The Gentle Tide

Gentle breezes and the delicate kiss of the sun on your skin.  The world, an expanse of sky, a very pale blue touched with the merest hint of yellow.  The glorious soothing scent of the salt drenched air and a slow rake and draw of a receding wave pulling stones which spin and whip out circlets of spray; a pause, a held breath; the whisper of the fingers of the tide reaching in once more to caress the shore - an eternal dance of love.



Time Up.
Inspiration:  I'm upset so I looked at some old photos and this reminded me of the beautiful summer.

Sitting Here, Listening

Here I sit, listening.  It is night and quiet.  With everything off, no television, no music or radio I can hear the buried sounds that have been masqued until now.  The continuous, but gentle whir of the fan on the laptop, a distant dog barking once or twice, the tick of the clock - that timeless sound that could easily be in a Victorian parlour as in my front room.  The indescribable sound of your own fingers running through your hair: a scratching echo that must only happen internally, resonating in the cavities in your skull. 

Then the unwelcome, vulgar sound of the door opening, a voice asking a question.  It seems intrusive and alien in the peace that has cocooned you for what has only been minutes but felt undefinable as if centuries could have passed in a moment.  Because peace brings its own timelessness.



Time up.
Inspiration: The Write Practice: Focus on your breathing while you create and listen for sounds that you may not usually notice: Pen noise against the paper, the sound of the keys as you type, birds chirping outside, quiet hum of the heater, etc.

Predator

There's a flash of blurred colour; it hovers for the briefest moment and then, in an instant, it is perched and probing jerkily into the feeder outside the window.  It is a goldfinch.  I don't think they are rare, there's plenty in it garden, at any rate, but they are very exotic- a really out of place bird amongst the gentle pastel colours of an English country garden.

It's head is constantly moving like a piston, in and out of the feeder, out to either side, twisting round to look behind, on constant lookout for predators and they are always about: Cats.  Domesticated predators; savages. Mauling their victims, toying with them,  dismembering them, as if for sport, rarely for food.  I don't often see them as they slink through then along the hedgerow, undulating in and out of the foliage, at the hint of detection creating a lean statuette and then moving on placing their paws gingerly and neatly keeping their eyes riveted on the vulnerable creature fluting from branch to branch.  It might dip and lunge ending in a fluffy of feathers and a corpse on the ground but, today, the goldfinch is lucky, I am there to stand guard against our common enemy.




Time up.
Inspiration: my garden. 

Golden bubbles.

"Alright, Hels? How's the heart today?"
That's her nick-name, Hels.  Her real name is Helen.  So, I suppose it's not really a nick-name, just an abbreviation.  She is my sister.  We both know, too, that there's nothing wrong with her heart; it's a euphemism for her mind.  She's always been quite a ebullient person but there has always been the slight hint that the effervescence is the tiniest bit forced and that the golden bubbles on the surface are an attempt to hide a certain cloudiness below, even from herself.

For few months she has not acknowledged problems, she has surrounded herself with people that don't discuss important things with her or challenge her opinion, at all.  There have been massive family issues that we've all been trying the cope with and she just won't talk, just cuts the conversation off or leaves the room or cries so that we are forced to change the subject.  So much burying.

It didn't come to any good, avoiding things.  She had a panic attack at work, thought she was having some kind of seizure and now she can't stop shaking.  I know there is a clawing in the pit of her stomach, night and day, and the fear will not give her a moment's peace.  That is how it works, the fear: the feeling that she has lost control and can't see a way out of the void.



Time up.
Inspiration: I forgot to post this yesterday.  So this is my instalment for yesterday.  I hoped to capture the idea that bottling up problems is not good and the effect it can have on the mind.

The Cabin

This is my favourite place.  It is my home.  I bought it and I helped make it.  Many people think that this is a poor substitute for a real house or flat.  they come and admire it and comment on how quaint it is but, they go home and ask their husbands or wives how anyone could live in such a tiny place. They don't realise how lucky i feel to be here.  it may be cold in winter; I have to put on jumpers in the evening and a few winters back I even went to bed in a hat for a few freezing nights.  In the summer it can get boiling hot and stifling until you throw open the door and the double windows and the fresh breeze wanders through the house.

Yes, it might seem like a doll's house to many but I don't mind.  It fits me and there is no space wasted.  There is no guest room and I have to climb up a ladder to get to my own bed at night but this to me is joy, not deprivation.  I walk out on warm evenings feeling the grass underfoot and watch the midges dancing in the air.  I rest my back against the front door and feel the caress of the sun on my face.  

I watch the apple tree turn from bare, to blossom, to fruit and then watch as it weeps it's brown leaves to the ground.  I watch the blackbirds feasting on the fallers; pitted with disease and harbouring some maggots but such richness is still encased in those rosy orbs.

When I am at home, I feel that I can do or be anything I want and although the house is animate I can almost hear it's breath synchronised to mine.


Time up.
Inspiration:  I'm really rushed tonight I have loads of work to do so I wrote about a special place to me and this is the easiest one I've done.

Dormant

The North wind blew.  It blew so hard that the dew froze on the leaves of the trees making them like lace.  It froze the water on the stream at the edges leaving only a turgid and slothful movement in the centre.  It quieted the tiny song birds in the trees who were now intent only on finding enough food to see them through the day and night to come.  It whipped across the faces of people desperate enough to venture outside like razor blades until they scurried back into the warmth of their homes, shriven. It threw crows like missiles through the grey, bleakness of the sky.  It was a day to be dormant.



Time up.
Inspiration: none tonight.  I just needed to write and that's what came out. Clearly not as much as usual. 

Chekhov's Gun

Ellis wasn't an unattractive kid, he was just awkward and quiet.  Like so many teenagers, he spent too much time thinking, his black thoughts turning inwards, constantly tormenting himself over trivial inadequacies.  As a consequence, he was sullen and avoided the other students at school as much as possible.  All apart from one.  She was a golden girl, popular and beautiful but gentle and 

open, completely the opposite of himself: Jessica.  It was as if she existed for him in a permanent halo.  When she walked past, along the buzzing corridor, his gaze, although covert, devoured every single fragment of her.  He had been watching her like this for years and he was exhausted by the hollowness of his adoration.  He needed recognition.  He felt compelled to make some sort of connexion, he didn't care how small, he just wanted her to notice him, to witness in his eyes the awe in which he held her.  Ultimately, he wanted her to love him like he did her. 

He hadn't planned it exactly but he took his chance.  As she walked past on her pilgrimage to class, he allowed his books to tumble from his hand.  They slid like a wave breaking at her feet.  She looked at him and down at the floor, looked back, cocked her eyebrow at him, without the the hint of the gentle smile she used so readily for others, nearly everyone, he thought, and walked on. 

Time up.

Inspiration:  from The Write Practice, they suggest: Practice foreshadowing by writing a scene, early in the first act of a story, and slip in Chekhov’s gun. Don’t fire it yet.  Just make it present somehow.