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Chexala's Drabbles
Dribbles and Drabbles
Hi! Welcome to my drabble thread. I've been doing drabbles for a while now with visual art, but I decided that I should do them for writing as well. So here is my drabble thread. Yay? My main reason for wanting to do drabbles is so that I can get in the habit of writing on a regular basis. My goal is to write at least one drabble per day, if not more, as a sort of opening warmup for a writing session. So, I wont be working with any specific characters or worlds of mine, and I don't think I'll be getting around to any fanfiction. If I do, I will lable it as such. I'd love to hear people's feedback if they have any. I'm trying to flesh out my style and get my mechanics under control, so any kind of commentary or critique is very welcome. Updates: Jan. 7: modified drabble list, posted Light June 26: posted Love June 14: opened thread, posted Introduction |
The Drabble List
Well, I had a drabble list with 150 themes, and I finally accepted that it was just too much. I decided from now on to work with much shorter lists with tighter overall themes to them. So without further ado, the new list:
Finished Lists None net. |
Introduction
I wonder how best to introduce myself. Who am I as opposed to you? Or in comparison. I am of a certain sex, age and status which you may not be. I don't know that those facts are the important ones however. Suffice it to say that I'm given to pondering and I like to drink tea. I say I'm given to pondering, but I don not know that it is entirely accurate to make that claim. I am shy, so I am inclined to live within my head rather than in the world. I like to think, to let my mind wander. Sometimes my mind wanders down dark, destructive paths; it takes a great force of will to pull myself away from them. Other times, my mind wanders down more cheerful, random pathways and I let it stroll where it will. On the occasions when my mind hits on something interesting, I'll sit and niggle at it, explore it, flesh it out. That is when I'm given to pondering. I say that I like to drink tea. This is entirely accurate. Even now, I have a steaming pot of a mysterious Japanese tea sitting beside me. I found the tea while exploring the tea cupboard; it was hidden away in a box of green tea with brown rice. I suppose that could be it's flavor; the package was green, which often signifies green tea, but the labeling was all in Japanese script, so I may never know the true flavor. I like it anyway. Light, and creamy as if I had poured in several cups of half and half, which I didn't. I drink my tea straight. Ponderous thoughts and mysterious tea. How else do I describe myself? There are hundreds of useless words I could combine and recombine into hundreds of useless forms in an attempt to describe myself. It would be something I would do. If I spent long enough at it, I might be able to reach an accurate and true written exhibition of myself. It might or might not be understandable. I think the only way I can truly describe myself is through color. If you don't mind sticking around for a while, I could go get my paints, paint something for you. You could even take it with you when you go, if you like. Because you will go, eventually, wont you. They always do. I think about that sometimes. And I haven't been able to figure it out--are they leaving, or am I sending them away? |
Love
"I don't know where to begin Kaleb." "Beginning at the beginning is often a good idea." Ashley glanced down, glanced back at Kaleb, shook her head, glanced away again. "Well," she said, still not looking at Kaleb, "I've decided that I'm not going to follow the patterns, fall into the traps." "What patterns and traps?" Kaleb asked. "Oh, you know, the 'I love you but I can't tell you' pattern," she said, taking a deep breath before continuing. "The trap of unrequited, unhealthy love." She looked up again, looked Kaleb in the eyes. Kaleb said nothing. Waited. Ashley straightened herself up out of her slouch, holding Kaleb's eyes with her own and said "Kaleb, I love you." "Oh," he said. "Oh Ashley, I'm so--" but she interrupted him. "No Kaleb, wait. I'm not done. I don't expect any reply to that. I know that you and--you and Rachel are happy together, and I don't want to fuss with that." She gulped through her tightening throat and pressed on. "But you asked me to start at the beginning, so that's what I'm doing. I love you, and I know it's never going to happen that way with us. I've been trying to get over you for a while now, for everyone's sake, and I've realized that, well, as long as you're around, it's not going to work. So I'm going away for a while." Kaleb stared at her in dumbfounded silence for a moment, then began to speak all in a rush, in fragments. "Oh God, Ashley, how long have you--where are you--for how long--when are you leaving? Will I be able to get a hold of you--I--oh God, Ashley--" Ashley sighed and sank back in her chair, away from Kaleb who was now now perched tensely on the edge of his. "For at least a year Kaleb. And no, you can't get a hold of me while I'm gone, that's the whole point. I can't--you can't be a part of my life until I'm over you. I'm leaving tomorrow." "Tomorrow? But where are you going? Ashley, why?" He was visibly struggling to grasp this sudden change of events. "Oh Kaleb, you don't listen. I can't love a man who doesn't listen, it isn't good for me. I'm leaving Kaleb, and you cannot follow." "But Ashley," he cried, "I love you too!" They stared at each other for a moment, then Ashley took her head in her hands with a moan. "Oh God, no Kaleb no. Oh that's just too rich." She laughed a bitter bark of a laugh. "Well, that's going to make everything much harder. I may have to be gone even longer." "Wait, you're still leaving?" "Yes! God, but you never listen! Your loving me, whatever that means, doesn't change anything. We're incompatible, surely you must know that?" She stood and he rose after her. "But Ashley, for so long I've hoped, I've wondered. Rachel and I aren't happy, forget her. Let's just you and me go away together--" He tried to take her in his arms but she shoved him away with a noise of disgust. "When you're willing to drop Rachel just like that, no thanks. 'For so long' he says. And how long has that been Kaleb?" "For a month, I've--" "Ha! A month? Kaleb if you had told me you loved me a month ago you loved me, I'd've taken you in a heartbeat. It's too late now." "Ashley--" He reached for her again but she stepped away from him. "I need to forget you Kaleb, you're no good for me. I've made my decision, and I stand by it. Goodbye Kaleb." He stood staring at her, unable to grasp what she was telling him. She had always been there, so devotedly, whenever he needed her, how could she be leaving him? She went to the front door and opened it, saying again "Goodbye Kaleb." ~~~ After she'd forced him from her house, she'd cried herself to sleep. In the morning, weary but determined, she'd resolutely given her keys to the house sitter and taken a taxi to the airport. She turned off her cell phone. With each security check she passed though, she felt her pleasure growing. She boarded her plane and there she was, in a first-class window seat on her way to Spain and she was leaving him. She was leaving him. So much for love. As the plane took off, she looked down at the city falling away below her and whispered, one last time, "Goodbye Kaleb." ((Huh, writing that was fun. I haven't written anything that melodramatic is a while. Yay for melodrama?)) |
Wow. I really like your works. Quite good, quite good.
