Some Drawings and Some Words

Last year I went to a school where we wore uniforms. Due to observations, thoughts, and a wonderful class where all I had to do was listen to music and draw to my hearts content, this piece came to be. I started it over a year ago, it was taken up again and finished tonight.

The observations: Everyone in high school wants to fit in or stand out. What about just being yourself?

The thoughts: Everyone seems to want to be popular. Yet I was popular, and I didn't even like it very much. Everyone either wants to be you or doesn't want to be you, and they don't even know you. I must say, it's nice to be in a new school, where most people have no idea who I am, but enough people do for it to be happy.

The class: Drawing with Miss Fosse. Which meant drawing with Micheal Buble Christmas music playing in the background, Ingrid Michealson when I got to pick the tunes, and a certain noisy middle table that I got to enjoy from the side table without having to participate in their crazy conversations.

***

Feel free to use the Huh? feedback button if needed. I would be amused, I'm not sure if this story makes sense myself. But if it does in fact make sense, I'd love to know that, too.

Coin Laundry: A Short Story

A short fiction story inspired by the Italian laundromat I didn't actually see, by Emma:

I work at a laundromat, which does not mean I get to spin around in the washing machines and fall in love with a girl I met in the coin laundry. But every once in a while, something interesting happens. This is the most interesting thing of all--

She came to the laundromat every Tuesday for three years. She walked in without talking, placed her load in the washer, and sat down to read a paperback. Halfway through the book she moved her button downs and underwear to the dryer, sat down again, finished the book, and left with her laundry basket. She never read the same book twice, and it she always finished them by the time her laundry was done.

That was everything I knew about her until one day in '94, she walked in with her basket, started the first load, and walked out. Most people didn't sit around waiting like she did, so it wasn't too surprising. Except everyone else always came back in a couple of hours to reclaim their newly cleaned clothing, but Flora never did. I didn't notice until I was tidying up for the night and saw that the washer she always used was still full. I moved her clothing over to the dryer, assuming she would come back tomorrow. Her clothing sat in that dryer through five Tuesdays before I decided it was too late.

As I went to get her clothes out to throw them in lost and found, I realized she might have written some sort way to reach her on one of the tags. I started searching, and as I did I do admit I was interested. Interested in the sort of girl who spent hours reading dime novels while her tiny load of clothes washed, never saying a word to anyone. You can learn a lot about a person based on what they wear, and I found myself wanting to know as much as I could about her. So I learned what I could from her laundry, and made up what I was sure was fact.

All of her button downs were the kind that don't need to be ironed, she had five of them,one for each work day. She must have worked a job that required a slight dressing up, and she refused to wear one of her work shirts more than once between washes. Four of them were white, one of them was pale pink, for special days I assume.

Her one pair of jeans had small holes in both knees, and grass stains around the edges. She was a gardener. There was a crumpled, dried to-do list in the pocket of her light washed jeans. The only writing I could decipher said poppy seeds and lemonade. I decided she liked poppies best and never drank soda pop, only lemonade, which she preferred to buy from some kiddo's stand. Along with the list was some pocket change, so she was always prepared for just that.

There were gardening t-shirts mixed in with her party blouse, she only had one. Parties didn't come frequently enough for her to need more. The t-shirts had North Star Humane Society and Little League Baseball printed on them. She spent her sick days from work going on humanitarian trips to Ecuador every summer, and coached little league on the weekends. Summers were always her scene, and winter felt like a death sentence.

I found one high top sneaker tangled up in her floral patterned pajamas. Even when I had taken everything out and folded it, I couldn't find the shoe's partner. The one that was there was well worn and well loved, and someone had written I like you in black sharpie on the heel. She hadn't tried to wash the message off and had even tried to keep it there, maybe it was the only sentiment she had left over from a summer love of years passed, another evidence of August magic that never followed her into the fall.

