The name of the game is "Make It Up Monday," and the rules are as follows:
Every Monday, I am going to post a picture that I have found somewhere on the interwebs.
Take a look at the picture - I mean really look at it - and write down in the comment form a response to it.
It doesn't have to be super long or anything (but it can be as long as you want), just a few words even will do.
I will post information about the picture, but it is up to you whether you use it or not. If you want to completely disregard the info I provide and come up with something completely original, then go for it!
For example, if a person is in the photo, what is he or she thinking?
What was going on directly before the picture was taken?
What's going to happen after?
Or, if you like captions, write a caption for the picture.
Easy as pie.
My only request is that you keep it marginally clean. Nothing that is purposefully offensive or rude, s'il vous plait! I believe that every word in the English language has a place for use (including the 4-letter ones), but please don't use them gratuitously. Just in general be classy about whatever you write.
All games have winners, right? Well, this one is no different. I and a small team of super qualified judges (aka my awesome family) will look at all the submissions and pick out our favorite. Depending on how many people enter, we will pick between 1 and 10 entries, and on Friday at approximately 5pm I will post the winner(s) with his/her/their submission(s) and a link to his/her/their blog(s). Free publicity! Wooo!!!
Always remember, have fun with your writing. Don't force it and just enjoy getting your thoughts out on paper (er... or computer screen?).
I will post my response in the comments section along with you guys, but it won't be added onto the list of submissions.
Here we go!
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| Go check out the Picasa album of Steve Baragona, the photog HERE! He's quite good, eh? |
Peace.
Stef.
P.S. I'm opening the floor for anyone who might have some ideas on future Make It Up Monday posts. Should I stick with the picture prompt? Should I expand that idea to something bigger and more involved? Or should I scrap the idea altogether and do something else? I'd love to hear your thoughts. Thanks in advance!
Comments
Now, as to today's MIUM photo — I will let the nice little photo to percolate for a while.
“I think he’s a thousand years old,” she replied. “He’s as old as the earth.” There was something disturbingly cosmic in her tone.
“Sixty?” I tried not to let the concern squeak out in my voice. But it did.
“I know this is a lot for you. I know it’s more than you bargained for. But the spirituality of this place will melt our souls together in a bond stronger than the moon and the earth.”
More than I bargained for? Pretty much. Twenty seven hundred miles from home with my Internet girlfriend that I just met and just happens to possess a cultish insanity. And I’m stuck here in some Tibetan Deliverance. I half expect this shaman dude to drop his pipe of I don’t even wanna know and break into Dueling Dramyins.
“No honey.” I had taken a lot of time to gather my thoughts, but I still had no idea what I was going to say. “It’s just so much energy here. It’s hard to wrap my head around.” Energy? What the hell am I talking about? That’s when he gave me the pipe. He just handed it to me.
“She’s not what she seems to be,“ he said with the most practiced English and complete annunciation I had ever heard, as he pushed his smoking cigar stick thing into my palm.”
If you mean she’s not crazy, I beg to differ. And then, a long inhale. What the… I feel kinda.
Thud!
“Get his shoes off. We don’t have much time.”
Your own uncle Liu grows the best tobacco you can get, how about learning how he grows it, and what he uses to fertilize the earth with! Afterward, we can practice more gung-fu in the back yard.
He has secrets you don't know
Laughing, he won't tell.
Most of all, I remember his voice. He spoke rarely, and when he did speak it was to chide me for misbehavior. I feared his voice even more than I feared the long, thin switch I learned to associate it with. His voice was sharp and stern, and it cut through the air like lightning.
My mother told me stories of a young soldier in love with the woman who would become her mother, or of a mischievous youth not unlike myself. But to attach these stories to the old, stoic man in the corner of the room was impossible for me. I knew my grandfather only as he was now; to imagine any softness or joy in him was unthinkable.
I was perhaps five or six on the day my grandfather called me to him. I searched my mind for reasons he might have to punish me as I approached him, too afraid to match his gaze.
“Today,” he announced, “you will accompany your grandfather on a walk.”
I hesitated as he stood. My grandfather moved from his chair so rarely that I thought him little more than an extension of the shadows. Now, seeing him stand with his baggy clothes draped over his thin frame, I could see how frail the man I feared truly was.
My grandfather took my hand, and I could feel his plump veins and spindly bones. In the other hand he held that ever-present pipe, unlit and waiting patiently for its master’s orders.
Saying nothing as he led me outside, my grandfather took me to a building on the edge of our small town. Slowly lowering his creaking form onto the curb, he beckoned me to do the same, never making eye contact with me but always staring forward. Across from us a square formation of stones outlined where a foundation had once been.
“This is where I grew up,” my grandfather said slowly as he dug into his pocket. “It burned down a few years ago.”
Out of his pocket my grandfather produced a pack of matches. He struck one and watched it burst into flames before lighting his pipe. After taking a thoughtful drag, my grandfather’s hand dove into his pocket again, this time pulling out a small bundle of sticks I had never seen before. He slowly pulled one from its companions and fiddled carefully with the stiff, white string attached to it.
“Watch,” he said.
He struck another match and touched the flame to the string. The string spluttered alight, the fire slowly creeping up its length to the small bundle wrapped around the stick’s head.
The flame touched the bundle and--woosh!--the bundle shot up into the sky and exploded in a mess of lights.
I squealed. I had seen firecrackers during New Years but in my short life I had yet to see something as wondrous as a tiny rocket! I looked excitedly at my grandfather, hoping that he would send up another.
My grandfather carefully withdrew another from the bundle, and again he struck a match and lit it. But this time he handed it to me.
I panicked, momentarily, fearing the rocket would harm me, but I listened to my grandfather’s instructions and howled with excitement when I felt it lift off and watched it fly up into the sky! I chased after its trail and jumped and called out as I watched sparks fall. I turned, grinning from ear to ear, and caught the look on my grandfather’s face.
He was crouched and leaning against the wall behind him, his spider fingers curled around his pipe, his dark eyes fixed on me, smiling. His teeth were stained from the smoke and the wear of ages, the lines in his cheeks and under his eyes more defined from the distortion of his features. But never had I seen my grandfather look more youthful than he did right then.
'I'm the man.'
'You're the man?'
'I am the man!'