Tag Archives: The Daily Prompt

Six Gifts for My Sister

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The Prompt: The Language of Things—You have to write a message to someone dear to you, telling that person how much he/she means to you. However — instead of words, you can only use 5-10 objects to convey your emotions.  Which objects do you choose, and what do they mean?

First of all, I have to say that this is my all-time-favorite prompt, so kudos to its creator. It is original, thought-provoking and fun.

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Six Gifts for my Sister

 Older sisters are our teachers, our critics, our cruelest enemies and our best friends. When we were younger, my sister was no exception. With age, however, some of these roles have fallen away. The others I often take for granted even though I know they are still there.

This year I will be, as I have been for most years in my life, far away from my four-year-older sister, Patti, for Christmas. Betty, my 11-year-older sister, unfortunately started to leave us four years ago and now lives in a world we are not a part of. Both Patti and I fear the same thing happening to us and we’ve made some Thelma and Louise pacts to that end. Hopefully, we’ll never have to use them and will fade peacefully away in our dreams when we are well over 100.

If this sounds excessive, you are right. I am a glutton for life and probably part of the reason is the capacity for play taught to me by my sister, who was always my most imaginative playmate. Even when I’m sad, I love living and want for life to go on for as long as possible, so long as I remain relatively pain-free and retain my mind, my sense of humor and my girlish good figure. One of these things does not belong. You can probably guess which one.

Since I live in Mexico and my sister will be in her home near Phoenix this year, we have sent gifts early. Mine sits on top of the armoire in my beach rental in its blue wrapping bag with curly ribbon. I have added a pelican feather and gaudy ribbon streamers. Since I’ve chosen to spend this Christmas far from friends and other relatives, it is my only gift and I am hoarding its mystery until the last possible minute. Perhaps I’ll open it at 11:55 P.M. on December 25! I’m sure my sister has not opened hers, either.

A usual tradition in our family was to do Christmas stockings to which we all contributed. (Well, except for my dad, who instead donated the cash we all used to purchase our stocking stuffers.) With that in mind and feeling sentimental, I’d like to assemble an imaginary Christmas stocking for my sister to open right now—as soon as she sees this. It’s a not such a large stocking, but as in all things imaginary, anything is possible; so I’m sure all the gifts will fit.

I need to start at the top, with the lightest most crushable items, and so the first gift she will find sticking out of the top of the stocking will be something flat, rolled into a cylinder before wrapping. When she rips off the paper in her usual unceremonial fashion, she will know exactly why I have given it to her.

It is a folder of Debra Paget paper dolls with snub-nosed scissors taped to the front to encourage her to actually cut them out. I have visions of them decorating her tree for the remainder of its life this year, or even better, my sister on her stomach on the living room rug, cutting them out while she listens to “Our Miss Brooks” or “The Shadow” on the radio, then assembles the material for a paper doll house: Kleenex box beds and sofas, tuna can tables covered in tissue tablecloths. Since she taught me these imaginary games, she’ll figure out the rest. Then I want her to imagine me there playing with her. She can be Debra Paget. I’ll be anyone she wants me to be, as was the norm way back then when we constructed our first paper worlds.

The next box she pulls from the stocking will be long, narrow and flattish. It will weigh practically nothing. There will be instructions on the front to open it more carefully than usual, for it is fragile. When she folds back the paper, she’ll find a box of the old aluminum tinsel—the extra long and extra skinny type that only she knew how to put on perfectly. It was an art, this distribution of tinsel on the tree. One had to be sure to spread it out evenly in bunches of only three or four strands. For maximum beauty, it had to be hung on the ends of branches so it hung just to the top of the next branch without lapping over. In our house, it was never thrown! I am absolutely sure that now, as then, Patti and I are the only ones with patience enough to do the job right, so she will have to do it for both of us.

I’m sure that what the next gift is will be obvious. It is a Christmas tradition started by my mother, who would tuck a small box of Russell Stover Chocolates in each stocking. At times, she would succumb to temptation and all of the boxes would be empty as she generously absorbed all of their calories herself. I am making one small change in tradition and tucking in a box of See’s Chocolates in lieu of Mother’s poor taste in chocolate. Helen Grace would be even better, if I knew where to buy them.

