TO LIVE AND DIE

it all comes to this…

So this week tje prompt was “To Live and Die” and there were a few pics to go with it.

This is my effort

——————-

The first thought that went through Terence’s mind as he opened his eyes was “What a lovely light,”  This thought was soon followed by a second which considered why the devil he might be lying on the floor, and a third one hot on the heels of the second which pondered where exactly he might be.

He attempted to move but nothing happened.  His eyes seemed to be working just fine but beyond that nothing else did what it was meant to. Not one thing.

“Well this is just no good,” he said to himself, “this simply will not do at all.”

He strained again but still nothing.

For a while he lay there looking up at the light.  “It really is quite pretty,” he thought, “I should get one like that for the hall at home.”

In an instant something about the word home triggered an explosion of memories and emotions inside of him.  He was suddenly overwhelmed by a lifetime of experiences flashing before his eyes, and it all started with her.  

She was present in almost every thought and every memory.  She seemed to have been there from the very beginning but for some reason he could not recall her name.  He could feel her touch and he could hear her voice , and she was all at once a stranger and so very familiar.

There were children too, and grand children.  Birthdays, holidays, Christmas and so so much love and laughter.  There was a little house by the sea, and a dog that always barked when the gate creaked.  Memory after memory washed over him as he lay there looking at the ceiling, and as they flashed by she became older, yet no less beautiful.

In between the laughter there were tears, and the cold darkness of solitude and yet always the laughter and the love would return and each time he would see her smiling face.  A great sadness overcame him as he saw her laid to rest, her coffin laid into the ground on a cold grey day.  Terence lay quite still and enjoyed the intensity of each moment until, at last, he remembered how he got here, where he was and why he was looking at the ceiling.

And then there was nothing.

The Engineer crouched over Terence and ran a scanner across his forehead.  He spoke into a small receiver embedded in his grey coverall collar.

“Base 9, this is Henderson, I have found the synth and can confirm that shut down has completed.”

“And what is his Status?” came a response.

Henderson double checked the dial.  “I can confirm that the unit has reached end of life cycle and his memories have successfully downloaded to central.”

“Good work Henderson” came the response, “We will format the content and pass it onto the family, seems the owner’s kids were pretty fond of the unit and have asked for the memories.””Copy that.”


	

Afterwards Writing Prompt #2 – Monday 15th of January – “ALCHEMY”

Another writing prompt for your pleasure

Over the many years Ive been dabbling on here I have always enjoyed prompts. Quite often I like to create lists for myself, and I always wnjoy them even more when I have an image or two to stir my writing loins.

So I figured I might share some of mine. Use it if you want. or don’t.

Theres no limit to how long or short it should be, just see where it takes you. It could be a short story, a poem, or just whatever takes your fancy.

If you send a pingback or a link to your piece in the comments  I will gather all of the outputs together at the end of the week, so for this one the closing date will be Sunday the 22ndof January.

If there is interest or people actually get into it I might compile the best one from each week and pop them into a compilation of sorts and pop it on Amazon at the end of the year (accredited of course). But let’s see how it goes first eh…

So this week your prompt is ‘ALCHEMY’, and these are a few pics to go with it.

Oh, and you can do what you want with the miages. They are all AI generated so no issues with copyright.

Afterwards Writing Prompt #1 – Monday 8th of January – “Darla” – Sci Fi

Something a little sci fi to start the year off.

Over the many years Ive been dabbling on here I have always enjoyed prompts. Quite often I like to create lists for myself, and I always wnjoy them even more when I have an image or two to stir my writing loins.

So I figured I might share some of mine. Use it if you want. or don’t.

Theres no limit to how long or short it should be, just see where it takes you. It could be a short story, a poem, or just whatever takes your fancy.

If you send a pingback or a link to your piece in the comments I will gather all of the outputs together at the end of the week, so for this one the closing date will be Sunday the 15th of January.

If there is interest or people actually get into it I might compile the best one from each week and pop them into a compilation of sorts and pop it on Amazon at the end of the year (accredited of course). But let’s see how it goes first eh…

So this week your prompt is ‘Darla’, and these are a few pics to go with it.

Oh, and you can do what you want with the miages. They are all AI generated so no issues with copyright.

Some Writing Prompts – August 2019

So for those of you who like a writing prompt or two here are some for August.  Three fairly obvious themes I think.  Make sure you add a pingback and I will attempt to pull them all together at the end of the month.  Let’s see what you got. 

  1. The day the skies burned
  2. Monorail
  3. Tomorrow, today.
  4. Dead satellites
  5. Orbital lockdown
  6. Binary lovers
  7. Apocalypse 2029
  8. Turbo
  9. Above the clouds
  10. Born to the stars
  11. Gravity
  12. Roses and bullets
  13. Darkest valentine
  14. Broken Mirror
  15. A lover’s touch
  16. Lips, blood red.
  17. My tomorrow, my yesterday.
  18. Summer no more.
  19. Innocence
  20. Love’s call
  21. Between the sheets
  22. The longest night
  23. Fangs
  24. A voice from beyond
  25. Our darkness
  26. Necrodancer
  27. Putrid
  28. The things inside
  29. Swarm
  30. The Awakened
  31. Sunrise no more

Writing Prompts

Since I took to writing about 18 months ago I have loved prompts.  Other people’s words inspiring and challenging me to create something and share it.  My favourite have been M’s which you can see here which I still try and do when I can.

