First, having scoured all the travel books, And sold my car, And gotten my passport and plane ticket I don my Backpack of purple canvas My silly “Earth” shoes My ‘70’s maroon jeans and top. I am on my way Not like Jack Kerouac with his drunken friends Cruising down Route 66 But on this…
Category: Writing
Attention Older Readers: I Need Your Advice
Okay, so it’s happened: I looked up and realized my kids have grown up. Yes, okay, so Sarah IS 29, Liz 26 and Rachael 20, but you don’t understand, I’ve been a Mother with a capital M for the past almost 30 years. And Ray has been a Father with the same focused interest. Alas,…
Flash Essay Prompt: Leonard Cohen, Brother George, and Recovery
As Leonard Cohen writes in his song, Anthem: Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There’s a crack – a crack – in everything That’s how the light gets in. I just read a fellow blogger’s heartfelt account of the bumps on her road to recovery from alcohol abuse. She spoke…
Prompt: Describe a Favorite Piece of Furniture – My Favorite Rocker
The bent wood rocker is brown with age, and the thin arms are lighter than the rest of the wood where human arms have rested upon them. The back has five wooden rungs that are attached to two long round pieces of wood that stretch three inches above the highest rung and all the way…
Flash Essay Prompt: A Stolen Cross and the Lesson that Comes with It
Jesus is hanging on a metal cross. This cross is part of a stand so it is freestanding rather than designed to hang on the wall. The metal is silver and Jesus is silver and the nails that are attaching him to the cross are silver. The cross and stand are about a foot and…
Prose Poem Prompt: Elusive Truth
She didn’t understand him. She had never understood him. She wondered why she loved him. He was elusive. He was foreign in his differentness. And yet. He pulled her. Yanked at her with his allure. Kept her aching for him in his absence. She knew they were no good together. They were mountain and plain….
Prose Poem Prompt: Hamster Wheel
Today is one of those days when I want to do nothing. Absolutely nothing. Go sit out in the sun and just let its rays wash over me. Warm these cold feet of mine. Fill me with power from somewhere other than myself. I get tired of the need for constant self-initiative. When you are…
Flash Essay Prompt: The Word “Other”
Other? What does that mean? Other means not us. Someone different. Someone who does not share common traits or beliefs or locations or even species. Other is a word that comes up a lot when people want to judge someone harshly. He has other beliefs. She has other interests. Not ours. Against us. Not with…
Nothing Like an Award or Two to Brighten Up My Day!
Much thanks to my fellow bloggers for two awards for my blog, 20 Minutes a Day. Thank you susanwritesprecise for the Lamplighter Award! This is for a blog you find that brightens the world. This award can be passed along as many times as you like and the recipient either accepts or declines and that’s…
Flash Fiction Prompt: Foot, Jacket, and Silence
The day was cold. Camille pulled on her jacket and trudged outside for a cigarette. Damn these new laws that made standing by the dumpster behind the building the only acceptable place to smoke. And what a social pariah she had become. Almost everyone in the call center glared at her when she left, and…
20 Minutes a Day 