The next box is small and may have slid a bit further down in the stocking when the others were removed, so I’ve attached a streamer that extends well out of the top of the sock. Pull the streamer and the little box will pop out. Inside is a key. Looks like the key to a car. Actually, it is the key to a little tan Scout whose top can be taken off to make it a convertible. Here are the instructions I’ve written for Patti and wrapped around the key:

—There is room for the driver (that’s you) and one more friend in front. (That’s me.) I am sitting there in honor of friends no longer able to: Patty Peck, Diane Looby, Mary Jo Kuckleberg. I think Karen Bossart is so slim that she could also squeeze in front with us. In the back, along the side benches and on the floor, if you really pack them in, there is room for at least eight others and I have written them all to be expecting your call. Billy Francis, Clarence Rea, Mick Penticoff and Bobby Brost are all must-rides. Since the male friends of your youth have outlasted most of your female friends, Billy and C.J. and Mick can bring their wives to sit in for Patty, Diane and Mary Jo. If my buddy Rita North were going to be in Arizona for Christmas (she isn’t) she could tag along as both of us always longed to do—and sometimes we were actually asked! Jim, I don’t think a Scout is your style, but be a sport and ride along in the back with the guys! You’ll discover formerly undiscovered levels of fun bumping along in this replica of Patti’s and my first wheels. And there is always room for one more in the back of a Scout!

The next gift is merely an envelope. Inside are two tickets to Africa. The accompanying note reads:

—To complete our journey that was once curtailed by a revolution and shooting that sent you off to bravely face the rest of the trip alone. It’s about time we tried it again, hopefully with happier endings. Since then, you’ve been back so many times that you can probably pick the agenda better than I could, so it’s an open ticket. You fill in the blanks.

So, we’ve finally come to the bottom of the stocking, but anyone who has plunged into the depths of a Christmas stocking knows there is always something left in the stocking’s toe. In this case it is a small but substantial box wrapped in rich gold paper with a shiny silver cord. Inside is a slide with a large diamond set in gold. Although I know that gold and diamonds are no longer my sister’s “style,” this one is a wonderful modern design with an emerald-cut stone set in a flat gold setting. It is this gift that I’ve chosen to show her worth to me and for that, nothing but the best will do!

Merry Christmas to all. Especially to that sister who has been there for me every single time and who need never worry again about being mean to me in our youth. That, too, is what older sisters are meant to do. It gets us ready for the world, which will not always be paper dolls and U’ing main in a Scout chock full of friends.

 

 

Don’t Make Me!

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The Prompt:Kick the Bucket—What are the top items on your anti-bucket list — those things you never, ever want to do, places you never want to visit, books you never want to read, etc.?

Don’t Make Me

Please don’t ever make me go back to Cancun.
If I never return there, I’ve visited too soon.
Don’t make me go to church again or listen to more rap.
Don’t make me go to bed at eight or take a daily nap.
I don’t want to do those things I don’t want to do.
Don’t make me look at animals trapped up in a zoo.

Brains are meant for keeping up farther in your head.
To have to eat the things I think with fills my mind with dread.
Don’t make me eat anything only adults eat:
liver, caviar, pate, kidneys or pigs’ feet.
All of those are parts of animals I’ve come to fear,
for none of them are meant to put in human mouths, my dear.

I think that I’ll live longer without jumping from above.
For bungee cords or parachutes I have no sort of love.
Even roller coasters present uncalled-for risk.
For me a walk upon the beach is adequately brisk.
Anything that’s bumpy, jerky, swooping, fast or twirly
makes me want to arrive late and go home really early.

Please don’t make me listen to those who rant and rave.
If I meet them in the street, I’ll merely nod and wave.
Let bores much given to monologues find another ear;
because those who never listen, I have no wish to hear.
Tea-partiers, loud mouths, bigots and folks in the elite
are on my list of strangers I do not need to meet.

I hope no radiation or chemotherapy
is ever necessary to make me cancer-free.
No machines to make me breathe and no dialysis.
As little poking, pushing, testing and analysis
as possible is what I wish for on my “do not” list.
Just let me go gently into that final mist.

I’ve grown to hate the overuse of “bucket list” as label
for what folks want to do before their death if they are able.
So please be more original in thinking what to call
that list of things that you most want to do before you fall.
For the thing I don’t want as “I am” turns into “been”
Is to ever hear the phrase of “bucket list” again!

You might be able to find a list of other people who have answered this prompt by clicking on each person who has “liked” this topic here:

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/kick-the-bucket/

Necessary Dangers

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The Prompt: Alphabet Soup. Write down one word for each letter of the alphabet and then construct a post making use of these words.

