Dale offers the prompt “up, down and sideways” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
The first photo is looking up directly at the sunrise. The second photo is looking down at the reflection of the sunrise on the water.
In the third photo the sunrise is off-center. I have to look (a bit) sideways to see it.
After their last doctor visits Jeremy and his wife, Felicity, planned a series of trips across the country. They went from their children’s homes to those of other family members to friends making sure to mark the date so they would not forget to attend Sunday Mass wherever they were. They saw baby alligators lie on mama alligators’ backs in the Everglades, fancy roosters wander the streets of Key West, cold Alaskan glaciers, deep Arizona canyons, Rocky and Blue Ridge mountains and wide expanses of oceans with turtles, birds and seashells.
Some noticed the medications they were taking while others wondered about their talk of checking off items on their bucket lists. Regardless, they could be counted on to visit when there were births or weddings and to offer consolation at funerals leaving those they visited overwhelmed with peace.
In spite of the medications and bucket lists Jeremy and Felicity beep bopped around the country for another thirty years and the Lord visited them every day putting at the top of their list those who most needed to see them next.
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Denise offers the prompt word “date” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.
Romans 10:13 – “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” (KJV)
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.
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.
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This story originally appeared in Whispers and Echoes.
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.
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Denise offers the prompt word “bubble” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.
Dale offers the prompt “as night falls” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
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.
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Denise offers the prompt word “blur” for this week’s Six Sentence Stories.
Dale offers the prompt “house plants” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
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.
Dale offers the prompt “one winter’s morning” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Prompt.
At the moment I am in Florida, but the following photos are from a time in Northbrook, IL, when the winter morning was cold and snow was falling.
I still remember that morning. I am glad I went out to take photos. It is my idea of what winter is all about.
Poetry, Short Prose and Walking 