I'm trying again. I posted this story here last week and two hours after I published it, it disappeared! I have no idea if the cause was something I did or something Google did. I wonder if perhaps the previous title I created (using some of the word prompt words) sounded a little smutty (not intentionally!) and perhaps Blogger flagged the post as inappropriate content (it's not!) and took it down. I've contacted them but have had no response.
Moral of this story, ALWAYS keep a copy of your work!
I wrote this piece of fiction using word prompts. See below for more details.
An Onomatopoetic Conversation
“Sooo.” My mom crooned, in a soft persuasive murmur, “Are you going to help me?”
“Mmmmm.” This sound came out of my full mouth garbled and non-committal–I uttered it both as a platitude and a moan of pleasure. The piece of steak I was chewing was so rare I almost heard it moo before I put it in my mouth, just the way I like it.
My mother was not placated. “Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaack!” Her tone rose to a shriek. “Egad. Were you even listening to me? Did you even hear a word I said?”
Still working on my steak, I took a big schlurppp of my wine and swallowed. I tried hard, but I couldn’t suppress the impulse to giggle at her expletives, and I let out a big guffaw.
“Hmph.” My mom’s state of annoyance came surging through the phone line. You know my car is in the shop this week. I need you to run some errands before we all congregate tomorrow.”
I asked, “Hm… What do you need me to do again?"
“Grrrphhhh. Grrr.” No one can growl quite the way my mother can. The sound of it made me jump. I accidentally dropped my fork, and it landed on the steak with a SPLAT and splattered the bloody juice all over my shirt.
“Just a minute, mom!” After listening for the barely audible clink, indicating I had switched the phone to mute, I then set it down. I walked over to where the light was coming in through the window over the kitchen sink and examined the stain on my shirt. I squirted a little dish soap on it and tried to rub it out. The friction of the fabric sounded like the whoosh of a bird’s wings when it takes off in flight.
Before unmuting my phone, I nostalgically said to myself, “onomato-PEE-AHHHHH.” Many years ago my brother and I had created this word, to describe the way our mother often used onomapeia when she spoke. Suddenly, I was looking forward to the dinner, when I would congregate with my siblings and reminisce about our childhood.
Eager to avoid the hazard of my mother’s wrath, I apologized for my lapse in listening to her earlier in the call.
I said, “Yoikes! I’m sorry I wasn’t paying proper attention to you earlier. Please tell me exactly what you need.”
“As I said, I’d like you to go to the market and pick the groceries for our family dinner. I’d also like for you to buy me a peasant skirt.”
"A peasant skirt," I squawked. "Why on earth do you need a peasant skirt?"
Mom explained, “My women’s club meets this weekend, and we will discuss the painting Return from Market by Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin and a poem Eavan Boland wrote about it. I plan to go in costume and imitate the woman in the painting. It seems like a good way to add some zing to a meeting that could otherwise be sort of boring.
“Oh, Mom,” I said. “Where would I even find a peasant skirt? Are they even in style anymore?”
“Don’t worry, honey. I called around, and the boutique on 5th Street has just the skirt I want. You can just pay for it and pick it up.”
“Ka-ching!” I rolled my eyes at such a frivolous purchase and then immediately felt glad we weren’t on a video chat. Eye rolls always angered Mom!
“Mom, everything in that store costs a fortune. But if you want me to, I will buy the skirt for you.”
I then told her about the bloody steak stain on my shirt, and (of course) she offered to get it out. She said I could drop the shirt off to her upon my return from the market when I delivered her the groceries. Although she was originally very irritated with me, before we hung up Mom told me to be prepared — she planned on giving me a hug and a great big smooch.
Two separate challenges supplied the prompts.
To write this story, I used the prompts from both the 4/28/21 Words for Wednesday Challenge and a challenge from writer, Micheal Burg, MD (AKA Medium Michael Burg).
The First Challenge
The Words for Wednesday weekly writing challenge prompts were provided this month by Wisewebwoman on her blog. I encourage you to go to the comments there and read the other stories writers have posted.
The prompts she supplied this week:
~ An image of a painting and two lists of words taken from a poem about the painting, written by Eavan Boland:
- Congregate, Impulse, Market, Peasant
- Wine, Surging, Light, Hazard
- “Back from Market” a painting by Chardin.
The second challenge:
Michael Burg provided a list of prompts in his post, A Fun Onomatopoetic Prompt. He solicited the favorite “sounds” of other writers, then complied those in a list and challenged his readers to write a story using all of them.
Here is his list of words:
(Spellcheck complained a lot about these! 😉)
hmph, sooo, clink, Hm…, Grrr (growl), SPLAT, Mmmmm, whoosh,
Ka-ching!,onomato-PEE-AHHHHH, murmur, egad, Guffaw, Schlurpppp, Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaack!, Moo, Yoikes!, Giggle, Grrrrphhhh, zing
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Just for fun
I added a few onomatopoeic words of my own. Did you spot them?
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I am so glad that you were able to recreate this piece.
ReplyDeleteI do love onomatopeia. Rustle is one of my favourites...
Rustle is a good one!
ReplyDelete