PROMPTuesday

Deb at San Diego Momma posts writing prompts each Tuesday. It's a great way to get your creative juices flowing.

Deb sends us on a trip this PROMPTuesday - to Chicago.  Joe at "The Write Practice" makes it simple.

Write about Chicago.
Write for fifteen minutes.

PROMPTuesday

I've joined in the wonderful and creative writing exercise presented by San Diego Momma -.PROMPTuesday These have spurred my creativity, and have been a lot of fun at the same time.

Each Tuesday, she posts a writing prompt. Participants play by the following rules:

• You must write your entry in 10 minutes. This encourages top-of-mind, primal thinking before the ego and judgmental brain kicks in. Just set a timer, make your kid count to 600 slowly, whatever. It’s an honor system. And I trust you.
• Keep to 150 words or less (I always run over a bit!)  
• Post on your blog or in her comments so everyone can read it.  
• Have fun!

This week, Deb didn't get her PROMPT up till Wednesday. Today’s PROMPT is:
Write about a reunion.

From L to R - Me, Karen and our friend Nan

 This one is easy, since I just had a reunion, of sorts.

I got an email from a friend of mine. Her husband was on an extended business trip in town and she was coming to spend a few days with him - coinciding with his birthday. Other than the birthday, he'd be working and she had some time to explore. Could we hang out?

PROMPTuesday on Wednesday

I've returned to the wonderful and creative writing exercise presented by San Diego Momma -.PROMPTuesday These have spurred my creativity, and have been a lot of fun at the same time.

Each Tuesday, she posts a writing prompt. Participants play by the following rules:

• You must write your entry in 10 minutes. This encourages top-of-mind, primal thinking before the ego and judgmental brain kicks in. Just set a timer, make your kid count to 600 slowly, whatever. It’s an honor system. And I trust you.
• Keep to 150 words or less (I always run over a bit!)  
• Post on your blog or in her comments so everyone can read it.  
• Have fun!

This week, Deb didn't get her PROMPT up till Wednesday. Today’s PROMPT is:

The phone call. Write about a call you received that changed your life.

PROMPTuesday

Each Tuesday, Deb at San Diego Momma posts a writing prompt. Read, let your creative mind wander, and then write! Post in her comments, or post a link to your own blog.

Plein-air painting by William Wendt

Today, Deb wants a list! A Top Five list. Go to her site and check out the ideas.  Then pick a list and post your Top Five:

Here's mine - Top Five Things you want to do in your life
1) Learn to paint with watercolor, acrylic, or oil on canvas. I've always wanted to be able to pick up a brush and capture the light and color that I see before me. I'd especially love to learn how to do plein-air painting.

2) Speak French - really speak it. I chickened out when we went to France two summers back, and though I could read French, I stumbled in my touristy English. I want to take a language immersion course, and really speak French.

3) Visit Venice, Italy - I long to see this romantic and mysterious city. Plus, I'm jealous of my kid, who got there before I did.

4) Learn to surf - each morning I drive past people in wetsuits on the waves, and wish I could pull the car over and join them.

5) Publish a real book - it would be my dream come true.

OK everyone - how about your Top Five? Check out Deb's PROMPTuesday!

PROMPTuesday

I've returned to the wonderful and creative writing exercise presented by San Diego Momma - PrompTuesdays. These have spurred my creativity, and have been a lot of fun at the same time.

Each Tuesday, she posts a writing prompt. Participants play by the following rules:

• You must write your entry in 10 minutes. This encourages top-of-mind, primal thinking before the ego and judgmental brain kicks in. Just set a timer, make your kid count to 600 slowly, whatever. It’s an honor system. And I trust you.
• Keep to 150 words or less (I always run over a bit!)
• Post on your blog or in her comments so everyone can read it.
• Have fun!

 So for this week’s PROMPT, A song - Dan Fogelberg's "Same Old Lang Syne." Let the music marinate a bit, and then write starting out with this sentence - "I hadn't seen him since high school."

PROMPTuesday

I've return to the wonderful and creative writing exercise presented by San Diego Momma - PrompTuesdays. These have spurred my creativity, and have been a lot of fun at the same time.

Each Tuesday, she posts a writing prompt. Participants play by the following rules:

• You must write your entry in 10 minutes. This encourages top-of-mind, primal thinking before the ego and judgmental brain kicks in. Just set a timer, make your kid count to 600 slowly, whatever. It’s an honor system. And I trust you.
• Keep to 150 words or less (I always run over a bit!)
• Post on your blog or in her comments so everyone can read it.
• Have fun!

 So for this week’s PROMPT, tell me a ghost story. Something haunted that’s happened to you or a friend of a friend of a friend. Or? Make something up if it’s more your style.

As the last of the exhibitors closed up their displays, Ed walked the Arena's perimeter, locking doors one by one; the catering loading dock, the backstage door; the compactor bays, the roll-up door where the chair racks were stored. The lobby doors' crash-bars were dogged back up and latched; the fire exits checked, and the only door remaining was the double door to the parking lot.

The Municipal Arena was too shabby and small for most exhibit shows these days, and the City was planning a new convention center to replace the 1930s hall. The Antique Show had been coming for 30 years, even though business was down.

PrompTuesday

I've return to the wonderful and creative writing exercise presented by San Diego Momma - PrompTuesdays. These have spurred my creativity, and have been a lot of fun at the same time.

Each Tuesday, she posts a writing prompt. Participants play by the following rules:

• You must write your entry in 10 minutes. This encourages top-of-mind, primal thinking before the ego and judgmental brain kicks in. Just set a timer, make your kid count to 600 slowly, whatever. It’s an honor system. And I trust you.  
• Keep to 150 words or less (sorry, I ran over a bit!)
• Post on your blog or in her comments so everyone can read it. 
• Have fun!

This Tuesday, the prompt is: Write in the style of an unreliable narrator. Take an unremarkable incident or phase in your life and turn it into something BIG, something over the top, something EXTRAORDINARY.

 I thought about it a second, and came up with this:

PROMPTuesday

Every Tuesday, Sandiegomomma hosts PROMPTuesday, where she issues a creative writing prompt and hope that people take it and run. I have been terribly delinquent with PROMPTuesday, but this week I am going for it. This week's prompt is:

1. Who are you?

2. Where did you come from?
3. Where are you going?

Who am I? That's a difficult question. Having a defined identity is supposed to be a good thing, and we know many people who enjoy the certainty of knowing exactly who or "what" they are. My father was a Texan - that was his identity, despite the fact that he lived away from Texas for some 45 of his 78 years of life. Some people proudly claim their humble origins, being Just an Okie from Muskogee, or Jenny from the Block.