By this time I had given her a name-- Flora. I found it fitting. She could go as a Flora, I thought, before remembering that I really knew nothing about her. Three years of paperback reading twenty feet away from me and I didn't even know the color of her eyes, let alone if she enjoyed gardening, or ever drank soda, or felt dead like her poppies in the winter. And suddenly I wished I did know those things, and I realized I could have, if I had ever started with a smile or opened my mouth to say hello.

I packed up her party shirt and single high top along with the rest of her one week worth's wardrobe in a box and wrote Flora's Things on the top. I didn't put them in lost and found but instead in the closet of things that never got thrown away. Every Tuesday I watched for her, hoping she would give me another chance to get to know her, to at least find out the color of her eyes, but she never came back. I kept the box as a reminder that I never really knew what people were like until I asked more, talked more.

I always smiled at my customers after that, and found out the names of the regulars. I found out Barry coaches Little League Baseball in order to be considered cool by his nine year old son and his buddies. Lucy loves flowers and has a greenhouse so that she can have her own personal summer, anytime of the year. Tom once reminisced about a summer romance and high top sneakers while I sat watching. So I guess in the end there was a little bit of Flora in each of my customers, and I was learning to find more of her in myself. The neighborhood kids always knew they could count on my to buy their ten cent lemonade after that.


Listen to Coin Laundry by Lisa Mitchell

Pip & Jackie (a series of one shots)

My latest form of writing fave-- one shots. I wrote one a few days ago and due to popular demand I am now posting it. [insert winky face here] I think this will actually turn into a series of one shots, creating something bigger, because I am enjoying the characters and I would like to continue to get to know them.

One shots are just a glimpse of a story, a scene, something short. I like writing them because I don't have to have every detail thought out, I just write until I feel like it's a good place to stop. Because we all know I am sucky at trying to write novels, and even short stories can give me grief, because blog posts are my comfort zone, but one shots I enjoy!

Here we go.

***

For as long as I can remember, everything in my life has been a race. When I was little, even raindrops rolling down the school bus window became two things fighting to beat the other to the bottom. My parents used to tell me that I was born to race, I even beat my twin sister out of the womb. But no race had ever affected me as much as I knew this one would. This time, I was racing to win Jackie Garfield’s heart.

I bent down to untie and tie my summer stained shoelaces one last time, sneaking a sideways look towards Jackie. I hoped she noticed that I could tie my shoelaces without saying “around the tree and through the rabbit hole.” She looked perfect, as always, blonde curls, big Disney Princess eyes, an ironed white dress just as clean as my shoelaces were dirty.

The PE teachers had a nice baseball mitt set aside for the winner of the race, but I knew the real prize was Jackie. Her name became my mantra as I pawed the ground with my sneakers and took deep breaths, waiting for the signal.

It finally came. I started off just right, not too fast, but enough that the crowd didn’t forget about me. Got to play the crowd, got to get Jackie’s attention. I watched as other kids started out too fast, just to start falling behind a couple hundred yards later. Suckers I thought, every good racer knows never to do that. I had never made that mistake, I was born to race, I was born for Jackie Garfield.

Just before rounding the last bend I turned my head to look at Jackie. I knew exactly where she was standing. Our eyes met and I even threw in a wink. Watching her surprised grin gave me exactly what I needed to launch into a full out sprint down the last straight of the track. Just call it a Pip Thompson Signature, I loved to surprise everyone with the last sprint. I loved leaving people in the dust of my All Star sneakers.

Most of all, I loved it when Jackie ceremoniously brought me my first place prize. Her smile directed towards me, her eyes bashful as she held out the baseball mitt, her high five and the tingle I got in my hand when for a nanosecond they were touching. A second of perfection with every high five. School years worth of daydreams with every smile.

Darling, stop. A Short Story.

On Pinterest I found a story prompt. All it said was Begin a story with "Darling, stop." That led the the short story written below, written this morning during my "Morning Ramblings" time.

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“Darling, stop.”

The cat was carving it’s signature into the refrigerator again. You’d think Darling was practicing for the day it became famous, due to how many times the cat had perfected it’s scratching all over the house. Fame happened for Grumpy Cat was Darling’s reasoning.

