Watching

December 27, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Professional Development, Reflections, Speech Language Pathology, Trauma and Development, Writing Tags: CCC, Chronic illness, Disabilities, Flash Fiction, Grief, Loss, Micro-fiction, muscular dystrophy, Oceanside, parenting, Progressive 10 Comments

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“See there?”

Marie squinted against glare. “The windmills?”

“No.”

David’s finger shook along with his head, and Marie felt the wheelchair’s handles vibrate. The sorrow hit her, unexpected as always. Most days now she managed to surf life without being blindsided, but it was harder to do in this place, his favorite, where everything reflected the losses. His. Hers.

“The bird,” David insisted, his reedy voice robotic with timed inhalation.

His inflection was one of the first things to go, and its absence had robbed away a part of David that she’d adored from the moment he had first looked at her, dewy-eyed from birth, and mewled a symphony of baffled indignation.

“Ah, yes, the bird on the poles! I see it now,” she filled the space with words to compensate for his worsening inability to speak in sentences.

“Watching,” David exhaled, satisfied.

For the end? Marie silenced her sigh.

For Crispina‘s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Note: Dedicated to all parents and caregivers, and to all who are navigating the throws of progressive illness. May you find peace, and space to breathe in, and may you know moments of joy and an abundance of love through life’s difficult path.

Back In Time

December 26, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: Ancestry, Belonging, Creative writing, Flash Fiction, History, Micro-fiction, Science Fiction, Self Discovery, Time travel, Troglodyte, Weekend Writing Prompt 20 Comments

Photo: Ronan Furuta on Unsplash

After years of failure, ridicule, he was finally ready.

To find out the truth. About himself. About where he’d come from. Where he would’ve belonged.

He turned the dial. Held his breath. Grasped the handles. Stepped on the lever.

The world spun.

Time thumped.

A banshee screamed in his ear. Perhaps the wind. Perhaps his own voice.

When vertigo subsided, he swallowed bile. Inhaled. Opened his eyes.

A man in furs crouched near him. Spear in hand.

Boron’s heart flooded with relief and delight.

He knew it!

He was, down to his DNA, a troglodyte.

For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Troglodyte in 95 words

Not Forgotten

December 23, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Memoriam, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Creative writing, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Letting go, Loss, Memoriam, Mentor, Micro-fiction, Tribute 39 Comments

It was his favorite saying, so of course it was the one they chose. Never mind that no one else would understand the meaning. “Others,” he’d say, “have their own stories to hoard or trim or bloat or be rid of.”

They knew that no matter how far Heaven was, he’d see this and smile.

He’d taught them to let go of what held them down.

“Gone!” he would announce, tossing fistfuls of dirt to the wind to aid the transformation. “You’re free of this. You can move on!”

His motto gleamed above the desert sand.

Gone, but not forgotten.

Photo prompt © Trish Nankivell

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Elfie’s Solution

December 17, 2020December 18, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: Aptitude, Attitude, CCC, Creative writing, Elf, Flash Fiction, Holidays, Just for fun, Micro-fiction, Siblings, Word Play 14 Comments

ccc110-elf CrispinaKemp

“Not every elf can be on a shelf.”

Elfie heard this all his life. From his teachers at the Santa Academy. From his parents, Elfonso and Elfinia. From his judgy Aunt Elfisia. And now from his insufferable brother Elfonso Junior (who everyone called EJ), who just had to rub in the fact that he had gotten into the EFS (Elves For Shelves) program, while Elfie did not.

“But what if I want to be an elf on a shelf?” Elfie protested.

“It’s not about what you want,” his mother scolded. “It is about your Efltitude Score.”

“…and,” EJ added with an elfin smirk, “as we all know, you don’t quite measure up.”

If it weren’t for his mother’s presence, Elfie would have tossed EJ under a reindeer.

Thinking of reindeer. And reins … gave him an idea.

No shelf? No problem.

He’d hang out as an elf by himself.

For Crispina‘s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Unintended Consequences

December 16, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Current events, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Allegory, End hate, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Micro-fiction, No More Hate, Pluralism, Protection, Scarecrow, Tolerance 31 Comments

“This is the stuff of nightmares.”

Nina grinned and admired her handiwork. “This is the idea.”

Daniel shuddered. This thing was creepy even in full daylight. He could only imagine how it would appear in twilight or moonlight or through a flashlight’s beam. “Did you have to make it so KKK?”

Nina’s grin slipped and quivered but returned. “Not the intent, but perhaps the effect will nonetheless be meaningful.”

Daniel scratched his afternoon whiskers. Itchy stuff, all that growing up. “How so?”

“A dilapidated, pathetically-desperate-for-a-shower bully racist figure protecting a multi-racial, pluralistic graveyard is perhaps quite apt. Don’t you think?”

