100 words #6

Okay, so I didn't get this done in a week. I will still make it to 7, though!

I chose 7 adjectives and 7 nouns at random from the dictionary. I matched up one of each for seven days. Each day for a week, I will write a 100-word story using and/or inspired by (loosely or closely) each word pair.

#6

adjective – unrifled: of a firearm; not having rifling or internal spiral grooves inside the barrel

noun – remanence: the magnetic flux that remains in a magnetic circuit after an applied magnetomotive force has been removed

Will a magnet stick to a Slinky? A slinky’s metal, right? It makes a sound like metal. Slinky slinky slinky slinky. I wonder if that’s why they named it that. Slinky slinky slinky ow! I better not snap it like that anymore. I’m hungry. Grapes! Do dogs like grapes? Nope, dogs don’t like grapes. Ew! Okay, paper towels.... Okay, we’re out of paper towels. Um. Regular towel. Oh, it’s touching me it’s touching me it’s touching me! Annnnnd it’s in the washer. Okay, deal with that later. I’m not that hungry anymore. What was I doing? Grapes. Fridge. Magnet. Slinky! 

Does anyone see the connection between the words and the story? Yeah, pretty tenuous on this one.

100 words #5

I chose 7 adjectives and 7 nouns at random from the dictionary. I matched up one of each for seven days. Each day for a week, I will write a 100-word story using and/or inspired by (loosely or closely) each word pair.

#5

adjective – southernmost: farthest south

noun – lira: a monetary unit of Italy, Turkey, Israel, Malta, etc. either currently or in the past

Groceries:

-ramen, one case

-tortillas, 12-pack, burrito size

-peanut butter (store brand)

-jelly (store brand)

-bread (white, store brand, day-old shelf if possible)

-bag rice

-bag kidney beans

-hot dogs (regular, not all beef)

-ketchup (packets from McDonald’s on the way out)

-toilet paper (six-pack only)

-cat food

The cat doesn’t know how to eat less. She wouldn’t know why she was going hungry. It’s all right. The electric bill can be another week late until I get my paycheck so we can pay the phone bill.

This is the lowest our bank account has ever been. Happy New Year.

100 words #4

I chose 7 adjectives and 7 nouns at random from the dictionary. I matched up one of each for seven days. Each day for a week, I will write a 100-word story using and/or inspired by (loosely or closely) each word pair.

#4

adjective – planar: of or pertaining to a geometric plane; flat or level

noun – half-back: one of two backs who typically line up on each side of the fullback; the main ball-carrier in football

Apparently it wasn’t a game, it was a campaign.  And despite the name, there were very few dragons, although they—the made-up characters—did spend a lot of time in actual dungeons. Books and papers with strange charts and lists were spread all over the plane of the table. Kirk was explaining to her how his friend Jim’s character... sort of protected his own character during fights. Battles?

“So he’s like the fullback to your half-back?” she asked.

“Um, sure, I guess,” Kirk said with a look halfway between confused and disgusted. He turned his attention back to his books.

100 words #3

(I totally forgot about this yesterday! There will be another one later on tonight.)

I chose 7 adjectives and 7 nouns at random from the dictionary. I matched up one of each for seven days. Each day for a week, I will write a 100-word story using and/or inspired by (loosely or closely) each word pair.

#3

adjective – middle-aged: being of the age intermediate between youth and old age, roughly between 45 and 65

noun – enceinte: a wall or enclosure, as of some fortified place

A tire shop. A phone number. Coffee. Then a movie. Then dinner and a movie only they never got to the movie that time, couldn’t stop talking. Six months later, a casual (but actually terrified) request: “You wanna just get married?” Laughter, a kiss. A small, simple wedding. A really big yard sale, then down to one house and a mortgage with two names. Today it’s twelve years together (starting from the tire shop), and they’re both forty-seven, and they’re (inexplicably to many) just as happy as ever. She is his comfort; he is her fortress. Middle age is good.

100 words #2

I chose 7 adjectives and 7 nouns at random from the dictionary. I matched up one of each for seven days. Each day for a week, I will write a 100-word story using and/or inspired by (loosely or closely) each word pair.

