Day 17 – #StoryadayMay2021 – Tammy L. Breitweiser

THE PROMPT

Here’s a prompt from Edna St. Vincent Millay’s poem Travel:

. . . there isn’t a train I wouldn’t take,
No matter where it’s going.

Create a character who cannot wait to leave their town. Why do they want to leave? What or whom will they leave behind? Will the decision to start anew prove to be a good one?

Robin Stein is the author of this prompt.

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I adore the idea of writing on a train. I even wrote several grants trying to have a writing retreat that way. I am thinking of planning a trip for myself this summer. It doesn’t matter the destination really. It is all about the time on the train to write and watch the people and the scenery go by.

I have a story that takes place over the span of 2 hours that I have been rewriting for years now. It is called, 12:34 because I ALWAYS look at the clock at that time, usually daily.

The prompt is about the idea of escape, a common theme in my stories one way or another. Today’s story seems like it about a person’s escape from a demon, however the real escapee is the demon itself. It is a story about appearing to be something that you are not, or trying not to be.

I am not in love with this story if I am honest. I started it and it felt familiar. I search the Google Drive [if you are following along…do you sense a pattern here? Compost piles/documents are helpful people!] I did find a few lines that took the story in a different direction which I liked better.

The real winner from today was a 100 word essay I write in response to Nicole Breit’s email today. I had to play with the word count about 6 times after the initial draft was composed to get exactly 100 words.

Here is the essay:

PAPER DOLLS

Paper dolls do not have knives in their backs. Coworkers paid attention to my clothes and they made me a paper doll to change my outfits every hour. Another time, Flat Tammy was taken to a writer’s conference. The proof are the posed photos. I made myself paper dolls and used my Bitmoji and scraps from food magazines into collaged outfits I would never wear. Other dolls I made had no face. Today I wear a dress that came from the girls’ section at the store and I am told I look like a doll. If only I was flat.

Day 17 Anchors: demon, ashes, costumes