Today at RDP, sgeoil has asked us to share a story,
poem, photo, painting, essay, etc., focusing
on the word ‘frisky’. Here’s my take.
Tag: Garden
RDP Saturday: fuchsia
Today at RDP, Punam has asked us to share a story,
poem, photo, painting, essay, etc., focusing
on the word ‘fuchsia’. Here’s my take.
RDP Sunday: valley
Today at RDP, drkottaway asks us to share a
story, poem, photo, painting, essay, etc.,
centered on the word ‘valley’. Here’s my take.
Nature’s Chain
Written for Crispina’s Crimson’s
Creative Challenge #049. I chose pic #4
Here’s where the image took me.
Matins
Written for Shweta’s Six Word Story Prompt #131.
Graphic by Kevin @ The Beginning At Last/No Theme
Thursday. The prompt word is ‘solitude’. This is my story.
The Sentinel
Written for The Unicorn Challenge where
we are urged to get creative in 250 words or less.
The photo below is our inspiration; this is my story.
Crop Invaders: A Haibun
Written for Weekly Prompts Weekend Challenge and
Weekly Prompts Wednesday Challenge where the
required words are “wrong” and “hoarding”. This is my haibun.
The exact year escapes me but it was a long time ago, to be sure. It was the summer we returned from vacation to find our tomatoes had ripened into gorgeous red orbs ready for eating. I could practically smell that grassy-green, spicy-sweet summery aroma. But something seemed wrong, off somehow. I felt like I was not alone in my garden, like I was being watched. Taking a closer look, I discovered disturbingly large caterpillars feasting on our lovely harvest. The bloated green creatures blended in so well with the underside of the leaves, it took a few seconds to register why our crop was full of gaping holes. Probing, boring, ravaging, gorging, hoarding. No tomato was salvaged that summer. Not one. That was the year I stopped planting tomatoes.
garden interlopers
devastation
signaling summer’s end
NAR©2024
This is “End of Summer” featuring Katie Melua and L.U.C. from The Peasants soundtrack
All text, graphics and videos are copyright for The Sicilian Storyteller, The Elephant’s Trunk and The Rhythm Section and are not to be used without permission. NAR©2017-present.
Perfect Day For Planting
Written for Six Sentence Story where we are asked
to be creative in no more than six sentences
using the word “light”. This is my story.
We got a late start with spring cleaning in our yard, especially along the side of the house where our attached garage is located; even though the gardeners had cleared a lot of old shrubbery away for some new plants and bushes, it was just not meant to be after we were derailed by the sudden death of my husband’s twin brother on April 2 and me being sidelined since the first week of May by a major sinus infection (the heavy-duty antibiotics have left me “out of commission” and able to eat only extremely light meals or, at times, nothing at all).
In mid-May, we put in a couple of small white azaleas, relocated a baby rhododendron which wasn’t doing well in the far back corner of the yard and planted a bit of Blue Bugle and Lilies of the Valley for light ground cover (along the side of the house, not visible in this pic), but that’s as far as our broken spirits and depleted bodies would allow us go.
When Colette is here with us (Tuesdays, Thursdays and the occasional Saturday or Sunday) and the weather is good, she wants to be outside; hell, even if the weather isn’t good, she wants to be outside – a phenomenon about most children that escapes me as they (well, she definitely) seem to be impervious to heat or cold or rain or snow or wind – all the elements, times when Bill and I would prefer being inside nestled in our recliners with a lightweight blanket.
Speaking of nestled, we discovered that sparrows had made their nest in an old watering can in the corner of Colette’s playhouse; the mama and papa birds are very resourceful, building the new home in a location almost invisible to us, one which I discovered quite by accident when I heard a faint chirping noise coming from the playhouse and …. with my trusty flashlight in hand …. I went to take a peek but was immediately dive-bombed by a wildly protective kamikaze sparrow which, when it sped just inches by my head, had me believing it was a small bat …. terrifying!