#2

adjective – granular: of the nature of granules; grainy

noun – boundary: something that indicates bounds or limits; a limiting or bounding line

There’s a line of salt across the doorway, so I can’t enter. Counting every grain would take too long—five minutes, at least—and I am hungry. I can hear their heartbeats through the closed door, quick with terror, like little rabbits. Their fear smells sharp and sweet, the way I vaguely remember green apples tasting. That tang in the back of my throat only increases my thirst. There’s a scuffling from inside: they’re attempting to hide, as if it will make any difference. The curtains are closed. No salt line on the windowsill. I smile and prepare to leap.

100 words #1

I chose 7 adjectives and 7 nouns at random from the dictionary. I matched up one of each for seven days. Each day for a week, I will write a 100-word story using and/or inspired by (loosely or closely) each word pair.

#1

adjective - cross-country: 1. directed or proceeding over fields, through woods, etc., rather than on a road or path: a cross-country race. 2. from one end of the country to the other: a cross-country flight

noun - antepenult: the third syllable from the end of a word, as in te in antepenult

I can’t be last. The biggest loser in a neon t-shirt and tennis shoes. My shins are killing me, I’m covered in sweat, and my face is the color of the inside of an over-ripe watermelon. I’m not going through all of this and ending up last. I’ve got nothing left to give, but I give it anyway. I pass Grandma In Yellow Shorts. And in one last burst, I stagger across the finish line just ahead of Ninety Pound Ponytail Girl Who Is Probably Anemic. Yes! Third from last. Third from last isn’t too bad for my first marathon.

Check-in

It is now slightly more than halfway through the year. (Cue flailing and shock.) How am I doing with my not-resolutions from the beginning of the year?

I will spend less time on the computer and more time reading books.

Um, sort of. I still probably spend way too much time on the computer, but I have read 21 books so far this year! I've finished a total of 2 (TWO) books since school got out. You know, a month ago? Oy. I did a lot better with this when I got 20 minutes of reading time with my students times three classes a day. I didn't read the whole 20 minutes every class every day, but even with just 20 minutes a day, period, I made a lot of progress. If I wasn't suddenly hooked on the Supernatural DVDs a friend is loaning me, I would probably be getting more reading done.

But hey! 21 books in just over 6 months! Not bad, I think. If I push it, I might make 50 by the end of the year, and that would be awesome! 
 
I will purge useless/broken/unwanted/unused stuff from the house.

I had a yard sale a few weeks ago. We got rid of the queen bed in the guest room (and replaced it with a futon which takes up way less space), a little table, some speakers, the bean bag chair we never used, and our old bookcase. We now have room for two NEW bookcases (which are jam packed full! and now there are NO books in stacks on the floor in my office), and we shifted some things around the dining area so it's more open and, I think, looks nicer. Anything not sold at the yard sale was carted off to Goodwill. Yay! We also cleaned up the guest room a little, got rid of an embarrassing amount of trash, I even managed to part with some wardrobe items I never wore. 

I will write at night in my Book of Days planner/journal at least a few lines about that day.

I've been pretty good about this. What usually happens is I'll space it for a while, then do two or three or four days at a time, but that still works. (Sometimes I look at my Facebook activity to remind myself what I did!) It will be really cool to look back on this in a few years, or even a few months. However, it's not exactly something I'll want to pass on to my children and grandchildren. There's some really really personal stuff in there. It's a just-for-me treasure. 

I will be a better housekeeper (which will hopefully be easier to do with less Stuff).

After the yard sale, the house was a wreck for a while as we moved things around, waited until we had money to buy bookcases, put them together, organized books, etc. etc. Ugh, I hated it! Since we got all of that squared away, however, it's still looking pretty nice. The piles of books on the floor of my office have a place now, freeing up floor space so there's only a very small pile o' stuff in there now. For the most part, dishes are being washed and then put away in a reasonable amount of time, mail gets sorted as soon as it comes in, the laundry is under control(ish), and you can usually see the surface of both the coffee table and the dining table! 

I will be a better listener and not an interrupter or a wait-until-you're-done-talking-so-I-can-say-what-I-wanted-to-say-er.

I think I am getting better at this. Although with some friends, sometimes, the only way to get a word in edgewise is to interrupt! ;)

I will pray more.

This still isn't happening as much or as often as I'd like it to or it should be, but what I have been doing is when I tell someone "I'll pray for you," whether it's on a Facebook post or in a letter or a text, I pray right then. There at my desk, in the car, wherever, just a quick prayer for them and their situation. That way I don't forget about it by putting it off until "the right time." It's always the right time for prayer.

I will write more--more letters, more blog posts, more journal entries, more stories, more poems.