Others see themselves in terms of their job - a Mechanic, a Nurse, a Lawyer or Chef. Some jobs seem to be better suited for taking on as one's identity - you can even imagine the proper costume for a Professor, a Ballerina or a Rock Musician, but it's hard to embrace an identity if you're a Marketing Manager, for example.

For many women, their role in the family is their identity. A Mom. A Grandmother.

"Do you know who I am?" asks the affronted celebrity, CEO, or distinguished professor when treated with disrespect. But, somehow, it's worse when their identity isn't even acknowledged!

Some people run away from their identity. You think of figures like the Duchess of Windsor, who did everything she could to escape the stigma of being a poor relation raised in a Baltimore rooming house. Or P. Diddy, now an icon of mainstream fashion in the Hamptons - no longer a kid from the Harlem projects.

So who am I? Once I was an outsider. My family moved from town to town, and I was always the new kid in school, the one who didn't fit in, the tomboy in the girl's gym.

In my 20's I fell into the profession I practiced for over 20 years - a theatre stagehand - and it became my identity - I was a full-fledged member of an exclusive club. When I joined the union, this sense of exclusivity intensified. We had our own language and our own shared experiences. We worked at night when other people slept. We did dangerous work, and watched each others' backs. We took risks, and covered up for our own and our brothers' aberrant behavior. When I met stagehands from other cities, there was an immediate bond, because our club had many chapters.

It is not unlike the kind of bonding I hear about from fire-fighters or policemen. Or - to pick a less noble profession - prostitutes, who, in what might be the penultimate expression of identity, say they are "in the life."

I held my stagehand identity for a long time. For me, perhaps, it was so important because it was the opposite of what I was before. No longer the outsider, I was a dues-paying insider. I knew what lay behind the scenes. When I stopped doing that kind of work, I remember how wrenching a break it was for me to realize I would no longer "be" a stagehand. And yet now I can't connect with that emotion anymore.

So, what am I now? I don't know. I am not a "role" - I am a wife, but I am not a capital "W" Wife. I am a mom, but my son is now an adult. I can no longer claim that I am a "one-word-profession" - my current job is so bureaucratic and functionary it takes a whole paragraph to describe it. Having lived all over the U.S., I am not of any one region, and even my economic class has fluctuated up and down over the years, so that I move now in realms I'd never have dreamed of before.

And I'm not sure I really want to "be" something. I think it might be, for a while, more interesting to be an observer, a camera, as it were, to see things. Or a sponge, to soak in what the world has to give.

Where did I come from? I can only think back to where I started and how I traveled to where I am. I came from small to big. I came from a place that looked inward, and then one day I looked outward and I left. I came from narrow horizons, and now mine are wider. Yet they're still not as wide as they could - and should - be.

Where am I going? That's easy to answer. Everywhere I can go. Show me more.

PROMPTuesday

Every Tuesday, Sandiegomomma hosts PROMPTuesday, where she issues a creative writing prompt and hope that people take it and run. This week's prompt is:

What was your favorite toy as a child? Write a vignette about playing with it. (What did you feel? Who were you with? Where did you live?)

There's a toy I vividly remember from childhood - it was a plastic car, colorful and bright, and unique in two ways. First, it was a car like none I'd ever seen on the street; three-wheeled and squat, the front of the car hinged to open like a door, with a windshield and two pop-eyed headlights. I've since learned it was a replica of an Italian car called Isetta. The other reason it was unique was that it was larger than the usual toy car - it was about six inches long, and three or four inches high. It was a perfect toy car for a girl, because I could put small dolls and figurines inside and let them ride. I have a vivid memory of this car, and a sense of longing as well - probably because I had it only a short time, and that loss has lent it an importance in my mind that it probably doesn't deserve. It played such a fleeting role in my life that I no longer remember where we lived or how old I was when I got it. I don't remember who gave it to me, nor do I remember why it disappeared. It may have been a gift brought home by my father from a business trip. My car was one of a pair of cars - my brother had one, too. They were the same, only different colors. And while I remember clearly that mine was bright primary green with a red interior, I have absolutely no memory what color my brother's car was.

It's odd that these toys disappeared - my family is unusually prone to accumulation. But now I think of it, when we recently went through my mother's house, there weren't many childhood toys. My parents kept scores of useless and obsolete artifacts of their lives - notepads from my Dad's employer in 1962; 60 year old wastebaskets; autograph books belonging to long-dead great uncles - but they really didn't keep many of our toys. For four kids, we had lots of toys, but other than a few iconic examples, they did not survive to be packed and carted from house to house to house along with all the tons of stuff.

I wonder why. Were we so hard on toys that they were destroyed? I certainly remember the time our next-door neighbor, Johnny Masters, ran his father's lawnmower over my Barbie doll. I allowed him to do it - rapt curiosity about the blades' destructive power trumped my attachment to her.

Were our toys co-opted by the first grandchildren, well-loved by them and then discarded? Why were toys the one category among family possessions that Mom chose to purge when we moved house, seven times before I was twenty?

Even now I can almost feel that green plastic Isetta in my hands. It was made from two molded pieces of plastic - the chassis red and the body that fit on top green. Its plastic was soft and flexible, its hinged door snapping shut with a little pop. The black tires spun on a thin metal rod that threaded through the red plastic chassis. Being kids, and curious, we soon figured out how it was held together, with plastic nubs fitting into plastic notches, and it came apart.

Maybe that's what happened to our toys - little wheels came off little axles and rolled away behind furniture; notches wore out until fittings no longer clicked; plastic hinges flexed, twisted, and split. An empty green shell would have been useless without the weight of the red chassis. Bit by bit, the pieces must have scattered, along with other discards - tinker-toys, lincoln logs, legos and doll-arms. Revealed only when rooms were cleared, bed frames unbolted, closets packed and couches removed. The detritus of broken toys remained, strewn over the unvacuumed carpet like flotsam on sand.

There are lots of high-quality HO scale model Isettas offered on EBay, but this cheap plastic toy offered by EBay seller dkolexion is exactly like the toy I remember, only mine had a red interior.

Here's a fun site if you're interested in learning more about real Isettas.

PROMPTuesday

Every Tuesday, Sandiegomomma gives writers a prompt to help inspire us and make writing fun! Today's prompt?

What is your craziest travel adventure?

We had a two-day trip from Fort Wayne to Des Moines, at the end of a series of three one night stands. We'd gone from a Friday/Saturday 3-show run in Erie, to Akron, then South Bend and Fort Wayne.

