Dale offers the prompt “from an interesting angle” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
Trying to find an excuse to include these photos I thought the angle of the bird’s head standing on the boulders was interesting. The angles of the palm trees in the second photo made me think of an arch over the full moon.
View of Fisher Island (and a bird) from South Beach, Miami Beach, Florida
Full Moon Rising Over the Atlantic Ocean at 72nd Street Miami Beach, Florida
After a decade Bill called. He reached a level of intoxication where lunacy required an audience. He also had a list of unforgivable people and wanted to go over it with me. Admittedly I’ve messed things up, plenty, but I was surprised to find my name on his list.
After an hour I told Bill I could hook him up with a good shrink or an exorcist if he preferred. That worked. He hung up.
A week later I called him back. Bill was sober and I was tactful. We joked some before I brought up the exorcist.
Stanley presented his theory of causality explaining how point A met point B in a new dimension where infinitely many things occurred. He drew illustrations to make his point. Around point A there were lines and circles which he called causes. He decorated point B with more lines and circles and called all of that the effect happening like the popping of a bubble.
Then Stanley looked at me for encouragement.
I wondered what would be the easiest way to tell him without embarrassing myself or frustrating him that I had no clue what he was talking about.
The first photo is from Miami Beach some years ago. There is a new moon with Venus just below and faintly below that to the right is Jupiter. Of course, I might have misidentified these. I think I got the moon right. It will set soon as night falls.
The second photo was taken facing east over the Sea of Galilee. This full moon has just risen as night falls.
While walking through the neighborhood overcast by a blur of rainclouds Charles passed a young girl urging her two brothers half her size to keep up with her.
One said, “It’s gonna rain,” but she answered, “No.” Then the other said, “It’s gonna rain,” and she repeated, “No.”
Charles also thought it was going to rain. He hadn’t brought an umbrella, but after hearing the girl’s words he slowed the pace of his walking convinced in spite of the clouds that it wouldn’t rain.
Whether to fulfill a child’s prophecy or to give Charles something to think about it in fact did not rain, at least not until both he and those three children reached the shelter of their homes.
Red bougainvillea made a splash against a white wall as Tom wondered where he was.
When his mind wandered he’d sometimes get lost in imagined disasters he could do nothing about. Fortunately, although they seemed determined to mess with him to the extent they still could, he had enough sense to reject dark demonic misdirection.
Then Tom saw Phyllis wave to him in the distance. He hadn’t seen her in a decade, not since the funeral. Her smile and the joyful brilliance of the bougainvillea told him his journey was finally over and a new, better one had just begun.
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Denise offers the prompt word “mess” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.
They sat outside our dorm singing the Moon Song. It was his favorite. Even she knew it. He sang, “Yadda yadda goo goo.” She responded, “Doodoo doodoo wah wah.” This would go on and on.
I imagined them singing the Moon Song for decades even after a long day of fighting and making up. When they grew old I imagined them singing it to each other in their hearts.
Indeed I hope so.
But we didn’t have air conditioning. My window was open. This was exam week. And that’s my lame excuse for shouting, “Shut up!”