Friday Fictioneers – Room with a Memory PG13 Serious

Rochelle Wisoff-Fields is host to Friday Fictioneers, a collection of 100 (+/-) word stories.  After reading mine below, click > HERE < for the rest.  Enjoy!!!

Source: PHOTO PROMPT Copyright -Mary Shipman

Room with a Memory

By Scott L Vannatter – 100 Words

The room or, what was left of it, had been decorated.  The characters, cartoons nearly imbedded into the wall, were funny without having that scariness most cartoons have.  I had helped pick them out; now, they would be a legacy of sorts.

I had begun the tearing process.  Funny how tear and tear could work so well together.  My drops of wetness poured onto the very walls that used to make me happy.  Now, the dampness on one board would be encased in glass so I would never (as if I could) forget.

Baby and Mommy hit by a drunk.

 

_______________________

Namaste,

Scott

A Mother is Beautiful – Without Airbrushing

Mothers are Beautiful!

Sometimes, I get humbled.  Here we are always dealing with beauty and what-not and I read this article and I am humbled.  Read it.  It’s short.

http://www.takepart.com/article/2013/06/29/jade-beall-post-baby-body?cmpid=tp-ptnr-upworthy

See?  I knew this.  I don’t have to be told what a real mother looks like.  I was married to two of them.  I have dated several.  The problem is that, not only do men not always pay attention to the fact that a little less than perfect means the woman has lived, loved, and raised children, but also the women seem to forget this.  I don’t know how often I have seen or talked to women who are struggling to overdo the workouts and exercises and diets in order to “lose” the baby fat or get the wrinkles gone or whatever.

Truth?  They don’t look bad on you, sweetheart.  Especially, if we just stop and realize how they got there.  Society has messed with all our minds and it’s time we stop it.

Smile and be happy that you have lived enough to have a bit of stretch mark, that a couple of pounds is in the wrong place, that you are not that perfect model.  You are you and you is beautiful!

What do you think?

Namaste,

Scott

A Young Woman, an Assumption, and My Life

When I was in high school, I was head-over-heels in love with a young woman.  We dated, became close, and things were going very well.  I was the usual guy in school:  I hadn’t thought long-long term.  Marriage was in my head, but I hadn’t done the details.  I just knew this was “the one”.

My family and I went on a trip for two-three weeks to a State Park (Levi Jackson) in KY in the summer.  We had done this before; I always enjoyed it.  This time, however, I was lonely; I missed my bright-eyed, laughing young blonde and had a difficult time thinking of all the time without her.  I believe I wrote several times; I know I sat and thought about her constantly.

Finally, the time was up and we returned home.  I went to see her very soon for a date.  I drove to her house and knocked.  When I was let in, there was another guy there.  He was there for her, of course.  She and I went out, but I was cold and fairly unforgiving; I was angry and hurt.   I remember saying something to her when I dropped her back off, and she knew that we weren’t going out anymore.

I thought back and “realized” what the problem was:  A relative had been talking to me about “French kissing” and had said that you get pregnant from it.  I was fairly naïve then on the subject of sex, so I took him at his word.  Of course, what he meant was that French kissing can lead to other things that get you pregnant.  Anyway, the next time I had seen her she had been ready to try that and I had refused.  I “knew” that the reason she found someone else was that I had not been willing to do that.

She stayed in my head for a very long time after that, decades.  I, finally, reconnected with her when I was in my 50’s.  We had both been married and divorced.  I, having had my filters turned off from the stroke, asked her about why we broke up.  Her statement:  I had been planning to go into the ministry at the time and she could not see herself as a minister’s wife!

I was wrong!  I had been wrong all these years!

Now, I am wiser; now, I understand better.  This has really helped to teach me to ask questions and seek out answers and not to a-s-s-u-m-e.  It’s not that I would have done anything different in this case.  She didn’t want to be a minister’s wife, but couldn’t tell me that, so she chose a rather poor method of letting me know she was done.  However, I might have been different if I had not gone all those years carrying her memory in my head and reliving the times over and over.

What was important was that, had I been able to ask questions and get refinement, I would have asked the relative and things might have turned out a bit different there! 🙂

You ever make an assumption that changed a large part of your life and then find out you were wrong?

Namaste,

Scott