The Jealous Dog song

~ Sahara ~ 9 Comments

This is a fun challenge; I’ve never done something like this before!

Right now, he’s probably home snuggling with that fuzzy new pup and

Look, she’s jumping on the sofa.

Right now, he’s probably making her some juicy ham bread

‘Cause she begged for a loaf-a.

Right now, he’s probably walking with her to the dog park

showing her the fountain spray

And while he’s away…

I  chewed up the corner of the shoe

That his dear old  momma brought him from the bou-

Tique in Rome that she found at  a meet and greet.

I tore my sharpest little paw down the side of the wall

  Scratched a hole in the bed and all

Maybe next time he’ll think before he cheats.

 

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Rose Colored Glasses

~ Sahara ~ 4 Comments

My home at age 12 – a time in life I hated, yet I currently look back on fondly.

I’m an only child, and my real dad started leaving us way before 12, so it was just me and mom. The house was small and red-bricked with a circular stained-glass window in the front. It had a long hallway that, when we moved in when I was two, I yelled down to hear the echo. ~EH!~ When i got older, we swapped the carpeting for hardwood floors, and I could slide down the hallway. There was a little phone alcove in the middle of the hallway, and we stacked phone books under the telephone there. When I was talking with my friends, I unwound the cord pulling it so far to my room.

We had a basement – it was  finished on one side, unfinished on the other and cool on both. I would sit on the finished side, watch 21 Jump  Street, and fold laundry. Especially in the summertime. The AC – which was robin’s egg blue, of all colors – didn’t work very well, and during a thunder storm, we had to turn it off. Sometimes days passed without it on. Just fans.

The yard was big. I had mowed, crawled on, made snow angels on it – I knew that yard. Each tree. I knew them all. Climbed a few. Bushy overgrowth in the backyard became monsters and spaceships and a clubhouse for one. Mulberry bushes. At 12 years old, I kept my 10-speed on the side of the house.  The street was short and boring – no other kids.

It was in a bad neighborhood, but situated in a great part of the city.  And I could ride to all of those parts. Moreover, I had the time to imagine and be outside, and I miss that so much.

*Writing 101

 

Lolly, lolly, lolly – Don’t get your adverbs here

~ Sahara ~ 2 Comments

A dusty and rain-stained window barricades me from outside clatter. Facing a side street, lighter traffic and a large loading docks create dark, cemented, oil-stained caves. I could see water from an exposed pipe drip down the side of the first cave where two men are alone and talking. Gesturing with their cigarettes, their motions were getting wider with each movement.  The man farthest from me is shifting back and forth on his feet in agitation.

The next dock over houses an unmoving mound covered by a pink thermal blanket.  A tied white grocery bag sits atop it.

The third dock is the brightly lit by an overhead lamp. A circle of men are standing by several women are sitting on the dock. They are all laughing and flirting with each other.

For the briefest of moments, the bone china image in my window is still and pristine.

In the first bank, a man throws a punch, and the image shatters. The men from the third bank tangle together in their effort to reach the fight, and they all bowl over the man who threw the first punch. The women trail behind, and as one of them passed the second dock, she lifts a corner of the pink blanket, and a brown hand extends from beneath it, smacking the intruder.

 

*Writing 101, Day 8

~ Sahara ~ Leave a comment

My favorite meal from youth? Ones that have emotional importance – it depends. Actually, no, it would probably have to be the one mom would make for us for St. Nicholas day. St. Nicholas Day, December 6th, was always the precursor, in my child mind, to Christmas. I put my shoes out by the fire place and got gold chocolate coins. But the day before, St. Nicholas Eve was also like a holiday in my house.

That was the day, when I was little, that mom and I decorated the house for Christmas. She would put up the big bulky tree and we would put candles and garland around the house, and ornaments up.  It may also have been the day we started playing Christmas music, though that may have always been Thanksgiving.