"The only thing good about Fort Wayne," said Steve, "is there's a great liquor store across the street from the theatre."

I'd been wanting to tour for a couple years, working as a local stagehand when the shows came to town. When I'd gotten a call for a job as Property Department Head on a bus and truck, I'd said, "Sure!" and there I was.

On the bus. The chartered Greyhound had been gutted of all seats except the first eight rows. The seats faced front and rear joined by tables, and behind them two tiers of plywood enclosures flanked the center aisle, fitted with foam pads and heavy curtains. Each crew member had a bunk. The toilet - called by all the Blue Lagoon - was in the back.

Mine was on the driver's side, top tier, second bunk down. A pillow and comforter; a shelf with my alarm clock and my cassette-radio playerwith earphones, all secured with bungee cords to stay put. A curtain drew across the window, to shut out the light or furl to watch the road go by.

But most nights, when we got on the bus at the end of the load-out, we were too hyped up to go to sleep right away. Each travel day it was someone's turn to clean out the ice cooler and stock it with snacks and beer.

If it was a good theatre, we could shower before pulling out. Some theatres even had laundry facilities - for a tip the wardrobe mistress would wash and fold your clothes. But the bad theatres, the shitholes and dumps, were too disgusting to take a shower in. The actors waited until they got back to the hotel to wash. The crew didn't have that option. When we finished the load-out, we had to get on the bus for the next town, sleep and wake up at eight the next morning to go to work. You got used to the smell of your coworkers' stinky feet and morning mouth in the closeness of the bus aisles. You learned how to brush your teeth with water from the cooler, spitting the scum out on the pavement outside the bus, before going inside to start the load-in.

And that's what this trip was like. It had been South Bend before Fort Wayne; a dump of a theatre, in a moribund downtown, dead and deserted. The load-in was particularly bad - all the wardrobe crates and orchestra boxes had to be winched down to the basement through a trapdoor in the floor just inside the loading doors - which meant that everything else had to stop while that went on. Since orchestra and wardrobe were my responsibility, it meant that Jake, the electrician, acted like it was my fault - like I'd traveled back in time to 1921 and designed the damn building personally just to fuck him up.

This was the eighties. This was the age of sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Bus and truck legit touring theatre was just as rigorous as rock and roll, only without the stars and glamor. We had the same long hours, though, and we actually had better money than rockers did, because we were union.

Every workday started at 8 a.m. and ended at 2 a.m. You did what it took to keep going and then drank enough beer to put yourself to sleep, bouncing and rocking through the night on the interstate, then pull on a dirty pair of jeans and walk into another theatre the next morning.

After South Bend - no shower and no food, and on the bus as late as 2 a.m. - we'd gone to Fort Wayne. Fort Wayne wasn't as bad; the bathrooms were old but clean, and the showerheads spit out enough lukewarm water at 1 a.m. to give a feeling of well-being.

And Steve had laid in six bottles of French wine, from that surprisingly well-stocked liquor store across the street.

"Hey, my man - My Man Stee', " said Roberto, our bus driver. He flexed his arms, and worked the kinks out of his shoulders. He wore a blue uniform shirt with a patch on the breast, embroidered with his name, "Roberto." He always wore a black leather vest over the shirt when he drove. He had a round dark face, a goatee, and oily kinked hair in a combover across his wide domed skull. "You got some a them black beers in that cooler?"

The cooler was stashed in the foot-well of the first row right behind the driver's seat. I had become accustomed to sitting right on the lid of the cooler, with my feet out in the aisle. Steve sat in the first passenger seat. Our soundman, Bill, for some reason, liked to stand in the stairwell in front of the divider panel before the seats, one foot up and one foot down a step, looking out the wide curved front window as Roberto steered the bus down the interstate.

"They're in the cooler," murmured Steve, sounding drowsy. He'd smoked a joint outside in the street after loading the carpenter truck, and he was mellowing out for the ride.

"Hey, Skinny Bitch," said Roberto, although he pronounced it "Beech." That's what he called me. All the women were Beeches, all the men were My Man. "Can you get me onea those black beers?"

I stood up, flipped open the cooler and dug around in the ice for a Beck's Dark. Roberto had developed a taste for Beck's Dark. Whenever we could find it - and that was not always easy in these towns - we'd get a half-rack for him. I popped the cap, and leaned over and put the tall green bottle in his cup holder.

"Gracias," he said, and he took a big swig from the bottle. "You treat me right, Skinny Beech."

Then he reached into the little curved pocket made by one of the gauges on the dashboard, opened a paper bindle and, with a long nail on his little finger, hoovered up a snort for the road.

"Okay, my friends," he said, and he grinned. "This is the Crazy Cubano talking to you." This is what he said every night when we hit the road. "You done your jobs, now I gotta do mine. I got to get the People to the Place! Here's what we gonna do. "

By this time, we all knew to say the last bit in unison with him. "We gonna sneesse tha sheet and get the fuck on down the road!"

PROMPTuesday

Every Tuesday, Sandiegomomma gives writers a prompt to help inspire us and make writing fun! Today's prompt?


Please finish the story begun with this sentence:

She lifted the smudged glass to her lips, stopped mid-raise with that familiar lopsided smile and whispered, “This is the last you’ll see of me.”

"I wish," I said, tired of her sassy mouth and the way she always tried to act like she was so mysterious. Truth be told I was tired of being stuck with her and Clyde, in this dirty hideout. We'd been traipsing around the country from houses to sheds to barns, and now we were in this little ole motor court outside of Platte City, Iowa, running from the law and - frankly - worrying about Bonnie's burnt leg. It wasn't healing the way it should.

I had been asking - begging - Buck to cut loose from his brother, now that they'd given him his parole. We could go back to Oklahoma and build ourselves a life with my folks. Or we could go back to Denison - I know Ardis would hire me back at the salon, and Buck could get an honest job.

But here we were - again - on the run with Clyde and W.B, and Miss Priss-pants Bonnie, who looked at me now with a smirk like she was sorry for me - as if I was the weak one, needing care, even though she was the one who couldn't walk, and who cried in the night when the pain came. Like she was somehow better than me just because she'd had some poems published in some newspaper. Okay, I admit that she's prettier than me, and such a tiny little slender thing Clyde looks at her like he loves her to pieces, but there's something mean as a snake about that girl, and I don't like my Daddy* being around her and Clyde.