Necessary Dangers

 How did you find your way into my dreams,
ripping my comfort apart at the seams?
I barely escaped to back rooms of my self
where still I found thoughts of you stacked on a shelf
carefully obscured both in front and above
by other less perilous memories of love.

You walked nonchalantly into the room
that I had just cleared with a cloth and a broom
of other dangers and sadnesses not
knowing that I had been once again caught.
Now I hide out behind walls at the back
where all of my worst fears reside in a stack.

Cowering here as you stride through the place
that your very presence has turned dark and base.
How could I have loved such a frightening soul?
The box of my heart turned into a bowl
with all of my secrets and weakness revealed—
things that I now know I should have kept sealed?

There you sit quietly, perched on a chair,
one hand on the desk top, one hand on your hair
writing cruel words—I know about me.
I ease my way over, hoping to see,
but the paper is empty, your ink has turned clear
making improbable all that I fear.

As now I remember that I let you in,
forgetting all else in the charm of your grin.
The joy of your hand as it guided me sure
across the dance floor—all that allure
that kept me involved in the surface of you
overlooking the dangers as most of us do.

If I’d had an x-ray taken of you
when our romance was shiny and new
I might have seen sooner your dangerous zone
and taken a detour, and left you alone.
And perhaps now my dreams would be placid and calm.
so I’d sleep without worry, sleep without qualm.

I might not have moved off to the edge of the world,
might still have been sleeping, never unfurled.
Perhaps it’s these dangers that make us let go
of all of the comforts of worlds that we know
and send us out elsewhere to discover a self
we’d have never found sitting safe on a shelf.

The Sweet and Bitter Lie

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This is one of 15 creches I’ve constructed of unaltered natural items I’ve found on the beach. For some reason, I am captivated by the gentle side of Mexico best symbolized by her obsession with the Virgin of Guadalupe. I’ve seen motorcycle leathers with an image of Guadalupe on the back! I’ll publish pictures of the others soon. I know. A seeming contradiction to the words I’ve posted below, but perhaps one or the other view is just a sweet little lie!

The Prompt: Sweet Little Lies—As kids, we’re told, time and again, that lying is wrong. Do you believe that’s always true? In your book, are there any exceptions?

The Sweet and Bitter Lie

I think the sweetest little lie we tell ourselves and our children is that of a beneficent and caring God. This belief and the religion that stems from it  is our way of comforting ourselves. It is totally aside from reason. How else could we look at a baby turtle struggling to swim for the first time plucked up and swallowed by a hungry pelican, or a baby suffering with cancer or a horribly deformed child and think, “This is the product of a caring Father?” We all must conclude, if we make use of our senses at all, that nature is impartial and serves only its own cycle. There is no kindness in nature, other than her beauties and comforts; but even they all serve a purpose: to survive against all odds, and to kill or at the very least to depend upon the death of other organisms in order to do so.

I do acknowledge that Religion is probably necessary for many who do not think far enough to recognize the sweet lie. For those who use it to create more compassion for others, I applaud the end. But right now it seems as though religion is being used more as a weapon and political ploy than for the “good” side of its coin.

I don’t know how I align my agnosticism with my belief that there is some sort of incredible synchronicity going on in the world. This is a topic for another day, I guess.

For other posts on this topic, go here: https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/sweet-little-lies/

Work Ethic / Canción de México: Two Poems

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The Prompt: Gut Feeling—When’s the last time you followed your instinct despite not being sure it was the right thing to do? Did it end up being the right call?

Work Ethic

There’s something stirring in me. I do not know its name.
It whispered to go seawards, so that is why I came.
I do not know the object, though once I thought I did.
Once here the book I thought I’d write left my mind and hid.

I find that I am drifting like a seabird on the swell;
and so far that is fine with me, in fact I like it well.
Instead, I write these ditties that I finish every day,
forsaking what I think I should to just write what I may.

No need for all the boring things: research, footnotes, citing.
Whatever is in front of me is what I end up writing.
Some might say that it’s responsibility I’m shirking,
but I say that I’ve simply learned to go with what is working.


Canción de México
(Song of Mexico)

This small café sits on the square, or rather the rectangle.
The gas trucks pass by, blaring “Gaaaaas,” their grounding chains a-jangle.
Trucks and cycles lacking mufflers roar by every minute,
bass blaring from each car window without much music in it.

The guinea fowl make such a ruckus that they sound insane,
but to complain about the noise in Mexico’s inane.
The daily garbage trucks, the water truck and all the rest
all live by the assurance that what’s loudest is the best.

