Posted in poetry, tagged choice, depression, gratitude, inspiration, metaphor, one day at a time, poetry, positive attitudes, the emotional life on August 26, 2023| 1 Comment »
Life is too short to be wasted in finding answers. Enjoy the questions. Paulo Coelho One square block of sidewalk. Sometimes it appears sufficient, a part of a whole. On other days the pocked places rise. And the darker pebbles act as if they are meant to rule my spirit. As if the promise of lighter squares on the path ahead couldn’t exist. I’m stuck. One more step, then one more until the walk becomes a journey again.
Posted in short story, tagged acceptance, birth defects, compassion, disabilities, encouragement, experience, inspiration, Maya Angelou quote, positive thinking on August 20, 2023| Leave a Comment »
I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. Maya Angelou
ONE, TWO, THREE, GO
The other side of the bus door would become a faraway adventure to another state. Faraway, a vague notion that showed up only in Lucy’s story books. The little-kid kind. The ones she could read. She told her boss at the thrift shop where she had worked that she wanted to wait for the bus alone. She would be okay. The new place wanted her, and that made her happy. She could be the strong middle-aged woman her body said she was.
She felt the stare of a small boy who could be five, standing next to her. She knew what he saw. An awning-sized forehead, small green-pea-sized eyes, and a jaw as square and pocked as a sidewalk block. Didn’t matter. Bigger people stared, too. Maybe grown folk weren’t as blunt about it as kids. They were all rude.
Lucy’s mother had a troubled pregnancy and delayed birth. Lucy’s brain didn’t get sufficient oxygen. She understood why that made her learning slow, kind of. But she couldn’t see why she had to be ugly, too.
She turned toward the boy, slightly. He paused, then buried his head into the shoulder of the woman with him. She leaned toward the other side of the long bench, her eyes closed, and either sighed or moaned. Lucy couldn’t tell. She stayed focused on the door that would open soon, her exit from the impossible, thanks to the kind woman she worked for at the thrift store, who saw her frequent bruises and wouldn’t stop asking about them.
But Lucy didn’t have the money for rent and all the bills that came with living alone. She had to stay with her father. He apologized later. Said he missed Lucy’s mother, and couldn’t get over her death. That’s what set him off. How could a woman as good as his wife get cancer? But he wasn’t nice to her before she died, not that Lucy could remember. And apologies didn’t help when, in a drunken rage, he stepped on Lucy’s chest and broke a rib.
Lucy cried in the bathroom at work because each breath brought a nasty stab. That’s when her boss insisted that she tell the truth. Now. The police came in, and her father ended up in jail. Summer and winter mingled inside Lucy, next to the hurt, both relief and rejection. But her boss turned her confusion into spring. She had a friend who owned a sprawling three-hundred-acre farm. She offered Lucy a home and a job in her house. However, Lucy would have to move to Indiana, more than a hundred miles away. The friend would pay for the bus ticket. Lucy’s boss added a word new to Lucy: stipulation. Her father could not visit until he had been paroled for two years and sprouted wings and a halo.
Lucy fidgeted with the handle on her suitcase. She hoped she had everything she needed: a few pairs of jeans, some T-shirts and sweatshirts, a worn coat wadded into a ball, a toothbrush, and toothpaste. A half-dozen storybooks.
She looked into the glass door of the parked bus but got lost in her own reflection and winced, frightened. Did her boss tell her friend how ugly she was?
The little boy got up from the bench and came closer to her this time. He tapped her on the elbow. “Scuse me,” he said. “You going to Shelbyville, too?”
Lucy nodded.
“My Uncle Red brought me and my mommy here, but he had to go to work. She can’t walk good. Can you help her get on the bus?” he said. “Please?”
A man disconnected the guard rope.“Be glad to,” Lucy said, noticing the woman for the first time, as she leaned into a worn suitcase and grabbed a cane. The woman breathed as if she were in pain.
“It’s a long ride to Indiana,” Lucy said as she took a few steps forward. “If you like, I have some storybooks with me. My favorites.” “Okay,” the boy said. “I got some, too. Let’s share.”Lucy linked an arm around the younger woman’s waist as she looked at Lucy as if she had wings and a halo instead of a broken face. A good omen.