In the silence, I could hear the insects chirping, and smell the cigar smoke from outside. Clyde and W.B. smoked, and because I wouldn't let Buck come to my bed with cigar smoke on his breath, the three men stayed outside when they drank. "That fuckin' sonovabitch," I heard Clyde say, "Just let him put me in that box again, just see if I'll let him! We'll storm the goddam prison farm and bust everyone out!" I could hear Buck murmur trying to calm him down like he always does.

Bonnie and I were inside one of the two bungalows near the rear of the motor court. We'd been quiet, to keep clear of the law. She was sitting up on the bed with her injured leg propped up in front of her. The water glass stood on the nightstand, with an inch of neat whiskey in it.

"You want me to check those dressings?" I asked. I was always trying to be a good person. It was what my mother had always told me to do. Poor little thing had been hurt in that car wreck, and being on the run made it hard for the burns on her leg to heal. "I could warm up some water for a poultice," I offered, hoping to turn her mood. Like always when she started in drinking, she could turn mean or sweet.

She looked at me, and in the dim light of the kerosene lantern, her thin little face looked like she was about twelve. "Blanche, you're so good to me," she said, and sighed. "I didn't mean to talk the way I do. What is all this going to come to in the end?" Seems like tonight she was being sweet, although I knew it could turn just as quickly the other way.

"You'll get better, don't you fret," I said. "We'll be together a long time - we're sisters now. I went to town this afternoon got me some gauze and some merthiolate. You want some more in that glass before I take off the tape?"

She gulped a mouthful of whiskey and turned her head away while I peeled off the bandages. It was hard to keep a wound clean living the way we've been doing. I soaked my handkerchief in the water I boiled on the paraffin stove, and tried to lay it on gently. The flesh was swollen and corrupt, and it hurt me to see it. Bonnie's eyes were closed and she drew her breath in through her teeth.

The sound of a car engine broke through the chirp of crickets. From the front of the cabin, I heard the men knock their chairs over, their footsteps running behind the building. As I saw the headlights sweep the windows, I turned to look, and from the corner of my eye I saw Bonnie roll off the bed onto the floor away from the door. Car doors slammed, and then there was a pounding on the door.

"Open up in the name of the law!" It sounded like something out of the movies.

Bonnie was gone, I was the only one in the room. I went to the door and put my face near the jamb. "Hang on a second while we get dressed," I cried, and then the night burst open in sparks and shattering glass and I fell to the floor. A bright light filled my eye and I could no longer see what was happening.


* This is my first foray into a kind of historical fiction. I've been researching the story of the outlaws Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, and the PROMPT this week made me think about the peculiar relationship all the members of the Barrow gang had with one another. They were young, they were damaged, but above all they were family. Blanche Barrow, who was married to Clyde's older brother Buck, called her husband "Daddy" and he called her "Baby." In January 1934 at the Red Crown Tourist Resort near Platte City, Iowa the Barrow gang was ambushed by local cops. Blanche Barrow was blinded by shattered glass in her left eye. The two couples escaped, only to be ambushed again shortly afterward, where Buck Barrow was killed and Blanche arrested. Blanche never saw Bonnie and Clyde again. Bonnie and Clyde were ambushed in May 1934 and killed. For a very informative website about the outlaws, go to Texashideout.tripod.com

PROMPTuesday

Every Tuesday, Sandiegomomma gives writers a prompt to help inspire us and make writing fun! Today's prompt? Use in a story/poem: a skein of red yarn, a comb and a bottle of water. Here's mine:

A stroller pushed
through stalls at El Mercadito,
baby displaced by groceries;
A jug of water, fresh bread
the chiles and onions,
Filling the fabric sling seat.
Father holds the girl in his arms,
a pink flowered headband
held with a comb in her dark curls.
Mother looks at dishtowels, socks.
Plump skeins of embroidery yarn,
fill a plastic bin
with a tumble of color.
The baby reaches out
wanting a ball of red wool
eager to hold its brilliance,
to feel it spring beneath her fingers.

My photo is from a trip to El Mercadito in East Los Angeles this December - in a second floor notions stall I watched a little girl drawn by the bins of brilliant colored yarns.

PROMPTuesday

Here's the theme for this week’s PROMPTuesday. Here it is:

Write a story about when you last were humbled, felt humbled by the presence of something/someone in your life, or lay prostrate at the feet of the universe and said “I don’t know what the hell I am doing. I will now relinquish control and let you take over.”

It was a warm summer evening, the insects singing in the high grass. The two-lane highway was mostly quiet, the occasional car going by, sometimes a truck bound for the next town, its gears grinding. Our cottage was set back from the road, behind our landlord's house, at the end of a gravel drive.

I had tried to sleep since coming home from the doctor that afternoon, but the heat in the little house was oppressive and I couldn't drop off. The stirrings inside me were insistent, they demanded attention but I tried to ignore them.

Connie had told me to expect little change until early in the morning. As she washed her hands after the exam, she said, "Many new mothers experience a long slow labor. You're better off staying comfortable at home - don't come to the hospital until you're ready," she said.

I had read all the books. I had talked to other women. I'd taken the classes, along with my husband. I was not a young girl, but an experienced woman, a strong one. I was physically active - the work I did was physical too, with climbing and lifting and carrying. The pregnancy had been easy and I had glowed with health. I could handle this, I thought. I had bookmarked the pages about going into labor - I re-read them just to verify what I was feeling.

How do you pass an evening, waiting for the inevitable? While I tried to sleep, my husband studied at the kitchen table in the still afternoon. Did we eat? I don't remember. The news came on television.

I got out of bed. We slept on a futon on the floor, and heaving myself up had become more difficult as the weeks had passed. My hamstrings felt tense, I couldn't lie down.

This cottage was temporary, a summer vacancy at the end of the academic year. After a year of his fellowship, we would return to our own university. But the baby was due at the end of June, and our midwife was here, so we stayed. I had quit my job in May, so my days were shapeless. Across the road was an ecological test field run by the university's forestry school, where native weeds grew unchecked. I walked it every day - the books said keep exercising, walking was good.

"It's hot," I said. "I can't sleep."

"How do you feel?"

My husband had been with me every step of this, but he had always let me lead. We would do this as naturally as we could. A nurse-midwife; healthy eating. Exercise. LaMaze classes. We had put in our names to reserve the much-praised Birthing Room the local county hospital maintained. It featured pleasing decor in gentle colors, specialized furniture like a Birth Chair so the mother could remain upright.

We would resist drugs, epidurals, episiotomies, in-utero monitors. We had our bag packed, with the Walkman with the cassette tapes - baby would be born to an eclectic mix of World Music - the rolling devices to massage a cramping back, soothing scented oils for aromatherapy. We would do this our way, my way.

