"Modern" is relative to the amount of time one exists on this earth. If you live long enough, you might notice that society simply recreates itself.
Meh. Sooner or later we'll come up with something totally new.
Sunday Scribblings 304: Action
Newton’s Third Law of Motion
Actioni contrariam semper et æqualem esse reactionem: sive corporum duorum actiones in se mutuo semper esse æquales et in partes contrarias dirigi.
He regarded his sleeping younger brother with a rancorous air, frowning and resisting the urge to show him a finger, just like dad did to the referees on television.
The car rumbled on, small bumps in the road causing them both to jostle. His brother had squirmed in his seat, messing with his belt and using his jacket as a pillow, and his head had rolled to one side and was now gently bumped against the door.
Wouldn’t it be something if a huge bug landed on his stretched neck, biting him until his head was just one big bump? Mom would soak his whole ugly head in a bucket of that pink lotion. Or maybe dad’ll hit a big bump and give him a concussion, and he’s already asleep… and you’re not supposed to be asleep when you got one of those. Maybe he’d be gone forever then. Good.
He wouldn’t hate him so much if only the little jerk hadn’t stolen his favorite Matchbox car. It was the red one, with doors that really opened. He got it for his ninth birthday and he loved it. But he forgot to put it away before bed and his brother had come along that morning and found it. Down the stairs the jerk had come for breakfast, making vrooming noises and running the plastic wheels down the banister. He’d immediately snatched it back, and that resulted in a tattletale's high-pitched caterwaul. Their mother, vexed, took his car and stuffed it back into his brother’s hands. Jamie! Stop tormenting Bobby! Let him play with the damn car. I don’t have time for this!
He glanced at the front seats, at his parents heads. They were looking forward. The tone of their voices told him that they were intent on their adult discussion. A smile crossed his face, one that would make the cartoon Grinch proud, and he slowly raised his arm, coiling back and calculating just how much force was necessary to cross the distance between them to land a stinging attack on the jerk’s exposed ear.
It happened suddenly. At first he thought he had grossly miscalculated or that the road had given dad a really big bump to navigate. He felt himself forced towards his brother. He saw his brother’s small form, already leaning against the door, appear to flatten into it, his neck strained unnaturally from the forces at work on them, his head bouncing around in flow to the impact. Neither would remember the sound of impact until later, when it was dark and no other sounds could block its emergence from deepest memory.
There was a series of tumbles, crunch, crunch, crunch, and crystals sparkled in all directions. It was like in an adventure movie, the kind his parents wouldn’t let him watch because of the content, but it was just like that. Legos, a drink cup, the plastic whistle he thought he’d lost; treasures the car had stolen from them were now tumbling around the interior.
We’re in a big clothes dryer, he thought, and then he closed his eyes because the world was so hard to look at. He found himself falling up, or rather he found that he was still belted into his seat but that the car was upside down. The engine ticked softly and his mother began to sob.
“Jamie?” His father’s voice was hoarse. “Jamie boy, you okay?”
“Yes, Daddy” he said. He glanced over at his brother. The rest of the world froze. He felt his own breath come in ragged gasps, his body beginning to shudder despite the restraints. I take it back, his mind screamed, please God, I take it all back amen. I don’t wish he was gone forever.
His father called to Bobby, and Bobby said nothing. He hung from the seat from his loosened seat belts, a beanie baby with trickling blood replacing plastic beads. His father’s voice called again, fear unfettered, and then his mother began to struggle against her own restrains.
But it wasn’t either parent that Bobby called for when his eyes fluttered opened. His mouth formed into a big O, and he glanced sideways at Jamie. It was his name that Bobby at first whispered. The whisper became a croak, and the croak a wail; a big, beautiful caterwaul that put his previous noise that morning to shame.
Hearts filled with relief and love, the brothers reached out an arm to each other. Tattling and retaliatory attacks on ears were forgotten as they hung in space. His little brother pressed something warm into his hand and he knew by feel what it was.
“I’m sorry I took your car,” was all the younger could say.
It didn’t matter. He’d forgiven him. He’d forgive him a million times even if he stole it a million times.
______________________________________
This week’s Sunday Scribbling is “Action”. I thought perhaps I would take this in the direction of two warring brothers hitting each other in stages of escalating violence until parental intervention but then I thought of Newton’s law if applied to the heart.
The elder brother resented his sibling, hating him in childish fashion until an event occurs that causes him to emotionally spiral in the opposite direction. The ferocity of his hatred is replaced with an equal ferocity of love.
I also felt an action piece would be a good use of topic.
As to what caused the accident: I imagined it to be caused by a careless, texting-while-driving person. I thought I would drive the point home by causing the younger brother to die, ending the piece with “But I was only texting…” but I just don’t have the heart for it today.
Read more...
Actioni contrariam semper et æqualem esse reactionem: sive corporum duorum actiones in se mutuo semper esse æquales et in partes contrarias dirigi.
