Sometimes when I’m fishing for story I hook a word that I don’t want to let go. The word I caught for this shorty was “figment.” I developed a really strong beginning from that word but then totally fizzled on the ending. Hopefully I can pick up the thread in revision and do a much better job.
Working Title: Figment
1st Sentence: She just doesn’t believe in that ghost shit, never has.
Favorite Sentence: How to describe “dubious” emerging from the writ-in-air face of a shimmering, transparent, apparently former man?
Word Length: 1,056
Photo here.
My husband’s family likes to tease his younger brother about his greatest fear when he was a child, which was that a meteor might fall on him. I wonder if he felt vindicated when he heard about the meteor that fell in Russia and saw the amazing video. My shorty doesn’t measure up yet but it might in revision.
When I was a kid, one of every year’s major concerns was whether my father would please my mother with an appropriate gesture on Valentine’s Day. We kids teetered on the line between dread and excitement as we waited for Dad to come home and prove himself to be worthy or unworthy. It was always a close-run thing. I didn’t quite get it right in this shorty but it’s a strong start.
Occasionally I see a pretty tattoo and I think, “Why not?” You only live once. But then I think… PERMANENT. And that word is enough to scare me away. Just further proof that I was born with the sensibility of a middle-aged woman in mom-jeans. Anyway, thinking about tattoos today led to a piece that isn’t great but has potential when I can come back to it.
Really struggled and it shows. This one will live on the hard drive.
This hot chocolate looks so comforting. It’s the right virtual treat to enjoy as gratitude for completing the very, very difficult Week 41. As for the day’s shorty (I’m typing this post on February 21), I had no heart for writing the day after saying goodbye to our kitty. Late that night, when I couldn’t make anything in my idea file work, I looked through my file of unfinished stories and found a start to something I wrote more than four years ago. My “I really wish I didn’t have to think about this” approach helped me to zero in on why I never wrote more than a few paragraphs after a whole page of notes on what I wanted to accomplish: The story’s vision was far too complicated. I saw how to render a simplified version in much shorter form and pounded it out. It’s a joke-story in any case, probably destined to live on my hard drive. But it’s nice to check off another piece that had been languishing in my “unfinished” folder. And it was good to work on something meant to be humorous.
Had to say goodbye to my sweet girl this morning. Just a couple of months ago she was making a mess of the index cards I was using to help me organize a chapbook. She loved nothing more than to interfere whenever I or my husband was focused on a task. We miss her so desperately already. As for my daily shorties, I have kept up with them, barely. But right now I have no heart for anything else. I will catch up on story posts when I’m better.
Among the many, many lessons this challenge is teaching me so well: The idea file or writer’s notebook is an awfully good friend. I had to end this shorty badly, though, for lack of time to find the right ending.
Again, a whole day of effort, but I got there. And the story is pretty good, maybe a keeper. The idea file is really coming in handy these days.
I like it when I can figure out how to build on the scraps I save in my idea file. Struggled the whole day then finally made something work. Not a keeper in present form but it has potential for when I come back to it.
I was so directed yesterday, using contest guidelines to frame my composition. Today I didn’t count the number of starts I threw out. In the end I grabbed a paragraph from my idea file as a start and forced myself to build a narrative sentence-by-sentence. And an odd, creepy little narrative it is.