"I don't know," I said, "I wonder how long it will be." A wave of sensation washed through me, gentle but unmistakable, seizing my joints, my upper thighs.

"Connie said it would probably be around three in the morning," he said. "Remember? You were supposed to take a nap, she said you'd need your sleep - did you? This is supposed to take a while."

"A little," I said, "but now I'm restless. Can we go take a walk?"

Dusk was falling and the field across the road was dim. Our feet crunched the dry weeds in the path. He threw a stick for the dog to chase, and I watched it wheel through the lavender sky. I gripped his arm and he looked at me.

"Just a little push, there," I said. "I think it's getting stronger now."

The dog returned, dancing before us, teasing us to take the stick from his mouth. My husband bent away from me a moment, and as I stood alone I faltered.

The sensation moved through me again. It wasn't pain, it was force. It was something I couldn't shape or channel. It was as if I didn't own this body anymore. "Can we go back, now?" I asked. The dog bounded after the stick again.

My husband called him back, and hooked him to the leash. I started toward the road, compelled to walk, my muscles needing the motion, the shift of weight from one hip to the other. On the road, as we waited to cross, a truck boomed past, and I could feel the rush and suction of air in my womb as it passed.

"I think it's time," I said as we reached our driveway where our car sat waiting.

"Let's call," he said, "We're not sure. Remember when they said it would be? It's too early. Can you hold on a while?"

I sat , but my bones shifted and roiled with the current. I stood up, my hands on the back of the chair, upright not by my own will but because my body had to. It rolled through again, like a wave, like the percussive boom of the truck, scattering chaff as it passed.

"I can't," I said. "I can't. We have to go now."

PROMPTuesday

For this week’s PROMPTuesday, let’s assume your book is getting published. And that you need a dedication page.

What is your book about, who will you dedicate your book to and what will you say?

Write a story based on this prompt.

"Mine is but a simple tale of a young but plucky girl from obscurity who, with a deep longing and passion within her, managed to rise to prominence, to bring her story to the masses. Many's the night I tossed without sleep, wondering when..."

"Yes, Mrs. Savoy," I said, "and readers are going to love this story. But while we want to draw them into the book, let's not give it away at the beginning. The dedication pages is where you acknowledge those who helped you along the journey, to thank them."

She raised her eyebrows at me. "But, dear, my whole story, my entire oeuvre is of my own making - that's what makes my autobiography so compelling - surely you agree?" She waved a hand around the room.

We were in her morning sitting room in the house at the top of Mandeville Canyon. The massive coffee table was too far away from the overstuffed couch I was perched on, so I balanced the laptop on my knees. Mrs. Savoy sat in a Victorian armchair, tufted and dripping with fringe, cocked at right angles to the couch. This morning she wore a caftan embroidered with gold thread and sequins. It was lavender, matching the freesias in a crystal vase on the table beneath the Venetian mirror.

"Absolutely, of course," I said. "But is there someone you'd like to mention? Mr. Savoy, perhaps?"

"Well, of course," she said. "I was devastated by his loss! It was heart-wringing! Perhaps the dedication is the proper place for me to let the world know how deeply I grieved." She settled back on her cushion and looked appropriately somber for a moment, holding the pose.

"Yes," I agreed, and typed a few lines thanking Morris Savoy, the man who'd brought her, young Arlene, from that chill mid western town to Los Angeles. The real estate mogul who'd toiled and amassed millions, only to die young, choking on a forkful of New York Strip steak - well-done, as he liked it - at the Pacific Dining Car. If only, I often mused while ghostwriting her autobiography, if only he had taken it rare, he might have lasted longer.

"You've been so active in philanthropy and the arts," I prompted. She had given millions to efforts such as the new Savoy Clinic of Cosmetic Surgery, and, more recently the Savoy School of Etiquette. "Are there people you'd like to remember? Perhaps students who've inspired you with their stories?"

"Why, surely, I've been the role model to shape their success, darling?" She tossed her head lightly. Her hair - maroon-red since last week - bobbed up as she raised her brows, so tightly drawn was her forehead. "I mean - who else would have thought to organize classes to teach the poorest among us proper business etiquette - children from poor homes will never be able to rise in this world without the proper grounding, you see."

Mrs. Savoy had involved herself in the arts and education as well. Her Ballet-to-the-Bario program, which donated pointe shoes and tulle to school P.E. programs in the inner city, had resulted in the acceptance of one student to the top college athletic dance team - they'd performed at this year's Super Bowl - and, the Read-a-bonics efforts with the school district had generated enough controversy for national news.

"The girls?"

She sipped her tea, and then hesitated, the delicate bone-china held just inches beneath her nose. "Well, if I mentioned Jillian, at least perhaps she'd pick up the phone and speak to me," she snapped. "And I suppose I should mention Valerie - though she's never thanked me for all I did, raising her for Morrie, without a shred of gratitude."

"Well," I said, closing the laptop, "I think the dedication should be brief and to the point. We've worked together so closely I'm sure I can put together something you'll approve of. After all, we want the readers to turn the page and get right into the story, right?"

"Of course, my dear." Mrs. Savoy plucked a little silver bell from the end-table by her elbow. In seconds a woman in a starched uniform entered the room, and wordlessly took my plate and saucer. I smiled at her, but her dark gaze went somewhere past my shoulder, though I tried to catch her eye.

"We're done, Graciela," said Mrs. Savoy. "Would you take mine, too, while I show Miss Harrison out?"

"She's such a treasure," said Mrs. Savoy, watching the maid disappear silently through the swinging door to the kitchen. "She's been with me for so many years. I just don't know how to thank her... the language difficulty, don't you see."

"Good- day, dear," Mrs. Savoy air-kissed my cheek from the steps beneath the massive front portal. As the door closed behind me, I walked down the curved flagstone drive, encircling a central fountain, then took the stepping- stone path around the side. My Honda was parked down the hill, where the kitchen deliveries went.

PROMPTuesday

Sandiegomomma challenges us to WRITE with PROMPTuesday.

Today's prompt: "write a character sketch of someone you love (child, partner, pet, mentor, etc.). Detail this person, let us see him or her through your description. Maybe you want to “show” your loved one through action and movement, or perhaps you are viewing him or her in repose. Either way, get down to brass tacks and give us the one you love through your writing."

S. and me, before the twins arrived.

I am the oldest child in my family. I have three brothers. Brother S. was born after me, and the two of us shared toddlerhood, toys, rides to day-camp. We both vied for our Daddy's attention. And we shared dismay and consternation when my mother brought home G. and B. - Twin boys, eclipsing us in our parents' eyes.

