The Catch

October 14, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Birthday, Fishing, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Just for fun, Micro-fiction, Relationships, Siblings, Surprise, Vegan 46 Comments

“What’s with the basket?”

Sharlynn’s lip curled up. “For the catch.”

Robert raised an eyebrow. “Thought you went vegan.”

“I did,” Sharlynn grinned. “But Bertrand resists, and I thought I’d shock him and prepare fish for his birthday dinner. It’s not every day that a man turns half centenarian.”

Robert groaned. At forty-nine, he was next in line.

“So,” Sharlynn’s eyebrow matched her brother’s. “May I come aboard?”

“Sure,” Robert waved in half-invitation, half-defeat.

“Don’t look so worried,” Sharlynn laughed. “I’m gonna clean’em up myself. Also, Bertie’s getting kale quiche. What I truly hope to ‘fish’ is some fresh seaweed.”

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers (Photo prompt © C.E.Ayr)

A Matter Of Scope

October 12, 2020October 12, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Quotes, Reflections, Writing Tags: Arts and Crafts, Botany, Creative writing, dVerse, Flash Fiction, Historical fiction, Making it work, Micro-fiction, Prosery, Quote, Relationships 35 Comments

(Photo: Anna Sullivan on Unsplash)

“It was never a matter of reach, but of scope,” Morris mouthed the words around his pipe.

Ethel harrumphed under her breath, but gently. She had to take care to not move the petals or she would have to restart the lot, and there was nothing she disliked more than having to redo tediousness. Be it in business or in marriage.

“Cannot see what you find in him,” her mother had criticized her daughter’s choice of man.

“Perhaps we look at him through the wrong end of the long telescope of Time,” her father had chuckled in knifing disapproval.

“Too long a telescope it must be,” her mother had deadpanned.

Her parents were both gone now. To the shorter end of cholera. Left Ethel and Morris the house. And a failing botany business which they were slowly but assuredly pressing into sought after art.

Prosery quote: ‘We look at him through the wrong end of the long telescope of Time’ (Hummingbird, D.H. Lawrence)

For the dVerse prosery challenge

In Opposition

October 10, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Current events, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Poetry, Reflections, Writing Tags: Asinine, Current events, Elections, Future, Having a voice, hope, parenting, Poetry, Politics, Protest, Vote, Weekend Writing Prompt 21 Comments

(Photo: Liam Edwards on Unsplash)

They stood in opposition to

Those infatuated

By the asinine,

Those energized by contempt,

Reveling in hate.

They stood in opposition to

The denial of reality

And the dismissal of

Fact

And science

And pain

And death.

They cast ballots in opposition to

Ineptitude upheld as

Strength,

And insults as

Saving face.

They linked

Metaphorical arms

In solidarity with

Truth

And hope

In possibility of

Reclaiming faith.

To show their children

That voice

Helps.

For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Asinine in 74 words

Going Farther

October 9, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: CCC, Coming of age, Creative writing, delight, Fairy Tale, Fantasy, Flash Fiction, Folklore, Forest, Just for fun, Micro-fiction, Photo prompt 16 Comments

into-the-woods-ccc100

On the tenth visit on the tenth week following her tenth birth day, she took ten additional steps beyond the Big Tree Boundary.

She went Farther.

At first nothing happened. The woods looked as they had before. The trees no different in the Farther Realm than they were in the land she’d known and was allowed in until then: Green branches, a ground springy with the fallen leaves, wind whispering in the tree tops, birds’ song.

Then the light shifted and the air shimmered with a sense of something else. A being with.

She shuddered. Not in fear but with expectation. Not everyone went Farther, and none she knew spoke of what they’d found.

She stilled. The world around her blinked. The forest floor awoke.

Her heart raced and she inhaled. Her soul spoke. She knew it! She knew it! She’d be among the few allowed to see Fair Folk.

For Crispina’s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Cleanup Crew

October 7, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Clean up, Evolution, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Just because, Micro-fiction, Precautions, Storm, Survival 48 Comments

“Well, that’s not too bad,” Irvin scratched his chin. The scruffy look added credibility, but the cost in itchiness was high.

Darwin nodded. Looked bad to him, but he wasn’t gonna say nothing. He always ended up sounding stupid and he’d heard enough evolution jokes. Thank you Mom and Dad.