Towards the back end of last year though I found myself thinking that maybe I should consider doing my own prompts for myself and as part of a process see where that took me.  So, I picked up a shiny new notebook that I got for my Birthday and picked up one of my fabulous new Bic pens and started to write whatever came into my head until I had 31 prompts for January.

It was not a particularly long process, and I actually did it sat at my desk at work whilst I was on a rather dull teleconference.  I think it was maybe 20 minutes of work.  Once I have the 31 I then put each as the header on a page and proceeded to jot down an outline or ideas or thoughts inspired by these prompts.  It went surprisingly well and within about 90 minutes I had 31 ideas that I can now turn into something this month.  I hope.

Anyway, whether I finish them or not doesnot matter what mattes is that I have a ton of ideas to use as I get chance.

Oh and then after that I had an idea to take my most favourite album ever and use each of the tracks as the tirle for a short piece.  I haven;t fleshed that out yet but some point in February I hope to put out a dozen pieces all linked to the ‘Blind Man’s Zoo’ album by 10000 Maniacs.

So, in case you are still reading these are what I came up with for the 31 prompts for January.

  1. Butterfly
  2. Firestorm
  3. Flowers of Autumn
  4. Electric Dreams
  5. Once upon a never
  6. Twice shy
  7. Turbulence
  8. Tears of night
  9. Wednesday
  10. Last orders
  11. Overtime
  12. Samantha
  13. The cave
  14. Tomorrow’s forever
  15. Beyond the night sky
  16. A place in the dark
  17. The last summer
  18. The first winter
  19. Orbit
  20. Descent
  21. Into Madness
  22. Forever forlorn
  23. Beyond time
  24. Malcolm
  25. Driftwood
  26. Orbital city one
  27. Fear of the dark
  28. Nevermore
  29. All my yesterday’s
  30. Dawn’s light
  31. No more tomorrow

It was a fun exercise and whilst I will still be doing other peoples prompts I enjoyed the feeling of finding all those inspirational thoughts and moments for myself.

Why not try it for yourself and share what you come up with?

 

 

Room 101

So, 30 prompts, 30 days, whatever 30 times 101 words amounts to…

Thanks to Michelle for the prompt

Okay this was scheduled but I want to be done with the challenge, so I am pressing publish right now! 

Now, as challenges go that was quite something .  I set myself the goal of using every single November daily writing prompt from Michelle’s page and to do a 101 words on each, all on something a bit weird or odd.

As a writing experience I tackled it by writing all the prompts on a page in word and then under each I bashed out the basic outline for the story and the twist.  The prompts really fired my imagination and I did the whole lot in one go and it took me about an hour or so.   A few changed as I progressed but for the most part what you see on my blog is what I planned on day one.

Now I only started the challenge on the tenth of November, so I thought I would do one a day and catch up the others along the way but as it turned out I wrote the first 8 in one day (as I had a day off work) and within 7 days I had written all 30.   Once I started I seemed to not be able to stop and it felt great ticking them off and completing that idea.

I’m not quite sure where I found the time but the planning helped in that I was working on them in my head before I started writing.  A few took some heavy editing in terms of word count early on but by the 30th post I could mostly write it and come in at about 100 words without trying.

What I like is that I think I could probably do something more substantial with each one so am really happy with it as a process, even if some of them are a bit crap.

Anyway, thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed them and thanks again M for the prompts, they were fab!  If you don’t follow Michelle you should.  Do it.

Michael


Photo courtesy of pixabay

On the matter of prompts

I do so very much like the challenge of prompts.  You know the type, where you’re provided with a picture or a word and the challenge of creating something – often limited to a small number of words. 

I do so very much like the challenge of prompts. You know the type, where you’re provided with a picture or a word and the challenge of creating something – often limited to a small number of words.

When I started my blog in July it was the WordPress daily prompt that provided me with the most inspiration. I have since moved away from those somewhat as I have discovered lots of other wonder blogs out there that stir my imagination, but the thrill of a good prompt remains.

I think perhaps I enjoy them so much because they give me that central idea to which I can attach the randomness of my thoughts. Quite often I will have an idea in my head that I want to write about but it is the prompt that provides the catalyst for the finished piece.

Anyway, here are some of my favourite blogs that provide me with some of the inspiration for the stuff I produce. A huge thanks to you all for the effort that goes into running the prompts!

The prompts are great, and the work by fellow bloggers equally so!

I know there are more I have forgotten…

Do you have others you like to use? Leave a link in the comments section below.