To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction:
or the forces of two bodies on each other are always equal and are directed in opposite directions.
He regarded his sleeping younger brother with a rancorous air, frowning and resisting the urge to show him a finger, just like dad did to the referees on television.
The car rumbled on, small bumps in the road causing them both to jostle. His brother had squirmed in his seat, messing with his belt and using his jacket as a pillow, and his head had rolled to one side and was now gently bumped against the door.
Wouldn’t it be something if a huge bug landed on his stretched neck, biting him until his head was just one big bump? Mom would soak his whole ugly head in a bucket of that pink lotion. Or maybe dad’ll hit a big bump and give him a concussion, and he’s already asleep… and you’re not supposed to be asleep when you got one of those. Maybe he’d be gone forever then. Good.
He wouldn’t hate him so much if only the little jerk hadn’t stolen his favorite Matchbox car. It was the red one, with doors that really opened. He got it for his ninth birthday and he loved it. But he forgot to put it away before bed and his brother had come along that morning and found it. Down the stairs the jerk had come for breakfast, making vrooming noises and running the plastic wheels down the banister. He’d immediately snatched it back, and that resulted in a tattletale's high-pitched caterwaul. Their mother, vexed, took his car and stuffed it back into his brother’s hands. Jamie! Stop tormenting Bobby! Let him play with the damn car. I don’t have time for this!
He glanced at the front seats, at his parents heads. They were looking forward. The tone of their voices told him that they were intent on their adult discussion. A smile crossed his face, one that would make the cartoon Grinch proud, and he slowly raised his arm, coiling back and calculating just how much force was necessary to cross the distance between them to land a stinging attack on the jerk’s exposed ear.
It happened suddenly. At first he thought he had grossly miscalculated or that the road had given dad a really big bump to navigate. He felt himself forced towards his brother. He saw his brother’s small form, already leaning against the door, appear to flatten into it, his neck strained unnaturally from the forces at work on them, his head bouncing around in flow to the impact. Neither would remember the sound of impact until later, when it was dark and no other sounds could block its emergence from deepest memory.
There was a series of tumbles, crunch, crunch, crunch, and crystals sparkled in all directions. It was like in an adventure movie, the kind his parents wouldn’t let him watch because of the content, but it was just like that. Legos, a drink cup, the plastic whistle he thought he’d lost; treasures the car had stolen from them were now tumbling around the interior.
We’re in a big clothes dryer, he thought, and then he closed his eyes because the world was so hard to look at. He found himself falling up, or rather he found that he was still belted into his seat but that the car was upside down. The engine ticked softly and his mother began to sob.
“Jamie?” His father’s voice was hoarse. “Jamie boy, you okay?”
“Yes, Daddy” he said. He glanced over at his brother. The rest of the world froze. He felt his own breath come in ragged gasps, his body beginning to shudder despite the restraints. I take it back, his mind screamed, please God, I take it all back amen. I don’t wish he was gone forever.
His father called to Bobby, and Bobby said nothing. He hung from the seat from his loosened seat belts, a beanie baby with trickling blood replacing plastic beads. His father’s voice called again, fear unfettered, and then his mother began to struggle against her own restrains.
But it wasn’t either parent that Bobby called for when his eyes fluttered opened. His mouth formed into a big O, and he glanced sideways at Jamie. It was his name that Bobby at first whispered. The whisper became a croak, and the croak a wail; a big, beautiful caterwaul that put his previous noise that morning to shame.
Hearts filled with relief and love, the brothers reached out an arm to each other. Tattling and retaliatory attacks on ears were forgotten as they hung in space. His little brother pressed something warm into his hand and he knew by feel what it was.
“I’m sorry I took your car,” was all the younger could say.
It didn’t matter. He’d forgiven him. He’d forgive him a million times even if he stole it a million times.
______________________________________
This week’s Sunday Scribbling is “Action”. I thought perhaps I would take this in the direction of two warring brothers hitting each other in stages of escalating violence until parental intervention but then I thought of Newton’s law if applied to the heart.
The elder brother resented his sibling, hating him in childish fashion until an event occurs that causes him to emotionally spiral in the opposite direction. The ferocity of his hatred is replaced with an equal ferocity of love.
I also felt an action piece would be a good use of topic.
As to what caused the accident: I imagined it to be caused by a careless, texting-while-driving person. I thought I would drive the point home by causing the younger brother to die, ending the piece with “But I was only texting…” but I just don’t have the heart for it today.
Mag 101: Intersteller Fast Food
Intersteller Fast Food
“What is it?” he asked
As his brother offered it
On a woven mat.
“It’s the new earth rage,”
His brother smugly replied,
“They call it ‘sushi’.”
“Ugh! It looks toxic!
Can’t you stick to crop circles?
At least remove bones!”