Not so much with the blog posts, eh? I did, however, participate in Camp NaNo this June. It's just like NaNoWriMo in November, only they do two sessions in the summer: one in June and one in August. I wrote 50,138(ish) words in 30 days. The quick way to describe the story is "1920's carnival time-travel romance." I really like the story and I have the next at least 20-30 pages fairly well plotted out. Past that, I have more vague ideas, but I do have ideas! I thought I might have enough for a Book Two, but now I'm thinking it'll probably just be Part Two of the same book. I haven't written anything since June 30th (that's 11 days now), and I really need and want to go back to it. I'm actually not totally sick to death of the story, and I have IDEAS! This is a big deal. I've done NaNoWriMo 7 years in a row and have never finished any of those stories. I did continue to write on a couple of them past November, but then those, too, petered out to nothing. It would be a really great step for me to FINISH a story!

I've also tinkered with a couple of short stories, and of course I've done my usual geeky RPG writing with a couple of friends on IM. (I bet between the three of us, we easily do 50,000 words a month.) And I wrote three letters just today!

I will find a lesson plan format that works for me and I will plan in advance as well as I am able.

This was mandated by my school. After a lot of fussing and asking questions and "what if"ing and discussing, we finally got a template that, I think, works pretty well. It's not overwhelming, but it communicates to the teacher (me) and any administrators that happen to walk in generally what we are/should be doing that day. It's good. I just print out a few at a time and fill them in with pencil, usually for anywhere between 2-5 days at a time.

I will remember that I am not teaching Language Arts, I am teaching people.

(This is turning into a really long post, sorry.) This isn't an exact response to the not-resolution, but stick with me. During the Midsummer Night's Dream/Summer Solstice party I helped to host and throw last month, we did a neat little ritual I read about online. Everyone wrote down one or two or a few things they wanted to let go of, then we threw the scraps of paper into a fire as a symbolic gesture of watching them float away as smoke. I wrote down "anger" as one of mine. Certainly my students, individually and as a group, would really get on my nerves sometimes, especially the last month or so of school. Too often, I came to realize, I would react in anger instead of rationally and calmly. I realized I even do it at home to my husband sometimes, even to my pets! I've been trying to be conscious of that, and when I feel that anger rising up in me, I remember (or attempt to, as much as I can) that I'm speaking to a person (or an animal) and that 99% of the time, what they're doing is not to personally upset or attack me. They're just being themselves. I need to chill out, breathe, and handle the situation appropriately. Little by little little, I'm getting a bit better at this. 

I will not dwell on the past any more than I can absolutely help.

This is hard. I miscarried my second child in February, and this is the thing that comes up to bother me the most. The most often and the most strongly. It seems like sometimes when I think I'm doing really well, almost to the point of being smug about it--"I can look at this friend's baby pictures on Facebook and not cry!" "I can have a conversation about childbirth with a friend!" "I can talk about our 'someday' nursery or parenting skills with my husband!"--that's when I get slammed the hardest. I literally feel sick and my body feels heavy. I don't know how healthy this is, but the only thing I can do, right now at least, is to push it away into the back corner of my mind and make myself focus on something else. Usually this is after I've given into the feelings for a while and cried, sometimes alone, sometimes with a person I love. I might write about it, or just compose an imaginary blog post or letter in my head because I deal with things in words. And then I have to put it away, because otherwise I can't function and have a happy life. If I dwell on it, I just can't. So I guess I'll just continue to struggle with this... I don't know how long. It won't disappear when I finally hold my own baby in my arms, but maybe, hopefully, it will lessen. I just want to be pregnant and give birth to a healthy baby so, so badly. If you pray, please pray for my husband and I.

I will Skype loved ones that live far away.

I have not done this. I should.

I will love this year.

Yeah, for the most part, I have.

Words

Why do people feel the need to *talk* so much?  

"I'm home!" when you come through the door. Well, obviously. I heard the door open, I heard you clomp inside in your boots, heard the dog yap and run toward you. It's fairly obvious that you are no longer out there but here. Thanks, got it.

"I'm so mad right now!" Really? I couldn't tell. Smoke is practically pouring from your ears, you're red in the face, eyes scrunched up in frustration, the muscles of your neck and arms tight, your hands in fists. Thank you for telling me you're mad, otherwise I wouldn't have picked up on it.

