Out of nowhere, I wrote a short story this weekend.
Blockages is about a frazzled, single mother of a young child, living in toddler chaos, who calls on a plumber to fix a leak in her kitchen.
The kitchen is a bomb site but she hasn’t got the energy to tidy before he arrives. When he does, she’s intrigued to see that he’s much older than anticipated but he seems to know what he’s doing, and so she heads to another room, to allow him to work.
Out of sheer exhaustion, she ends up napping with her daughter and while she does, he not just fixes the leak but reorganises and tidies the kitchen.
She’s stunned to see her gleaming and orderly kitchen, and is on the precipice of anger, until he explains that his late wife suffered from mental health issues and he used to do the same at home. She softens and over a cup of tea and biscuits, they share their experiences of suddenly losing a partner, albeit in very different circumstances.
After he leaves, she opens a drawer and takes out an envelope containing her divorce papers. It’s time. She now has the space to process the next stage of her life.
Fin.
It’s around 800 words and it’ll most likely never see the light of day. I enjoyed writing it though.
Where do ideas come from?
It’s hard to say when you’ve had a brain that’s been able to manufacture stories all your life. But I think the idea of a life ‘blockage’ is front and centre for me right now. I’m doing my best to clear a path forward and this story is almost certainly a manifestation of that.
I may also have been subliminally inspired by Doechii, the hip-hop/rapper, who just won a Grammy. I saw a clip the other day where she said that while she was honing her craft, she set the goal of writing one song a day.
“It doesn’t need to be a good song,” she said. “It just has to be a song.”
That made sense to me. One brush stroke leads to another.
Ergo.
It doesn’t need to be a good story, it just has to be a story.
And so it’s a story.
What have you been up to this week?
Lisa
If you like women with a voice, quirky rap/hip-hop, De La Soul, Miles Davis, a point of view, charisma, joy, lyrics that will send your head spinning, Erykah Badu, Lauryn Hill, storytelling, MC Lyte, energy, being uplifted by sheer force of talent, rude words, TLC, Kendrick, Alanis, being inspired and overall fucking awesomeness, watch this.
Love the story within the mote, Lisa!! Good one!
Bloody love that story x