The twins. Not sure who's who.

As the oldest, I pretty much had my say about how things went. I could boss them around when I wanted to, and hide in my room when I wanted to. S. and B. tacitly acknowledged my authority, but G. - ah, G. defied me. We interacted like oil and water, oil and vinegar, never mixing, always remaining in a suspended emulsion that, uneasily, often broke down as one fluid sought to rise above or engulf the other.

As kids, we knew exactly how to annoy each other. I smacked him down, but he popped back up again and again. He sassed and danced in like a wasp, stinging and flying away. I called him names, I called him FAT - he wasn't, but he was just a bit huskier than his twin and S. and I were skinny as rails. He had a nickname for me that still causes me to cringe if I hear it. We knew exactly what hurt, so finely tuned were our antennae toward one another.

This is B. on the left and G. on the right. I think. It's hard to tell them apart in this picture.

As we grew up, my brothers all grew bigger than me. I still retained the air of authority, but only because they granted it to me - like any aging, weakened monarch, I accepted my role as Older Sister and didn't overstep, and my brothers respected me for it. A few spats here and there to spice things up, but we had wisely achieved detente.

Smarts run in my family. Sometimes the gene manifests itself in intellectual brilliance - that's my Mom, Dad, and S. and B. Sometimes it's just Smarty Pants. That's me and G.

Not too many families can boast multiple PhD.'s - my family of six has three.

But I only managed to skip, coast and bumble my way through a Bachelor of Arts degree in Theatre. G. dropped out of college, and didn't get his degree until much later in life. He worked in bike shops and industrial plants. I scuffled in Off-Broadway theatres in New York, and then became a union worker in Seattle. In my family, G. and I were the slackers, the blue-collar workers, the bums. The ones who liked to drink a little too much, the ones who had the crazy friends, the wild stories. The ones with big dogs, broke-down cars, the ones Dad slipped twenties to, the ones who barely got out of trouble by the skin of our teeth.

Of all of us, G. and I are most like Dad. I was Daddy's little girl, his first child; I could do no wrong in his eyes even while he and I argued and shouted at one another during my teenage years. And when G. settled down from his wild, wild ways, he followed a path more closely modeled after Dad's life than any of us. He married and raised a family; he became a businessman and a manager, like Dad.

I have no idea what's happening in this picture. G. is about 21. Dad is quite obviously playing to the camera.

When I see my brother G. today, even though he and brother B. are identical twins, it's G. that reminds me of our Dad. His expression, his posture, his sense of humor - yes, even the occasional sour cynicism Dad indulged in - the set of his jaw. The way he tells jokes. The pride he take in his own kids.

As for me, I visited a relative I hadn't seen in several decades, shortly after my Dad had passed away. When she opened the door to greet me, she gasped. "Why, g," she said. "You surely favor your father!"

Now, when I look in the mirror, I see my Dad looking back at me. And when I look at my brother G., I see him too. We are the most like Dad - funny, irreverent, cynical, irritable, quick to anger, quick to forgive - maddening, without a doubt, to those who love us.

This autumn, G. and I shared a road trip, traveling with our Mom to her new home. And although road trips tend to strengthen bonds between people, I think the one we already shared was pretty strong.

B., S., g., and G. I'm about 17, so B. & G. are 13

And don't you bug me about this, or I'm telling Mom.

PROMPTuesday

It's PROMPTuesday again. Sandiegomomma's weekly writing inspiration. Today's prompt:

Start a story with the sentence, “It was a dark and stormy night.“

Here are the rules:

• Try to write your entry in 10 minutes. This encourages top-of-mind, primal thinking before the ego and judgmental brain kick in. Just set a timer, make your kid count to 600 slowly, whatever. It’s an honor system. And I trust you.
• Aim for 250 words or less.
• Please have fun. Don’t put pressure on yourself. Together, let’s rediscover the simple joy in the writing process.

It was a dark and stormy night. Rebecca called Light cue 56A, and Frank could hear the dimmers buzz under the music as the front-of-house lights rode the curtain up for Act II, casting a blue glow onto the set of the haunted castle, and the corps de ballet posing onstage. He stared at the cue light, double set of red golf-ball-sized light bulbs, dangling from the lighting pipe overhead and clipped to the offstage edge of the velour drape.

"Standby, Light Cue 57 and Thunder Effect," she said, poising her finger on the button to turn off the stage right cue light.

"And 57 - Go!" Rebecca flipped the toggle switch off at the same time. The strobe light mounted just inside the downstage portals flashed a millisecond later, and Frank, standing upstage right, saw the cue light go out and he shook the wooden handle attached to the thundersheet, issuing a shuddering roar from the floppy sheet of galvanized steel.

"Stop! Stop! Stop!!"

The music abruptly stopped. The wraith-like dancers, their arms gracefully raised above them, broke their pose and slumped their shoulders.

"Can we go back?" The voice came over the head-set and then through the PA system so everyone in the theatre could hear. "Sorry, ladies. We need to go over that transition again. It was late! Rebecca, call the curtain up on measure 6, dah DAH, dum da dum Duummmmm!"

"And can we have more thunder?" said the choreographer from the auditorium, and the Voice of God repeated the request - "We need really loud thunder, back there. Really loud."

It was now 9:30 p.m. They had tech'ed Act I last night, and had gone over notes this evening before starting Act II at 7:00 p.m. How had they spent an hour and a half, to be still working through the Act opening?

Frank shifted his shoulders to work out a kink, and let the thundersheet settle back into place. It was hung from a pipe attached to the backstage wall; a thin galvanized sheet of steel about 3 feet wide and six feet long, its bottom edge clamped into a handle made of two-by-four stock. A stencil marking it property of the ballet company was painted on the steel, along with the stencil of the union insignia. Someone had written "Eugenia's Thunder Thighs" on it in black magic marker - Eugenia was the ballet's artistic director, and Frank was not sure whether she had seen this legend or not. She was a scrawny old bird with a beak of a nose, and she often smoked cigarettes out on the loading dock with the rest of the guys during a break in rehearsal.

He watched two of the dancers roll their eyes at each other. In the wings, the male lead propped his leg up on the back of the lighting boom, stretching his hamstring. Over on the flyrail, Cookie called out, "Heads up, curtain coming in!" and he and Jeb slowly brought the main drape down until the hem touched the groundcloth.

Rebecca flicked the switches and Frank's red cue lights came back on. "Standby, please," said Rebecca. "We're in Light Cue 56. Warning, Light Cue 56A, Curtain up, Light Cue 57, Thunder Effect and Light Cue 58. Standby. Are you cued up again on the music, Joe?"

