Short Stories – penned in moon dust

The Lake of Gold #photochallenge

May 29, 2022 by moondustwriter, posted in Photography, photography challenge, Short Stories

There was a legend an age and a half ago – it was about a lake of gold.

“A curse,” they said “was placed upon the lake.”

Anyone who drank from the lake of gold would turn to stone.

In the lake there lived a bird who had a long beak that could catch fish but could never drink.

A girl would watch every morning as the sun was awakening and the gold was rippling. In her hands was a single drink of water saved for the bird with the special beak.

Each morning the bird would strut to the girl. He gave her a shy little smile.

Once he brought her a fish as a gift. She washed the fish and it turned to gold.

When the villagers heard about the golden fish, they became greedy. A man watched the girl as she greeted the bird.

One day the girl did not come. A man came in her place with a hand full of water. The bird would not come near. The man slapped the water in anger. One drop got into his mouth and he turned to stone.

The next day the girl came to her bird with a small handful of water and he looked at her with a shy smile…

Written for Slack Photo Prompt photo above.

Alheimers and old butcher knives #short Story #atozchallenge

April 1, 2020April 2, 2020 by moondustwriter, posted in a to z, a to z challenge, elderly, Short Stories

“Daddy was the main caregiver for mama who has had Alzheimer’s for several years. She never knows who I am when I visit. At home she always had a pattern: She would look out the window, get a plate and arrange some cookies, sit on a chair and wait. She would do that three times. She then went to her room, turned on the light, took off her robe, crawled into bed and shut off the light. Daddy would shut the door and call “goodnight” through the door.”

“What was she waiting for?”

“I don’t know, but she never ate the cookies. I figured they were for someone else.”

***

The upscale Alzheimer’s ward was nice. That way children don’t feel guilty when they never visit.

She carried herself with such grace and was so polite.

“Would you like a cookie?” She held out a decorative plate.

“Yes, please. What was he like?” I asked her as I took a stale cookie from the plate.

“He’s a lady’s man. I knew that when we married. I thought he would settle down, he never did. He’s better than Millie’s man though. Mama always told us ‘now girls the two best ways to keep your men in-line are with a sprinkle of that white stuff in sweet home baked cookies or the butcher knife that we keep sharp for the chickens’ necks.”

“Hmm. uuuu” I wrapped the remainder of the cookie in my napkin. I tried not to choke on the cookie in my throat.

“We knew no one would suspect two old gals.” Her smile was sincere as she fingered her strand of pearls.

“Did you ever want to use the butcher knife on your husband?” I was thinking as we talked that her mind seemed fairly clear.

“Certainly not! Millie had rat poison that she saved from daddy’s shed. She said rats came in all types and sizes.”

“Did you ever umm use it?”

Thanks for stopping by – you’ll have to come back tomorrow to read the finish of this flash fiction story for the letter B

***

Welcome to the A to Z Challenge where writers spend the month writing.

I presently work in Hospice and have a love for elderly people (I’m quickly becoming one)

Alzheimers is a hard diagnosis and as it’s constantly changing; its alot like Covid-19.

On the letter “D” I will discuss Dementia which presents in many ways like Alzheimers.

I have found with Alzheimers that a patient can have a little less stress with a few things in place:

Routine – offers stability when an Alzheimer patient feels like the floor has come out from underneath him. Getting up at the same time, eating at the same time helps the body and mind work together.

Diet – A good diet is essential and good fats (for the brain) need to be part of each day. With a generation that is used to non-fat everything this can be a challenge.

Exercise – taking safety into consideration exercise is key. Walking each day and doing some eye hand coordination exercises (make them fun) keep the mind and body in tune.

Safety – A patient can forget they are no longer an avid hiker or runner. Falls are an aged person’s worst nightmare. Identify risks before a fall can happen.

Activity – You patient will still enjoy activities that were once part of everyday life. One patient reads his book about Einstein everyday. He is more engaged in the pictures than the content but that book is an old friend.

Signs – you may laugh at this one but it worked. My male patient kept forgetting where the bathrooms in his house were. He would go in a corner of the garage or in the yard but he always could find the restroom at the store or a park. I put up a restroom sign with a picture of a man and an arrow pointing to his bathroom. it worked.

Most people have a family member or friend that has Alheimers. What have you seen that makes it easier to “live” with?

