I started out with good intentions.

I started out with good intentions. I wasn't sure if this was a good idea or not, but I figured I shouldn't wait around for life to find me again. Picking up and moving from the town that I had lived in for the last thirty-four years wasn't an easy decision, but I know that it would sure be an interesting choice.

The first thing to do was to figure out where I was going. I created a checklist of where I had visited in my life, which places called to me, which places I had always wanted to visit, which places my better traveled friends told me I would like. Then, after I had gone to all of that trouble, I picked a place that didn't seem to fit into any of those places at all. Gnome.

Now, I know that Gnome is quite a ways away from where I started life, but just the name of the place made me giggle with anticipation. I had always been a bit of a SciFi nerd, and with a name like Gnome, all I could picture was a town with a population no taller than three feet tall.Oh how I wish that were true, even though my brain knew otherwise.

Besides the name, moving to Alaska had advantages. Money. How awesome must a place be that they actually pay you to live there? Sure, it might be somewhat more remote than I was used to, but I can be patient. I don't need to have my hands on all the newest toys right when they come out. I just hoped I would still get the two day shipping I had become accustomed to.

The next step would be the least fun, packing. The good news, I didn't have that much stuff. So I found myself walking through each room and asking myself if I actually needed any of it. I surprised myself with how little any of my material possessions I was attached to.

Prompt provided by http://www.thinkingten.com/

Avoiding a meeting

I walked into the bar and saw her across the room from me. I hoped that she didn't notice when I walked in. Whit a guy the size that I am, that was very wishful thinking. Her eyes glanced over towards my direction, and I saw the look of recognition in them. The recognition faded into resentment and hatred like I knew that it would. What I had done to her had set her life into a downward spiral that few could have stopped.

I didn't like what I did, but it had to be done, for both our sakes. She could have chosen to take it many different ways, but she decided to play the victim, like she had always chosen to do. I couldn't let myself feel bad for her decision to do so, but something, so small guilty feeling, always felt bad. All I did was walk out of that room, never looking back, never responding to the words and emotions that followed me for the next several years. I had to leave. I had to make the choice to help myself so I could survive another day.

Luckily, she turned back to the friend she had been talking to. I continued into the bar and said hello to the people that I had know from a previous life, people that I had not seen in person for several years, people that I had missed talking to, people that mattered to me. I tried to continue as if I didn't see her there, going about her life, pretending that we hadn't had the life we had. It was everything I could do to keep moving and not turn and leave.

This was the meeting I had been avoiding, the thing I had not been looking for, the one thing that made coming back here such a hard decision. I know I had moved on, but I wasn't expecting her to have not let go.

This prompt provided by http://www.thinkingten.com/

Prairie, Parlor, Purple

He grew up on the prairie. He was used to things being a little harder to do then they should have been in the first place. That is why he still liked to drive his old pickup, with the manual transmission and manual steering, into town when he needed to.

His car was from a different age. An age when things were built to last as long as their owners. Things were made out of steel, not the plastic and carbon fiber of the new automatic cars. His car was, also, unique in the fact that it had actual purple paint on it, not the color infused surface of the current vehicles had. His car was like him, old, worn out, and leaving people wondering how it was still alive.

He had become used to the stares once he got to town. Not just the stares at his ancient car, but the stares at him. The stares at his gate as he limped through town. He never did understand why people were so quick to have their joints replaced these days.

He limped his way up a couple of streets from where he had stopped his car, and wandered into the restaurant that had become his second home. As he entered, all the children using the virtual shooting parlor stopped and looked at him. You could hear the faint noise of astonishment from them in seeing what they had only imagined to be real. An honest to goodness cowboy. Some of the children even gathered together to whisper to each other about him. He never did mind that part.

He took his usual seat towards the back where none of the tourists would bother him. The waitress that he had know for going on twenty years now brought him his usual drink. He sipped it slowly and wondered how many more years he would get to enjoy this place.


Prompt provided by http://www.thinkingten.com/

It was hours before the sun would come up...

"This might be the most frightening thing I've done in a while." she said to the Commander. He knew, coming from her, that was saying something.

It was hours before the sun would come up, and all they could think about was the this last step in the year long mission they were about to complete. Years of planning, recon, more planning, practice, thinking about contingencies. All of that had come down to the next few hours for the two of them.

It seemed like they were just working on reflex at this point. They had been thinking about this moment, the moment they were going to push the button, for the last eight months. Once they found this last person, they could push the button and be whisked off to their homes. It almost seemed surreal for the both of them.