More (better!) poems and stories can be found at http://magpietales.blogspot.com/
Sunday Scribblings: #250 Invisible
Sunday Scribblings #250 - Invisible
A Quick Haiku
Inconspicuous
She lies in wait for my foot
Hey Cat! Don't trip me!
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
More Sunday Scribblings can be found here.
Sunday Scribblings #249 - A Walk in the Park
#249 - A Walk in the Park
Old Mrs. Milton trundled down the icy street, shopping bag swinging in tempo with her labored gait and punctuated breaths. She wore about her thin shoulders a shawl of the whitest snow, and a matching coating had settled upon the thin flowered scarf that she always wound around her hair when going about the town.
Paper-thin skin grew angry red against the frosty wind. It was necessary to go out. She was too hardy in soul and too poor in pantry to pay it any mind. She gazed momentarily at her exposed skin and pondered its diaphanous nature. Had those veins always been there, so very elevated? Was that a tendon creaking as she clenched and unclenched her hand? She marveled at mortality’s fragile quality. Ah, but this is the hallmark of being ancient, she laughed to herself and then turned into the park.
She had taken the same familiar park short-cut for nearly eight decades; ninety-three years had passed since Mrs. Milton’s birth. “Seven makes one hundred,” she chuffed, and momentarily wondered if they would put her picture in the paper.
The park held many wonderful memories, of course. The colorful playground contained primary colored slides, climbing devices and swings but the area had once been a small ice rink where children and aspiring lovers spent lazy winter afternoons. Her mind’s eye saw two bundled up boys laughing as they played chase across nature’s cold glass.
A modern art sculpture festooned a pavilion area that was home to a gaily decorated petting zoo in the early 1900s. Her sister was so afraid of the goats, and always hid behind their mother’s skirts whenever they approached.
Vendors of all sorts once lined the path and you could buy roasted chestnuts in the winter. How she loved those chestnuts! Her mouth watered at the thought of summer ice flavored with cherry, peppermint strings that made the tongue flop and flip, and always the cotton candy and popcorn smells.
A tall oak loomed into view and she paused before it, as was her custom. This place was the heart of the park itself and the very spot where Mr. Milton dropped to a knee and asked for her hand. The War was then, and she had almost said “no”, but his eyes – those beautiful eyes! – caused her heart to defeat her common sense. Oh but that was a good thing indeed, and Mrs. Milton had never been happier than when her husband was alive.
But he had passed away, so many long years ago, long before his prime and long before she was ready to say goodbye. Isn’t that how it always is? She had outlived him and had outlived their two sons and, most troubling of all, had outlived her only grandchild. She was rather alone, both in companionship and in the park itself.
No matter, she thought. Happiness is a state of mind. She considered herself blessed to not only be alive but to have the strength to do her own shopping. Granted, it was a mere two blocks and a walk in the park but she was independent still. Slow-moving, very much so, but independent.
She shook her shopping bag and took up the journey again. She could just see the gate at the far end of the park. Her kettle was waiting.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
Please visit Sunday Scribblings for similar posts.
Shadow Shot Sunday: 138 "Ice Play"
This is my first entry for Shadow Shot Sunday. It's a bit of macro; melted snow clinging for existence as it battles the sun on my deck. If I were a bit animistic, I'd say that the larger one is comforting her offspring even as she shields it from the harsh light.
Read more...
More Shadow Shots can be found here.
Prompt Writes: love
A simple drop in a still pond,
unfurling ripples in satin slips
scattering water bugs
and bringing disorder to what was so orderly prior.
This drop,
this sudden onslaught,
welcomed and cherished, ripples ever onward.
I stop.
I consider.
I remember a time before,
way back before,
when it was only water bugs and stillness.
This drop you brought,
tender in its path but often disturbing of the surface -
joyful drop,
painful drop,
heavenly drop,
comforting drop,
adventurous drop.
I watch the pattern unfold.
My heart is glad.
unfurling ripples in satin slips
scattering water bugs
and bringing disorder to what was so orderly prior.
This drop,
this sudden onslaught,
welcomed and cherished, ripples ever onward.
I stop.
I consider.
I remember a time before,
way back before,
when it was only water bugs and stillness.
This drop you brought,
tender in its path but often disturbing of the surface -
joyful drop,
painful drop,
heavenly drop,
comforting drop,
adventurous drop.
I watch the pattern unfold.
My heart is glad.
Prompt Writes: Bud
Crocus bud
Nubile wisp
Seeking light
Finding cold mantle
And hesitating
Just below
Before bursting
Past snow
Past ice
As courage
softly leads
Sweet elegance
To wilting,
Bitter death.
Alas! Mourn
This crocus
A spring
Harbinger wasted
Read more...
Nubile wisp
Seeking light
Finding cold mantle
And hesitating
Just below
Before burstingPast snow
Past ice
As courage
softly leads
Sweet elegance
To wilting,
Bitter death.
Alas! Mourn
This crocus
A spring
Harbinger wasted
_________________________________________
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)