This week’s prompt builds on the one from last week. Last week you were asked to list family and friends and define them by character qualities. This week I would like you to choose one or two of them and write about when and how you came to know that/those individual/s by those qualities. Be as specific as you can. Remember the details are important. Also write about how that incident/s made you feel and if that feeling still persists today.
If you write something you wish to share with the rest of us, please feel free to put your blog URL here in the comments section for those of us who would like to read. If you have questions or wish to discuss anything about what we are doing, again, that is what the comments sections is here for.
Have fun and write.
1sojournal 
I don’t know that I want to put the results of my ponderings on my blog, which is read by family and friends, so may I put my response on here, for you to
critique unmercifully (please)?
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I’m sorry but I haven’t been able to do the prompt’s as I would have liked too. Perhaps I can only do one thing at a time. I will try harder. Please forgive.
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Good Lord! You two must have me confused with some other individual, lol. Perhaps a nun in her black and white habit, pointing her finger at a classroom of stilled small children, as she tells them how sin leaves a huge black stain on their little white souls. Or, some wrinkled faced second grade teacher in tweed skirt and a shirt with small lace at the color, her bi-focals riding low on her nose, and her hair pulled back in a really tight bun, with a red corrections pencil shoved through it. I’m choosing to laugh at all of this.
Annell, you are free to make whatever choices you find necessary. Go back, do some of it, or none of it at all. These are only suggestions and it’s the busiest season of the year. Don’t ask for forgiveness, you don’t need it. You are fine whatever you choose to do and only you know what and when, and just how much to do that.
And Viv, my whole schtick is to get people on the page and help them to stay there. I will critique whatever you choose to put here, but I am not, can not be merciless. I firmly believe in grace, because that’s how I’ve made it thus far, and keeping that grace, means making sure I give it as well.
Please, both of you, remember I am me, Elizabeth. And if it isn’t fun, I ain’t doing it. Period. Lol, thanks for your comments, I think, and the laughter I hope you know I am reeling with. You two just made my day. Thank you,
Elizabeth
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Weeelll, I’ve writ it so I might as well submit it:-
A friend from way back
The day we moved house to North London in 1951, chaos reigned as wet paint and furniture removers make uncomfortable companions. I was fourteen.
‘Someone at the door, Mum’ I yell.
‘Well open it then, you silly girl.’
‘Yes?’ I say, confronted by this weird-looking youth. Spotty face, owl glasses, knobbly receding forehead and chin. High pitched nervous giggle. Not exactly prepossessing. But oh so correct.
‘I’ve called to see Vivienne Showell.’
‘That’s me.’
‘I’m Richard, Domini’s cousin from Enfield.’ Domini was my best friend from the school I’d just left. So this is the famous Richard.
‘Domini asked me to invite you to come to our club. It’s on Friday evenings. I’d better ask your parents for permission.’
By this time, Mum has come down and is peering round me at the apparition.
‘Well, come in boy. Don’t stand there knocking.’ Mum obviously thought he looked harmless enough, as I was allowed to go to ‘Club’ (later known as the Ridgeway Revellers) so long as I was home by ten.
That was the start of my growing up. A whole raft of new friends, aimless evenings spent learning to flirt, singing round the piano, playing darts and table tennis – which was our euphemism for endless games of ‘photography’: turn out the lights and see what develops. Harmless enough in those innocent days, nothing serious.
I must have been a bit of a bitch. I used Richard unmercifully as fallback escort when between boyfriends, but dropped him when a better-looking bloke came on the scene, though we were always supportive of each other through the ups and downs of adolescent crushes. We rumbled on for a few years in this fashion until one after another the Revellers dropped out, prey to exams or serious romances.
Some years later, as a pompous engaged virgin, I heard that Richard had come home on a 48-hour pass from National Service for a hastily arranged early morning wedding, only three weeks before the arrival of a miniature version, complete with receding forehead and chin. His devout Catholic family was rumoured to be singing the Miserere at the shame of it.
