writing | BulgingButtons

September 10, 2015
by BulgingButtons 1 Comment

A Taste of Fiction

Here is a short piece I wrote for a class I’m taking. Please feel free to leave constructive criticism. Thanks!

Fourteen Months and Then Some

I’m foggy at first, unsure of my surroundings, but a flash of lightning illuminates the cinderblock and I remember where I am. It’s been fourteen months, three weeks, and two days since I last saw them, kissing their soft damp heads goodbye in the August heat. I inhaled their baby powder scent deeply and promised I would be back soon, a promise I knew I couldn’t keep. Still, they looked at me with those big wet eyes, just like always. I turned away so they couldn’t see me cry. I never let them see me cry.

When they were born three years ago, I promised myself things would change. They were four weeks early and so tiny. I spent hours in the ICU with them, stroking them gently, willing them to live. We were alone, even when the room buzzed with activity. Jax and Maddie. Maddie and Jax. The perfect babies I was never meant to have.

All through high school I cramped and puked every month. My mother was a drunk and told me I was a drama queen. I wish. Years later, a pretentious doctor at the free clinic announced that I would never have children. Perfect. I never wanted them anyway. I was sure I would be a horrible mother, based on my own horrible mother. Besides, kids were a nuisance, and expensive too. I had plans, and they didn’t include kids.

Things change, though, whether you want them to or not. I just knew I was pregnant as soon as it happened. God must have been in a funny mood that night, because he gave me two babies to carry. I was pissed. That was not supposed to happen, but it did. Son-of-a-bitch. Those babies made me stop and think, though, at least a little.

I wanted to go back to school, but school costs money, and money is one thing I have precious little of, especially after having two babies in the ICU for so long. There was no money for extras, and hardly any for even food or diapers. Still, I got by. I did some things I maybe shouldn’t of, but I had to. Nobody else was taking care of us.

I suppose it was bound to happen eventually, but I still didn’t expect it. I got caught. I was stupid. I was on the way to pick up my kids when I made a detour, like I’d done so many times before. It was going to be quick. I needed the cash. Too bad for me I let my guard down. Too bad for me I lost my kids that night.

Fourteen months, three weeks, and two days. A lifetime of not seeing my babies. I turn to the wall and there they are, frozen in a blurry photo. Maddie and Jax, smiling without me. I smile back in spite of my self, then wipe away my tears.

June 25, 2015
by BulgingButtons 3 Comments

One More Day

Nineteen down, one to go. Days of summer work, that is. Not that it’s difficult work. It isn’t. In fact, it’s very rewarding work that come fairly easily to me, especially since I’m part of a terrific team.

We’ve been running a writing camp for kids at our local university. I did it last summer too, and enjoyed it. It’s fun to be with kids, teaching, in an environment where the strongest “discipline” that you ever dole out is a raised eyebrow, and the kids are all there because they want to be. Oh, and there’s no grading, no worry about common core, and no tests. Cool, huh? The kids think so. I have to agree.

Still, the alarm clock goes off each morning, and there’s a commute to deal with, made longer by summer construction (which is absurd where I live – do it during the cooler months, people!). Then there’s the trek from the parking lot to campus and back. Not so bad in the morning, but grueling in the afternoon heat. All in all, not a bad gig, but I’m looking forward to a few weeks of NO obligations. What will I do? Read. Write. Sleep. Swim. Visit family and friends. The usual. I can’t wait!

I’m looking forward to days where the biggest decisions I make involve which flavor of fudge to sample and which bathing suit to wear. Should I read another chapter now or wait until tomorrow morning? Do I want to cool off in the ocean or in the pool? It’s a rough life, but someone has to do it. This time, it’s going to be me. One more day. I know it’s going to be a good one.

June 13, 2015
by BulgingButtons 2 Comments

Summer Writing Marathon

Have you ever thought about all the places writing hides?

That’s the question we posed to our summer writers, kids entering grades three through twelve. There are several of us teaching these kids at our local university this summer, and recently we took them on a writing marathon on an unusually rainy day.

The writers were split into age groups and we toured the campus, stopping along the way to learn about the various sites, then sitting down to write before sharing and moving on.

We stood on a bridge and watched traffic whiz below us, we sat single file in the middle of a palm lined pathway, and we got comfy in plush chairs in the basement of the student union. We also visited the snakes in the life sciences building, discovered a secret garden, and imagined ghosts roaming the halls of one of the oldest buildings on campus.

It was amazing how these experiences unlocked the creativity of the writers. Some included their observations into pieces they had already begun, while others were inspired to write brand new pieces, including several poems and at least two ghost stories.

I took the opportunity to write also, since I told the students that I wouldn’t ask them to do anything I wasn’t willing to do myself. I wrote about the rain, and the students, and what it must be like to live your days in a glass tank, like the snakes we saw. I also wrote about how important it is to slow down and really notice your surroundings. That writing marathon took us all over campus, but the best place it took us was deeper inside our minds.