Not His Kind

July 2, 2022Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: Adversity, Finding peace, Flash Fiction, healing, Home, kindness, Micro-fiction, Relationships, Starting over, Weekend Writing Prompt 33 Comments

daniel-diesenreither-9K8q3K_zuog-unsplash

(Photo: Daniel Diesenreither on Unsplash)

When he first saw her, he thought, no way!

After all, he preferred the quiet kind who’d let him listen to the crackle, to the silence, to the breathing of the cabin’s logs.

He thought her flippant. Voluble.

Disrespectful of tranquility. Wasting words.

But she’d been sent, and his household needed a woman.

So he endured.

Till he heard her soothe a monologue of comfort into his orphan’s ear.

And his heart turned dear.

For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt of Flippant in 74 words.

Anew

March 23, 2022Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, History, Home, Memory, Micro-fiction, Nothing is Impossible, Old and New, Revisiting, Ruins 36 Comments

bet-shan

She took the bus to near as possible. Then walked. A few cars honked, perhaps to offer a ride. Perhaps to get something she wasn’t offering.

She waved them off. Walked on.

It made sense to arrive by foot. As in the times before.

The times she should have no way of knowing, yet did.

Remember.

They’d tried to put her behind locked windows between soft walls when she first tried to speak of it.

She had learned not to.

But her soul knew.

And there it was. As then.

Almost.

The stone crumbling, yet still her olden home.

Anew.

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo prompt © Rochelle Wisoff-Fields

Stable Home

March 9, 2022Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Things Kids Say, Trauma and Development, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Adversity, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Home, Making do, Micro-fiction, Priorities, Seeking safety, Stable, Survival 42 Comments

lisa-fox-stone-cabin

They thought it mattered to him that it wasn’t fancy. That he’d care it was damp. Or old. Or cobbled together from what materials could be found.

They were wrong.

All he ever wanted was a roof that did not leak, a hearth that could be lit, food enough to fill his belly, safety in his sleep, a bed that did not bite, walls that did not threaten to collapse about his ears.

The cabin was all that.

And more.

Sure, it had housed horses, and smelled of them, sometimes.

It only made it more a home.

A stable home.

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo prompt © Lisa Fox

The Gall

January 8, 2022Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Trauma and Development, Writing Tags: Adversity, Betrayal, Cruelty, Deceit, Flash Fiction, Home, Homelessness, Micro-fiction, Temerity, Weekend Writing Prompt 16 Comments

(Photo: Abigail on Unsplash)

She steamed and paced and stomped and stewed.

The temerity. The audacious liberties he’d taken.

It was one thing to sell the house.

Another, to have removed her name from the deed.

To have kept the change hidden.

Her parents’ house, no less.

The place of hers – not his – childhood.

Cruelty was why she’d left him.

But this?

He, vacationing on islands.

She and the children, homeless.

For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Temerity in 69 words.

Wild Away

December 5, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Trauma and Development, Writing Tags: Breathing Space, CCC, Childhood Adversity, connection, Finding a way, Flash Fiction, Foster Care, healing, Home, Micro-fiction, New Beginnings 12 Comments

ccc160

Margot leaned closer to examine the stake. Her smile grew.

The child should be called Gretel, with such clues.

Then again, Margot was no evil stepmom. Or at least, not evil … The two of them couldn’t help not being biologically related.

Not any more than the girl could help being wild.

The social worker believed the latter a hindrance. Understandable, perhaps, given how many placements the child had lost. The system found it inconvenient to have a lass with more wilderness than tameness, who needed space and took it. Knowing Grenadine’s history, how could they not see why she’d tolerate no leash?

“This child will run away,” the social worker had warned when Margot said she’ll have her. “You’re so rural, you’d have no help keeping her contained.”

Margot had no plan to do so.

The child was free. The sticker meant that she’d be home by dinner.

For Crispina’s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

The Addition

March 15, 2021March 15, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Quotes, Reflections, Writing Tags: Creative writing, dVerse, Flash Fiction, Home, Prosery, Quote, Rescue, Second Chances, Trust, Writing Challenge, Writing prompt 22 Comments

(Photo: Simona Roubkova on Unsplash)

“What are you going to do with this thing?”