"Are you hurt?" I stood up right beneath that shelf and you almost heard my teeth rattle from the impact. I'm clutching my head and tears have sprung to my eyes. But did I hurt myself? You just want to make sure before you start comforting me.

This isn't directed to or from any one person, just... people. I'm not frustrated or angry about this. Just sort of bemusedly exasperated at the weirdness of humans. Aren't we weird?

"I love you." I know. I know you do. I can see it in your eyes, I hear it in the way you speak to me. I feel it with the way your arms wrap around me and your legs tangle with mine, and I know you love me because you tease me and pick on me text me stupid things to make me laugh and think about me when you see a website or a movie I might like. You don't have to say it for me to know. You don't have to say it.

But I like hearing it. I like knowing that yes, you're human just like I'm human, and when you say "I love you" or "I'm home" or ask "Are you hurt?" you're reinforcing that what I know, what I feel, is valid, that you know and feel it too. That we're both people together, spewing out utterly pointless words just to keep feeling human.

So maybe the words aren't totally pointless.

Poe Night

Welcome to the (first annual?) Edgar Allan Poe Night, co-hosted by Ann and Heather at Ann's house on the evening of 21 October, 2011.

{{Click the pictures to make them bigger and start a slideshow}}

For you literary types, you can play Spot the Allusion. We have bits from "The Cask of Amontillado," "The Raven" (several times over--you may find a [paper] bust of Pallas over a doorway if you look very closely) of course, gifts from the Poe Toaster (the mysterious man who visits Poe's grave every year on his birthday), and "The Fall of the House of Usher."

There were also black paper cutouts of rats lurking around the walls from "The Pit and the Pendulum", Ravenwood red wine, blank bookmarks to decorate with fake quills (red Bic pens with black feathers taped on top), plenty of old books, lots of candles, plates with quotes from Poe's poetry, prose, and criticism written on them, mismatched wine glasses, banners made from fabric and pages from an old, falling-apart book containing some of Poe's stories, illustrations from that same book adorning the table, wonderful food, and even better company. The whole thing was conducted solely by candlelight.

We played True or False with facts about Poe's life and works, and everyone learned a little something. Someone read a poem that reminded him of Poe and someone else read the poem from "House of Usher." Thanks very much to my friend Ann for hosting; all I did was bring decorations the day before and help set the table earlier that evening. Everyone had a wonderful time, and I can't wait to do it again, whether it's another Poe Party next October or a night honoring another author in a few months!

Autograph Book

I went to 5 or 6 different yard sales on the way home from knitting group this morning. AMAZINGLY, I only bought stuff at three of them, though I totally made out like a bandit, especially at one! I've been looking for some very specific things, which I might start showing you after a bit, and I did not let myself look at any clothes (er, except I did buy a Cheshire Cat t-shirt and a pretty wrap skirt, and I coveted a couple of fur coats but didn't buy them). I could yammer on about the other things I got, but I'll save that for later. Today I want to tell you about the autograph book.


An autograph book is a little book of blank pages in which a person collects the autographs of friends and acquaintances, although they often also contain little notes, poems, rhymes, jokes, or even drawings.

I like how she added "Sunday" before School-day Memories, and wrote the name of her teacher, "Brother Wilcox" instead of the more typical year she graduated from that class. It's also got her address, which you can bet I will be scoping out soon, if possible.

This is the autograph book of Annie Lillian Lambert. I know her middle name, even though it isn't in the autograph book, because I also bought her 5-year diary, which was sporadically filled out for 1943 up until July 16th, with three entries in 1944. (The diary, the autograph book, and a really cute 1930's children's book I got for $1 all together.) In the diary, she mostly wrote about the parties she went to with friends, receiving letters from various boys, who drove her home or who she sat next to on rides around town (and what a "swell guy" the beau of the moment was), and the occasional prayer meeting at church or test at school.

The first handful of pages appear to be filled in by visiting preachers, maybe at revivals or just from gentlemen who came to preach at her church. I know sometimes "back in the day," nearby towns used to swap preachers for a Sunday. After that, the rest of the pages (and there are many!) are written in by Sunday School friends. There are also quite a few from people she met at a church camp called Pinecrest (written "Pine Crest" in the book) Camp in Palmer Lake, Colorado. A Google search pulled up The Historic Pinecrest, a lovely place to get married, with a chapel, an event center, and a lodge. Only the chapel looks like it might be remotely "historic," but I couldn't find anything more about it. Either it's a different place altogether, or it's undergone a lot of remodeling since 1945.