Won't it be exciting to see number 79 xD |
Thanks! Glad to know someone likes 'em!
Haha, yeah, 79 should be quite fun. ^__^ |
Light
The moon was full and shining very brightly so that only the brightest stars could be seen. A few lonely clouds, fluffy like popcorn, drifted south. Everywhere the dew on the grass and pavement glistened as she walked past. In her room she had felt stifled and agitated, but out in the night she felt invigorated and calm, Striding swiftly, she left the noise and busy lights of the dorm behind her, heading towards the dark corners of campus. The streetlights that covered the grounds were all lit as usual, and the library, closed for hours, was ablaze with light. It seemed wasteful, keeping empty buildings lit all night that way, but she supposed the school has it's reasons. She walked along the curving sidewalks of the central plaza, passing by the lawns she usually played on. The farther from the dorms she went, the darker campus became, until she found the patch of lawn she was looking for. By some fluke, the nearest streetlights had burnt out, and the rest were all blocked by tall bushes and shrubs. Here she stopped and stood to admire the moon unmolested by artificial lights. It was such a simple thing, really, the moon. Round, white, pockmarked, and reflective. It passed from full light to full shadow with precise regularity each month. For all that it waxed and waned, the subject of much admiration, derision, and poetry, it never really changed at all. Yet despite it's simplicity, it's ordinariness, it was so compelling, alluring, enigmatic. She had never understood why this was, but it had always been so. The moon waxed, regular as clockwork, and she, regular as clockwork, came out to see it. She pulled a plastic blue bottle out of her pocket, quirking a smile at the label, which read "Bazillion Bubbles!" Unscrewing the lid, she fished out the bubble wand which she dried on the hem of her skirt. Dipping it back into the soap with precision, she began to blow bubbles. Long streams of them burst forth from her steady, well-practiced breath, and with each breath, more and more collected in the still air. Each reflected the moonlight as is drifted first upwards then down on a parabolic path of momentum. Some popped on impact with the grass, but some caught in the dew and stayed, quaking and wiggling, glittering like nobodies business, there on the lawn in the moonlight. A breeze sprang up, whipping the airborne bubbles up in a small tornado of soap and sparkles. Like a symphony director, the wind blew the bubbles like a troupe of dancers first one way, then another,sweeping them up, driving them down, scattering them and collecting them again. She kept blowing bubbles, replacing those that popped, sending them out into the wind, savoring their antics, savoring the long breaths she used to create them. Her companions in the dorms set much store by mind altering drugs, and meditation as means of relaxation; she preferred the habit of blowing bubbles, which to her seemed more delightful and pure. The grass before her was soon coated in bubbles, and she shifted here and there to broaden the shimmering blanket. She saw a few bubbles caught on the bushes, and she moved to add more, and soon the whole place was sparkling and glistening like a vision of fairyland. She imagined that the moon and stars rejoiced to see themselves so dazzlingly reflected back to them. Dipping the wand, she realized that she had used more than an inch of the bottle contents, and decided it was probably time to go in. Trailing bubbles as she went, she meandered back towards the lights of civilization, with which we drown out the quiet light of the stars. ((Dear me but it has been a long time since I last wrote.)) |
Dark
It's amazing the difference a little light can make. Growing up with electricity and an overabundance of artificial light, we tend to find candles quaint and lovely, but essentially useless. In a dark room, under a dark moon, a candle doesn't seem so useless anymore. One candle can change everything. We like to say that we are not afraid of the dark, foolish creatures that we are. What do we know of darkness? We like to reminisce about the periods of our childhood when we needed our parents to check the closet or under the bed, and leave a night-light on when they left. We like to tell ourselves that we grew out of it. We're adults now. If, when walking down a low-lit street at night, we find ourselves a bit nervous, we tell ourselves that it's not the dark we're afraid of, it's what's in the dark. We forget that we've never experienced true darkness. Always, always, there is some light from somewhere. If not the moon, then stars. If not a bulb, then a candle. A match. A flame. There is always light. We have never known darkness, and we think that we are not afraid of the dark. I am in Darkness. True, pure, pitch black no matter where I turn. I kept my eyes own in the beginning, in the vain hope of seeing something, but it brought such despair that I have long since closed them. It is easier that way. I speak of the beginning, but there is no time in Darkness. Anything that happens is just one of many connected or unrelated events that brings sensation and leaves again. There are no days, years, units. No shadows, no candle marks, no sundials. I can count numbers, but that is all they are; they do not make time. There is no time. I have been cut out, severed from the flow. I am in Darkness. |
Wow, those are amazing. Keep on writing those, please!
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