Write on Wednesday: Small Expectations




This week's Write on Wednesday exercise is about "Small Expectations": imagining myself as tiny as my thumb, where would I live, what would I do?   Pop over to Ink Paper Pen if you would like to join in with the Write on Wednesday exercise this week.  The link on it will be open until the end of Friday.  











Write On Wednesdays




I stretched out my curled up body from of the warmth of my home.  The sweet smell of the surrounding nectar was calling me as was the birdsong.  It must be morning time.  That rumble in my tummy was becoming tremulous and threatening to rock me out of my rather precarious home. I needed food now.  I crawled out of my gum nut, shaking off the old seeds, grabbing what I could to pop them in my mouth.  They were hard to chew, and made me thirsty, but kept the hunger away for a while.  I saw a drop of dew on a nearby leaf and sucked it up to quench my thirsty while I looked around for my friends.


"Sssoo, ssweety, you're awake again?" It was Silver, the slippery tiger snake, startling me as he stared at me with his hungry eyes.  I stood very tall.  I felt very tall now as I was as tall as the largest gum leaf on my tree but still I picked up my pronged stick that lay near my gum nut and held out in front of me with all my might.


"What do you want, Silver?" I shouted using my loudest, fiercest voice. 


"He's mine, Silver, lay off, ha haaa haaa" In swooped my friend, Cassandra the Kookaburra, "Hungry, Gerry? Let's go grab some tucker! Jump on."  


I jumped on her back and clutched at a any feathers I could so that I didn't fall off as she took off, swooping here and there, up and down, in and out of the trees, down into the grass, over the billabong.  My legs flew out behind me as my body bounced along.  I loved flying with Cassie.  I wanted wings like Cassandra so that I could go wherever I wanted, escape from the Silver and Rascal the red-back spider.   Oh, to glide through the air, up to the top of the trees, out the end of the earth and back again, to the stars and the moon, out the best of the nectar, the sweetest pieces of food, to find other friends to play with, oh, I wanted to fly so badly.


I stretched my arms out to feel what it felt like to fly, flapping them just like Cassandra did.  Cassandra's body kept moving away from me, I was flying!  I was in the air and flying!  I flapped harder and harder but I was going down, down to the ground, to the thick, thick grass, where Silver's friends lived.  


"Help, HELP, HELP! CASSANDRA!!!"


I felt a whoosh beneath me as the beige and blue feathers came from behind me and collected me just before I landed.


"Why did you let go Gerry?"  She called as she made for the nearest tree to land, clearly shaken. 


"I'm sorry, Cassi, I'm sorry. I just want to be like you."  I buried my face in her back and cried as she carried me to safety. 


"You're safe now Gerry." Cassi soothed, "You don't need to be like me, you are your own self and that self is wonderful."  Cassi wrapped her wings around me as we perched up high in the trees overlooking the grasslands, safe.


xx Meg



14 comments:

  1. ah, nice write. one with nature.

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    1. Thank you! maybe that is me! I love to be in nature ;)

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  2. That was so cute! I loved the first paragraph, and the idea was sweet. Great write!

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    1. Thank you Claire, do you think that I digress from the first paragraph? (LOVE feedback...)

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  3. What a great tale, Meg!

    A vivid and lively story with endearing characters.. it would make a great world for a book series for kids.

    For some reason I love this line, it has beautiful rhythm: My legs flew out behind me as my body bounced along.
    I loved the introduction of the characters, and how the world is revealed easily through their action and dialogue.

    Do you mind me suggesting an alternative sentence structure?
    When I read this sentence I got derailed by the verbs:
    That rumble in my tummy was becoming tremulous and threatening to rock me out of my rather precarious home.
    To me, it needed a 'was' to avoid reading as 'was becoming tremulous and was becoming threatening to rock me..':
    That rumble in my tummy was becoming tremulous and was threatening to rock me out of my rather precarious home.
    But that's a lot of 'was verbing'.
    Perhaps:
    That rumble in my tummy became tremulous, threatening to rock me out of my rather precarious home. [or 'was becoming' if you prefer]
    Or:
    That rumble in my tummy was becoming tremulous, and it threatened to rock me out of my rather precarious home.
    Or:
    That rumble in my tummy became tremulous and threatened to rock me out of my rather precarious home.
    My editor told me that if I read my sentences out loud, I'll hear the rhythm better and how it will sound to another reader's mind. You probably know this, but it's such great advice I thought I'd pass it on. :)

    I can see you love feedback [me too!], but tell me if this is too much feedback, hehehe. :) One of the things I'm doing right now is going through a gamut of my sentences and working on my verbs. So it's stuck in my brain. :)

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    1. Thank you Melinda. Yes I do LOVE feedback - I did stumble on this line - it felt awkward in writing and I can see with your edits how it can improve. I often read out loud what I have written, but when I am rushing to post, it sometimes gets forgotten... Not too much feedback - Bring it on! Love the idea of working on those verbs.

      Thank you again, and thanks for the positive feedback as well about the story. I could feel myself in there, curled up in the gum nut.
      Thanks, Meg

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    2. Oh cool! Please feel free to give me feedback too - I'm the same in that I rush to post the WoW pieces and I often miss something. I was probably high on coffee when I posted the above, as well as the fact that I write in a conversational style [ie. too much] - as I'm sure you can think of your own alternatives! :)
      Keep us all posted if you continue to work on this story... :)

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    3. LOL! I swing from the rush of coffee to the low of needing it...aaagghh..! I will keep you posted! Mind you I have my MUCH bigger project of my book on my trip that keeps me very occupied - I love these exercises to stretch me.

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  4. Beautiful and vivid details of nature. I love it!

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    1. Thank you Stephanie for your feedback and taking the time to read, Meg

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  5. Melindas advice for reading out loud is great - it's something I often do (and still get it wrong pretty often) - I sometimes find that I know what I mean which makes any errors (inc spelling mistakes) invisible somehow.

    I do really like this - you have created great characters and could easily take this further.

    Im wondering who (or what) Gerry is as although my assimption is a tiny human he really could be anyting at all at the moment.

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    1. Thanks Sarah for your feedback. It is an interesting question you raise; I guess that I hadn't really thought about it. He could be a tiny human, he really could be anything! He could be a fictional character that doesn't exist in reality. I really just let myself go with this exercise, thinking small, smaller than my thumb, and I landed in a gum nut! That is where it all started. Thanks again for your feedback, Meg

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    2. That's funny because I also wondered at the beginning of the story what Gerry was, but I got absorbed in the dialogue and the fable of it. It didn't seem to matter in the end that I didn't know, because I related to his plight.

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    3. That was how I was feeling, that it didn't really matter who I was (ie human or other), but that I was tiny - but I am very interested in how the reader feels about this. loving the feedback!

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