"Yeah, we're ready."

The music poured from the onstage monitors, and the company went through the sequence again. When the red cue light flicked off, Frank flapped the thundersheet again.

"Stop! Stop! Stop!!!" the music ground to a halt. The Voice of God said, "Louder! Let's hear it again."

Frank flapped it again. "You call that loud? I want it really loud!"

Again. "I want it as loud as you can do it! I want you to BE the thunder!"

Now Cookie and Jeb were cracking up with laughter over on the flyrail. Frank's ears burned. He grabbed the handle with both hands and shook it for all he was worth, and kept on shaking it till his ears rang.

"That's IT! I want you to do it like that every time," said the director. "Let's go back to the beginning."

Frank looked at the thundersheet. Its wooden handle was smooth and darkened from years of other stagehands' palms gripping it. Graffitti listed names, productions, and years. "Jerry B., Nutcracker '96. Jensen 1978.

Be the thunder. He saw the twinkle in Cookie's eye, and wondered just how humiliating the jokes would get. Shit. Thunder Thighs. He guessed it couldn't get worse than that.

His light came back on and the music started again. He gripped the handle. He owned the damn thing now.

PROMPTuesday

Sandiegomomma has today's PROMPTuesday, an exercise designed to spur creative writing.

Today she asks us to think about the importance of music in our lives. The prompt is: I want to know about your songs. What brings you back to a pivotal moment? Or an everyday moment you’ll remember forever? Tell me a drop of your life as crystallized by a Top 40 hit, a Broadway number, a dirge.

I'm at a business conference in a distant city today, and one of the things my colleagues and I are discussing is music, the performing arts, and what it means to the community - especially now in hard times. How can music and the arts become a part of the lives of Americans, and, especially young Americans in today's economy? I'm re-posting an earlier post about how music - one song in particular - was a part of my life when I was young.


Last night for some unknown reason, while I was loading the dishwasher, I started singing the melody of the popular Holiday concert band piece, "Sleigh Ride." (click on the link to hear it)

I was not thinking about it, I just started singing it. [The Man I Love] came into the kitchen, and he started singing along. Also without thinking.

We both sang the syncopated melody absolutely perfectly, and suddenly started laughing. Of course we both knew it. We share a common American experience - we were both in high school band.

"Sleigh Ride" was written by American composer Leroy Anderson in 1946, and has been a popular holiday tune ever since.

Anderson was the son of Swedish immigrants, born in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1908, and attended the New England Conservatory of Music and Harvard. In the 1930's he began arranging music for Arthur Fiedler director of the famed Boston Pops Orchestra. Anderson had a long career as a composer, musical director, and teacher, but "Sleigh Ride" is among his best known works.

[The Man I Love] and I did not attend the same high school - he was in rural Florida, and I was in suburban Ohio. He played the string bass and tuba. I played percussion.

I played keyboard percussion instruments - xylophone, marimba, vibraphone and chimes. Musicologists group percussion instruments into two major classifications - membranophones and idiophones.

A membranophone is an instrument that makes sound by the vibration of a membrane, like a stretched skin on the top of a drum. Timpani, snare drums, bass drums - they're all membranophones.

Idiophones are instruments that make sounds by vibrating their entire body - when you hit a triangle, a bell, a wood block, or the aluminum key of a glockenspiel with a mallet, its entire body resonates.

I think glockenspiel players welcome the holiday season, because it marks the end of marching band season. Marching with a glockenspiel is a pain. You have to wear a harness to hold the lyre-mounted keyboard in front of you. Then there's the music. Not all marching band scores have written glockenspiel parts. The glockenspiel is tuned to middle C, so you can play Oboe parts. But often marching band arrangements don't have Oboe parts, either, so you end up with a Flute part - written so high above the bars its hard to read.

Another hazard is cold weather. In the cold, metal keys contract and go out of tune. I remember a November parade in freezing rain where the entire glockenspiel section mimed playing, because we were half a key sharp from the rest of the band.

So, after ten weeks of practicing pinwheels in the parking lot, a glockenspiel player looks forward to the holidays, when you can hang out with the drummers and count rests. And practice your mallet skills for "Sleigh Ride."

There are some challenges for players in "Sleigh Ride." I had a mad crush on the trumpet player who had to make the horse neigh sound - when he messed it up during one concert, you could see his ears blush pink, all the way from the percussion section at the back of the stage.

For percussionists, there are many critical moments. In the bridge, there's a whip-crack made by slapping a hinged wooden flapper. Many a high school percussionist chokes from the pressure, missing the beat. (Ask me how I know!) The glockenspiel is featured in one long, syncopated phrase at the end of the chorus that runs the length of the keyboard. If you screw it up everyone knows!

Years and years of playing - or hearing - a piece of music tends to imprint it into your brain and your body. Which is why two people of the same generation, educated in American schools of the 1960s and 70s, could spontaneously and unconsciously burst into tune with perfect harmony.

"Come on, it's lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you!"

PROMPTuesday

Sandiegomomma has today's PROMPTuesday, an exercise designed to spur creative writing. Today’s prompts are: “Hallway,” and “Will-of-a-wisp.” My entry is inspired by travel, and by memories of many past business trips, and many hallways.

The gentle muted bell of the elevator rang as the doors opened onto the sixth floor. The sign indicated his room was to the right. The plane had been delayed, and he had arrived at the hotel late, checking in with a tired, bored clerk in the deserted lobby. The dining room had been darkened, and a vacuum cleaner growled and fussed somewhere beyond sight.

The walls were covered with lime green grasscloth, and botanical prints of orchids and flamingos hung at intervals. The carpet was thick, green, printed with a trellis pattern and a border of tropical flowers. He headed toward the room, first passing an open door which spilled chill fluorescent light onto the lurid carpet, a humming ice machine within. Cubes clunked into an echoing reservoir deep within its guts.

The hallway stretched on for miles, punctuated by small alcoves where the doors to each suite were inset. He trudged onward, toward the darkened square of window at the end, marking the numbers as they ascended. The wheels of his luggage whizzed and clicked behind him.

The little paillette of light glimmered green as the keycard dipped into the lock, a tiny electronic murmur, and then the handle gave, opening into the darkened room.

It was quiet, and smelled a little stale. He furled the handle on his carryon, and went to the window. He pulled the plastic rods that drew the white gauzy curtains, and looked out. Beyond the glass, dotted lines of streetlights curved away, marking the cloverleafs of the expressway and access roads. Across the six-lane highway, a different hotel loomed, windows glittering and a colored plastic sign, just like the one here.

