Sunday March 16th, 2014

The exercise:

Write about: road work.

The birthday party at the alley began at 1:30 this afternoon. Seeing as Max has recently taken to falling asleep for his daily nap at exactly 2pm, Kat and I were not expecting to stay very long.

But distraction can be a wonderful thing. A yellow balloon was particularly effective in this department (I still can't believe it remained unpopped when we left), so we were able to stay until 3pm.

Since Max was so keen on trying, I did take him up to "throw" a few balls down the lane. I am very proud to report that on his fifth ball he managed, entirely on his own, to knock over one of the three pins.

I wasn't even expecting him to be able to get a ball all the way to the pins.

Mine:

Another passing thought, decorated with hope and love and the best of you. Grab hold, add it to the pile. Don't worry about tying it down - it's not going anywhere.

More words floating our way, promises emptied of truth mere moments after departing from earnest lips. We'll take them. No spare parts turned away around these parts.

Plans and daydreams, written on napkins, letterhead, grains of sand, nothing at all. Fret not, my dears. We will put them to good use.

Come, bring them to us. All shapes, all sizes. We need all of your good intentions.

This road to hell won't pave itself.

2 comments:

Greg said...

So is Max's average better than yours now? :-P
I still find myself startled at how short children's parties are, and the odd times of day that they're held. I know, intellectually, that it's all a function of the age of the children, but a two-hour party at 1pm seems... odd somehow.
Great punchline today, definitely not something I saw coming, and I was wondering how the first few paragraphs fitted with 'road work'!

Road work
Miss Snippet eyed the crossing-guard as he walked out into the middle of the road. He placed his stop-sign-on-a-stick firmly before him, as though believing that he were Gandalf denying the Balrog, and stood there defying her to run him over. She was tempted.
A small crocodile of children stood on the pavement, ignoring his attempts to chivvy them across, and it was only when Miss Snippet smiled (it looked like a snarl) and waved an angry hand that they dared scuttle across like so many migrating crabs. Finally then, the crossing-guard unplanted his staff and retreated to the pavement as well, and Miss Snippet was free to enter the school car-park.
*
"Road work," she said, entering her classroom. The children looked up from the plans and blueprints and purchase orders that formed most of their daily education and waited to hear what would come next.
"The roads around the school are becoming dangerous," said Miss Snippet, "and I'm worried that there will be a death before long. We shall replan them and rebuild them."
"We'll need council permission," said Lucy promptly. "I've got a contact though. I'll go and sit on his knee and cry until he lets us do it." In turn each of the children volunteered what they could do to get the project started, and Miss Snippet had to wipe a tear away; they were serious young professionals now, and the eldest of them was still only 8.
"One last thing," she said as they concluded. "There needs to be space in the road-bed for a body or two."
Jake nodded. "We expected that," he said. "Do you have a list, or shall we use our own?"

Marc said...

Greg - hah. Hah, I say :P

Oh, I did enjoy that opening. Such great descriptions :D

And these children under Miss Snippet's guiding hand are only becoming more worrisome to me...