Tuesday the temps soared to a scorching 86ºF – a leap from the mild low-70s of just the day before – so it was, according to Colette, the “perfect day for planting!” …. a concept I did not agree with thinking it was too hot and we would be in direct blazing sunlight for the entire time …. but I did not object (mainly because the child could not be dissuaded and it was far less taxing than yet another round of the Disney edition of Monopoly); armed with our faithful spades, Bill with his macho shovel and pitchfork, we planted another azalea along the side of the house, then Colette and I pulled all the weeds and detritus from the two ancient cement planters on either side of the bench you see in the above photo, replacing all of what was growing in them as haphazardly as Albert Einstein’s hair with two bright pink kalanchoe plants, then stood back to proudly bask in the glory of our gardening prowess.
Of course, manual labor such as that demands a reward and certainly not a monetary one which would be looked upon with disdain and confusion by a 4-year-old whose idea of recompense consists solely of instant gratification in the form of ice cream – the I-don’t-give-a-hoot-how-messy-I-get kind – and after getting Colette situated in her pink fairy chair, pinning up her waist-length hair and snapping on the 15-year-old bib we originally used for our first grandchild, Mckenna, I disappeared into the kitchen and returned with fudge-covered vanilla ice cream pops for Colette and Bill and a lemon ice for me; judging by the look on her face and the twinkling, totally satisfied light in her eyes (photo below), Colette was over the moon with her sweet, sloppy treat and …. you know …. she was right after all about it being the “perfect day for planting!”
NAR©2024
This is “Let It Grow” by Eric Clapton
All text, graphics and videos are copyright for The Sicilian Storyteller, The Elephant’s Trunk and The Rhythm Section and are not for use by anyone without permission. NAR©2017-present.
April Showers: A Haibun
Written for Weekend Writing Prompt #359 (tempest, 29 words)
Moonwashed Weekly Prompt (gilt-edged) and
Weekly Prompts Weekend Challenge (pointless)
It’s springtime! I love to see my flowers growing but sudden storms wreak havoc on defenseless, gilt-edged blossoms.
roses madly thrashed
spring’s wild tempest rains attack
my pointless garden
NAR©2024
29 Words
This is “Dead Flowers” by the Rolling Stones – Totally Stripped
All text, graphics and videos are copyright for The Sicilian Storyteller, The Elephant’s Trunk and The Rhythm Section and is not for use by anyone without permission. NAR©2017-present.
Almost Paradise
Written for Fandango’s Story Starter #142
Was everything that happened really all my fault?
It all came about one day in April, the 1st, to be exact. Newly divorced, I had recently moved into a house in the country and was enjoying my morning coffee on the patio. Birds of many different varieties flitted about the bushes and fruit trees in the yard next door. Even a couple of deer and a few rabbits were contentedly munching on the grass. I felt like I was in the middle of a Disney movie and wouldn’t have been at all surprised if the animals started talking and singing!
Looking around my property I couldn’t help but compare my landscaping to that of my neighbor, Marjorie. Hers was overflowing with every sort of plant imaginable while mine had a paltry number of pitiful-looking bushes on the verge of death. I began to envision my very own Garden of Eden. There would be shrubs and fruit trees and flowers everywhere, graceful statues and a tranquil water feature. My yard was going to be much better than Marjorie’s!
Perhaps her ears were burning or it was just a coincidence but at that very moment Marjorie turned her head in my direction. Even from forty feet away I could see her beady eyes squinting at me. A rather obese woman, she was sweating profusely as she labored in her garden, her ridiculously small bonnet providing little shade to her balloon-like face. I waved to her but she didn’t wave back; either she didn’t see me or she chose to ignore me. Marjorie wasn’t all shits and giggles. Her husband left her for another woman (no big surprise there!) and her grown children lived far away. It seemed like her only joy in life was tending to her expansive garden.
Being a city boy, I knew nothing about gardening so I called the local nursery where one could get anything from a hose nozzle to a majestic pine tree. One of the landscapers came by a few hours later and walked through the property with me, making suggestions as we went along. I told him money was no object and gave him free reign to plant whatever he thought best – the more impressive the better.
A few days later the nursery’s trucks arrived at my house. I caught a glimpse of Marjorie peeking through her curtains as my many purchases were unloaded and wheeled into my yard. The landscapers got to work planting everything from small flowering shrubs to walls of bamboo. They put in an arbor, birdbaths, several angelic statues as well as a Japanese-inspired water feature. Before my eyes the once barren wasteland was now a flourishing oasis. Take that, Marjorie!
