In keeping with my philosophy of writing, here’s a piece I wrote this past February.\u00a0 The format at Main Street Writers is this:\u00a0 Kathy, our peerless leader, gives us a prompt and a 30 minute limit, and says GO.\u00a0 We get a ten minute warning, and then we all read our piece to the group, inviting positive feedback from the group.\u00a0 There are usually five to nine of us, plus Kathy.\u00a0 She also writes and reads.<\/p>\n
These writings will always start with Kathy’s prompt.
\nWhat would you have written?<\/p>\n
2-14-13\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The prompt:\u00a0 \u00a03-4 steps to this one<\/p>\n
Short list of topics I want to write about<\/strong> Short list of things I don\u2019t want to write about<\/strong> Share something from everyone\u2019s lists<\/strong> <\/p>\n I forgot it all.\u00a0 Lists are supposed to save me from doom, embarrassment, disappointing my Sweetie, and having to go to Home Depot seven times a day.\u00a0 But when the lists are so divergent, and the pressure is on, I can write one second, and forget the entire list by the time my eyes have moved down the page.\u00a0 Could this be the first signs of Early Onset Old-timers Disease?\u00a0 These days, that probably depends on how many Wendys Triple Deluxe Baconators I scarfed down over the past year.\u00a0 I can feel the prions attaching themselves to my brain cells like little limpets and sucking my memories out one by one.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n What was I writing about?\u00a0 Oh, yeah, pick one from column A, one from number two, and one from the third column.\u00a0 Mix and match.\u00a0 Never mind, I seem to be on a tear with this now.\u00a0 I have to say it isn\u2019t my fault.\u00a0 I have never been one with a great memory.\u00a0 In Mineralogy class as an undergrad, we were told to prepare for an exam involving mineral identification.\u00a0 When the time came, there before us , being slowly passed from hand to hand, were twenty five blue minerals.\u00a0 The Dreaded Blue Exam!\u00a0 I later found out the professor gave one every semester.\u00a0 I couldn\u2019t remember the name, chemical formula, crystal structure, or cleavage of most.\u00a0 Unfortunately for me, I was sitting toward the back of the class, and one of the classic identification techniques for minerals, after all is lost, is taste.\u00a0 Twenty three people before me had licked each and every one of the samples, because they didn\u2019t know what they were either.\u00a0 The one we all got right was halite, your ordinary run of the mill rock salt.\u00a0 This one was a deep translucent blue, and was slightly damp anyway, even before being licked by everyone.\u00a0 Salt has a way of adsorbing moisture from the air and holding it on its clammy surface.\u00a0 The sample had come from the salt mines of the Salina Salt formation beneath Syracuse, where we all sweated through this exam.\u00a0 Halite, NaCl, cubic\u00a0cleavage, isometric crystal system, hardness 2.5<\/p>\n What is amazing to me is that I remember that experience at all.\u00a0 If I didn\u2019t have it saved in my phone contacts, I wouldn\u2019t know my mother\u2019s phone number, but I can remember an exam I failed in 1974.\u00a0 I was sitting next to Deborah Sue Tout.\u00a0 I had a mad crush on her.\u00a0 Sheesh.<\/p>\n This morning, I didn\u2019t forget that it was Valentines Day.\u00a0 I just forgot to say it to Linda before I said anything else.\u00a0 Bad move, Sport.\u00a0 One more marker moved over to the BAD column that she has tallied on the kitchen wall.\u00a0 I tried to explain to her that I have a bad memory for such things, but there are some things that excuses just don\u2019t fix.\u00a0 Like never get your Sweetie, a milk chocolate lover, a whole pound of dark chocolates for Valentines Day.\u00a0 That one is a bit higher up on that list, but it sure gets trotted out a lot.<\/p>\n I had hoped to remember what I was supposed to write about, but the directions are all the way up at the top of the page, and I don\u2019t suppose that I have the time to scroll back up there to double check.\u00a0 I\u2019ll just stay down here where I can fall back on my excuse.\u00a0 Ignorance is bliss.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In keeping with my philosophy of writing, here’s a piece I wrote this past February.\u00a0 The format at Main Street Writers is this:\u00a0 Kathy, our peerless leader, gives us a prompt and a 30 minute limit, and says GO.\u00a0 We get a ten minute warning, and then we all read our piece to the group, 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\nPrague, family, out west, customer service disasters I have known<\/p>\n
\nFinances, work, old relationships<\/p>\n
\nSelf serve gas pumps, incest, monkey-faced dogs, love, relationships, the ocean, bananas, worms<\/p>\n