Emmanuel #Christmas #story

December 24, 2017December 22, 2017 by moondustwriter, posted in Short Stories

There are people everywhere in this little village of Bethlehem. It was light when we began our journey. My little ones are cold, but they have to wait in line like the rest of us. “There will be a crust of bread soon,” I whisper. I rock back and forth on my feet to keep warm. My shawl is wrapped around my daughter’s shoulders. The memory of the day’s sun is my only warmth. “Move along” a soldier on horseback almost knocks over my little boy. My husband silently pulls his namesake close. I know he wants to curse the Romans but even a scowl of discontent will lock him in prison. A murmur courses through the crowd, ” It is said Messiah will come.” “Maybe this year,” an old priest says in hushed tones. God knows we are destitute and Rome is an unbearable manacle around our wrists. “Please come and restore peace,” I silently pray. “Lift your face” a Roman holds his rod under my chin. “Were you praying?” I shake my head. “Dust in my eyes, master.” “Keep your pretty eyes open.” He looks lustfully at me. “Get going,” he strikes my husband forcefully on the back.

“There was a chorus of angels,” a message filters down the line.

“Shepherds in the fields saw them.”

“It must have been frightening.”

“Do you know what that means?”

“Our God has heard us.”

“Why are we still in these rags then?”

“Be patient wrongs will be made right.”

“Rome must be destroyed.”

“In good time…”

“Messiah will set us free.”

I imagine life free of this nightmare. Tyranny’s fist gone from our lives. My children will not know oppression as I have. I take a risk and fall to my knees praising God in my heart for His gift of love.

My arm is gently grasped. “Come with me” a voice grazes past my ear. “You will find your family later.” I am led to a stall. “Thank you,” I say to the man who has vanished. I am used to animals so the strong smell doesn’t bother me. I kneel because I am filled with knowledge that I am in the presence of glory. God is with me in this moment and all the cares of life have been washed away. I get off my knees and spin in a joyful dance. My eyes meet the mothers’. Her smile is so serene as she holds her precious baby. “Here,” she offers “hold Him.” I am a mother of three,but I feel ill equipped to hold the chosen one. “Yes, it’s alright.” I look in His face. A single word fills me “blessed.” His finger grasps at mine. ” Yes, I am blessed,” I coo. Somehow I understood with no words being spoken what this small child was meant to do. “I will pray for you,” I mouthed to the mother as I looked at my Messiah one last time. “Shalom,” I said as I departed.

It’s as if everything around Him was acknowledging His birth. I heard the words of Isaiah brush by me on a fragrant stream of air. For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. ¹

As I walked back to my family, my circumstances had not changed. The Romans were as callous and barbaric as before, but I knew that my life would always be different. “God is with us,” I smiled, ” and He has come as a babe to save the world.”

****

Jesus came to the world not to rule with iron might but to love in absolute vulnerability. The ultimate gift was given to mankind. This love is more fierce and powerful than any military or political presence. This love sets all people free. It is only in this guileless love that Peace can be found; only in the Son of man can we be delivered from life’s manacles. SHALOM

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Turn Back the Time #fiction #addiction

April 1, 2014 by moondustwriter, posted in Short Stories, wordpress

I stood before the hands of the giant clock. They teased me as they clicked:

“you can go anywhere in your past

choose but choose fast

before the hand has gone one minute

you will either venture

or quit it.”

I was faced with a genie in a bottle decision. Where do I go? What do I revisit? Can I fix “it”?

In that 30 second time span I chose. “Take me to the year 1968 and the place Haight and Ashbury in San Francisco.”

There I was in a paisley maxi dress with my hair braided. It was me but it wasn’t me. I wasn’t the flower child. My mother was. If I could only save her from this moment where she wrecked her life, my life, my family…

“Can you tell me where Saxi is?” I tried to keep from inhaling the air . The secondary smoke would result in a nasty headache or a “high.”

“She just left with Brad.”

Brad was an innocuous name for a destroyer of life. This creep came into the suburbs to captivate young, attractive women.

“Saxi,” I called as I ran along Haight . I followed a couple of very lost in the clouds hippies. Her eyes barely acknowledged me. The spark that said, I love you sweetie-pie was extinguished.

“Please come home, Saxi.” I whsipered.

I had lived this moment so many times in my adult dreams. “Taxi” I whistled with all my might. I shouted this time holding out a Twenty which did the trick. Quickly I grabbed her arm pulling her into the car before she could think in her drugged oblivion.

“Take us to the train station.” I had no desire to have that creep follow us. We were leaving San Francisco and home for good.

****

The hands moved forward more gently as they shadowed Saxi’s wizened face. Her last, dying words “Thank you for rescuing me sweetie-pie.”

***********************************************************************************************************

The Haight Ashbury district in San Francisco was known in the 60s and 70s for it’s free love, free pot, free clinics. Long lines of tourists would motor through the district to see the strung-out hippies. I knew several teens who ran away to Haight. Even though their parents eventually got them “back”, they never came home. The heroin addiction in my baby-sitter rendered her an “on again off again “junkie for the remainder of her life.

This week’s writing prompt for Word Press Daily Post was Time Machine.