"May 28, 1944

Dear Annie,

Cows like punkins
Pigs like squash
I like you
I do by gosh!

A friend
Ruth Rupe"

There are several Rupes in the book; I assume they're siblings and/or cousins around Annie's age.


"June 11, 1944
Grand Junction, Colo.

Dear Annie,

Annie is your name.
Grand Jct. is your station,
Flearting (sic) with the boys
is your chief accupation (sic).

Sgt. George Gray
&
Bertha Whitesel
&
Flora Rupe"

I wonder where she met these folks! I'll bet she was very excited to spend time with a Sergeant! And who are Bertha and Flora, and why did they feel the need to sign the same page but in lead pencil as opposed to the blue pencil George signed with? Just friends being silly after the fact, or were they really there and just used a different pencil?


"Aug. 16, 1945

Dear Ann,

When you are kissing your sweetheart,
Out by the gate,
Remember, love's blind
but the neighbors ain't.

Your friend at Youth Camp,
Carlene Alexander"

From the 1944 diary entries, I'm assuming she's at least in high school from all the talk about "driving around" and "he drove me home!" Was she really that big a flirt and that boy-crazy? Or am I just getting a small part of the story--the things she thought were important and wanted to write about and the things her friends wanted to remember and tease her about.

Many of the preachers and some of the friends or acquaintances wrote well-wishes and exhorted her (one even used that word, exhort!) to live a life for God, that she would be a blessing to others, that the Lord would bless her, that God needs her talents, and so on. Reverend C.E. Myers from Osborn, Missouri, at a revival in Grand Junction on May 6, 1944, wrote Rom. 11:33 on his page. The verse is, "Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways!" John H. Kane of Anderson, Indiana, (camper, preacher, or friend?) recommended Annie memorize 1 Cor. 10:13, as "It will help you much." That verse is, "No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it."

Lila Mae (with whom Annie spent many days and nights, according to the diary) wrote "In your fruitcake of friends, remember me as the nut!" after her little note, but she wrote it upside down and added in the corner, "Ha! ha! I made you turn upside down." There's also some sort of code on the edge of her page. I'm sure they were very close friends with lots of inside jokes.

There are several references to the colors of the pages, usually in rhyme (these are only a couple): "I'll be polite and write on white/ And save the yellow for your fellow." (Lila Mae) "I'll write on yellow 'cause it is mellow" (Myron Hogen/Hagen?) In the book there are white, yellow, pink, and blue pages. I think this must be typical for autograph books because of the rhymes, which the folks who signed must have memorized and written often in various autograph books. One person named Lowell Ely (maybe? water smudged it) wrote around in a spiral, "Some people write up some write down Just to be different I will write around." Bertha Whitesel (who may or may not have known Sgt. George Gray!) added to the end of her cute poem, "Yours till the Mississippi wears rubber pants to keep its bottom dry." I also saw "Yours til the butter flies," and, "Yours till the popcorn balls."

I'm sure this is WAY MORE information than any of you really wanted or certainly needed, but I just love this whole thing! I understand the thrill of being a historian or an archeologist, now. You only have so much to work with, but by putting pieces together, matching up handwriting, finding out information on places, dates, and names, and using a little imagination, you can put together a picture of someone's life decades or even centuries in the past!

Did any of you ever have an autograph book? What are some memorable things you've seen in autograph books or yearbooks? What sorts of things did you used to write?

Drip.

Mini-lesson tomorrow on writing in the second person ("you" instead of "I" or "he"), and general fun creepiness for October and the fast-approaching Halloween. Students will choose a phobia from the sheet they've been working on (using the dictionary and another source to utilize prefixes and roots to find the meanings of phobias!). The following is the model I wrote.

---

Hydrophobia

Drip.

What was that?

Drip.

That sound, that maddening sound.

Drip.

Water. There is water on your floor. Water falling from the ceiling into a puddle on your floor, an ever-growing, slickly wet puddle of water.

Drip.

Each sinister drop adds to the puddle, creeping closer and closer to your safe, warm bed.

Drip.

Your toes curl. You clench your fists in the bedsheets. You squint your eyes shut, but that does not drown out the sound.

Drip.

Frantic, you cover your ears, palms pressed tight, eyes still shut, but you hear it even still.

Drip.

In your brain.

Drip.

Driving you mad.

Drip.

One...

Drip.

drop...

Drip.

at a time....

...

DRIP.