#story

[rudamaruda520]

me as a writer

[foldingfittedsheets]

Just helped a really lovely woman in her eighties who told me she’d been married for fifty nine years. I made an appropriate sound of awe only for her to scoff.

“It’s too long. Fifty nine years is too long to be married to someone. He’s just always there. Since I was twenty. You guys nowadays get to wait but we had to get married right away back then.”

“Before we retired I had some damn time to myself but now he’s just there. Watching golf.”

She shook her head, “We always said we wouldn’t turn into our parents but there he is, watching golf.” After another sigh she repeated, “It’s just too long.”

Placing bets on her husband mysteriously disappearing in the next year.

[woshibai]

My instagram:instagram.com/woshibaii

爬山 Hiking

Translation: Guandi Wu

Proofreading: Amir Hampel

[askoverkill]

You should talk to Bonnie, Lupis is probably with them and if not you can quickly tell them about the party tonight

transcript below:

(You find Bonnie with the local kids, without Lupus.) (Welp, that's the only place outside the Labyrinth you've seen them be at.)

(Hopefully other you has it covered.)

(…No, he's right.) (Calling him that IS weirder.)

(Next time you two talk, you'll need to think up nicknames.)

Hey Frin! I need your help!

Oh, yeah?

Yeah!!! Does the world look better with or without the new shade?

You mean, the world ending?

Yeah, those ones!

I think it makes things prettier.

It's kind of... cool...

I think it's creepy and I don't like it. What do you think?

...Mhm, It's a little too ominous for my liking.

SEE! Frin's smart and he agreed with me.

That proves nothing, Bonnie.

(...That shade used to make you think of blood...)

(But now all you can think about is checkers.) (This is arguably worse.)

[nadinescholtes]

Ruin: While I was away I created a few animatronics. Two have passed. But here, this is my son Eclipse!

Ruin‘s Monty: That’s an ugly ass kid!

Clips: I’m not a kid and I’m not your son.

Ruin‘s Monty: He has temper, I like it. You can call me Papa!

Clips: What?!

Ruin: We have grandchildren as well!

Clips: They are not-

Ruin‘s Monty: Lead the way!

[write-on-world]

[ibajo256]

[foldingfittedsheets]

I went on an adventure today to return a pillow to IKEA with my coworker @astrid696.

We were having a nice day and got stuck in traffic coming home. On the way her phone rang and she was driving so she declined the call with a sigh. “I feel so bad for him,” she said.

“You know that number?”

She did. It turns out her phone number had previously belonged to a woman named Serena. The man calling was her dad. He had Alzheimer’s and didn’t remember his daughter was dead, so he just called the number he knew was hers.

I was stricken to hear this. “Do you talk to him?”

“Yeah. Sometimes he thinks I’m her and we talk. I have a notebook with facts I’ve learned about her so I can connect with him better. Sometimes he knows I’m not her and I say I’m her friend.”

I struggled with the beauty and humanity of this for a moment. “What’s his name?”

“I don’t know; I just call him Dad.”

We sat in silence and I was overwhelmed with feelings. That she was so kind and thoughtful about this random connection. A man who called and spoke to her with love for the daughter he missed.

"One time," she added, "he called me just after I had a difficult day with my mom. I knew Serena and her mom had a rocky relationship so I talked to him about my frustrations with my own mother and he gave the following advice: ‘Everyone fails sometimes, even parents; what's important is to communicate with our loved ones, even when it's difficult.’

“I have never forgotten that advice and it healed a portion of my heart."

[writersbloxx]

Body Language

When someone is...

Sad

Face/Body:

Avoidant/reduced eye contact

Drooping eyelids

Downcast eyes

Frowning

Raised inner ends of eyebrows

Dropped or furrowed eyebrows

Quivering lip/biting lip

Wrinkled nose

Voice:

Soft pitch

Low lone

Pauses/hesitant speech

Quiet/breathy

Slow speech

Voice cracks/breaking voice

Gestures/Posture:

Slouching/lowered head

Rigid/tense posture

Half formed/slow movement

Fidgeting or clasped hands

Sniffing or heavy swallows

Self soothing gestures (running hands over the arms, hand over heart, holding face in palms, etc)

[angstandhappiness]

LMAO KEEP DOING IT DUDE But seriously though, if it works then it works

sickens me to my stomach. how dare this guy get to live my dream.

[freddieardley]

Winter beaches, The Outer Hebrides.

Photographed by Freddie Ardley

[thechekhov]

I've had this little idea in my head for a while now, so I decided to sit down and plot it out.

Disclaimer: This isn't meant to be some sort of One-Worksheet-Fits-All situation. This is meant to be a visual representation of some type of story planning you could be doing in order to develop a plot!