“You get the rake and the bin. Start scraping,” Irvin ordered. “I’ll go check the inside.”

Awning roof sure slants funny, Darwin thought, but didn’t say. Just made sure he was on the far side of the van when the corrugated metal screeched.

Survival of the fittest and all that.

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

(Photo prompt © Sandra Crook)

Tucked In

October 6, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Meditations, Muse and Flow, Poetry, Reflections, Writing Tags: Blanket, Calm, Creative writing, Dream, Lullaby, Night, Poetry, Quadrille, Rhyme, Sleep, Writing prompt 27 Comments

Photo: Peter Oslanec on Unsplash

The voice of song

Lulled her to sleep

As wind whispered

Leaves into heaps.

Her mind soared on

A night’s journey’s sweep

As breathing slowed

And memories steeped.

Her body warm neath

Blankets soft and deep,

She sighed and found

A dream to keep.

For the dVerse poetry quadrille challenge: blanket

Pathfinder

October 1, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Trauma and Development, Writing Tags: Adversity, Apprehension, Bus ride, CCC, Creative writing, Flash Fiction, Going home, Hypervigilance, Micro-fiction, Photo prompt, Wary 26 Comments

bus-interior-wet-day CrispinaKemp

It was going to be better once she got there. Not like last time.

She held her purse on her lap with both hands, knees together, spine away from the cushion and her body swaying lightly with the movement of the vehicle, as she watched the world roll ahead of the front window, indistinct in the liquid grayish light.

It’s been raining for hours. A persistent misty drizzle that had dampened so many of her earlier years. She shuddered even though the bus was overheated. Perhaps because she sat in her coat.

The driver leaned on the horn and she released one hand to steady herself against a possible braking. Her seat in the center of the last row had no armrest, but it was the only one with a clear path out.

She always needed to have an unobstructed way out.

And yet, there she was, going back.

For Crispina’s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Definitely Not Pie

September 30, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Curiousity, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Just for fun, Micro-fiction, Mystery, neighbors, Pie contest, Science Fiction, Unexpected 65 Comments

“Is that where it goes in or is that where it comes out?”

Shirley thought it was obvious, but it was true one should not assume, let alone when something appeared to be mundane but could be the exact opposite. She took a step forward and leaned closer.

“Step back, you fool!” Daniella pulled her neighbor away from the bin that had just manifested onto their shared driveway. She should have known Shirley would be impulsive. The woman once cut into her own potentially-prize-winning rhubarb pie before the contest was even over. “Are you trying to get abducted?”

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Zany Blayney

September 26, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Poetry, Reflections, Writing Tags: Ditty, Family, Just because, Just for fun, Micro-fiction, Mime, Poetry, Practice makes perfect, Rhyme, Weekend Writing Prompt 37 Comments

krisffer-aeviel-cabral-MANyoqKE-8c-unsplash

(Photo: Krisffer Aeviel Cabral on Unsplash)

He copied how his father walked.

He mimicked his older sister.

He laughed at jokes nobody heard.

He scared the babysitter.

He wouldn’t do a thing

That wasn’t done by others.

He was an endless mirror

And annoyance to his brothers.

He drove them all to near insane

Till finally came the time

When he left to get

Hired as a mime.

For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Zany in 62 words

Left Hanging

September 25, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: Arguments, CCC, Cinderella, Flash Fiction, Micro-fiction, Oh oh, Ouch, Photo prompt, Relationships, Splitting up, Writing Challenge 13 Comments

sole-shoe CrispinaKemp

She didn’t need to be quite so blunt.

Not that she ever did mince words. Or hold back actions.

It was what he loved about her. It was also what became exhausting. Fending off arguments. Splitting hairs.

He wasn’t averse to a good conversation, but was it really necessary to have confrontations about the best-by-date of parsley or whether T-shirts needed to be folded a certain way or whether such-and-such celebrity looked better before their latest procedure or if they ought to order red or yellow apples?

“You’re apathetic to the world!” she’d accused. “If you don’t care about small things, how would you care about the bigger issues?”

His sigh only infuriated her.

Perhaps it’s better that she left. But did she really have to hang her purple shoe, the one he’d gotten her, outside his window?

She used to be his princess. Now he was a stepsister.

For Crispina’s Crimson’s Creative Challenge