For this “non-prompt” week I’m formalizing a process that I’ve stumbled into before: Think of phrases and sentences until something takes hold. Then instead of exploring what that phrase/sentence brings to mind, beginning to sketch out how it might make a story, just write what flows from it. Then skip a space and do this again. And skip another space and do it again. Then develop transitions between the unconnected pieces until a narrative that feels alive begins to take shape. Cut anything that doesn’t serve the emerging story and write to an end. Go!
Working Title: Indian Princess
1st Sentence: On the way home I passed a teenaged girl in ragged clothes handing out flyers.
Favorite Sentence: Specializes in spiritual cleansing and Indian princesses who can’t afford decent clothes, specializes in getting a divorced, middle-aged accountant super-, super-pissed off.
Word Length: 829
Photo of William Ordway Partridge’s Pocahontas statue (erected in Jamestown, VA, in 1922) by Hfdapuirhdk 4/2006.
I want to do a week with no prompts to see where my head is and how the process goes. If I can’t come up with something I’ll go looking for inspiration but for now it’s back to just letting my mind wander into story ideas.
With my October 1st story, I can celebrate the completion of Week 22! The treat in the photo is a slice of “lemon burst” cake, purchased at a coffee shop in Perkins Cove, Ogunquit. Between the husband and me I think we downed 4 of these when we were there. This one made it home to pose for the camera before I attacked it. Mmm.
I’m not sure this experiment of writing a week of stories inspired by Haystack (three of which I set in a Haystack-like place) did much for story-quality but I enjoyed immersing myself in the thoughts I had while at Haystack, as I flipped through my photos and notes in search of story. The day’s shorty was an odd one with a really forced ending but I have hope that some of the material can be reworked someday.
Well, I did it! I have completed my FIFTH month of the Daily Shorty Challenge! I am shocked and really I shouldn’t think too much about it. Instead I will dream about these celebration profiteroles. Dream with me?
I won’t top this. I could not BE more satisfied with this project right now. Let the record show that at just before 1:00 AM, I completed the day’s shorty, which I worked on all day, off and on, and which just so happens to be the resurrection of a story I tried to write in the first half of 2009, and then returned to a number of times the last couple of years, failing each time to complete a draft. I didn’t even open those earlier Word files. I just re-imagined the basic idea of the story, which happened to come to mind because it fit so well with my trip to Haystack, and this time, after starting from scratch with a new opening image, I just insisted on finishing it. I really like it, too, but that could be all about the victory of the finished draft, and so what if it is. Ahh, happy days. And many thanks to Cheryl Wilder, who said, you want a little Emily Dickinson? I’ll give you a little Emily Dickinson. And I’ll do it in 5 minutes flat. Damn, Girl!
A bell tolls at Haystack at meal times and when it’s time to meet for a talk or someone has to make an announcement. That felt old fashioned and very… communal.
I was at Haystack for a cultural summit that took place over about a 24-hour period. When we summiters woke up the second day and headed to the dining hall, we discovered a treat: Some of our brethren (I think they were all men) stayed up late the night before and with the help of some high-octane inspiration they set to work on… chair sculptures! This is one of the four they made. The protagonist of the day’s shorty handcrafts chairs from reclaimed materials.
I was fascinated at Haystack by the rows and rows of wooden steps leading from the main campus area and down past the dorms and to the water’s edge. This is one of my many photos of them at various angles.
In the dining room the lovely folks at Haystack kept a huge cookie jar and a bowl of cider, as well as carafes of coffee and hot water for tea. When I discovered this a man was reaching into the cookie jar and looked at me, shouting, “World’s biggest cookie jar!”—I was annoyed that I didn’t have my camera handy. The next day the cookie jar was in the kitchen, so I snapped this photo through the pass-through. You can see the cookie jar on the counter next to the base of a food processor (as well as the reflection of it in the window). But you can’t tell how big it is. Just trust me that it’s enormous. And it was full of yummy chocolate cookies.
I just attended a cultural summit at 
Sure, you hear about Maine’s lobster and chowder, all those sweet blueberries, the gorgeous coastline, the rich history of great writing and art. But did you know that Maine boasts chocolate shops that will make you weep with gratitude? Well, I weep. Maybe you can indulge without tears. To celebrate my completion of another week in my Daily Shorty Challenge, enjoy with me this plate of chocolates I bought at Perkins Cove Candies in Ogunquit, Maine, which now holds the revered title of Claire’s Favorite Chocolate Shop, a coveted honor indeed. Pictured here are 3 orange creams, a peanut butter cup, a caramel, and their chocolate-to-slay-all-others, a cashew turtle. All in dark chocolate, of course. Oh, dear. I’m weeping.
I wrote part of this story during the 3-hour drive to Haystack. More on this beloved Maine institution very soon but for now I’ll just announce to the world that every delightful thing you’ve heard about it is TRUE. What an extraordinary treat. And amidst all the great pleasures of the day, I was able to find enough time to finish the story. My prompt was the photo of shells here, which I gazed at for a few minutes before packing the car. Then I meditated on my memory of the shells for a while and… wrote a story about Komodo dragons, of course!
This has been a very tough few days. Yet again I struggled to produce a complete story. Yet again I wrote a lot of words I had to toss. An easy one very soon, please?
This one took 5 starts. That seems to be my limit—once I hit 5 my goal is to amuse myself. And I did. Long live Martha B. Kitchen.