The photograph of the street sign is from the San Francisco China Times

The Babushka Blessing #shortstory #Ukraine

March 11, 2014 by moondustwriter, posted in Our World, Short Stories

We had one hour to do a frantic shop for items we could only get in Ukraine. The list from friends was rather long: Hand carved jewelry, stacking dolls, hand painted spoons …

“Mommy we are going to run out of time. Why don’t we split up?” My precocious thirteen year-old daughter suggested. I scanned the park with booth after booth of items for sale. The park was large and everything looked the same.

“No way!” I said in English knowing that my two girls could be swept away in a foreign land in a moment. My limited Russian would be unheard, my screaming in English heeded less.

“We will never be able to do it all.” My 10-year-old daughter chimed in

“Then we will do what we can, first I have to get grivna out of the ATM.” I heard both the girls sigh as I dragged them quickly to a corner of the square.

“It will only take a moment. ” A moment I knew we did not have.

As I left the ATM machine, an elderly Babushka came into my vision. She was so frail and thin as she carried a woven satchel of groceries that looked like it weighed more than she. With a weak but genuine smile, she looked right at me then at the girls.

Do you ever feel your hand magnetically reach for your wallet when you see someone poor and weak? I knew my husband (8000 miles away) would have growled at me. It didn’t matter. I felt the compelling need to help this frail woman.

I pulled out grivna and gave her the equivalent to several weeks worth of food. I said a few words in my very poorest Russian accent. The smile in her eyes could have lit the pavement. Then this woman put her tissue paper-thin hands on my girl’s heads and said a blessing. I didn’t understand all of what she said but I knew it came straight from the heart. She looked me in the eye with a toothless grin as she placed her hand against my cheek then she was gone! I felt washed with something indescribable.

Now our time was even less than it was before. I looked at my watch, we had to catch our bus to the airport in thirty minutes. The oddest thing happened- As we went to the different tents to check out what was for sale, it was as if a sea parted before us. Each kiosk had exactly what we were looking for and the price was less than we had planned. One man as we were leaving handed me a beautiful handmade wooden necklace. He gestured for me to wear it. It reminded me of the beauty and strength of the Ukranian people and of the old woman. I wondered if he knew the babushka.

I was not looking forward to the trip home. Two days of travel is grueling; add two young girls and an injured mother (I had been injured in Crimea.) We were alone from Odessa to Vienna to New York and finally LA. I felt like people kept looking out for us. A man helped carry all of our luggage to the plane , we needed to hail a taxi in Vienna and someone shared theirs with us to the hostel. All along the way people were unusually thoughtful to the girls and I.

There had been a man trying to escape justice who had hidden in the luggage compartment on our plane out of Odessa. He was subdued (in Vienna) before he could be violent or set off whatever was in his duffle.

When I got home I looked at the necklace hanging around my neck. ‘Oh Babushka you gave me so much more than I gave you. Your blessing got us safely home. Spasiba Bolshoi.’

******

I just wanted the reader to know that this short story is true. I wrote this piece a number of years ago and archived it. Based on the current turmoil in Ukraine, I hope to send some blessings back.

The Ukrainian people are a strong, beautiful and creative people. How can anyone want to strip that from our world?

Moon Beast #halloween #shortstory #children’sfiction #amwriting

October 31, 2013 by moondustwriter, posted in Children's Stories, flash fiction, Short Stories

the beast below

“It was long ago when the world was young.The Moon some say was bright and full once or twice a year but then she would be gone for weeks at a time.” My grandmother said with a quiet, serious voice.

I closed my eyes. Grandmother told great stories.

“There were fewer people, no one to protect our world or our universe. I do not think when Mars chased Luna that he intended to sire a beast. But beast he was.”

“How can such silvery beauty as I spawn repulsion?” she screamed as she flung him into the abyss of night.

“I am sorry, Luna. Please forgive me” the love struck Mars pled.

“Our love created that foul thing. We cannot be together, ever.”

“So Mars retreated to his corner of the Solar System looking each evening for a glimpse just a whisper of her , his dearest Luna.”

“A star took pity on the child as he somersaulted through the dark. She sheltered him, giving him time to grow. The star did not intend for its kindness to be met with such hatred. The beast devoured the star and grew strong.”

“You fool he sneered you should have let me die. He shook his fist at his mother, a piece of the star hanging from his mouth.”

“The beast found himself on a planet called Earth. It was green,full of life. The beast could not stand the light so in daylight he would vanish. At night dogs, chickens even people would be found missing. None wanted to believe the folk-lore.

“Grandmother, I simpered how can we be safe from this beast? I will never go outside at night again.”