Photo prompt: © Sandra Crook

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Not A Bird

December 10, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Things Kids Say, Writing Tags: Beach, Beach combing, CCC, Discovery, Flash Fiction, friends, Micro-fiction, Mystery, Photo prompt, School assignment, Siblings 13 Comments

ccc109-1 CrispinaKemp

“Hey! At the bottom of the cliff to the right. What do you think this is?”

Lisa adjusted the focus on her binoculars. “Can’t tell. A bit of junk?”

They were supposed to be cataloguing the different bird species they could find along their stretch of beach, but the seagulls were tiresome, and the sandpipers were too fast, and the wind had whipped so much sand around that she would certainly be carrying another pound of it just in her hair. Lisa wanted to go home. She wanted a nice bath, dry clothes, and a hot cup of tea.

“Perhaps a miners’ rail box.” Deena, binoculars glued to her face and hair tucked under a maddeningly practical cap, seemed oblivious to the stinging sand or Lisa’s rumbling stomach.

“Not a bird,” Lisa tried.

“No, but sure is a mystery!” Deena rose and pointed at the narrow trail. “Let’s go investigate!”

For Crispina‘s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Waiting To Travel

December 9, 2020December 9, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Grief, Harbor, Longing, Micro-fiction, Patience, Retirement, travel, Waiting 50 Comments

He left the house each morning as he always had, a bag with his lunch slung over a shoulder.

The harbor was no longer where he had to be, but work never was just an employment. It had been his world. Even more so since Marissa left to roam the realms beyond this world.

To him her current travels were as real as the ships that left for unseen places only to return with goods that others had stacked for his crane to unload.

One day he will sail to where Marissa was.

Till then, he watched each day unfold.

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo prompt: © Roger Bultot

The Present

December 7, 2020December 8, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Memoriam, Muse and Flow, Quotes, Trauma and Development, Writing Tags: Coincidence, dVerse, Flash Fiction, History, Memory, Micro-fiction, Prosery, Quote, Remembering, Revisiting, Writing prompt, WWII 13 Comments

(Photo: Adam Nieścioruk on Unsplash)

She was shaking when I entered the room. Hands wringing, lips trembling, her eyes a shade of numb I had rarely seen.

Mary had called me. She had come to check on her and bring a midday repast. Mother being too proud to ask for help, even though her legs no longer held her sturdily or long enough to cook herself a decent meal.

Appearance and stoicism were Mother’s barometers of standing.

Socially and otherwise.

Not that you’d know it from her mascaraed cheeks.

She pointed to the antique book I had gifted her the previous evening.

“I understand, therefore I’ll live,” was scribbled in the cover. “R.B. 1941“

Mother pressed a notepad on me. Scribbled on it were the same words. Same letters. An older hand.

“I forgot,” she whispered, caressing her initials. “But reading what I have just written, I now believe.”

Prompt quote: “Reading what I have just written, I now believe.” (Afterward by Louise Gluck)

For the dVerse prosery challenge

Sniffers

December 4, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: Animals, Anosmia, CCC, disability, Dogs, ENT, Flash Fiction, Just for fun, Micro-fiction, Personification, Siblings, Speech and Language Therapy 10 Comments

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“This won’t do,” Tina sighed. “You have got to sniff better.”

Spinner tried, but there was nothing. Or at least, nothing he could make heads or tails out of. And making tails was the whole idea.

He shrugged and spun around. Perhaps he’ll glean a clue from his surroundings. Perhaps it’ll settle the tension that trying to sniff things often awakened.

Tina groaned. “Mama was right. You will never amount to anything.”

“Hey!” Spinner whined.

Tina lowered her head. That had been below the belt. Still, it was true, and someone had to confront Spinner now that Mama was no longer there to instruct them.

“Look, Spin,” she tried to soften her frustration with a bit of guilt. “It really shouldn’t be so hard. You sure there’s nothing wrong with your sniffer?”

“I think it’s broken,” Spinner whispered, shamefaced. “What kind of a dog can’t tell the smell of poop?”

For Crispina‘s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Note: Anosmia, or the lack/loss of sense of smell, is a real condition that was made famous by the pandemic but is certainly not limited to the current virus. Nor is Anosmia limited to humans. Like humans, dogs can live without a sense of smell, though for many of them it carries a significantly higher ‘sensory price’, because their sense of smell is 10,000 to 100,000 more acute than that of humans.

Evidence Of Hope

December 2, 2020December 2, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Clues, Detective, Evidence, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, hope, Investigation, Micro-fiction, Runaways 58 Comments

“Aha!”

Nate looked at Mr. Banks. The tall man was bending forward, willowy limbs almost touching the pavement, round-rimmed glasses testing gravity.

“Aha, as in what?” Nate asked.

“As in I believe we have a lead.”

Nate felt his eyes fill. False hope was the worst. The desperation with which he clung to the possibility.

“And?”

The detective straightened. He pointed at the photo, then the pavement. “See her ponytail? See this? Her hair tie broke. Runaway or not, she would have tried to get a replacement. The pharmacy across the alley is the closest. They may well have footage.”

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers