The exercise:
Four lines of prose about: expectations.
Pretty easy harvest this morning, as I only grabbed a couple of crates of potatoes out of the garden. Everything else - apples, squash, even a few peppers - were already ready and waiting to go into the back of the truck. Well, perhaps 'ready' is too strong a word, as it took a lot of rearranging and convincing to get it all in there.
Anyway, the truck is crammed full of goodies. Hopefully we don't have to bring very much of it back after the market.
Oh! Almost forgot. Kat and I found out late this afternoon that we'll both be working at the polls on election day. Quite pleased about that.
Mine:
"You look disappointed."
I look up from the classified ad at the back of the local paper and stare at the apartment it's meant to represent. I guess there is a mountain view, if you count the crayon drawing of the Alps (I'm being generous - it could just as easily be a teepee or a seagull) taped to the window.
4 comments:
Canadian potatoes grow in crates? That must be incredibly useful, though back-breaking effort to dig them up at the right time. I wonder if there's a story in there somewhere...?
I suspected that you wouldn't be NaNo-ing as it's getting pretty close to the start and you'd not mentioned it. I think you're right though, sometimes you have to go back and finish what's been started already!
And congrats on the job :)
(Oh, and the barrel fire in the living room sounds perfect! Very rural.)
Expectations
Miss Snippet laid the last homework paper face down on the pile, and then had a good cry. Was she expecting too much of the children? Really? She'd asked them to write a detailed critique of Jane Austen – and surely a class of five-year olds could do that since Austen wrote at essentially that level – and the best they'd managed was "I think shes smely becos shes ded".
This isn't my favorite one I've written and I guess it could be called anticipation instead of expectation.
~~~
You sat before me,
hands folded in your lap.
Electricity leaped from you.
Nerves buzzed on your skin.
Eyes flickering like florescent lights.
Your lips moved;
no voice slipping out.
I spoke, each word a caress,
taking your hands.
"I want you to move in with me."
A gasp, surprise...
"But, I expected something else."
"What?"
"Never mind...yes."
Expectations
Expectations are tricky things. Why? Because they are, by their nature, more unlikely to be fulfilled. They either underestimate or overshoot; rarely are they met.
The Grand Canyon overshot my expectations. It was so immensely huge that I lost the feeling of "canyon" and got more a sense of valley. It was still impressive, truly grand, but did it meet my expectations? Did I expect incorrectly?
The Eiffel Tower was smaller and uglier than I thought it'd be. Maybe I should have seen it at night where the lights would soften the robust iron to a gossamer grid.
The Swiss Alps became the Goldilocks booya of my travels. Their chocolate box beauty with hints of snow topping green meadows filled with contented Jersey cows did fulfil my expectations. Those old Shirley Temple and Julie Andrews movies didn't lie, after all.
What is the best approach to this conundrum? To have no expectations, nothing to disappoint? A blank canvas on which to paint fresh perceptions, mayhap?
Greg - no sir, they grow quite normally in the ground. I suppose I should have said I picked a couple of crates worth, but I'm too used to talking to people that see how we do things around here I suppose.
That last line cracked me right up :)
Brittany - expectations or anticipation would both work. And as long as it's vaguely to do with the prompt I'm happy, so no worries here!
World of Exp. - I tend to not have expectations about things and I find it generally works out pretty well. But sometimes I do get excited about an upcoming whatever and expectations start slipping in the back door.
Post a Comment