Tag Archives: Slice of Life Writing Challenge

Oh, For Crying Out Loud!

Posted on by
2

My commute is such that while all of my subway ride is underground, various stations along the route are equipped with free WiFi. The thirty to forty-five seconds spent at each station is usually just enough time for my smartphone to pick up a signal and perhaps update texts and/or an app or two. As such I was having something of a textation, a texting conversation, with a friend. As we each were on different trains, with anything between two to seven minutes between stations, we innately accepted the stop and go nature of it.

At one pointed she texted something that caught me completely off-guard. I just was not expecting such words to come from her and it touched me in a way I was not prepared to handle. There I was, on the subway, choking with feeling. I was so completely overcome by it. I felt my face contort, tears I could not control were about to fall. It was made all the worse when the man sitting next to me touched my trembling shoulder asking if I were okay. I immediately put my head in my lap unable to answer. Unable to stop the ragged gasping that fell from my lips. I was just short of keening as I desperately tried to suppress my emotions.

GOD DAMN HER!!!!

It started with her asking me about a -how shall I say this? stranger than usual- Facebook post and the snark started. I wish I could share, but the comments started in the gutter and went downhill fast, even by my prurient standards. Taken on its own, it would not have been as amusing, but in context of the randomness of the texts coming in, some out of order, the time of morning, the picking on of a mutual friend and the simple lack of that life giving thing called coffee, it was all the more funny than it ever should have been to disastrous results.  That emotion I was choking on? Pure unhinged laughter.

I was was not just crying with laughter, I trying with all of my might not to howl with it. And that was my mistake.

I should have learned my lesson from the last time this happened and just let it out to begin with.  This happened to me years ago at work, where several of my colleagues, and my boss, thought I was distraught over something as I was literally sobbing with suppressed laughter for a solid ten minutes because my cubicle mate at the time and I got into a case of the giggles and completely lost it. When it happened back then, I went off the floor to the ladies room and let it all out – much to the amusement of the one colleague who witnessed the transition from presumably distraught to dying of laughter as I could barely breath for it.  The memory of that last time combined with this one. And. Did. Not. Help. At. All.  Apparently, laughing hysterically and sobbing hysterically share many properties, thus why the word hysteria exists. The poor caring -and bless their souls- folks on the train simply could not tell at first.  It was a good two stations until I could finally lift my tear stained face and unmistakably guffaw at their expressions, letting those near me on the train know I was clearly crazy as a loon, but otherwise fine.

I’m the kind of guy who laughs at a funeral
Can’t understand what I mean?
Well, you soon will
–“One Week” Bare Naked Ladies
<>==========<>==========<>

#SOL2017

#SOL2017

Let’s see how others are losing it through the rest of this Monday:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 27

Fine Dining

Posted on by
4

Yesterday was all about Georgia O’Keeffe, but that was not all I saw while at Brooklyn Museum. Continuing its feminist vibe, the museum also has on exhibit “The Dinner Party” by Judy Chicago.

At some point in our lives we ask or are asked “If you could have dinner with…?” type of question. In her work “The Dinner Party” artist Judy Chicago takes that question and answers it in a magnificent way. It is a tribute of women from mythical goddesses, government leaders, wordsmiths, artists, scholars, activists and more, from historical to 20th century contemporaries.

Before you get to the table itself you pass through an entry where you are welcomed via a series of banners which hang from the ceiling. The phrases, depicted in much of the color pallet used in the main exhibit, read:

“And She Gathered All before Her”
“And She made for them A Sign to See”
“And lo They saw a Vision”
“From this day forth Like to like in All things”
“And then all that divided them merged”
“And then Everywhere was Eden Once again”

“The Dinner Party” entry banner “From this day forth Like to like in All things”
“The Dinner Party” entry banner “And then Everywhere was Eden once again”

I do not know Ms. Chicago’s intention, but reading this I felt as though a powerful feminine deity looked around to see the mess that had been made of things and took action setting things right.

