I merge on to the highway as a speeding semi passes, and I watch a lone water drop–a leftover from this afternoon’s thunderstorm–streak across my windshield. I turn the radio up to rival the increased road noise, and the dilemma forces itself before me. Just because that woman is involved I’m observing from a distance. She’s always been up to no good. I’ve heard others call her a modern Jezebel, the embodiment of the feminist movement. If she’s involved it can’t be good. It just can’t.
Category Archives: Writing Exercise
Fenwick Northrop
Fenwick Northrop walked calmly down the sidewalk, kicking stones as he headed home. It was approaching 1 a.m., and Fenwick was returning to his dorm just before visitation hours ended and he would have had to leave his girl friend’s place. It was a school rule that nobody particularly cared for, but most grudgingly followed. It was most annoying when you tried to watch a late night movie but had to segregate genders come 1 a.m.
Going to Hell Occasionally
Well, it only happens occasionally, I explained. I try, but sometimes I don’t quite make it.
I see. So you only sin occasionally, he said.
Yeah, I guess that’s it, I said, somewhat sheepishly.
So are you planning on going to hell occasionally, too? he asked.
Closer Than They Appear
I watched the snow fall by the light of the street lamp and I wondered if people are objects in the mirror, closer than they appear.
Reflecting on Yo-yos
When I was a freshman in high school, the yo-yo became my salvation. It wasn’t until the second semester that I finally brought the toy to school, but the day I did I became a new person.
I spent the first semester quiet, reserved, scared. I ate lunch with two guys I wasn’t very good friends with. They listened to Metallica, stayed up watching late night HBO and were about as popular as I was, which was the only reason I sat with them. They would take my hat during lunch—in itself a traumatizing moment—and mock me with it. Once they spit a jolly rancher in my hat, leaving a purple stain across the white mesh.
Recalling Chicago
He was the kind of person your mother told you to stay away from. I sat next to him on the train. I offered him some crackers, and listened to him talk about crack. Tattoos ran up and down his arm like the profanity woven through his language. The other passengers glared at him or pretended he wasn’t there.
He sat slumped against a potted tree, clutching an empty water bottle, its label long since faded away. He mumbled quietly to himself. I watched him take a long, soothing drag on his Marlboro, and then extinguish the burning embers underneath his shoe. I could see his bare toes wiggle as he smashed the cigarette, his toes poking out of his holy socks, poking out of his dilapidated shoes.
It was hot enough to make the asphalt sticky. I was slumped against a building, trying to build up the strength to continue on. From my vantage point I watched her fall all the way to the earth. She stumbled, her leg giving out, and her knee came crashing into the concrete. It slammed into the concrete with jolting force. You could feel it from a distance. The others around her on the sidewalk hesitated for a moment. We all saw her fall. Their pace slowed for a second. They weren’t sure what to do. But the proud woman kept her gaze low. With all her might she pulled herself back up and struggled on. The people around her resumed their pace, grateful they didn’t have to dirty their hands and stoop to help the clumsy woman.
What did you see?
Afternoon Apathy
(it’s kind of a poem, it’s kind of a song–it’s kind of messed up)
I’m so confused. Is this what it’s all about, lost in my afternoon apathy? Would somebody please tell me where I’m going, what I’m doing and what the point is? What’s it all about, and why am I here asking questions in a little notebook–does this help me pull it all together or just provide concrete evidence for my insanity? What is it all about? Where does my hope reside? Is my Sunday School answer just another lie? Does my hope lie in bed with a pretty girl and a tender kiss or does my hope lie in what I can accomplish–a mighty statue to my pride–or does my hope lie in a web page–pulled together with such beauty, won’t you please take a look? Or will my hope reside in future days of better ways? Where do I find the strength to push on through the apathetic afternoon? What’s it all about and why am I here? Should I just take a nap and hope it all disappears, maybe drown myself in this or that calamity, create some passion within this stale heart and form a false hope to tell me what it’s all about, what it’s all about. Insecurity, tragedy, conformity. What is it all about and why am I here? Is it just a matter of easier to serve than love? How can you love what you cannot see? Intuitively I understand, but it’s not a matter of the brain, it’s a situation within my heart. What is it all about and why am I here? Will the answers suddenly materialize, or do I need to fall down on my knees? What do you want from me? You want it all so simple, but you can’t have me. I have you. You’re my Sunday cause, the thing that gives me passion. I tell you what to do and you change the world to my liking–I am serving the shoe box God. But how can you love a God you’ve consigned to a box? What’s it all about and why am I here? Questions that haunt my mind like the chorus of a hit radio song, over-played and under-analyzed. What’s it all about and just what is he rambling about? Too much negativity for you–where are your clean cut answers, cookie-cutter situations and sitcom resolutions? This is not an echo for your mother, she’ll frown and wonder who wronged me. He was such a nice boy. But it’s more than that, it’s more than you can know. It’s the world upside down through someone else’s eyes. What’s it all about and why am I here? Can I just curl up in your arms and make the questions go away, ignore the responsibility and the amazing calamity? Maybe this flood of introverted self-analysis will be gone and I can watch TV, hold your hand and be a happy American. What’s it all about and why am I here? I don’t accept–I won’t accept your answers; you never read the question. You put it in a box and have long since forgotten who you are and what you wanted to do. What’s it all about and why are you here? Minivans and McDonalds are a poor justification for your credit card existence. Is there more to this world than the material, and why can you not think and come to understand something more complicated than a thirty second commercial? Am I the only enlightened one? Look out, here comes my pride. It’ll run you down like a garbage truck, and we’ll all just wish I died. What’s it all about and why am I here? What’s the rationalization for this perplexing realization? Would someone please open the floodgate and answer me with grace, show me mercy, and love–a bloody human form. I know that’s what it’s all about, but won’t you please explain that to my afternoon apathy?
Sedgewick Couldn’t Sleep
It was a cold November night and Sedgewick couldn’t sleep. The full yellowish moon shone brightly outside his window, laying a patch of moonshine across his bedspread, from his neck to his knees. Sedgewick had given up fidgeting. Constantly rolling over and resettling, pulling his blanket tighter and shifting his pillow around didn’t accomplish anything. He had already resigned himself to a sleepless night, and was lying perfectly still on his back, allowing his mind to race and flow in a million directions.
Shopping Spree at a Toy Store
The music blared, the people screamed, and the counter echoed. Lights were flashing and brightly colored balloons kept falling from the ceiling. But Sedgewick ignored all that. He had won a five minute, no holds barred shopping spree at the local toy store. That means Sedgewick had five minutes to run through the store and fill up as many shopping carts as he could with whatever he wanted. Whatever was in his shopping carts at the end of the five minutes was his to take home. It was the prize any kid would die for. And Sedgewick had won. His grandmother had entered him a year ago when they last visited the toy store.
Sedgewick and Music
After Sedgewick came home from school and finished the snack his grandmother made for him, he always liked to go find his grandfather and see what he was up to. He’d sneak around like a detective until he finally found his grandfather. Some days Sedgewick would then just walk up and say hi. But other days, if his grandfather was doing something really interesting, Sedgewick would stay back and watch from a distance. He usually did this when his grandfather was playing the guitar.