Big congrats to me for finishing Week 40! We’ve got a huge snowstorm going here in Maine and I’m craving comfort food, so my virtual celebration treat is savory. That’s the kind of plate I could swim in for a long time…. As for the day’s work, do you know about 
My friend 
This one didn’t come easy but it finally landed. A strange one with some potential when I go back for revision. Inspired by February 3rd’s poem at 
Oh thank goodness. I can’t remember the last time I got a gift shorty. I did have to spend some time thinking about the prompt poem I got from 
Today’s prompt poem from 
I finally enjoyed two days of a little spark yesterday and the day before but today, sadly… no spark. I hope I have a really good week soon to make up for these late doldrums but who knows, maybe 9 months is the outer limit of how long I can write something every day and mine a little gold here and there. In any case, congratulations to me for completing my 9th month today! The treat in the picture is “artisanal nougat,” which looks like that Torrone candy I love to get at Christmas. I think a hunk like that is sufficient for celebrating another month. Excuse me while I don my dinner napkin. The day’s lackluster shorty was inspired by the lovely poem 
That’s more like it. Another shorty that doesn’t sing but it’s got potential, it’s about something real. After days of lackluster word-pushing, that’s what I need right now, a few pieces that remind me of why I write. Today’s piece was inspired by 
There is one good thing about the flu (and it’s certainly not worth it): Once on the road to recovery, everything you eat and drink is delicious, and everything you do is exciting because it’s so easy. Yesterday I straightened up the kitchen and felt incredibly happy that I had the energy to do it. I wanted to wash that dish—and I did! The day’s shorty isn’t great but it has a bit of spark and that’s enough for me right now. I’m going back to prompts this week and will be using the site 
And… um… good riddance. Thanks to my flu, definitely the worst week of the challenge. I wrote today’s shorty as a meditation on place that I hoped would help with another, long, unfinished story I’ve been revisiting. It helped in that now I know the longer story doesn’t need it. As for the photo, now that I’m recovering an appetite, I’m craving every food I’ve ever eaten and enjoyed, including junk food. For some reason today I am plagued by thoughts of Skittles.
I love it that the flu-stricken me really was trying to write well, despite knowing that I couldn’t. I remember noticing and accepting the total lack of creative interest in what I was doing. But the evidence is on the page: Throughout this shorty there are scratched-out phrases and sentences. So obviously I was still trying to uphold some kind of standard. My fever broke late the night I wrote this one, so this is the last shorty I wrote while seriously sick. As for the photo, I’m resorting again to photo therapy for my still-recovering self. One of the many things that makes me happy: fresh raspberries. Maine is justly known for blueberries but should be known for raspberries, too. But the summer feels awfully far away right now.
I remember working on this one. I would forget what I was writing literally while still in the middle of a sentence. There is evidence that I wanted to craft something good—a note partly down the first page in the margin reads, “Start here?” Oh, Honey. It doesn’t matter where you start this one.
My main concern since I turned this project into a year-long challenge has been that I’ll get very sick and find myself unable to keep up the challenge while ill. I’m writing this a week later than the date you see, now mostly recovered from a bout with the flu. I’m happy to report that I did, just barely, maintain the commitment. On my worst days I kept a spiral notebook in the bed with me and took advantage of the more lucid moments to scribble. Honestly, I did question my dedication to the challenge. I asked myself why I was insisting on writing stories while so sick, when clearly there was no hope for good work to come of it. What’s the point of that? Where’s the gain? I still have no good answer. But I did it.
Couldn’t focus. None of my usual tricks worked. Pulled something from my Idea File, finally, fleshed it out, made it as good as I could just to meet my requirements. And I began to suspect I had something worse than a cold. And yes, more photo therapy.
A very difficult day. Hugely fatigued, couldn’t focus, headache. The shorty I produced has potential, though. By bedtime I was cursing the nasty cold that had settled in (I’m writing this a week later). This photo has no bearing on the post, I just need cheering up.
I’m writing this day’s post a week later. When I can’t do a story post in the same day, I leave a line of notes in the story file (or on the notebook page) to remind myself of what I was thinking and feeling when I composed the draft. For this one I noted that I couldn’t focus and it took forever to pull something out. Part of the problem, I know now, was that I was coming down with the flu.
This raspberry tart looks almost unbearably wonderful. Faced with a shelf of those things I would eat them for every meal until they were gone, I think. Dream with me. And applause, applause for the completion of Week 38! On my last day of this week I used Leslie Anderson’s 
Coming to the end of my second week of stories prompted by Leslie Anderson paintings—just one more after this one. See the 
Daily Shorty 