And then you enter “The Dinner Party”

“The Dinner Party” by Judy Chicago at Brooklyn Museun

“The Dinner Party” by Judy Chicago at Brooklyn Museum

I had heard of the iconic, large scale project years ago. Still I was not prepared for the monumental scope of it. Chicago does not invite just one iconic woman, but what has to be nearly a thousand women in history to dinner. The lighting is intimate and inviting. You want to lean in and view each setting. About 40 who are represented by place settings at the triangular shaped table and rest via names inscribed on floor on which the table rests. Because of the flowing text and the lighting, I initially felt the table floated on tiles made to look like water. Especially in the center of the floor where the names of so many women, a representation of the ebb and flow, the fluidity of the female spirit throughout history. I thought it fitting.

Sojourner Truth Plate Setting – “The Dinner Party” by Judy Chicago at Brooklyn Museum Note: Harriet Tubman
Emily Dickerson Plate Setting – “The Dinner Party” by Judy Chicago at Brooklyn Museum. Note: Austin and Bronte
Georgia O’Keffe Plate Setting – “The Dinner Party” by Judy Chicago at Brooklyn Museum Note: Anis Nin

Ceramics, intricately embroidered table linens sit beneath utensils and golden chalices surrounding unique porcelain plates created for each invitee, with radiating forms representing female external sexual organs. Akin to a Georgia O’Keefe flower painting in spirit, she of course is a guest at this astonishing table. I was amazed by the beauty and depth of detail of each setting.

I cannot fathom the amount of staff involved in the creation of such amazing craftwork, but I give immense praise to all who brought this to life.

<>==========<>==========<>

#SOL2017

#SOL2017

Let’s see how the others are slicing their Sunday,

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 26

Georgia On My Mind

Posted on by
4

And before you start humming any more of the classic Ray Charles song, I mean Georgia O’Keeffe, the artist and one of, if not, the inventor of the American modernism genre in Art. Brooklyn Museum currently hosts an inspiring exhibit.

wp-image-1878780826jpg.jpg

The exhibit, though featuring numerous pieces of her art, was more about the woman herself. Known as much for her free spirit as for her dramatic and often sensual of art, something she maintained was never intentional,  O’Keefe was a female role model in the male dominated world of abstract and fine art. Her unique style made her a standout in many ways.

It was in the 1920s, when nobody had time to reflect, that I saw a still-life painting with a flower that was perfectly exquisite, but so small you really could not appreciate it. I decided that if I could paint that flower in a huge scale, you could not ignore its beauty.
–Georgia O’Keeffe

wp-image-339009781jpg.jpg

The queue to view the exhibit.

Like much of her art, when she wasn’t wearing black, she wore deep, rich hues. Preferring well-tailored, nearly mannish in her cut of clothes, instead of the more flowy, frilly styles that are a constant of women’s fashion, O’Keefe preferred a more androgynous look in her clothing style long before we started bandying the word about.

A style icon in her own right, the exhibit displays items of her clothing, and accessories -off the rack and custom made, over the years. She was also a sassy little minx as images captured her in various states of contemplation and dress – and undress- from various photographers such as Richard Avedon, Ansel Adams, and others, but especially her ex-lover Alfred Stieglitz. These photographs interspersed throughout the exhibit cover decades of her life and are as much art themselves in the stories they tell of their subject.

The exhibit also included video interviews of her at different times in her long career. Seeing and hearing her adds even more dimension when combined with all these personal pieces of her.Though I have known of her work all my life, I really knew nothing of the artist’s life until this exhibit.

It was a wonderful fusion of the art and the artist. I have a new and much deeper respect of both for it.

<>==========<>==========<>

#SOL2017

#SOL2017

Let’s see how the others sliced it up their Saturday,

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 25

You Want Me To Go Where?

Posted on by
4

Me, being me – with my mind and thus my mouth having finally resurfaced from the wasteland it wallowed in for most of yesterday, made up for its self-imposed exile with a vengeance – I eventually pissed someone off. Pissed her off to the point I was instructed to “Go to Hades!”

Those of you who know me, or at least have an inkling of me, are likely smiling already…

“Hades?” I asked incredulously, “Really? Go to Hades? You do realize being sent there is not exactly punishment?”

