Day: May 15, 2023

#WDYS — Mother and Child Reunion

Fandango14 Comments

Sharon was a mess. After the car accident, her doctor prescribed oxycodone for the pain. It worked and she was able to return to work and still balance being a good wife to Derrick and mother to Kevin. But the cost of being pain free and of carrying out her other job and family responsibilities grew when she needed larger doses and quantities of oxy to manage her back pain.

She lost her job because she was out sick so often and that meant she lost her health insurance to pay for oxycodone. But she needed it for her pain. It consumed her and due to her actions and addiction, Derrick left her and got custody of their four year old son.

Sharon hit rock bottom. She was homeless, living on the streets, selling herself for money to buy oxy from dealers. She was arrested for prostitution, sent to jail, and begged to be moved to a rehabilitation facility. She got in and spent the past two very hard years getting herself together. She’d been straight and oxy-free for nine months when she reached out to Derrick to plead with him to let her see her eight year old boy, who she hadn’t seen in four years. Derrick acquiesced and she was granted a one hour visit.

The day of the reunion with her son finally arrived. Sharon was waiting in the local park when she saw Derrick walking toward her with Kevin in hand. Will he recognize me? Will he even remember me? Sharon wondered. Four years is half the life of her little boy.

Derrick and Kevin stopped about 20 yards up the path from where Sharon was standing. He pointed to Sharon and gave his son a slight push. Kevin looked back at his father. Derrick nodded, said “Go on, son, it’s okay.”

Kevin slowly walked toward the woman. As he got closer, Sharon kneeled down on her knees and spread her arms wide. Kevin stopped a few feet in front of her. Tears started flowing from Sharon’s eyes. Kevin’s head cocked to one side. Then he moved closer and said, “Don’t cry.” He walked right up to her, put his hands on both sides of her face, and said, “I missed you, Mommy.”

Written for Sadje’s What Do You See prompt. Photo credit: Alisa Dyson @ Pixaby.

Blogging Insights — What I Like to Write

Fandango14 Comments

For this week’s Blogging Insights prompt, Dr. Tanya has asked us…

What type of writing do you enjoy the most?

My blog contains four types of writing: flash fiction, non-fiction, writing prompts, and “poetry.” The last category, “poetry,” represents a tiny fraction of my posts. And I put poetry in quotes because my “poetry” is mostly short prose where I randomly insert line breaks, capitalize the first word of the next line, minimize other punctuation, and rarely rhyme. So to call my alleged “poetry” poetry is a stretch.

My prompts are mostly for other bloggers. I don’t typically respond to my own prompts. I have one daily prompt that I host and a handful of weekly prompts, so that adds up to about 12 posts per week. So my prompts account for about 1/3 of my post each week.

The other two thirds is probably split evenly between flash fiction and non-fiction. My flash fiction posts are often in response to photo or word or music prompts from other bloggers and I enjoy writing them because it gives me an opportunity to use my imagination and to weave stories around pictures and words.

My non-fiction posts are often rants about politics, society, technology, religion, and various other things that are bubbling around inside my brain. Writing such posts can be cathartic, but they can also kick my blood pressure up a notch or two. On the other hand, I enjoy responding to Q&A prompts (like this one) and to music posts like Jim Adams’ Song Lyric Sunday prompt.

My non-fiction posts can also be about what’s going on in my life, and for the past three months, that’s been mostly about falling off a ladder, fracturing my hip, busting my right arm at the shoulder, and my rehabilitation struggles, which I’m sure my readers are tired of reading.

So, having just read what I’ve written so far, I’d say my short answer to Dr. Tanya’s question is that the type of writing I enjoy the most is flash fiction.

Share Your World — 05/15/2023

Fandango20 Comments
Share Your World

Di, at Pensitivity101, is our host for Share Your World each week. Here are her SYW questions for this week.

1. Children aside, do you celebrate your birthday/anniversary or is it just a normal day for you?

I’d say somewhere in between. We try to acknowledge that birthdays and anniversaries are not just normal days by doing something special that we know the other person would enjoy. But we don’t go overboard. My answer is “normal-plus.”

2. Do/did you always give your child a birthday party when they were young?

Yes, of course. But compared to what some parents are doing these days, the parties we gave for our kids were relatively modest.

3. If your child was born on Christmas Day (or a few days either side of the 25th), did they have a ‘half birthday’ in June, two presents/celebrations, or something else?

Not applicable to my family. Our kids were born in July and March. But our son-in-law was born on December 31. I don’t know what his parents did.

4. Would you prefer to give your child a party, or take them and a few friends on a special outing?

When our kids were still little kids, we most often did the party thing, but as they got older, we tended to do more of the special outing thing.

Gratitude

I’m grateful that we are grandparents now and that most of what you asked about herein is behind us. Now that our children have their own kids, these are their matters to handle and my wife and I are just along for the ride.

Fandango’s Flash Fiction Challenge #219

Fandango17 Comments

Welcome to Fandango’s Flash Fiction Challenge. Each week I will be posting a photo I grab off the internet and challenging bloggers to write a flash fiction piece or a poem inspired by the photo. There are no style or word limits.

The photo below is from Andrea Piacquadio at Pexels.com

For the visually challenged writer, the photo shows a man sitting at a desk holding a cup of coffee in his right hand. He’s looking intently at the screen on his laptop and he has a smile on his face.

If this week’s image inspires you and you wish to participate, please write your post, use the tag #FFFC, and link back to this post. I hope it will generate some great posts.

Please create a pingback to this post or manually add your link in the comments.

FOWC with Fandango — Reduce

Fandango15 Comments
FOWC

Welcome to Fandango’s One-Word Challenge (aka, FOWC). I will be posting each day’s word just after midnight Pacific Time (U.S.).

Today’s word is “reduce.”

Write a post using that word. It can be prose, poetry, fiction, non-fiction. It can be any length. It can be just a picture or a drawing if you want. No holds barred, so to speak.

Once you are done, tag your post with #FOWC and create a pingback to this post if you are on WordPress. Please check to confirm that your pingback is there. If not, please manually add your link in the comments.

And be sure to read the posts of other bloggers who respond to this prompt. Show them some love.