Scissors with black handles / Melinda Jean

The idea, owning her own. Grandmother was a seamstress and her anxiety around Andrea using them made sewing a task not a pleasure, which she dearly resented as the smell of fabric, could seduce her.
The sound the paper pattern made when her hand swept across the crinkles flattening it onto the cotton print. Pinning each long pin with its brightly colored balls on top. When the brown shaped tissue lie with all the pin-tops showing she felt she was part of some tiny celebration, a carnival of sorts. Then moving the blackhandled scissors the sharp precise blades coming together as the fabric fell to either side freeing it into the possibilities of becoming something. The thoughts of the finished dress, putting it on and all the places she could go dazzled her. Excitement filled her limbs. She almost shook with happiness as she pressed each seam through the zipper foot. The singer clomp clomping along, the rhythm of her own life, her own dress and one day her own scissors.

Refrigerator Art / Melinda Jean

To her it was art. The pictures of her niece and nephew, the Chronicle’s worn photo of the Obamas gleefully all hand and hand in coordinated colors.
To Him it was clutter.
She moved a few feet away, “How’s that?”
He moaned then smiled.
From year to year the pictures of her beautiful niece with the beautiful brown eyes, younger in black and white and then later in color. She was special you could tell. Her mom in other photo leans in exuberant, a single mom their close relationship beaming back from the cream refrigerator.
She took off a few more.
He allowed the eye clutter not to disturb him.
They had been together for years.

Refrigerator Art- Cyndi

She stood and stared into the open fridge trying to decide what to eat, or even if she wanted to eat anything at all. She knew it was mealtime, but she just didn't feel that hungry, and with no one else in the house she thought it was kind of pointless to cook very much anymore. Slowly she shut the door part way until the light went out and she caught a glimpse of paper held up by magnets on the other side. She leaned against the door, shutting it all the way and relaxed her body- almost as if she were embracing the old appliance. There were more and more pieces of colored papers all over the fridge- wrinkled, tattered and faded from the passing of the years. She gave in and let herself wander down the path of times past, when the house bustled with the chatter of childrens voices. And it was not just her own that had filled the space that was now so empty around her. There had always been a parade of friends in and out, having meals and snacks, hanging out and adding to the general revelry that always seemed to be a part of their home. She tentatively reached out her hand to touch the worn pictures and recalled the preschool days of finger paints and learning the alphabet. Then came the grade school years with each kid in turn doing the same required art projects, only putting their own slant on it when it was their turn and making it uniquely theirs. Middle school brought academic awards and certificates and the poor fridge had overflowed as the papers gradually crept onto the side wall of the kitchen. They were taped in place, lower at first as far as the little arms could reach, and slowly the artwork climbed higher and higher as the kids grew. They had been reluctant to remove any, so the wall eventually became a gallery of sorts. Eventually some of the lower ones were taken down, as the dog they had begged for, started ripping into them.

Now the kids were grown and gone and there was nothing new from them to grace the sacred space. At first there had been postcards and a few letters, but now they only communicated by phone or email. You can't post that on the fridge! She sighed and opened the door again. Life moves on and so must she. She reached in and grabbed a plate of leftovers to warm in the microwave.

-Cyndi
January 16, 2010

8/8/1988 (Dixie)

Life Before Children (LBC).
What was that?

Dim memories surface, then sink back down, like jewels in quicksand.
There they go, those memories...
No, wait!
Sports car leaps out of the mud, blue and gleaming. It grows large, sprouts wings and soars into the clouds. Disco music suddenly fills the air. Oh, oh, Aretha Franklin, Hot Tuna, Boz Skaggs. Waylon Jennings pulls up the commune on a magic carpet. What's that smell? Marijuana, the ocean, plumeria, lasagne. Motorcycle surfaces in roaring splendor, makes a mess, shouts sex and possibility. Sunday sighs, nothing to do but sleep in.
The jewels settle down, dot the surface, and sink
into 8/8/1988.

Death Sat Alone at the End of the Bar Hunched Over a Beer - Maya

Of course, I knew who he was. Who wouldn't? The black hooded cloak was obvious enough, but the long scythe leaning up against the bar was a dead giveaway.

You know, I might have expected to get chills or be struck dumb, frozen in place, but it wasn't like that. He wasn't scary, not like you'd think.