“Right, since you’re destined to rule by his side, it would not be fearsome to you.” She sneered. I gave pause, I was going to ignore it. Really I was.

I swear I was.

Okay fine! We know I wasn’t.

“That specific fact notwithstanding,” I rolled my eyes. “Hades ruled the underworld where the dead resided after their time on earth. Once you died you belonged to him and once you’ve crossed the Styx into his domain you were not allowed to leave. Those who tried to circumvent such were punished; otherwise he was mostly passive in his daily rule. So, you telling me to Go to Hades? Yeah, really not much bite in that. Hades, and his eponymous underworld, are a construct of mythology. Hell, the place you don’t have the maturity to call by its proper name, is a construct of religion.”

“Smartass. To Hell with you then!” Emphasis heavy on the noun this time.  I know my brow arched, I couldn’t help it and she, knowing me, groaned knowing something was about to drop and not in her favor.

Now class, what’s one thing that really galls us humans? Someone throwing our own words back at us.

“With you? Oh, Certainement!” I just grinned. “Since, as you’ve stated, I’m destined to rule by his side, it would not be fearsome for me, that would make me your queen. And either as Persephone or Lilith, I would surely make it hell for you.”

Lesson of the Day: Don’t mess with an erstwhile church girl, who likes classic mythology.

20170324_113634

From my desk at work: Spy vs Spy, a killer notepad and a mini traffic cone that asks “Where are we going? And why are we in this handbasket?”

<>==========<>==========<>

#SOL2017

#SOL2017

Let’s see how the hell others are slicing it up this Friday:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 24

Zort!

Posted on by
4

I am feeling rather indolent today. There really is no other word for it. Well, that’s not true – lackadaisical, torpid, languid, and lethargic also come to mind, but I digress.

“Where can I stick this?” Slipped from a colleague’s tongue. There was a slight pause as the speaker and two others in the conversation realized the verbal misstep and looked to me waiting for me to snark. On any other day I would have pounced on that spewing innuendo. I gave them all a whatever hand gesture – they are still waiting. I’m not angry, sad, tired or even bored, I simply can not be so bothered to be so bothered.

When not on autopilot, I’ve had no discerning thoughts, until I came here to post. For this creative mind that is constantly conjuring snark while running emotional apps, mental programs and existential subroutines, over speculative subroutines, under jokes, and in pure utter randomness, this complete lassitude of thought is unnerving to say the least.

It is just weird, really weird. I’ve shrugged, idly smiled, casually taught by rote all through this morning’s training session weird. Weird as in The Dude I just want to see what condition my condition is in, without being in any condition to condition really weird.

In the world of Pinky, are you pondering what I’m pondering? Pinky would be the Brain among the two of us right now. You’ll have to think about that, because clearly I’m not in the mood to.
<>==========<>==========<>

#SOL2017

#SOL2017

Let’s see how others are thinking it through their day:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 23

Yaaaaaawn

Posted on by
3

 

My insomnia is catching up to me. I’ve maybe had eight hours of sleep since Sunday morning. After two days of straight out documentation, plus an all day training session today, with another double session to look forward to tomorrow. I’m so knackered I could cry, but that would likely keep me awake. Of course, just as my eyes are actually starting to feel the type of heavy that I may finally get a few good hours in one night, I remember I had yet to post.

So goodnight, sleep tight and pleasant dreams to you, and hopefully me – if I can get this damned Lawrence Welk earworm I just gave myself out of my head.

<>==========<>==========<>

#SOL2017

#SOL2017

Let’s see how others are slicing through what’s left of this wide awake Wednesday:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 22

Just Swell

Posted on by
3

A guy on the train and I are flirting madly. We’re having fun, but I know it’s not going anywhere. As time draws near to when I’m about ready to leave, I let him down slowly with a contrasting statement.

“How is it this not enough, yet too much?’

“Because you can’t do what I do.”

“Like what?”