Darling the cat, named because it was the exact shade of red shown for Wendy Darling’s hair in Rosie’s childhood copy of Peter Pan, was obsessed with getting attention.

Rosie the human, owner of Darling, was completely content to be unseen. 

But on Thursday the 17th, someone noticed her.

***

“Do you need help? Please say yes.”

Rosie looked up from her Grumpy Cat prodigee into green eyes and really straight teeth.

“Um, well, I just need to get my cat to the Vet a few blocks down.” Rosie shoved her blond bangs out of her eyes, trying her best to look cool, which in reality probably meant she looked like a bad Justin Bieber hair flip impersonator, “are you a cat person?”

“Not really, but I can be if you need me to be.”

After a successful transfer of Darling from it’s owner to the attractive stranger, who could actually hold down the cat’s fury, Rosie picked up her grocery’s and started leading the way.

“I’m Patrick, by the way. I live just down the road,” he jogged a few steps to catch up to Rosie’s speedwalk.

“My name’s Rosie."

“Do you go to SVU?” Asked Patrick, gesturing to the local university campus across the road. That was more like asking How old are you? Because everyone college aged around there, went to SVU.

“Yeah, do you?” Rosie breathed out.

“Yes ma’am. I’m majoring in Sociology, which means I actually get to travel a lot. What about you?”

“Animal Sciences. So maybe I should practice getting better control over animals, eh?” Rosie nodded her head towards Darling, the perfect example of her failures as a cat lady.

Patrick genuinely laughed out loud at that. Not the “I’m flirting and laughing at anything you say” kind of laugh, or even a courtesy chuckle, but one that sounding like he was really amused. Rosie’s ears did a double-take of sorts, no one ever found her funny, especially not Darling.

He laughed like that again multiple times as they talked, every time was just as shocking to Rosie.

“Here we are!” Patrick announced when they reached the blue door of the Veterinary office.

He attempted to shift Darling over to one side in order to have a free hand to open the door, muttering “hey cat, it’s okay cat” under his breath. He obviously didn't know enough about cat-etiquette to ask the animal’s name. Rosie didn't want to break his concentration, so she just kept quiet.

When Patrick was reasonably sure of having reached a good position, he reached for the doorknob. Darling took the opportunity and leaped from his arms, dashing through the just opened door, leaving it’s signature torn into Patrick’s windbreaker.

In minutes the Veterinary office’s well trained team had Darling in the patient’s spot. The reception lady told Rosie that she could come pick Darling back up in an hour, because the visit would be a bit longer than usual.

After filling out the usual papers, Rosie turning around to see that Patrick was still there, reading a brochure about Animal Sciences. He looked up and smiled at her.

“I didn't mean to eavesdrop, but I heard you have an hour. If it’s one you can kill, do you want to go get a bite to eat?”

Memories of bad date experiences and food spilled on prom dresses flooded Rosie’s mind, but somehow she felt drawn to this young man who had just done what no one ever would-- carried her insane feline two entire blocks, and he wasn't even a cat person.  

"Sure, if you really want to." Rosie shrugged, trying to look nonchalant, which in reality probably meant she look a bit too eager.

“Grand,” Patrick’s smile somehow managed to get wider. He stepped up to open the door again, this time without the cat fight.

Rosie slipped out past Patrick and watched as he shut the door.

“You get to pick where we go!” He announced.

Rosie set off, speed walking as she always did, to her favorite cafe.

“Hey slow down! Don’t you ever just take life slow?” Patrick had to jog again to catch up.

“Yeah...” Rosie forced herself to walk normally, trying to think of a time when she ever took life slow. Ever since she had left for college life had been go, go, go. Even more so since she bought Darling.

“I’m not very convinced,” remarked Patrick, coming dangerously close to a wink.

Trying to change the subject, Rosie remembered the tear Darling made in Patrick’s windbreaker, “I’m sorry about your jacket. I can probably fix it if you want...”

Without realizing it, while trying to change the course of the conversation, Rosie had sped up even faster than before. She was already multiple feet before Patrick ran up, and nudged her arm.

“Darling, stop.”