Here are some of my guesses for how she picks a cue.
1. She closed her eyes and opened the dictionary (book with paper pages) and randomly pointed to somewhere on the page. The word where her finger landed was it.
2. The cue was the second word in the title of a book on her nightstand.
3. It was a word on the first bumper sticker she saw that day.
4. It was the fifth word on a Chinese fortune cookie.
5. It was something she saw outside that morning.
Okay, enough of my ideas and on to my Six Sentence Story, a little historical fiction, with emphasis on "little."
Her four-year-old self was very thirsty, and her shoulder length hair was sticking to her forehead and the back of her neck. As she stood impatiently watching her dad place the last metal siphon pipe into the irrigation ditch, her little brother was trying to twist away from her grip on his sweaty hand. During the tussle she stepped back and the surprise poke of a cocklebur on her ankle caused her to let go of his hand. He laughed, knowing he was free, and started running alongside the ditch as she tried to catch up with him. Since he was only two, he wasn't as sure footed as she was and stumbled, propelling himself head first into the water-filled ditch. She rushed to grab his slippery muddy lower limb and pull him back onto the bank to console him before taking his hand and heading for the house to get some dry clothes, and some lemonade.
What an engaging SSS, Pat. So vividly written!
ReplyDelete"During the tussle she stepped back and the surprise poke of a cocklebur on her ankle caused her to let go of his hand."
And thank you for some excellent ideas on how to choose our weekly cue word :D
Thanks, Denise. I learned a little bit about the art of letting a post rest, coming back to it, and reading it again. I did that after few hours and then again, before wrapping it up.
DeleteBTW, you are doing great at selecting prompts for the blog. I was just curious about possible stratagems hosts might use.
You painted that scene vividly! Squirmy two-year-olds just don't want to mind big sisters.
ReplyDeleteThank you. Anyone who has ever tried to keep a restless child in tow knows that scene.
DeleteI too wonder where the cue comes from! Good six. Love the imagery.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Paul. I'm glad I'm not the only one who has wondered about that.
Delete"...and some lemonade."
ReplyDelete(For me), that last touch is what separates a good story (Six or otherwise) from a great story. Not that we weren't already standing in the sun on a hot field, but it ends on a welcome note.
(Agree with the others, I enjoy the aside (or would that be, 'in front') comments to your post.
Thanks, Clark. That ending was a revision from how I'd written it. When I wrote the latter, I knew, "That's it."
DeleteI'm loving these glimpses into your childhood! What does Jim think? :-)
ReplyDeleteRemember, it is historical fiction. :-) Some things were skewed a bit. I don't know that he even reads the blog.
DeleteHe didn't recall this when we talked about it once, as he was so young.
I totally loved your suggestions on how Denise might have chosen our cue word this week. I found myself wondering that too! :-) In some Indigenous cultures children are often named for the first thing the mother sees/notices as the child is being born, as in "Red Cloud", etc. I suspect this might also be the method for generating writing prompts, it sometimes was when I was doing it! :-)
ReplyDeleteYour story painted such a wonderful picture of childhood, of taking care of siblings, and doing your best at it when you weren't that old yourself! I'm glad this story had a safe and happy ending. I can imagine that little muddy guy and his sister hand-in-hand and headed for the house and a mommy that probably wasn't going to be too happy. <3
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I didn't know that about the naming of children in some indigenous cultures. That explains a lot of the names.
DeleteI'm glad I was able to paint the picture in a way that you could see it.
Dirty clothes goes hand in hand with living on a farm. :-)
wow Pat, really well written! Engaging from the start! And having chosen the Q word for the better part of a year or so I can tell you all of those methods are viable. But I used to just try to think of a word that had multiple meanings so that it could be used in a whole lot of different ways. zoe/ivy
ReplyDeleteThank you.
DeleteI had noticed that about the prompts, how they all had more than one meaning. One of the first thing I do is go to the dictionary to read all the different meanings, just to open my mind to the possibilities for stories.