Lay down groundwork! (Backstory integral to the beginning of your story.) Build hinges. (Events that hinge on other events and fall down like dominoes) Suspend structures. (Withhold just enough information to make the reader curious, and keep them guessing.)

And hey, is this helps... maybe sit down and write a story! :)

[askoverkill]

Kids like bread, right? Maybe you could find something at the boulangerie.

transcript below:

Hey. Wanna buy something?

(Buying Bonnie something would be a good idea!) (...If you had the money for it.)

(You show off your single coin anyway.)

With one of those, you can get... A fourth of a pastry.

But, hey, aren't you one of the saviors? Traveling with little Mirabelle?

Here, you can have one on the house. How's a croissant sound-?

...Incredible. I've never seen anyone give such a look of disdain when offered a croissant.

(You don't want to think about it.)

A pain au chocolat, then. Only monsters don't like pain au chocolat.

(That's true!!!) (You got a PAIN AU CHOCOLAT!)

(Yippie!) (You can't help but admire it's buttery, chocolaty smell, it's so wonderful, so tasty…)

(You're pretty hungry! You can't resist the temptation any longer!!!)

(You try to contain yourself to a small, dainty bite, but...) (No! It's too good! You stuff your face and the pastry is defeated whole!)

...

Not gonna lie. Seeing a tiny one like you eat this like a rabid beast… That was disturbing, but also weirdly satisfying.

(Heehee. It's what you do best!)

(...)

(...WAIT.)

(YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO GIVE THAT TO BONNIE.)

[fujifingerz]

Her name was Nao and she was feeling sea sick but also really sad because she was headed back to college which was far away from her home...My japanese isn't very good...

I sat with her for a while and ended up asking a staff member for help. It was really bad weather that day, the sea was choppy so that was making her sea sickness worse...It was raining heavily with strong winds, and the staff member suggested she went out on the deck of the boat for some fresh air but it was TERRIBLE weather out there so I went with her. she ended up feeling better! and we waved goodbye once we got to our destination! Nao, I hope you're doing alright out there!

[lizardho]

When I came out, I was SO scared I was gonna get disowned. I wrote a letter to my parents, sent it to their emails, put a physical copy on the counter, and left the house for a few hours to give them time. In that time I tried coffee for the first time, which was a dreadful idea, and got all jittery. I kept waiting for a text or something but nothing happened.

After a few hours, I didn’t hear back from them so I went home. My parents were home and had stacked a bunch of groceries on top of the letter without opening it. They said “hi” and I said “hi” and went down stairs to the basement. I held my dog and panicked about what to do. My sister, who knew that I had written them a letter of great importance, told me they hadn’t read it yet. She also told me she could ask them to do so. I consented to this and stayed in the basement. A few minutes later my dad knocked on the door and poked his soft smooth little nerd head in and said “hey buddy” and I started crying so hard I almost vomited. He came over and gave me a BIG hug and said that it was gonna be OK, he was OK with this, he knew it must have been hard but he was here for me. He told me he and my mom had already talked years before they had me about how if they had to pick between their faith and their child they’d pick their child. It was a very sweet moment. I came out to my mom later that evening and we were both bawling the whole time.

The day after I came out to my parents, I came out to my brother @inbabylontheywept at a Mexican restaurant and he took it like a champ. That evening my mom took me for a walk and looked almost angry - she said she wanted to make sure that I didn’t use being a woman as an excuse to not go to grad school. I told her I wouldn’t and she instantly looked relieved and happier.

My dad, on the other hand, seemed to struggle with it. He kept asking me if I had a boyfriend, and I told him I did not. He kept asking me if I wanted to go clothes shopping with him and I did not. He kept asking me if I would let him go to some of my shows, and I had NO idea what he was talking about.

Finally, 6 months after coming out, of awkward misgendering and questions that didn’t make sense from my dad, he excitedly pokes his soft smooth little nerd head into my bedroom again and says “I found a movie about Your People.” My people. I was absolutely bewildered, but he was so excited and I knew he had been trying SO hard so I watched it with him. It was The Birdcage, and it was amazing. It also was revelatory in that I finally realized why my initially-supportive father seemed to be having such a hard time with my pronouns and stuff - he didn’t know what the difference between trans and doing drag was. After the movie he again asked if I would invite him to one of my shows, and I said, “Hey dad, you know how about half the world is women?” And he said “yeah,” and I said “Well, see, I’m on that half now. I’m not doing drag.” And it was like a switch flipped in his brain. He was like “omg that’s so easy? I was so confused about what to call you when?”

Anyway, my parents are charming and my family has been so kind and patient with me, I like sharing the stories of my little wins with them.