My new bountiful yard only spurred her on to do even more work in her yard; every time one of us added something new, so would the other. It became a petty, childish game of tit for tat; who could create the most majestic personal Nirvana?
The next morning while brewing a cup of coffee, I was shocked to see a police car and ambulance outside Marjorie’s house; she had suffered a fatal heart attack while working in her garden. Well, there certainly was no love lost between us but I never wished her any harm. She was a rotund woman; laboring day after day in her garden the way she did obviously put too much strain on her heart. I hoped whoever moved in next door would treat Marjorie’s yard with the same tender loving care.
A few weeks later I woke up to the screeching sounds of power tools and heavy machinery. Unable to see through my dense bamboo hedge, I walked around the front to Marjorie’s place; all her marvelous landscaping was being leveled! After everything was hauled away, a bulldozer began digging a huge hole. Week after week the work continued. The noise was enervating and I found myself spending more and more time working inside from my home office and away from my backyard utopia.
Finally one day in early August all was quiet; the work next door was complete. I decided it was time to fling wide the portals leading outside and enjoy an afternoon in the sun with the birds splashing in my water feature. My good friend Charlie stopped by and as we sat there enjoying a few ice cold Michelob Ultras, the pristine silence was broken by the shrieks, yelps and laughter of little children.
“Damnation! What now?” I grumbled, rolling my eyes and craning my neck for a peek.
Charlie nearly choked on his beer. “Don’t tell me you don’t know!”
“Know what?” I asked. I had no idea what he was talking about.
“You dumb son of a bitch!” Charlie howled. “Dear old Marjorie left a will stating that her house and property were to be leveled and converted into a daycare facility, complete with playground, carousel and swimming pool.”
“You can’t be serious! What about zoning laws?” I sputtered in disbelief. Visions of my plummeting property value made me groan. And Charlie laughed, clearly enjoying my distress a bit too much.
Was this some sort of twisted karma? I just wouldn’t let old Marjorie best me and now, what she couldn’t achieve in life she had accomplished in death. The ultimate victory was hers. I felt sick to my stomach.
“Almost paradise.” I sighed, a defeated man. Maybe everything that happened really was my fault after all.
NAR©2024
This is Joni Mitchell with “Big Yellow Taxi”
All text, graphics and videos are copyright for The Sicilian Storyteller, The Elephant’s Trunk and The Rhythm Section and is not for use by anyone without permission. NAR©2017-present.
MOAI MAN
He was covered with dirt, leaves, broken branches and assorted detritus of a dozen or more years’ worth of storms and the forces of nature … dismissed, ignored, abandoned and forgotten … never given a scant thought until I came upon him, and even in his forlorn and dejected state, cast off and tossed aside, he was still majestic and I knew I had to give him breath, new life, a home, a place of honor.
After pulling him from the webs of thorny bushes and strangling ivy, I wrapped him in a blanket, secured him inside my car and drove home where I positioned him on a table in my potting shed and gave him a thorough wipe-down; he was in remarkably good condition for having spent all that time in the elements … after all, he is not made of stone or plaster or concrete but of wood and still there was no rot, no boring holes from worms or bugs, no tiny gnawing marks from rodents as if he had commanded them all to stand back, to keep their distance.
A gentle sanding was all that was needed to remove any loose and chipping paint; there was hardly any, a sign that this proud fellow refused to allow years of snow, rain, wind and unrelenting sun to wear him down.
I primed my pump sprayer and, with a slight nod of deference to this royal figure, I began applying a fresh coat of paint as black as pitch … new garments meant for a prince; in constant, sweeping motions I covered him from head to toe until he was gleaming in a slick veneer of ebony, a raven cloak.
When the paint was dry, I raised him up in my arms and carried him out to a spot specifically chosen for him, a place where he will be seen by all, where he will proudly reign.
He is my Moai Man, carved by the Rapa Nui; his name is Jude and his bearing is regal. 🗿
NAR © 2023
The Elephant's Trunk 