The line paused as tickets were checked.
Lucy whispered. “I have a small pillow with me. It’s new and clean. Your mama can use it. But can I ask if you or your mom have trouble with your eyes? Is your vision okay?”
“We see just fine,” the boy answered. “Why do you ask?”
She laughed and turned to the boy’s mother. “Okay, ma’am, My name is Lucy. I’m glad to meet you. One, two, three, go.” For both of us.
Posted in short story, tagged acceptance, apology, choice, death, guilt, homosexuality, inspiration, perspective, positive attitudes, Robert Brault quote, sensitivity, suicide on August 13, 2023| 5 Comments »
“Life becomes easier when you learn to accept an apology you never got.” — Robert Brault
FINAL APOLOGY
Dear Helen,
I’m sorry. Three syllables, like tiny drops of water offering to renew a desert. I’ll whisper them to Lyle during his funeral. Tomorrow. Even if it is too late.
Remember how Lyle always was a tad different? Borrowed Mom’s lipstick when he was five and painted his lips instead of the wall. Mom didn’t understand. She couldn’t understand anyone. Her actions mimicked the uneven beige wallpaper flowers in our attic storage room. Not only bland. Disconnected. Didn’t matter what anybody did. When Lyle’s report cards dropped from A’s to failing in middle school, she reacted the same way. Numbed on antipsychotics. Better than when she wasn’t.
Then Dad left and took Lyle with him. Good move. At least he graduated. Got a commercial art degree and a good job until his boss found out. You know. About how he was different. Downhill developed into an avalanche after that.
You managed the falls, like always. You were there for him.
Lyle called you from Michigan. Often. You told the latest Mom-sitting-on-the-porch-naked stories and sent him exotic pears. Shared hair dye secrets.
No surprise when Mom died in the expensive facility. Just before her sixtieth birthday. And the cash ran out.
You got busier. And busier. Took on more work than anyone else on the sales team.
When Lyle called and said he needed to talk, you were working on contracts. Two at the same time. You told him you’d call him later. He swallowed so hard you heard it. In the noisy office with rock music in the background. In desperate memory now.
Then came the call from Dad. The note. The details…
I can’t write any more now. Later. Maybe. Can’t sign a letter written to me. When I’m ready to step past the fact that Helen could have stopped her brother’s suicide and didn’t.
And forgive her—forgive me…forgive me… Tell me about how I held up the mountain before it fell. One more time.
Posted in short story, tagged communication, fantasy, fiction, forgiveness, inspiration, irony, kangaroo character, L.M/ Montgomery quote, penquin character, perspective, positive attitudes on August 6, 2023| Leave a Comment »
Manure City University
“It’s dreadful what little things lead people to misunderstand each other.”
―L. M. Montgomery
Penguins and kangaroos don’t live on the same continent. Yet, Penny and Kango are university students in this tale. Since some human creatures believe space lasers started the California wildfires, I am stating: this story is fiction.
The college name appears distracting. However, even in today’s reality, words have multiple meanings. On the island manure referred to common happenings in real life. Word meanings change over time. For example, internet referred to two nets dropped for the same fish.
Penny and Kango spoke a semi-common language. However, different definitions and idioms often confused them. In Penny’s tribe, the word lounge meant escape. When Kango told Penny he was going to lounge in the common area, Penny assumed his roommate wanted him out of his metaphorical hair.
In Kango’s tribe, Penny’s word for please repeat meant I-am-irritated-big-time. A screaming hyena interrupted Penny when he asked Kango to repeat what he had said about a student who had fleas. A fire bell rang. It stopped Kango from smacking Penny on his left wing.
Fortunately, the words communicate and forgive made a perfect fit in all student dictionaries. Communicate and forgive appeared in an unexpected conversation the roommates had on the grounds between classes. Penny spoke one word and Kango mouthed the other. Exactly how that could happen is another story. It occurred after a lightning strike missed the pair by a miracle and a half. A moment the current world needs. With enough communication and forgiveness.
image made from public domain photo and colored paper
terrypetersen 