I'd just walked in, shaking the rain off my coat and stamping my boots on the doormat when I spotted him at the end of the bar. i didn't even stop to think about it, but hung up my coat on the rack and took the stool next to his. The thought did cross my mind - who was he here for? Was it me?

"Hello, friend," I said. And then I got the my biggest shock of the night. When he lifted his head to look at me, I saw that he wasn't a he after all. Death was a woman.

She had thick wavy black hair speckled with silver that fell forward out of the hood when she looked up, and her eyes were the bluest blue I'd ever seen. Our eyes locked and neither of us looked away.

"Sometimes I hate my job," she said. No preamble, no social chit-chat. Just that.

"I'll bet," I said. "Who ya here for? Am I allowed to ask?"

"You can ask all you want, I won't tell you. Can't."

"Well, then, can I buy you another beer?"

She looked surprised. "Yeah," she said. "I'd like that."

We sat in companionable silence for a while. It was - I don't know - comfortable somehow. And the funniest thing? No one else seemed to notice.

Prompt, 10/3/09 - Death Sat Alone at the End of the Bar, Hunched Over a Beer

Death of a Beloved- Maya

Alone in the house

for a week,

I thought about it.

What if this were

my permanent condition?

Not a little break, a respite,

a rare chance for solitude,

but the way, the state of being,

the everyday condition.

Finding the house locked up

every day when

I get home from work.

No one to cook for.

The handyman chores hired out

or left undone.

 

It is not a question

of maybe,

but rather one of when.

And who.

 

For one of us

will face this.

Jane Kenyon knew it. 

She wrote –

One day it will be otherwise -

And it was,

for her and Donald Hall,

she succumbing to leukemia,

and he left to write

his poems alone.

 

I loved this week,

the house quiet and all mine.

No struggling over who

gets to use the iMac now.

Cooking and eating

what I wanted

when I wanted it.

Peaceful late afternoons

in the hammock.

 

But always, always,

lurking somewhere

in my mind, the knowledge

that what is treasured now

could be despised later.

 

The death of a beloved,

a ghost of the future

haunting the house.

Maya, 8/29/09, Prompt: Death of a Beloved

A Wellspring of Spirit - JohnD

Prompt: A Wellspring of Spirit 08/22/09

We were down thirty-five to seven and Randy kept saying “Let’s go. We’ve got a chance.”

Let’s go? I laughed at the absurdity.

“The Hell with it!” he said finally. “You guys have given up. I’ll run it alone. I don’t need any of you."

I was offended. I think we all were. We were trying, but we were realistic, too. Randy was in la-la land. It seemed we were all in agreement: if he wanted to run it alone, let him. At the snap of the ball, we braced ourselves temporarily for the Mustangs' charge, but then, with very little fight, we let them slip through.

With his right arm, Randy tucked the ball tight into his body. I guess the Mustangs couldn’t see the ball. If he had it, of course, we would be protecting him, but we weren’t. They looked elsewhere, but nobody else was running or doing much of anything Then it was too late. Randy had momentum and they didn’t. He flowed through their defenses like water over stones.

Thirty-five, fourteen and we were back on the field in four minutes. Randy tried to get us pumped up again. Nothing! We were impressed, sure, but one lucky run wasn’t going to win the game. Now, the Mustangs were ready for him. He wouldn’t fool them again. He didn’t. He ran. Again, we did next to nothing for him. They were on him like a pack of wolves. And though they brutalized him, they didn’t bring him crashing to the ground. It was more like they crushed him from all sides. Out from the middle of that, he twisted and flipped around, hitting the ground running. He got hit again and again, but he harnessed the impact of each hit and catapulted himself forward to a fierce and motivational touch down. Thirty-five, twenty-one.

After that, we were all believers. We drove, rushed, fought, fought, and fought. We lost: thirty-five, twenty-eight. But we were a wellspring of spirit. The crowd went wild. I mean wild, absolutely wild. And they were mostly Mustang fans, on their own field. I think we gave a lot of people the show of their lives. Later, I learned that folks heard the cheering from that field almost two miles away. It was the greatest loss ever. I’m proud that I was a part of that.

“Let’s go! We’ve got a chance.” Randy was right about that after all.