Oh, the humble fish stick. When I was a kid fish sticks seemed special because they were so different from the standard dinners we ate all the time—hot dogs, fried chicken, tiny hockey-puck hamburgers, pork chops when we were lucky. My childhood love of crispy, fishy rectangles might have something to do with my adult passion for the grown-up version and a Maine specialty: fish and chips. Mmm, the fried haddock here in Maine. I do love a good lobster roll but I never, ever turn down fish and chips.
I remember when I began to bust out shorties that I had strong affection for but that arrived in unfamiliar shapes and with endings that maybe weren’t endings. That started in July and all those unfamiliar shapes, as much as my busy days, have delayed my Story Facts and favorites pages for July and August. I just don’t know how to judge some of these stories. For now I think that must be a good thing—I have faith that I’m teaching myself something new. Or at least teaching myself how to wander into the tall weeds with less fear. Anyway, today’s shorty is one of these inscrutables, inspired by the photo above. I really like it, partly because two silly rhyming songs from my girlhood made an appearance. But is it good? I have no idea.
So frustrating! Yesterday I got the story like a whole gift dropped in my lap. Today I tried in the morning, then late morning, then early afternoon, then late afternoon, then early evening. I was so desperate from all the trying that when I got to early evening I wrote a half-page of material that I’d decided before wasn’t going to go anywhere but then I did something I occasionally do to kick-start myself: I hit return and wrote an absurd sentence. Then the husband took me to dinner. When we got back I went back to my absurd sentence and wrote the rest of the story in “make myself laugh” mode. The result is a very odd, very silly story that, yes, makes me laugh. Next!
Enjoy with me this cinnamon-hazelnut stick as I say goodbye to Week 20! Yeehaw! My favorite prompt week so far has been the one using poetry. As I did before, today I got my prompt from the site 
When I bought seven songs for my song-prompt week, I actually added an eighth “bonus track.” “Landslide,” by Fleetwood Mac, inspired the day’s shorty.
Remember in grade school, when you had to write your name down the left side of the page, and then make a poem by producing a word or line that starts with each letter? Or you started with “W-I-N-T-E-R” because you had to choose a season, or “P-U-R-P-L-E” because you had to choose a color. When I wrote my shorty yesterday, my prompt was a photo of a hurricane (see the post just below). I was stumped. I came up with multiple first sentences that went nowhere. After 40 minutes of NOTHING, in desperation I wrote “H-U-R-R-I-C-A-N-E” down the left side of my notebook page. Then I wrote a sentence that started with each letter. I edited them to be more interesting, then went back to the top and extended each sentence into a paragraph that made sense as a lead-in to the next starting sentence. After that, I discovered that I really liked my “E” sentence and the couple of sentences I’d written after it. So I crossed out all the preceding work and started over with those last sentences, which quickly led to a complete story that I actually liked. So, thank you Mrs. Moral, my first-grade teacher, for making me write a poem out of “C-L-A-I-R-E,” one that I have blissfully forgotten.
This photo was the “picture of the day” at 
The Bates College outdoor track inspired the day’s shorty. My friend Alicia and I walked for 45 minutes (which was not nearly enough time for a proper girl confab) while I reserved one small part of my brain for taking mental notes. I guess my notes weren’t so great because the resulting story is destined to live its life undisturbed on my hard drive.
Another personal photo as shorty prompt, this one of the outrageous bed in our room in an Ogunquit B&B. I laughed in glee when I saw that thing and snapped my first picture of the trip before de-pillowing. It took a good 20 minutes to find out-of-the-way places to store all the pillows on that bed. As for the shorty, good idea but poor execution, despite much, much time invested. Next.
Well, I’m very sad as I write this. I’m participating in this round of my friend 
I just completed four weeks of using various kinds of prompts to inspire stories, including personal photos, place, poems, songs. This week I’ll do a grab bag of prompts, using a different kind each day. Today I decided to use a headline, something I’ll try for a week soon. I went to my go-to news site, 
Another week of shorties under my belt! New York style cheesecake is one of my all-time favorite treats and this piece is a BEAUTY, yes? Mmm, congrats to me. Today’s story prompt was the song “Anyway You Want It,” by Journey. Now THAT was a blast from the past. I love the idea for the shorty the song inspired but the promising start wound down to a disappointing finish. Maybe a strong revision will save it.
I made FIVE false starts trying to write a shorty in response to the song “Walk of Life” by Dire Straits, one I very much enjoyed way way back in the 1980’s when I was so young and the world was before me… heavy sigh. Sometimes I have to just throw my hands up and write myself a joke story to meet my daily shorty commitment. Next!
The day’s shorty was inspired by “Stuck with You” by Huey Lewis & The News. Not one of my favorites from this band (there was a time in my youth when I had a very strong affection for Huey’s chin dimple) but I have a nostalgic appreciation for the melody and easy lyrics. But I had to push hard to come up with a story for this one. Still, with a strong revision, what I finally got might be a keeper.
I knew well the music and some of the lyrics of “She’s a Beauty” by The Tubes just by virtue of being a kid in the 1980’s. I had never actually listened to the song with any attention, so I was surprised to discover that this is not a love song. Ha! Far from it. The shorty it inspired has the same attitude as the song, I think, making this story the first in my week of prompt songs that feels connected in any way to its inspiration.
Daily Shorty 