Friday May 15th, 2015

The exercise:

Write four lines of prose, the first of which begins with: The night before...

Got a lot of weeding done in the strawberries this morning. Hung out with Max at the start of the afternoon, helped Kat sort tomato plants for tomorrow's farmers market late afternoon. Packed the truck and picked rhubarb for the market after dinner.

And now... I sleep.

But before I nod off, allow me a moment to say: Happy birthday Mom! Hope you had a fantastic day. Thank you for all that you've done for all of us.

Mine:

The night before the first farmers market of the year is a swirling, chaotic combination of emotions. There is excitement, of course. But there is also anxiety (am I forgetting something?), anticipation, anxiety (am I forgetting something important?),worry/curiosity (how much of what we're bringing will we sell?), and resignation (okay, I'm definitely forgetting something but I am choosing to be okay with that, all right?).

And then there's the feeling you get when you're looking for your third and final market table in order to load it onto the truck and you see your market tent (provider of shade, among other duties) and you think, "Oh yeah... I should probably bring that too."

3 comments:

Greg said...

Sounds like you've got a strong start to the market season planned! I hope it's a good day for you and you sell out of everything!
Your description of getting everything ready for the market reminds me strongly of how I feel when packing for a work-trip abroad, even down to the resignation phase: I'm sure I've forgotten something but I'll just buy it when I'm out there and realise what it is. Though I guess in your case you probably couldn't buy a market awning and stand that easily when the sun is glaring down on you in the middle of a farmer's market!

Mine:
The night before the Open Day the manager of the laboratory had asked building security to run standard checks. He'd intended only that they check that things were locked down and that there was no chance of an angry capuchin breaking free from a cage and attacking visitors. He hadn't expected a visit from Charles Asciugimento himself, sitting in the manager's own seat in the manager's office, his fingers steepled in front of him and an angry gleam in his grey eyes.
"Please explain," said Charles, "why we've just located four recently missing children in cages in your laboratories."

Anonymous said...

I hope you have a great time at the farmer's market!

The Night Before

The night before had been a struggle of sorts; my mind fighting all my past demons and striving to forget the many faces that haunted my past. As the dawn brought the sweet salvation from the darkness of my soul, I could only sit in the faint light and ponder. I had severed all ties in my feeble attempt to become my own person with my own dreams and decisions. Yet, how could I do all that I want to do, all that I had set out to do, if I couldn’t even get a decent night’s sleep?

Marc said...

Greg - hah, no, I suppose we'd be stuck without a tent in that case :)

Yeah, I could see why the manager wouldn't have wanted Charles to get involved...

Ivy - thank you :)

That's a neat take on the prompt, and I especially liked the way it built to the final line.