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Snooty defined “‘Brook’ sounds too snooty, use ‘creek.’ You’re always putting on airs. Stop trying to be somebody you’re not, use ‘creek.’” said Mr. Barber. Shit, he was mean. I didn’t want him looking at my paper, not after what I’d just heard him do to Cynthia’s. He was right, of course, she was always
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Today, I want… Summer is a conundrum. I look forward to summer all year long, to be out of school and away from the stench of curriculum. I want to be away from pointing and clicking at things so trite and mindless that it makes me want to lose what little relationship with a creator
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I looked at the board. “MEDICATE.” My letters covered all but the “C.” Upwords, the word game of all word games, and I scored sixteen points plus a fifty point bonus score. “Eat that!” Nick looked at me with fire in his eyes. Not even his Mama, Express of the Galaxy, Sworn Sorceress of All
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Ode to a Teacher Hammat. John Charles Hammat. Unconventional teacher of the universe died last month. Taught for four years, my four years, enough to get one class through, and quit to clean houses and live however he chose. He’d had enough of public schools. He taught Drama and English, but I only had him
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“Didactic,” something that teaches a lesson. I’ve said that “didactic,” was my favorite word for years. and there are people who will verify this. I’ve been a teacher forever, I can only deny so many things. I just looked up a bunch of synonyms for it in Thesaurus.com… Academic, pedantic, homelitic, moralizing, pedagogic, schoolmasterist, why
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Right this very minute I am most grateful for my freedom. It makes me glad I signed up to be a teacher. Summer makes the stress of the stupidity I put up with for seven and a half months a year worth it. I schedule important events on my summer calendar. If it doesn’t get
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Avenue of the Olive Trees, Henri Matisse “The shadows are ripe,” she said, and one floated across her face. The clouds were out, tap dancing back and forth between the leaves and branches and the sun. True. They were dark and deep big green shadows on the ground from the ancient limbs, Giant, strong, and
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The writing prompt was something about standing in line at Walmart when your eyes saw your sibling/twin’s face for the first time. That’s what my memory was left with. I know the prompt was about a line and a long lost sibling. I decided to go with the twin theme. I always go with twin
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Carolina on Their Minds
Mary rolled the joint with a dollar bill and impressed the four others in the room as usual. Every Tuesday for the last two years the “Women of Presence” as they had labeled themselves, met in Lynn’s basement room and got high after work. Mary passed the joint to Sallie, who lit it herself. “I Read more
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Healing Presence
My seven a.m. writing group has been a healing presence for me. I’ve expressed more of myself to that group of people in fact and fiction than I ever have to any relative, friend, or therapist. Because of them, I’ve grown as a writer and a human. The journey continues to be full. I learn Read more
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Three or Four Cabinets
The ladies of the family have a disease. We are besotted with the collecting of pretty vintage dishes. Cheap dime store ceramics, thrift store cut crystal, hand me down depression glass and more fill not one but three china cabinets in my little old lady school teacher’s home. Actually, there are four if you count Read more
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Virgie’s Soup
My grandmother, Virgie made soup from whatever she had in the pantry, canned tomatoes, corn, green beans, potatoes, and carrots. She cooked it down then thickened it up. It was sour with a hint of all the vegetables working in tandem. Soup days at Virgies’s were reserved for project days. We could work straight through, Read more
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Quiescence n. Calm, serene atmosphere
“My mind is like somebody emptied the silverware drawer on a trampoline and the boys are jumping on it,” Ruth told Janice while she scrubbed the bathroom floor. Janice was in the bathtub cleaning the walls and around the window. So much mildew, it flourished in the hot soapy steam of the shower. “I don’t Read more
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The Ugly Step Sister
Ella’s job was to clean the ashes, cook, and sew. Mine was to embroidery and be on the lookout for a husband. I wasn’t supposed to go near the hens and chickens, but I was supposed to sit a horse and ride with the wind in my hair. I couldn’t even climb upon the beast. Read more
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Snooty defined “‘Brook’ sounds too snooty, use ‘creek.’ You’re always putting on airs. Stop trying to be somebody you’re not, use ‘creek.’” said Mr. Barber. Shit, he was mean. I didn’t want him looking at my paper, not after what I’d just heard him do to Cynthia’s. He was right, of course, she was always
-
Today, I want… Summer is a conundrum. I look forward to summer all year long, to be out of school and away from the stench of curriculum. I want to be away from pointing and clicking at things so trite and mindless that it makes me want to lose what little relationship with a creator
-
I looked at the board. “MEDICATE.” My letters covered all but the “C.” Upwords, the word game of all word games, and I scored sixteen points plus a fifty point bonus score. “Eat that!” Nick looked at me with fire in his eyes. Not even his Mama, Express of the Galaxy, Sworn Sorceress of All
-
Ode to a Teacher Hammat. John Charles Hammat. Unconventional teacher of the universe died last month. Taught for four years, my four years, enough to get one class through, and quit to clean houses and live however he chose. He’d had enough of public schools. He taught Drama and English, but I only had him
-
“Didactic,” something that teaches a lesson. I’ve said that “didactic,” was my favorite word for years. and there are people who will verify this. I’ve been a teacher forever, I can only deny so many things. I just looked up a bunch of synonyms for it in Thesaurus.com… Academic, pedantic, homelitic, moralizing, pedagogic, schoolmasterist, why
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Right this very minute I am most grateful for my freedom. It makes me glad I signed up to be a teacher. Summer makes the stress of the stupidity I put up with for seven and a half months a year worth it. I schedule important events on my summer calendar. If it doesn’t get
-
Avenue of the Olive Trees, Henri Matisse “The shadows are ripe,” she said, and one floated across her face. The clouds were out, tap dancing back and forth between the leaves and branches and the sun. True. They were dark and deep big green shadows on the ground from the ancient limbs, Giant, strong, and
-
The writing prompt was something about standing in line at Walmart when your eyes saw your sibling/twin’s face for the first time. That’s what my memory was left with. I know the prompt was about a line and a long lost sibling. I decided to go with the twin theme. I always go with twin
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Cindora
“What was wrong with the last gentleman caller? He was taller than you and wore a suit of the finest cut. He didn;t even grease his hair like you said you hated.” Cindora’s father, Mr. Weston poured another bourbon in disgust and slumped in his chair. His daughter made him want to pull hanks of…
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The Haunted School
One morning my classroom was unlocked and its door was open, the doorstop jammed tight to hold it open. Everyone else’s in the Penthouse, that’s what we called the third floor of West Side Middle School, was propped open too. It was weird because I always arrived an hour earlier than everyone else and their…
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Crop Circles
The aliens are here. How do you know? I saw the crop circles. Don’t be stupid. There are no such thing as crop circles. Yes there are. It’s where their mothership lands and makes a funky pattern on the ground. See? No. Jeb went out last night with his tractor and did that so the…
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Ask, I Dare you
Iwish thatI had patience but I know better than to ask for itto help me get just that.Patience has to come from trials and not something that is freely given.It is earned, learned, made, muddled, and messed up.Never ask God for patience. He’ll test you instead.
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Inertia
Whatever you practice you get better at. You have to run four miles a day to run four miles a day. If you want to make puff pastry, you have to make puff pastry. It’s not something you just get up one morning and do. It takes time and error. It’s simple, but complicated. You…
Devonne Brown 