I drink my coffee, eat my muffin, try to grin and bear it;
but when she sets a napkin down, I grab at it and tear it.
And even though one part of me says that I shouldn’t dare it,
I use a bit to wipe my lips. The other part? I wear it!

I stuff a wad in either ear, and though I still hear all,
I go by the illusion that I hear it from afar.
Sometimes I feel the threat of age, so quickly it is nearing;
but if I lose one faculty, dear God, please make it hearing!

New World Miracle

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The Prompt: An Extreme Tale—“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” — Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities. When was the last time that sentence accurately described your life?

Note:  For the ninth day in a row, I (along with several other bloggers) have not been able to pingback to the Daily Prompts page.  If you are able to, can you mention this poem in your blog and pingback to me?  WordPress doesn’t seem to be doing anything about this problem, although we’ve written numerous times!  Thanks.

I’ve told the second part of this story in an earlier post.  Now, here is the beginning and the ending.  One day I’ll tell the in-between.


New World Miracle
(Ethiopia, 1973-74)

Black Tiger in safari jacket
you told me
hyenas in the hills
would attack the mule if I tried
to ride alone
from the lowland landing field
to Lalibela.

By
sunset
we had reached
the high plateaus
sheep crying
miles away
shepherds calling
mile on mile.

In this high air
heard from mountaintop
to mountaintop
from valley
lifting to plateaus above
you with Afro out to here
admitted the hyenas were a lie
took my picture
tucked my camera in your pocket
pulled me up
to you
and
there was no
resistance
in
this
air.

I was
enamored
of the falling sun
the cries of shepherds
your hair
your jacket
your clean mouth
white teeth
and beautiful
tall rest of you.
I had always needed
to feel like this.
Giddy.
Your kiss pulled me in then
ricocheted
to valleys
under valleys
under valleys.
Always something
under
something else.

We were at the edges
of the world.
We were at its
cracking rims.

And I can believe
in you
standing
on the rifted rock
above the canyons
still
I can’t imagine
you
in the valley
deeper in the valley
than the valley floor.

I can’t imagine you
dusted hair
eyes closed by clods
growing trees from your navel
pomegranates from your fingernails.

When you touched me
I grew
then I grew too far.

But nothing
since
has touched your warm
your brown
your hands
your mouth
where you touched
nothing since
has quite
touched.

In your country
where names
are only words
strung together
your name
Andu Alem Tamirat
meaning new world’s miracle.

You could have come with me
to grow invisible in California.
Instead you
died in
futile
revolution,
seeding
painful
memories.

Remember
how you used to climb
out of my dining room window
to the back yard compound
to pick orange waxy blossoms
from the pomegranate tree—
how you used to
tuck them
in my hair?

Thanks Be to Pure Hearts

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The Prompt: Never Too Late—Is there a person you should’ve thanked, but never had the chance? Is there someone who helped you along the way without even realizing it? Here’s your chance to express your belated gratitude.

Thanks Be to Pure Hearts

 Thanks be to that creator of the universe—
the one I can no longer pray to in a church
because of those powers who take truth prisoner
and lead the masses to wherever they can be most safely trusted
to surrender reason to them.

Thanks be to that man who turned water into wine.
Not a teetotaler. Not even abstinent, or so some say.
That man who loved all and who would not strike anyone
except for merchants making a living from the church.
Two thousand years ago,
he saw that merchants and moneylenders
would lead the world wrong—
using the little minds of frightened men
to turn faith into a weapon.

Praise be to those at the beginning of it all
who tried to set a true course but made the mistake
of leaving the compass in the hands of human fools
who saw over all, how to use it for their own glory,
making power their god and oiling their way upward
not toward salvation
but toward ever higher places in this world.

Those who are not fools might speak our enemies’ names
yet be shouted down by those
Dunning and Kruger have named as their adjutants—
the countless mindless who speed the world toward ruin.

Yet for this day, I want to turn my back on those I’d rather curse
to thank pure hearts who still can see the way.
There is still, I know, a part of them in all of us,
evident in everyday things: a mother’s sheltering arms
or in as simple an act as taking the smallest piece of pie.

So when we give thanks today,
thank those who remain kind within the world,
carrying along the spirit
of those first beneficent acts
that started with the dust of stars
and from it created consciousness
and then implanted some good turn of will
so as to give hope in a world
that feels divided in the blackness of the universe,
lonely in this night
but steering by those pinpricks in its cover
through which light shows, even in the darkest dark.

