Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Have a Ball

It’s baseball season and golf too. The basketball playoffs are in full swing. Tennis balls, bowling balls, footballs, soccer balls, ping pong balls, billiard balls …there are balls everywhere. Incorporate a ball somewhere in your fiction today because that’s the way the ball bounces.

5 comments:

  1. Here because I was linked by Hannah. Hmm, I'll consider adding balls to my work :)!

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  2. Interesting, I never thought of this.

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  3. Ok, it has...er...balls in it...

    She left work a ball of rage and frustration. It was one of those days when she decided that what she really want to do is something that requires minimal thinking and creativity. Something that doesn’t tax one’s already strained nerves. Like being a guard at the museum, or a barista at Starbucks, or the person who sweeps up the hair at a salon.

    All day long, she thought evil thoughts. She thought about terrible things she could do and say, about appalling, irresponsible, impulsive acts. Something involving firebombing and gluing giant black spiders to surfaces and throwing water filled balloons from the office roof. She called her husband, who told her to cool it in his very calm, rational way.

    “BUT I’VE HAD IT!” she screamed. “I’M WALKING OUT AND NEVER COMING BACK!”
    Somehow, she always felt better to say the things she couldn’t imagine actually doing.

    “Just come home,” he said.

    And when she arrived, there was a fire in the fireplace. The house was tidy and supper was on the go.

    Someone very, very good had done these things just to please her. Someone knew that she needed to come home to something rational and serene. Someone understood that she needed a break. Without even being told.

    Small acts of kindness.
    Generosity of spirit.
    And a big, stiff drink waiting at the door.

    This is love.

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  4. Ha! Veronica, I love your interpretation of the prompt. I have one of those "very, very good" ones, and could so relate to this. Makes it all worth it, doesn't it? Great write.

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  5. Classic AC/DC playing through her ear buds, Jessica was having a pretty good night stocking the shelves of the old, home town toy store. She'd only been doing this job for a few weeks, but had already learned that this was one of those rare, nearly magical nights when it appeared to have been a light day at the register, everything went into place easily, and there was very little new product that had to be displayed. To top it off, she'd not dropped anything...until she dropped the soccer ball from the upper shelf. Jessica watched it fall and as it hit the floor, there was a pulse of light that swept out from the impact. Her music stopped playing and everything was quiet as she hopped down from the step stool and ran a hand across her face, rubbing her eyes. As she bent to pick up the dropped ball, Jessica heard the sound of boxes popping open, and paper and tape being ripped a few aisles over. She went to the end of the aisle, then crept toward the aisles from where she heard the noise. Peering down each aisle she passed, she heard the sound of tiny boots running across the floor a few rows ahead, followed by the murmuring of small voices. Passing the aisle that held action figures, she spotted a bunch of open boxes on the floor, but no action figures. Shaking her head, Jessica continued toward the sound of the voices, eventually peering down the stuffed animal aisle to see the action figures, all G.I. Joes from a quick glance, squared off against a similar number of various stuffed animals, talking smack to each other. She had a vision of a bad gang war scene from a movie before one of the Joes yelled out to her, "Hey, Doll, you gonna toss us that ball to play with or what?" Jessica nearly gave herself whiplash turning as the owner of the store whispered from behind her, "You better throw them the ball. The Joes can get rather surly if you delay the game." In a daze, Jessica took the ball out of its box and rolled it down to the group of toys, watching it shrink to their size as it rolled. She spent the next few hours watching G.I. Joe play a fairly even game of soccer against the stuffed animals. At one point, she looked over at the owner, who gave her a wink and said "You'll never find this happen in one of those big chain stores." She stared at him, dumbfounded. He continued, "You should see it when the Joes and the Barbies have a Ball."

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