We’d been conversing for a while; I knew I was deep in his head space. I arch a brow, slowly tilting my head back and to the side, as I even more slowly lick the inside of my lower lip before pursing them and then wait as he watches me. His response is near instantaneous and far too easy.

His pupils dilate and breath catches a little.

A vein near his jaw starts to pulse rapidly.

A hand reaches up to rub the back of his neck in nervous curiosity. He realizes what he is doing and quickly brings his hand down.

I know my smile turns into a slow, but teasing grin. Like I said, too easy.

“How  – I don’t even know what to call it – what is it you do?”

“Apparently manipulate sympathetic divisional responses in your autonomic ganglia.” I grin, mostly to myself, for I absolutely adore the times when I can successfully reel off such information at a moment’s notice as though it were pedestrian conversation filler.

“My what?”

Luckily, the train pulls into my station, so I stand and head to the door.

“Sorry, not telling, a woman has to have her secrets.” I wink exiting. At least I left him with a smile and tumescence.

<>==========<>==========<>

#SOL2017

#SOL2017

Let’s see how others are slicing through this Tuesday:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 21

It’s Lamb Time!

Posted on by
1

Spring equinox 2017 in the Northern Hemisphere will be at 6:28 AM on Monday, March 20 EST

I cannot lie, with the exception of the previous week, Winter 2016 has been relatively mild temperature wise. Granted there will be a couple more fights twixt lion and lamb for the next few weeks before we really feel like spring in our bones, but boy I am very happy to officially be on this side of the equinox at last.

Central Park Promenade in early spring

Central Park Promenade 1st Day of Spring 2016

Like most seasons some signs of spring appear before the calendar states such. The days are noticeably longer, grass has started to show its first shoots – though last week’s snow storm may have done a number on them, any day now I expect the landscapers by my job to start planting their annual tulip bulbs, there’s even the tiniest hint of what will be buds on the cherry blossom trees. Starbucks have the new coffee cup sleeves for spring and the annual joking, but not funny memes requesting people to please, for the love of all that’s holy, please get pedicures before breaking out the strappy sandals. Ahh spring!

To all of my southern hemisphere people, now entering autumnal equinox: may your coming winter be even more gentle than our past one. And please take time for Hygge.

<>==========<>==========<>

#SOL2017

#SOL2017

Let’s see how others are getting through their First Day of Equinox:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 20

Keepers

Posted on by
4

Most Facebook like me know about its On This Day feature. On This Day displays anything you’ve posted  post on your own page from previous years.  As an avid, I almost typed rabid – pretty close, Facebook user of eight years it is now rare to come across any given day that does not have at least four entries.

For the most part it’s a lovely trip down memory lane. All the jokes, the quips and memes, blog posts that I’ve chosen to share bringing memories. The only  major downside is a bittersweet revisit when I come across where I’ve posted on someone who has left this realm – a loved one, a friend or a favored celebrity. One can choose to delete the any upsetting posts to avoid such in the future revisits, but I do not delete mine. I feel if I deemed it important enough to post in the first place, then I should live with it. After all I’ve have learned the hard way everything heals with time. And speaking of avored celebrity  RIP Chuck Berry – who left us yesterday after 90 years and is now playing with his Ding-a-Ling for all eternity.

The other occasional downside is when I share something from another website —

photo of Facebook post Christopher Walken dancing

I click looking forward to revisiting the fun of it only to see–

screen capture of unavaiable video apology on youtube

— it gone. It’s not my content so I have no control over it when this happens. For the most part when someone else decides to delete the content or the site altogether – it’s gone. I have had posts where my only descriptor was “HAH!” and I’ll never know what was so funny on that date – now those I will delete as it serves no purpose to connect to a dead link. However, this is YouTube where there is almost always duplicates of everything – especially things that amuse and delight. In this case it is a compilation of scenes from movies in which Christopher Walken is dancing. It underlies with C+C Music Factory’s “Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)” and I adore it. So I knew, KNEW there was no way there were not other posts of this out there, so – to the Google! My trust in this clip amusing others, as it does me, was valid. At least this is one dead post I can edit and keep the fun going.

