Creative Prompts

Today in the Mid-Michigan Word Gatherers, we used a new prompt methodology promoted by our fearless leader. We wrote a NOUN on a PIECE OF PAPER, passed it to the next person, added a verb, passed it to the next person, added an adjective, passed it to the next person, and added an adverb, passed to the next person, and added a gerund. It pushed many of us to write something we never would have in usual prompt based exercises. Plus some of us had a grammar review!

Tree Drool Flaky Lightly Thinking

The tree drooled. That was strange. But of course. This must be a dryad. A nominal tree, with the spirit of a nymph locked into it. Always a sad story, the nymph chose to give up freedom of movement in the world for freedom from sexual harassment by an obnoxious member of Olympia.

I chose to move lightly, watching in fascination as I perambulated the tree. Yes. It was definitely drool, not just sap dripping. The flaky bark had a horizontal slash that clearly hinted, if you squinted properly, at a mouth. It was a dryad’s drool.

I decided to offer the trapped being a blessing. After thinking it over, not knowing how much consciousness she retained, I chose to speak very slowly. “You paid a high price for the advancement of complexity at the hands of arrogant men. The times are changing. You have learned patience. I will report your condition to the new magicians. Maybe they can liberate you now.”

I stepped back, and slowly walked around the tree again. Yes, definitely drool. I felt sad for the dryad. Very sad. I felt sad for all of womankind. After all, it was our fertility that created the need for the male dominated armies to protect our territory. The simultaneous kundalini awakening of the entire male population of course created excesses. I hoped that the dryad experienced sufficient time to make sense of my message. I decided to tell her that I would be back. In a week, or a month, or a year, or ten years. All but the blink of an eye to a dryad trapped for the last 3000 years. A blink of an eye for her. For me, a big task, to locate a magician’s group that would help to liberate her. I needed to give her a name. A name that would entice the magicians to come to her aid. A name. But what name? What name would do the trick?

Tea Kettle, Whistled, Imaginative, Heavily, Postulating

Her postulating drove me crazy. She was crazy. She said intuitive. I said imaginative at the least, probably crazy.

When I first met her, I wondered where she got her ideas. One day I found her alone, heavily breathing, her eyes closed. After a few more breaths, she settled into lighter breathing. A trance. That must be where she got those ideas.

She never could produce a shred of evidence for any of it. But her descriptions were extremely detailed and when she told me what she had seen, I felt like I was looking into another world.

The tea kettle whistled and brought me back to the current time. The current time, until I got to listen to the latest harvest of factoids from some other reality.

She drove me crazy, but I couldn’t leave her. Whether it was the pheremones, or the simple fact that we both knew we had better survival chances with each other than without, I was never able to figure out. But that morning I started to put together a plan. I was going to drive her crazy too. Make her question her reality. But how? Either I was going to have to learn to go into a trance, or my imagination needed an upgrade.