figment friday – a good one

it’s figment friday around here, and i’m still enjoying writing in response to the daily themes from figment. sharing one theme each week is still scary and uncomfortable, though. posting for this weekly commitment is the first time in 3 1/2 years of blogging that i’ve published bits of fiction. i’ve always stuck to real life, and it took me awhile to get comfortable with even that. offering something that was created in my imagination feels more vulnerable, somehow. but that’s the kind of challenge that i’m determined to meet in this year of sharing more.

the topic of the week on okieOLIO has been the story of my running transformation, so i decided to keep that theme as i wrote each day this week. i’m going to put the prompt for the piece i’m sharing today at the end so that it won’t influence the way you read it. if you’ve ever taken a class on creative writing, there’s a possibility that you’ve done a similar exercise, because it’s not uncommon among writing teachers. i chose it from this week’s themes because i know that my normal writing style works in opposition to these guidelines. here it is:

my dogs lie on the floor and watch me lace up my shoes. can we come with you? their big eyes plead. “not this time,” i say out loud as i reach for my shades. i know that this will be a good run. i can feel it. i don’t want a hard tug at the leash or pee pit stops to break up my pace.

as soon as i crack the front door, i am met with the warm, damp wind of june. it seems too warm for such a wee hour. i turn to the  dogs and warn them, “we have quite a hot day in store for us, guys.” oh, i can’t wait for the cool temps this fall! i think as i close and lock the door. but the heat does not mean a thing. my legs yearn to move and i have steam to blow off. both good signs that i can beat my goal for this run.

the path by the pond is all mine. i take the loop twice, then turn on the main road when three young boys show up on their bikes. the sun starts to rise, the wind picks up, and i turn it up a notch as a strong song plays in my ears. my feet move as if part of a wheel that rolls by it’s own force—i am just on a ride. i feel at ease as i breathe in time with my steps and the beat of the tune, and soon my mind is lost in thought.

i’m shocked when i see that i’ve made it back to my house, and i check the app on my phone to make sure i ran as far as i planned. cheered by what i see, i walk in the door and tell the ones who wait for me each day, “yeah, it was a good one.”

PROMPT: This is a prompt I love to use when I first meet a new class. I tell them to take out their pens and write me a piece–the theme is up to them. It need not be long. But it needs to be a real scene. And the sole rule that frames what they write is this: You may not use a word with more than one syllable. It sounds hard, but “syllable” is the lone word used here that has more than one.

Today’s theme comes from Nathan Englander, whose new collection of short stories, What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank, came out this week to raves.