges.  “Stay here, Candy,” she said. 

She shifted Tyler on her hip, tucking him closer to her side, before she pushed the door open with red lacquered fingertips.

Brainstorming

Classes officially started back up this week.  At times I am just shocked to be in the homestretch of classes, but then other days I am wondering why it isn't over yet.  This semester I'll be taking six classes.  S-I-X.  I also took six last semester and did ok until the very end when I lost my brain somewhere between Thanksgiving and Neverland.  This semester I am trying to stay more organized and on top of assignments so that I'm not battling down to the last moment.  Two days in and I've almost missed one quiz already so I spent a fortune in ink printing out all the class due date schedules. 

Anyhow, the first assignment for my creative writing class is to come up with a "spring loaded image."  I have the same professor as last semester, so I've actually done this before.  A spring loaded image is basically a short description of an image ripe with potential.  The example my professor uses in class is "A Wedding Cake in the Middle of the Road."  (If you clicked on the fancy linky-loo, you would have seen that this idea was made into a book back in 1992 , which just happens to be when my professor was taking a graduate class taught by one of the editors.)  So for today's writing (as a side note, I've only missed one day so far and I'm calling that success), I'm going to share some of my brainstorming ideas.  Don't expect them to be much, just a stream of consciousness to get the juices flowing.  Incidentally, if you come up with a spring loaded image of your own, I'd love to read it in the comments (wink wink).

---

Ballet shoes without ribbons
A half eaten sandwhich on a park bench
Crows on the porch beneath an open window
A downed telephone wire
An upside down truck on the roof
A man danging head first out the window
A baby in a stroller in the middle of the street
A record player stuck in the rut of a song
An empty cathedral
A molded cheese ball in a dark refigerator
The smoking wing of an airplane (anyone else imagining an airplane wing with a cigarette?)

 

Beginning

The mountains shrouded

With swaths of wispy clouds
Sweetly white where they cling
Like babes to their mother’s breast
And snow falls fast, feather upon feather
Blotting out the brown and gloom of winter
Promising ice-kissed spring not far behind.

The slopes of old regrets

Go sweeping down
Fast, fast upon the mountainside
Until the depths are reached
Darkness and despair in the canyons
And everywhere shadows
And everywhere paths pointing north

At the precipice

An empty hour
Bird calls and swooning wind
A thousand syllables of lost love
Buried in the scent of pine and moss
Growing things asleep in beds
New tomorrows under foot.

A lot riding on a little

Today I channeled my creative energy into a short essay/letter/thing which described my desire and ability to be a teaching assistant while I'm a grad student.  I feel like there is a lot riding on this essay/letter/thing - I can't afford grad school unless they accept me.  Unfortunately for me, the university I currently attend does not like to accept students who graduated from the same university into the Creative Writing Master's program.  I am hoping that the relationships I have made and the samples I submitted are argument enough to get me by.  In the meantime, cross your fingers, toes, and arms for me.  I won't be put out of my misery notified about acceptance until March.  Here is a snippet of one of my writing samples:

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Three news vans huddled like a herd of praying mantises around the bus, antennas extended.  Reporters tried not to blink at the bright light of the cameras while they rehearsed in front of a tangled knot of onlookers for the impending live shot. The reporters were as close to the yellow police tape as they could get without pushing against it.  Four cops patrolled the border, faces hard.

Deliberately casual, Sasha stepped over the yellow tape in one of the gaps between officers. Sparky noticed first, as she knew he would. He walked over to her quickly, shaking his head, his hands resting on the clunky police belt around his waist.

“You know you can’t do that,” he said.

“They key is pretending like you belong here,” Sasha said. She smiled at him, looking up because he was a good six inches taller than her five-foot-five frame.

“You can pretend all you want,” a smile threatened the corners of his eyes, but he held it in. “You still can’t come in.” He pointed to the other side of the tape.  She shrugged and crossed back over.

“What’s the scoop, Sparks? They got you on guard-dog duty again?”

Sparky shrugged. His real name was Phillip, but as a rookie he always got stuck patrolling the perimeter of the crime scenes and Sasha started calling him Sparky after her sister’s German shepherd.