Leah shrugged, and watched as Marty circled the addition to their household, arms behind his back in what she thought of as his ‘Wannabee Inspector General.’

“It is useless,” he muttered.

“It is cute,” she said, and chuckled at the horror on his face. “In its own way, at least.”

For to be fair, the poor creature would win no beauty contests. Patchy hair, droopy eyelid, bloated abdomen. But there was a trusting glint in the blue eye, and a gentleness that sought her heart and hooked it.

“You’d do it mercy to put it down.”

“I prefer keeping in mind even the possibility that existence has its own reason for being,” Leah challenged. “If we can be of help, why not even try?”

She reached down to pet the pup. “Her name’s Pat.”

Prosery prompt: “I prefer keeping in mind even the possibility that existence has its own reason for being.” — Wisława Szymborska, “Possibilities”

For the dVerse prosery challenge

Reprieve

January 22, 2021January 22, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Good stuff!, Life and love, Meditations, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: Beach, Breathing Space, Calm, CCC, Flash Fiction, Home, Micro-fiction, Oceanside, Photo prompt, Relaxation response, Replenish, Reprieve 13 Comments

ccc115

She lifted her face to the sun and felt the vibrant scents of waves and freedom fill her lungs. The whole of her relaxed as if on cue. Pre-programmed. Indelibly tuned in to the whoosh of ocean breath that she could not yet see but every cell within her remembered.

Her heart swelled and her chest rose, liberated.

The moment coursed through her in liquid satisfaction.

Surf. Ebb. Swish. Flow. Hiss. Sand-licking waves.

Another inhalation of the salty tang and behind her she could hear the sounds of other people readying to take the path from car-park to sand. A child protested. A man’s voice soothed. A door slammed. A moment later a discordant melody of feet clip-clopped onto the faded wooden slats, drumming a crescendo of expectation through her bare feet.

The beach.

A needed reprieve.

At home at last by the ocean where her soul had always lived.

For Crispina‘s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

No Country Bumpkin

August 24, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Poetry, Reflections, Writing Tags: Assumptions, Belonging, Bum, Creative writing, dVerse, Home, Illusion, New Beginnings, Poetry, Quadrille, Writing Challenge 32 Comments

Photo by Eric Muhr on Unsplash

She was not a country bumpkin

Though she aspired to

Be one.

So she dressed the part

And practiced

How to walk and talk

In twang,

And she hoped to look

Uncultured

To the folk stopping

In store,

So they’d believe

She was

Hardcore.

For the dVerse quadrille challenge: bum

Not Much

August 5, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Adversity, Dystopia, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Home, loneliness, Making do, Micro-fiction, Safety, Survival, Trains 44 Comments

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

There was nothing left to stay for.

Not much to pack, but still he managed to stuff the duffel with odds and ends. More for feel than for utility.

He won’t be coming back.

The empty cars stood, cooling, on the rails. There was an echo in his bones even with no movement. Even without any sound.

He scanned for danger. One never knew, and he had had enough surprises.

When nothing stirred, he climbed aboard. The metal floor smelled of pee and rats, but at least he’d sleep with a wall at his back tonight, a door barred shut.

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Bobby’s Boonies

July 18, 2020Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Writing Tags: Boonies, Contentment, Country life, Finding peace, Flash Fiction, Hinterland, Home, Just because, Making do, Micro-fiction, Weekend Writing Prompt 10 Comments

Photo: Nolan Krattinger on Unsplash

He never thought he’d feel that way. But there he was, besotted by life in the hinterland, buoyed by the boondocks.

Who’d have believed the sticks could end up so satisfying? Sure, he gave up the sunny beaches, but while his city pals squeezed onto small spaces on the sand to swelter in the summer sizzle; he could splash right in his backyard stream, in his birthday-suit if desired.

Then there were vegetables from the garden. The birds’ song. The quiet. He had discovered his inner bumpkin.

For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Hinterland in 87 words