Each month in class we write a prompt paragraph of 100 words or less. A prompt paragraph is a suggested topic for the writer to take any direction they desire in 100 words or less. It is always interesting to see the many different creative ways these prompts evolve. For the month of December the prompt was “Connection”.
“Bootsy, no! Get down!”
She jumps off the table. I keep catching her chewing the money tree plant, where half-chewed leaves dangle. Later that night she sticks her head all the way into my McDonald’s bag to sniff the fresh golden fries.
“Bad girl! Get your head out of there!”
She pops her head up, staring at me with her innocent green eyes wide open, like she’s done nothing wrong. She’s being a real troublemaker today. At least she obeys and is too cute to get mad at. I wonder where this disobedience comes from, but then I remember … I’m her owner.
Author: John Mistur
Running my hands against the cold metal bars is a relief as I walk down the suffocatingly hot corridors. The ricocheting noises off the cement walls are overwhelming. The tension and trauma are palpable. Every darkened cell is marked with an orange dot: dangerous, beware.
She catches my eye. Crouching in the shadows, trying to make herself look as scarce as possible.
I speak softly, “Hello girl. Aren’t you beautiful?”
She emerges and hugs the walls as she inches towards me. I bow my head, turn my body and extend my hand low—signaling submission. I look out of the corner of my eye. Our orbs lock and we are connected. She has found her forever home.
Author: Michelle Pahl
My husband uses a power chair. When we fly, he transfers to an aisle chair and I prepare his chair for baggage. Putting it back together is slower. I'm working as fast as I can when the flight attendant steps off the plane and says, “Ma'am, can you hurry?”
Eyes squinted, I pin her with my drop dead glare. “Ma'am, I am going as fast as I can.”
She tries to hold my stare but her gaze falters. She turns and slinks back on board the plane. Without her staring at me and making me even more nervous, I make the final connection.
Author: Laura Nicol
I entered our local food Co-op for lunch. As I glanced around to find a vacant table, my eyes met those of a woman wearing a black French beret. She smiled and said, “Would you like to join me?” Without a second thought, I sat down and responded, “Yes,” as we laughed and introduced ourselves.
My connection with Ruby was instantaneous. Her green suede pants and mauve embroidered jacket were a feast for my eyes; and later, I learned my color-detailed cowgirl boots, forty’s corduroy skirt, and hat delighted her textile-designer’s taste. Twenty years of friendship and connections sprouted that day.
Author: Diane Baumgart
My wheelchair bumped and jostled over the connection joints in the passenger boarding bridge as I disembarked at LAX into terminal B5. Wheeling directly to the flight information display screen, I saw my connection to Paris was running two and a half hours late. I needed to call April and let her know. Ever since she moved to France two years ago, she had been my connection in the City of Lights. When I tried calling, the connection was so staticky, she couldn’t hear me. Oh well. There was plenty of time to get a coffee and try again later.
Author: Katie Yusuf
For the last several years, around Thanksgiving I wonder if I have the energy and drive to cook the dinner as I have for the last forty years. At first, I say it’s too exhausting, besides now there’s just us three. But then I remember how our loved ones come alive again as we sit around the table. We laugh as we remember their antics, grow quiet when we look at the place they used to sit.
So, I’ll cook the dinner, if for no other reason than to relive our connections to the past.
Author: Kathy McKnight
When I was a kid, we had a telephone that was attached to the wall. It had a loud ring and we put a long curly cord on it so you could talk and walk across the room at the same time. We had what was called a party line and sometimes you would pick up the phone and other people were talking. If you needed to make an important call, you could ask them to please get off the line. Sometimes the connection with another person wasn’t very good and you had to hang up and try again.
Author:Evelyn Panfili
Tanya’s tears flood her pillow silently as she curls on her side in a room with five family members. Distant explosions are getting closer. She’s afraid and sad. Her father didn’t come home last evening. Would he ever come home?
Thousands of miles away, Ivan soaks his pillow, with tears and anxious sweat. Russians are massacring through his city, and his family hasn’t been able to evacuate yet. Fewer and fewer of his family are even still alive. His mother and baby sister were killed in the marketplace two days ago.
Both, so many, suffer immeasurably in this fractured world.
Author: Wendy Lamson Collier