Sate´d, Shaken and Stir-fried

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The Prompt: Shaken and Stirred—What’s the most elaborate, complicated meal you’ve ever cooked? Was it a triumph for the ages, or a colossal fiasco? Give us the behind-the-scenes story.

Sate’d, Shaken and Stir-fried

When I was in Thailand, age 19, I purchased a teak-handled brass cutlery set of 144 pieces—twelve place settings of 11 pieces each, 12 serving pieces. It was a beautiful set in a teakwood box the size of a suitcase, and I actually bought two of them! I was traveling by ship and so had no weight or luggage restrictions. Once I got back to the reality of the U.S. and realized what a pain it was to hand wash and polish all of these pieces, I never used them (and neither did my sister, who was the recipient of the other set)—except for once. I decided to plan one grand meal for 12 and to plan a menu that made use of every knife, spoon and fork. Although I’m sure I won’t be able to remember every course, I’m going to try, but as a memory aid, I first need to remember all of the pieces. Here goes: shrimp cocktail fork, salad fork, dinner fork, cake fork, demitasse spoon, teaspoon, soup spoon, ice tea spoon, steak knife, butter knife, table knife, cheese knife sugar spoon, 3 large serving spoons, salad serving fork, salad serving spoon, meat carving knife, meat serving fork, bread knife, pie server. Phew! I can’t believe how easily I remembered the pieces. It renews my faith in my memory and as an exercise, probably staved off Alzheimer’s for a few more years.

So, what I served, if I recall correctly, was an Indonesian meal and it probably included: shrimp cocktail in a sweet chili sauce, lemongrass sweet and sour coconut milk soup, cucumbers and sweet onions in yogurt and dill sauce, nasi goreng (Indonesian fried rice) with mixed fresh vegetables, chicken sate in peanut sauce, kecap manis (sweet soy sauce), deep fried rice noodles with scallions  (to replace the shrimp chips usually served with the nasi goreng), more sweet chili sauce to put over the rice and noodles. coconut ice cream (I believe we used the demitasse spoons for the ice cream) green tea ice cream, some sort of cake (This must have been so, to enable us to use those cake forks.) Tsing Tao Beer, iced tea and wine. I don’t know how I worked the cheese and butter knives in—probably during the hors d’ ouvres course.

I had set all the tables elaborately, using sarongs purchased in Bali as table cloths as well as batik napkins I’d had made there. Unfortunately, a friend who didn’t quite realize the planning that had gone into this, arrived late, just as we were sitting down to our meal, with four uninvited friends in tow! I am afraid I was less than gracious as I tried to gerrymander an extra table with regular stainless cutlery. The best-laid plans!!!! Many years later, I served a 13 course Chinese meal where I had guests bring the ingredients for one dish, which I sent them a list of. (I had on hand the unusual ingredients they would have had a hard time locating.) I think I was responsible for most of the dishes, but wanted them personally involved. When they arrived, I had a Chinese chef there who helped each to prepare their individual dish. Some of mine, I’d already made, but had him help me with one more complicated dish.

Most of the evening was spent cooking, but it was so much fun and by the time we sat down to our late meal, everyone’s mood had been elevated by numerous large-sized bottles of Tsing Tao beer—a vice I’d discovered in China and found a supply of in the trunk of the car of a drapery salesman whom I dated once—just long enough to buy the entire case of beer. I don’t know why he had it and why he was wanting to get rid of it, but it was another case of the synchronicity of those years in L.A. when all of life seemed to get sorted out and when I finally got on my way to becoming closer to who I wanted to be.

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/shaken-and-stirred/

Calling Uncle Duckie

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The Prompt: Calling Uncle Bob—Have you ever faced a difficult situation when you had to choose between sorting it out yourself, or asking someone else for an easy fix? What did you choose — and would you make the same choice today?

Calling Uncle Duckie

I can’t get my link established. Guess I’m just unlucky.
Luckily, I have a fix. I just call Uncle Duckie!
He can fix most anything from formatting to routers;
but you’ve got to stay real calm. He doesn’t work with pouters!

“Uncle Duckie, dear,” I say via email or on Skype.
“I want to post my post now, but I have a little gripe.
I can’t get my poem to post in single space, my dear.
It looks too long when double-spaced, and I have a fear

no one will read a two-paged poem. Long postings are no fun.
Is there any way that I can get it down to one?”
“Hit shift-return at ends of lines,” he tells me really pronto.
On my blog he wears the mask. And me? I’m merely Tonto!!!! **

** Note: In Spanish, “Tonto” means stupid. In other words, if viewed in Guadalajara, our favorite childhood program would be called, “The Lone Ranger and Stupid!”