They were trying to stay focused on the moment, but they both knew that the other was thinking about what would happen after. The awards, the thanks, the rest. She felt more tired than she ever had before, and she could see the same feeling on the face of the commander. All they had to do was tag the last one, push the button, and it would all be over.

Amazingly, he walked out of the building by himself. No guards, no protection, no knowledge of what was about to happen to him. The Commander tapped her on the shoulder and whispered, "Now. Let's go."

They started to move around the berm they had been perched on, and behind the house next to their target. It seemed almost too easy. They both had a sense of urgency in their steps as they approached him. They moved quickly and quietly, and just before they reached him, he turned towards them.


Prompt provided by http://www.thinkingten.com/

In the clouds

Save for the sound and feeling of the wind, I would have equated the sensation to being weightless. Funny how falling out of the sky feels that way. I must have hit something while I was hiding in the clouds. I thought I had scanned it well enough, but I must have missed something.

I gathered my concentration back and flew back up to the edge of the cloud I had just fallen out of. I peered into it a little harder this time. I still couldn't see anything. So I decided to move into it again, this time moving more slowly, more methodically, than I had before. I kept my arm out in front of me as I floated forward. After a minute or two, my hand brushed against something solid. I stopped and moved my hands around searching for it again. This time, my other hand came to rest on what felt like a kitchen sink. Cold, metal, solid. I moved closer to it so I could take a better look. Once I got within a few inches of it, I could see the faintest reflection of myself. So, this is how he had been hiding form me so well. He somehow treated the outside of his ship so the reflection wouldn't be so obvious.

I felt around some more looking for a seam, a crack, anything I could try and gain some purchase on. That is when I blacked out. He must have hit me with something pretty solid, because my head was throbbing after I regained consciousness. I woke up to find myself strapped to a table, in a large room, with so many other villains I couldn't believe how they all got here without me knowing.


Prompt provided by http://www.thinkingten.com/.

Currently

I have separated from my wife of three years and am starting the process of getting a divorce. I never thought I would be here, but at the same time am surprised that it took this long. There have been so many thing about this entire relationship that didn't work. Music tastes, conversations, communication, temperament. really, there are too many to list for me right now. I moved out of my house and back to my parents house. It is odd being here. I know in my head that I am thirty-four, but there is so much of this that makes me feel like a teenager. I stay out later, I hide out a bit, I try and help out where I can. I am thankful that my parents are here to help when they are needed, but I really need back into my house. I need private space with my own things. Like my bed, my TV, my room, my kitchen. At the same time I'm very much done with living in that house and look forward to moving into the house being built. I hope that is doesn't take the entire time the builder quoted us, because that would mean I'm not moving until the end of the year. I things go like I had planned on, there is a chance I will never live in this house that I chose. It is very frustrating on so many levels, but I also know that I am in a spot to create a new life for myself. I can choose to move to a new state, do things that I have wanted to do for years, do some crazy impulsive things that I would have never done had I stayed married. I have started seeing someone, and she seems like a very good match for me. We think a lot alike, and we call each other on our BS frequently. She is insistent that she is the "rebound girl" and I see ways in which she is. She is stable in her life. Right now, I am trying to cling to that stability because I feel like I don't have any. I know, in a little while, I will get back to that place. But in the mean time, I am off finding myself. I felt like I had lost essential pieces of who I was in the course of my relationship, and I am going to find out what kind of man I am and want to be. Frightening.

Sharing Something

Sharing the drink was a good start. I hadn't thought about what I would be doing later in the day yet, but I was sure that sharing a drink with this woman might lead to an interesting adventure. There was a cool breeze blowing in off the water in this small seaside town, and her blonde hair was fluttering just the slightest bit. The smells coming out of the kitchen were mixing with the sea air in such a way that I was reminded of spending weekends at my grandmothers beach house when I was little. The smell of the bread, the steaks, the sounds of the kitchen. They were all a good setting for the start of something.. interesting. She lifted the glass and took a sip. She smiled a half smile that said she had ideas on making mischief with me. Little did I know, that the mischief would bring me to a different town in a different country, several months later. It started innocently enough with this drink. That a walk through the town, window shopping the local retailers. We progressed to a walk down near the water talking of where we were from, how our lives were going, what our plans were. I can see now that she was only giving me half truths, peppered stories of her adventures in her secret life. By the time dinner had been consumed, and the plates were taken away, the groundwork was layed. We were going to rent a car and drive up the coast to see her "friend" a few towns over. We could stay there a night and go where the wind took us the next day. Her friends house was small, but furnished with things one might find in a city further inland. TV, kitchen, appliances were all of the highest quality. The bed we shared that night was so large, we could have had two more people with us.

This prompt was provided by http://www.thinkingten.com/.