But to decorate that day, she would always lay out a spread of our favorite kinds of foods: summer sausage and cheese and crackers, crackers, veggies, maybe some chocolates, and – this I remember distinctively – ham rolled up around cream cheese and pickle, cut up and pierced with a toothpick. That was the most distinctive and interesting flavor to me.

*Writing 101: Day 10

Recuerdos de la Alhambra

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The ancient stone cavern  was oddly fitting for the guitarist playing Recuerdos de la Alhambra. The notes  skipped off strings teased by skilled fingers, bouncing like the shadows of the marble stone in the candlelight from the silk covered table. In the center of the cavern stood a couple elegantly dressed. Her red dress seemed to shimmer of its own accord, and his black hair curled slightly over his crisp white collar.

* * * * *

The paiR. Dinner nakpins hang limp from hands – forgotten surrender flags. “Bastardo!” Snarled words and spittle. A snarled laugh of disgust. “HA!” Storming across the roomhe slams his hand against the knocked-over chair and sends it fly-flying against the wall. Wood rains. She charged closer to him closing-the-10-foot-distance beating her breast in protest. “’Li mortacci tua!” Whirling around, tearing hair. A red patch of silk fell to the ground.

 

*Writing 101 challenge, day 7.  Whachu think?

 

 

Take the bus!

~ Sahara ~ 5 Comments

Something from another city that I would bring to mine, without question or hesitation, is public transportation. I mean, I know I’m in the US and it’s a big place and all, but so is Europe, really, and there are trains crossing that whole continent. And then in the specific cities, lots of transportation options, such that you don’t need a car! I would love that!

I can take the bus to work from my little town across the river, but first I have to slay the first born bumble bee under the light of the harvest moon – it’s an ordeal, and it’s only offered certain days/times.

 

I Sang at my Renaissance Faire

~ Sahara ~ 1 Comment

But it was not what I thought it would be, alas.

As part of my 2014 36/36 challenge, I had given myself the task of singing at the faire, either by myself or with a tenor who works the lanes playing a bard. We even talked about the tune we would sing together.

This was part of my 36/36 challenge, but it was not quite what I thought it would be. 🙂

I pictured myself singing a little ditty, or standing with Alex, our Bard, in a lane to sing something else.  Instead, I sang “I’m a Little Teapot” for my guild.

I had left my mug behind one Saturday night and our guild leader had snagged it for safekeeping.  The penance, or cost for it, however, was singing something silly. If I had been someone else, he said, it would have been worse.

So I accomplished this goal, just not in a way that I thought I would.

 

Until Next Time

~ Sahara ~ 1 Comment

Time slows

In the dewy-promised morning of a welcome unfolding, my limbs and words reach out to those long unseen.

In a hot afternoon of mid-day revelry, hearing delighted cheers from the joust over the hill, playing tag with the sunlight to not burn my skin,

In the smell of the blacksmith’s fire as it stings the back of my throat and the soft fragrance of honey from the slowly melted wax,

Time slows.

Around the soft wool plaid-covered dining table and softly falling ash from the open fire, eating freshly simmered stew off  oversize wooden spoons, next to elders and the younger, all helping cast off, understand, and slow down the mundane dragging of life,

Reclining in swirling pipe smoke, calling out insults and verbal barbs with kinsmen, wrapping my tongue around thick pronunciation and enjoying their faces as they consider a comeback, reveling in their creativity,

Oh, how time slows.

Watching nature wake up, a rain of inchworms becoming a cloud of butterflies, verdant leaves, flowers, and a wee hidden sheep cushioning the visual space.

Air thickens with humidity until the tantalizing promise of rain finally blows through the glen, where nothing can thwart the pulse of life and joy that moves through.

A final exhausted circle of dusty day-worn bodies teasing, jovial and affectionate. Hands passing flasks and bottles around, each one carefully and considerately conserving a sip to share and make room for the next,

Time slows.

Alas, it does not stop, and so, until next time…

*Inspired by Day 1, Writing 101