Wednesday October 1st, 2014

The exercise:

Write something that has to do with: close... but not quite.

Max has come down with his first cold in a very long time. I guess the combination of travel, a return to StrongStart, and (most damningly) a sick StrongStart teacher was enough to do the trick.

He's fine during the day, it's just the nights. Oh, those nights.

Anyway. I should go get as much sleep as I can.

Mine:

I mentioned before that Kat's been hosting another little boy at our place a couple times a week. Apparently one of his favorite things to do is sing his ABC's, and it so happens that one of Max's toys has that song on it.

So they've been listening and singing along to that quite a bit.

I wasn't aware of this until Max started up on the way to Vancouver last week. Except he's not quite two yet, so it's not terribly surprising that he can't get all the way through without making any mistakes or forgetting letters or what not.

What did catch me by surprise, however, was a substitution he makes.

"A-B-C-D-E-F-G..."

Yup, so far so good!

"H-Grandma-P..."

Sorry, what now?

"Q-R-S..."

No, no, hold on. Back things up a bit, please. Grandma is part of your alphabet? Close, Max. So close.

But not quite.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It’s been said the sea and land fell in love at the beginning of time. It seemed they were meant for each other. But another entity was in love with the earth. The night loved her so much that all he could think about was her.
He decided to trick the sea into meeting him. The sea, never one to think poorly of another, agreed without hesitation. The night then captured the sea, chaining his waters to the moon. With the night in control of the one thing standing in his way, he was sure the land would finally fall for him.
But this was not so.
The land and the sea still fought for each other. The land grew out towards the sea’s cage. The barest of touch. Every day the sea struggles with his bonds, getting closer and closer to the land only to have the night pull him right back into his cage.
Reach out. Pulled back. Reach out. Pulled back.
Since that time, the sea has never ceased to fight.

Greg said...

Heh, Max sounds adorable. You should teach him to substitute "water" after G and before P though, so at least he'll be technically correct :) I do wonder how he managed to work "Grandma" in there... there's got to be a thought process to produce that, and it must be wonderful!
I have no suggestion for toddlers with colds during the night, though I believe whiskey on the gums works for teething, so you might want to see if it cures other things too :)

Close... but not quite
The hamster howled as the moon rose over the ridge, and Clara shivered. It was sat back on its little orange haunches, its chubby face lifted to the light and its teeth bared as the high-pitch howl ululated around the room. She considered putting a cloth over its cage, but then thought that if it stopped howling unexpectedly it might just wake things that were used to hearing it. She walked over to the window and stared out herself, looking at the moon and the stark, leafless trees silhouetted against it. There was no movement, as though the world had all gone to sleep for the night, and she wondered for the eighth time where Joey had got to.
Someone grunted in the corner of the room and she tensed. She'd put as little of the sleeping pills in the children's drinks as she dared, not wanting to hurt them, but now she was worrying constantly that they would wake up and try and get out of bed. She'd tied most of them in, just in case, but she couldn't bring herself to tie them all up as someone would need to free them in the morning. The grunt became a sigh, and then soft breathing, and she tried to make herself relax again.
The hamster howled at the moon.
Her leg suddenly warmed and shivered and she pulled a vibrating phone from her pocket with a sense of relief. She checked the screen: yes, it was Joey.
"Where are you?" she hissed into the phone, sure that he must have gone round to the back instead of tapping on the front door as they'd agreed. She listened intently.
"You what?!" Her voice almost rose above a whisper and was intense enough that the hamster chittered to itself. "What are you doing in Sixticton?" More silence.
"No," she said, her voice heavy with rage even though she was still (just) managing to keep it to a whisper. "The hat-maker is in Sixticton, the orphanage is here in JK Falls. Where I have eighteen doped up children and very little patience left." The only noise in the room now was Clara grinding her teeth.
"You have twenty minutes," she hissed finally, and shut the phone off. Thankfully JK Falls was close, but she was starting to wonder if Joey had really been the best she could do.

Marc said...

Ivybennet - really like where you went with the prompt. Has an ancient, mythical feel to it.

Greg - oh yes, I'd love a peek at the thought process that produced these results :)

Great descriptions at the start really set the scene here, the hamster in particular. And it's always nice to see Sixticton and its surrounding area from a new point of view :P