Fifty years on, I found him again through Friends Re-united, living in Canada and paterfamilias of a huge dynasty. We corresponded desultorily for a while, but too much water had passed under the bridge, and we lost touch again. But there will always be a soft spot in my heart for my first boyfriend.
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Viv, I love the story. Reminds me of playing, “Spin The Bottle,” our version of your “Photography.” Most of all, it makes me realize how much adolesence is a time for practicing, learning what works, or doesn’t, for later life encounters. Most girls have a Richard somewhere in their past, that one who played the role of boyfriend, but was more best friend than anything else. He helped each of us with the learning process of the male/female relationship.
As far as critiquing goes, I see some grammar errors and nothing more. A bit of polish needed on quotation marks and the role they play within the narrative. Otherwise, this is a wonderful little story about a certain passage we all must make. And unless you intend to publish this, I would remind you that this is for journal writing, no critiquing necessary, or even wanted, for that matter. I happen to like it. Could relate to it easily and it was immediate and lively.
Elizabeth
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Thank you, Elizabeth. I have done a bit of a tidy, but left the dialogue alone: my style with fiction is to tell much of the story through speech, and it seemed to fit with this factual one.
I’m puzzled about the quote marks: I have stuck to the style we were taught and which seems to be preferred by editors.
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Viv’s writing reminded me of words from a poem by Lilleskare Faugstad, “Do not go to look for long lost loves.” She then goes on to explain how they have been sailing with others, and will not be the same. I like to think of those words. But I think it was probably good to talk to a long lost love.
I only wanted to tell you I was disappointed in myself, I had such high hopes, and hope I will be able to catch up soon. Or maybe it’s a full fledged “block?”
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Annell, I actually did understand that. We all have hopes, and then life happens, lol. Don’t worry about it. If it’s supposed to happen, it will.
Can’t resist this one, though. I don’t believe in writing blocks, or even artistic blocks. There are only places we don’t want, or choose not to go. We may need to go in other directions, or can’t allow ourselves to go in others. So, it’s probably not a block. It is a matter of choosing to do what you need to do, and not feeling guilty for making that choice. Hugs,
Elizabeth
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You look smart in your black habit!
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Lol, thanks but I never wear black, can’t do it. And don’t particularly like those soft pastel and polyester pant suits either. Browns okay, but only if it’s accented with cream, rust, or burnt orange, and as far as I know, that isn’t a habit. It’s a t-shirt or sweatshirt, I wear only with jeans. And now you know why I never became a nun.
Elizabeth
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Viv, I am not ignoring you. It’s been a busy week, but I will send you an email, concerning what I know about the structuring of quotes. Hope that will bs suffiecient.
Elizabeth
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Thanks. Please, why is it snowing all over your blog?
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Because it is December and in December, Word Press allows an app that brings snow to the whole world (regardless of climate). You are on Word Press. There’s an appearance click you can do to turn on the snow. Or turn it off if you prefer. I like the snow, so leave the app on and it comes up automatically on Dec. 1.
Elizabeth
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what do you mean by prompt?
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Hi Mental Climax, and btw is that like having an epiphany, an ah-hah moment, or as we elders say, a brain fart? Sorry, just had to ask.
A prompt is simply a suggestion, hopefully one that prompts you to write. These are suggestions for keeping and maintaining a journal. Online if you wish, or private if you prefer. Some drop them here in the comments section as Viv did. Others post them to their own blog, and are welcome to place their URL here for the rest of us to visit and read. And far more, seem to keep them private on their own personal pages, whatever those might be. I keep a daily personal journal, but also attend to four blogs which often contain material gleaned from that personal writing. Ultimately, it simply means suggestions that you might want to write something about. In whatever manner you choose. Hope that helps, and thanks for asking,
Elizabeth
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im really sorry. i just did not understand at first. because of your clear explanation, i think i’m getting the juice of it.
have a nice day wherever you are.
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Hi again, Mental Climax, and there is never a need to apologize for asking a question. How else would we come to know what isn’t clear to us? If we don’t ask, we could remain in the dark for heaven only knows how long. I’m glad you came back, and hope you do so again. Here, the more the better.
And I’m from Wisconsin. Where are you from?
Elizabeth
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