Risking It

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The Prompt: Envelope Pushers—When was the last time you took a risk (big or small), and pushed your own boundaries — socially, professionally, or otherwise? Were you satisfied with the outcome?

Risking It

What risks are left in life at 67? That big risk of childbirth far behind me (and since I said no to it, so is the risk of my life being detoured by the products of it); travel no longer the thrill it once was; too tired to build and decorate any more houses; and love seemingly something that is going to be experienced in online spurts for the rest of my life; it seems as though the only risk left is that big one. And I fear it. Actually, resent it. I don’t want for life to ever be over.

I can’t stand the thought of fading into nothingness. Yes, my “work” might live after me, but my work is just the rumor of me. It is only the part of me I have been able to express. What about that entire unexplored rest of me? Where will it go? Will it ever have another chance? I feel the press of my own potential. Have I let it down? Will Hell really be the fleeting awareness, as I fade away, that I have left the most delicious offerings on the plate of life untasted?

I am not an athlete. I was never a mother. Although I have made some brave decisions in my life, nonetheless, I have feared too much. I fear being laughed at, rejected, passed over—so much so that at times I haven’t even tried. Like so many others, I have too often escaped. The power of books and films is that they afford us the opportunity to live vicariously those risks we put off taking in our own lives.

Then, the internet. Finally, the opportunity to control our fantasy lives—to create personalities for ourselves where we can leave out the parts we don’t want to face. We can always be 40 on the internet. Frozen at 145 pounds. Our successes are there on our cyber page for all to see and we can simply neglect to mention our failures. The internet is like a scrapbook with all of the faces we don’t want to see, ever again, relegated to Facebook, where we can block them with the push of a button.

Online, we get to think before talking, or at the very least, a chance to review and edit before hitting the “send” button. We are able to choose greater exposure with fewer risks. Or, one can opt for the “voyeur” stance—simply watching and imagining without ever taking the risk of exposing ourselves.

There is a swimmer a hundred yards off shore who swam by going in the opposite direction a half hour ago. A kayaker paddles by as close to the shore as she can safely travel without being swamped by waves. Two more kayakers come into view 500 yards out, paddling for shore.  It is not only the large decisions in life that expose us to risk, but there is risk, also, in the everyday details. You rent a kayak, yes, but how far out into the bay are you willing to paddle it? You go to potentially dangerous places, but to how much of that risk are you willing to expose yourself? We are all here at the same place at the same time, but I am sitting on my porch, well-shaded by the palapa roof.

The tern bobs just beyond the surf line, ducking his head underwater now and then, in search of any fish who are dumb enough to make it easy for him. Up above, magnificent frigate birds are executing their perpetual ballet—this time on our stage. Even clams stick their necks out now and then, albeit to their peril. Younger women and men jog by. Buxom grandmothers plod by. Children draw hopscotch patterns in the sand and poke at a large dying fish. I want to tell them to leave the fish alone as the child touches the eye, but when the fish doesn’t flinch, I hope it signals the end of its too-long death, gasping for air it can’t draw in now that it is surrounded by too much of it.  Simply by going after his own breakfast, he has taken a risk that will lead to his becoming someone else’s.

Part of taking risks is going into worlds we are not familiar with, to risk the discomfort of adjusting ourselves to that world. I think the secret is, however, to find familiar worlds within every world we take ourselves off to. It is not that we are rejecting the new, but rather that we are clinging onto those parts of ourselves that make us “us.” When I come to the beach, I occasionally meet with other writers. This keeps me reassured that I am sane to spend so much my life in recreating that life in words. It keeps me less lonely. It gives me a timeline and a goal. Without these touchstones that remind us who we are, we can all too easily become wanderers without purpose, going on to the next place in search of ourselves.

Sitting here on the porch, I am not necessarily any safer than the man or woman swimming so far offshore. It is my own risks I’m taking. I risk telling you something that will make you like me less. Something that will make me look foolish, deluded, poorly-informed, naïve, even crazy. A bigger risk is that in this writing I might see a part of myself I don’t like. This prompt today has done that: raised a question I don’t want to answer, even though I know the answer is hiding there somewhere within me. I know what the risk is that I’m afraid to take, but like the name of that acquaintance whose face I know so well but whose name suddenly eludes me, I just can’t quite put my finger on it. There is at least one risk left to take before that final risk formerly alluded to. Now I just need to set about trying to remember what it is.