And now for your and especially my own entertainment:

Christopher Walken Dance Now

====================

#SOL2017

#SOL2017

Let’s see how others are getting through their Sunday:

10th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge! – DAY 19

To Be Or Not To Be Guilty…

Posted on by
3

In the past few weeks, there seems to have been a spike of discussion online and in real life of females who have Friends With Benefits (FWBs) versus “a real” relationship and whether or not it is settling. I find this uniquely interesting as it is mostly the females who felt a sense of “less-than” or guilt for their choices. Most males do not feel any lessening of their self-worth for having FWBs, let alone guilt. So why are so many females so hung up over it. For simplicity I am going to mostly stick with the cisgender heterosexual monogamous relationships as I write, honestly because it’s easier, but the  subject crosses genders, sexualities and poly/mono -gamies.

Just as I had to work out my own issues, everyone must decide their sexual comfort levels that for themselves. I am not providing a How To on getting around/past/over said guilt. This is simply my two cents on why so many women seem to have this guilt in the first place. Your mileage will definitely vary.

I think a lot of the “guilt” some women put on themselves about sex outside of a relationship and/or marriage is rooted in the things taught to us growing up. Whether covertly or overtly a lot of it comes down do modern society’s taint that sex should be about love. In short, women should only be having sex with the person in which she shares mutual love. And if the mutual love is there then they should be married. Blame the “happily ever after” Prince Charming fed to little girls through Disney princess animations and every romantic comedy where gal gets the guy tropes as adults. Unfortunately, these far from realistic ideals of love and romance become so ingrained in our psyches, that come adulthood if it’s not Fourth of July fireworks, swelling arias, heart beat skipping breathlessness 24/7 it’s then it is somehow “less than” and is therefore settling.

Every female that reaches adulthood has heard “If you’re good enough to have sex with you then you’re good enough to marry”. While more experienced females, married or not, tend to have less of a bias on the subject, it is still very hard for most young females to work through the duality of wanting to satisfy a basic need versus “what would Mama think?” It is a grace to the modern times that couples who live together have far less of a stigma now than as few as fifty years ago. That we are now in the 21st Century has very little bearing on these core beliefs handed down to us through the ages since Adam and Eve.  And speaking of the First Couple… Compound all of the above with the thought of many religions which equate, and condemn, sex outside of the marital bed as being a sin.

The magic of the marital bed, in and of itself is funny as it does not 100% absconds one from the guilt of sex. I know many women that have been married or in long term relationships for years, but still will not have sex in their parent’s home when going for an extended family visit. I can pretty much guarantee that 90% of the time it is the female who has the hang-up about it. And 90% of that 90% is due to the fear of what their dear moms would think. These are from women who clearly did not arrive upon this earth via immaculate conception, yet the very thought of their mothers even thinking that they themselves are doing the very thing that gave them life, though they have every legal and “moral” right to as a married person, still makes them uncomfortable.

And while according to the adage the numbers of “size” doesn’t matter, oh but the number of partners a female has seem to do. Even a woman who is a serial monogamist has this magic intangible number that suddenly transforms her from  someone continually looking, but failing to find love, to becoming something…else.  A woman with one FWB is merely is not even pretending that what she is doing is about finding love and at best is “settling”, at worst she too becomes the ambiguous “something…else”. However, females happily engaging in multiple FWBs may then have wonderful pseudonyms from trollop to whore attached to their deeds as the classic double standards of the Madonna/Whore syndrome rears its nasty little head. Because oddly enough, even after all this time, since Eve said “Yes” oh so long ago, the onus to say “No”, to resist temptation – especially sexual temptation, is almost always on the female. Thus, those of us who can’t or simply won’t resist are in the wrong.

After all, we all know boys will be boys, but  good girls don’t.

When society in general has managed to create this dichotomy that glorifies and vilifies sex, even for those who have “the rights” to do it, really, is it any wonder so many women have guilt?

<>==========<>==========<>

That’s my two cents for today – come see how others are slicing:

Slice of Life - Two Writing Teachers

Tuesday Slice of Life Writing Challenge – Two Writing Teachers