As he looked out, a blinking light slowly passed through his view, like a will o' the wisp. A traffic helicopter, reporting on the slow flowing current marked by the rhythmic pulses of red taillights.

He sighed and sank down onto the bed. It wasn't home, yet it was strangely comforting. It was his space, all his; safe and his alone.

PROMPTuesday

PROMPTuesday - today's prompt is "This week, tell us about your first job."

The room was filled with long workbenches, faced with metal stools. The big room had a wide, worn wooden plank floor, thick concrete columns breaking up the space. The windows were huge spans between the concrete beams, murky textured glass in small panes held in metal mullions. They let in a soft dirty light, but we couldn't see out. An AM radio played, the sound echoing off the walls, a cheerful chorale singing, "Double-You Em Eff Peeeeeee! Smoooooth Muuuuusic!"

On the bench, a small vise with knobs and adjustable handles stood on the work surface, and to one side a soldering iron was poised, point down in a thick coiled holder, to guard against burns. There were bins near the back of the bench, some holding flat dull-green chips, and others filled with the intricate, toy-like capacitors, transistors, resistors; emblazoned with drops of bright red paint, shiny with silver, or striped in brown, blue, pink, yellow.

Beside me, a young Filipina woman bent over her vice, probing with the soldering iron as a thin veil of smoke rose up from her work. She wiped the hot tip of the iron on a damp sponge, and stuck it back into the holder. She reached into a bin, selected a resistor, and deftly threaded its leads through the holes in the circuit board. She flipped it over, and neatly clipped the ends off with a tiny pair of cutters.

"Hey, Cal, can't we turn that thing to some real music?" A tall black woman entered the room, laden down with a big bag and a box of donuts. "Why do you like that damn elevator music anyway, you think we're working in a high-rise?" She twiddled the dial and the pure sound of the Temptations flowed out of the radio.

I was nineteen, home from my first year at college, and it was my first real job. I earned minimum hourly wage, assembling printed circuit boards for walkie-talkie radios, at a factory in Red Bank, New Jersey. My co-workers were mostly women, young and uneducated, some who were young mothers, some wild-child Jersey girls who spent their nights and weekends on the boardwalk in Asbury Park.

For eight hours a day, I bent over my work, crimping tiny wires, holding the malleable thread of solder to the hot iron's tip. I loved how it held firm, first, and then suddenly melted and ran and puddled.

By the day's end, my back would ache. My fingers were sore, because I was still clumsy and new, poking my fingertips with the little wires. We had two little jars of fluid at our workbench - they were actually baby-food jars, brought by the women workers from home because the size was convenient. One held an amber liquid resin, the other a clear industrial solvent. We sometimes dabbed a connection with resin to make the solder flow better. When we finished a board, we dipped our brush in the solvent, and cleaned it. The resin and solvent fumed in the thick air, and the foreman was good about allowing girls to get up and clear their heads when overcome.

I liked soldering. I was pretty good at it - I was praised as a "natural." I loved watching the solder flow, and even better, I loved it when I had to un-do a solder joint - press a ribbon of braided metal against the joint with the hot iron, and watch as the fibers sucked the molten silver into themselves, freeing the trapped wire from the board. The braid, once flexible, now stiffened and solid with metal.

Our quality control was casual, but it was all about the electrical connection, and the flow. Connections that let the electrons flow from one component to the next. That summer was about connection - with Mina, who gave me my first taste of Filipino food in the lunch room. The back-and-forth arguments over the radio station - soul or salsa, all-news or easy listening. Watching Vonda, waving her hands in the air as she told an ever-more-crazy story, her acrylic nails sparkling. Covering for Joy, who was dating a guy in the stockroom - I'd let her run my refill orders instead of going myself, so she could grab a few minutes with him in the stacks. We'd sometimes smoke a joint together on the loading dock after our shift ended, the smoke like the burning incense of resin up in the factory loft above.

I was the only one on the floor who was going to college, but I easily slipped into the flow anyway. I propped my elbows on the table in the lunch room, red sauce from meatball subs dripping down onto the oily paper. I cackled at the put-downs and practical jokes. I met the boyfriends, shook hands with the husbands, wiggled my fingers "hi" at the children. The life of the factory fumed and flowed around me, the current buoyed me, and I rode my circuit-board rafts through the rapids. I let the molten solder flow and fuse all the different pieces of my life together, joining them.

I learned to tell the difference between a properly done solder joint, shiny and flat, mirrored and pure; and what we called "cold solder" where the joint, while firm, had been disturbed in the cooling process. Cold solder was dull and pebbled, cold joints were weak, and compromised the ability of the electrons to freely flow. The solder must be hot enough to meld the disparate parts of the circuit board as if they were one, to properly make the electrical connections - or so we were told.

In this room, we never actually saw a fully assembled radio - except for Cal's boom box, whose sound connected our days. We breathed vaporized silver and listened to sweet soul music all summer long.

PROMPTuesday

This week’s PROMPTuesday asks that you post about your favorite — or “most awesome” things. What do you love? What can’t you live without? What do you like to watch on TV? What are your favorite websites? What do you use on your hair? (This last one is a requirement.)

It's not easy to think of something I can't live without. About the only thing I truly need to survive are my glasses, or contact lenses. I'm blinder than a bat without correction.

Living where I do, in a region that people call "fire prone" I am always made aware of the possibility of my home - and all my belonging - being destroyed in a fire. Last year at Thanksgiving, 55 homes in Malibu were destroyed before dawn.

I imagine that. I imagine being awakened from sleep to flee my home, without the chance to think, to choose; and knowing that when I return all will be ashes.

We're told to make lists of what to take with us, odd combinations of practical and sentimental things. Put the insurance documents in a fireproof box! And don't forget the baby pictures!

Every time the Santa Ana winds blow, as they are this week, we remind ourselves of the lists. Where's the box? Should I unplug the computer? Load the trunk? Point the car face-first out the driveway?

Every day some other piece, some other object gets added to the pile. Those cute shoes. The family silver Mom insisted I take. That book I was in the middle of. That clever little pin I found in that boutique.

Can you imagine them going, gone? The book's leaves lifting with the breath of the flames, charring, flaring, and crumbling? Would my bakelite bangle crack and shatter with the heat? In the bathroom, does the Pantene Extra Volume shampoo boil in its bottle before melting and then crisping into bubbled goo on the blackened shower tiles?

You can't think of that - it's too much. So you let go. You try to unmoor yourself from things. I can live without all this, you say. But the real question is - what will I mourn after it's lost?