“There, there child. Listen…

For some time the dark beast roamed the earth never content with his destruction. He would stoke the earth’s innards and make rocks so hot that it flowed from mountain tops into villages below. It was not enough. The Moon Beast for so he was called by the Universe would grab the sinews of the earth and pull shaking the ground, making worlds tumble.”

“We must stop this” Venus looked with a jealous side glance at Luna.

“I have no power over him, none at all,” Luna cried.

“There must be a solution” said the usually disregarded Pluto.

“He has one weakness, have you not seen?” The Sun rumbled. “He cannot be in the light of my rays. Perhaps I could shine day and night.”

“But you cannot Father Sun,” Saturn wrung her hands.

“Luna, on the nights that you come out our son shrinks in strength. Your beauty makes him sick. Perhaps if you shine each night, he will die.” Love burned in Mar’s eyes.

“How can I destroy my son?” Luna despaired.

“You must” the people of the earth chorused to the Heavens.

“What did Luna do Grandmother?”

“Sadly, the celestial mother put on her silvery shawl to steal herself against the cold night air and kept a nightly vigil. The beast could not stand her light with time he grew weak. Luna too was growing weak. Mars saw it and wrapped his warm arms around her once or maybe twice a month to give her rest. It is said that on dark, moonless all hallow’s eve night’s very strange things happen. No one knows for sure if the beast died. Luna continues to shine. She hopes her son is still alive. She sighs in relief each time her dearest Mars comes so that she might rest. Tonight, grandson, if the moon is hidden you must run to your home. Quickly now and keep your doors locked; I have heard strange tidings.”

The next morning a mournful wail into the a blood-red dawn.

“Luna WHYYYYYY?” Continue reading “Moon Beast #halloween #shortstory #children’sfiction #amwriting” →

An Immigrant’s Dream #flashfiction #history #statueofliberty

September 12, 2013 by moondustwriter, posted in flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Short Stories

“I see her far away in the distance.” a youngun called.

The tall looming lady was a welcome sight after long weeks at sea.

“Hot meals will be a welcome relief after weeks of soapy soup,” the weary matron thought.

The pretty girl, in the gown, that was beginning to show its wear, wore a tight smile. ” I hope he likes me; there is nothing to go back to if I’m sent back.”

“Will there really be work for the likes of a scrawny boy with naught but two pence to rub together?”

The Lady distanced herself from the expectations.

Today at Friday Fictioneers Rochelle has up whipping up stories on the sea entering New York harbor.

Tear of a Star #shortstory #amwriting #flashfiction

August 13, 2013 by moondustwriter, posted in blog, flash fiction, Short Stories

They tried to capture it – my tear

The myth was if you caught one tear of a star you could rule the world.

But they got it wrong.

If you managed to get me, a star , upset I would not cry there would be natural disasters

The world would vomit its dead, storms would come in like a tide, the waves would get bigger drowning more people in waves of concrete.

If by chance you touched one tear of mine you would scream in torment.

For though nothing has happened it feels as if your entire body has been dropped into a vat of caustic acid.

Only one could manage a tear – my lover.

Loving arms wrapped around me would calm the waves, put out the fires, stay disaster.

His reassuring voice would put an ice cap on this inferno

As he laid me upon a green/ blue pasture in the universe as he brushed my hair,

I would be sated.

But that time has yet to come.

If by chance you meet this man

send him toward the end of the celestial grove.

For the hour grows late and my patience with humanity is waning

ire and mercury rises.

The Day They Packed My Computer #fiction #challenge

July 28, 2013July 28, 2013 by moondustwriter, posted in blog, Short Stories, wordpress, Writers

Today they moved the last of my belongings to somewhere. No one would tell me. My family thinks because I am “old” that those things no longer matter or that I will forget about them like I forgot the grocer’s name (last week).

I watched someone fumble with the box containing my type written drafts, hand drawn story boards, and copies of every last radio script. A tear fell to the ground; no one heard it except Font, my spaniel. My faithful Dell which replaced my IBM Selectric years ago was in another box bound for the place where computers go instead of heaven.

“Don’t worry mom everything is on thumb drives.”

“For what?” I wanted to yell under my carefully tucked afghan. “Can I access my work with my thumb, perhaps my teeth?”

My bony fingers were itching to take one more sweep across the keyboard.

My daughter was dripping with sincerity, “We have you enrolled in a number of classes at the retirement community.”

I can’t tell you how many times over the years I have heard ,”Those who can’t do… Teach.”

I smiled to myself knowing that I was teaching a number of those classes.

Little do they know that my archived work is auto loaded on my blog. Should be good for hmmm about 5 years. I can still, after all, operate the “Like” button.

*****

The WordPress Daily Post prompt is what would you do Without Blogging? A pox on such a thought. My fictionalized response reflects what I would do….

Here’s what others would do without blogging: