The Truth Doesn't Always Set You Free

The Write. Eat, Post, Bathe group is starting a new series of weekly prompts. This is a good thing, because I still haven't snatched my writing mojo free from the gnarled talons of a vindictive and spiteful muse. I need all the prompting I can get. This week's topic is 10 Secrets.  

A writer should have this little voice inside of you saying 'tell the truth. Reveal a few secrets here.' - Quentin Tarantino

I thought this would be easy but, in reality, it sucks. I keep secrets. Always have, ever since I was a kid. When you live in a glass house, you need a deep basement. Secrets are not always a bad thing. But they get a bum rap in these days of hyper-connectedness. We'd be better off if we all had a few more secrets, I think. Take back some dignity, people!

That being said, here are 10 'secrets' for your perusal. They are not particularly earth shattering or revelatory. Maybe they are slightly entertaining. For starters, I'm stealing Cyn's number 10.

10. I love purses, bags, backpacks, etc. I have way more than I need. I also hate cleaning them out. Too time-consuming. So I have little bags of stuff that I can grab and put into the new bag. Presto chango.

9. I have a new mattress - one of those foamy things. I don't know that I sleep better, but I do know that I can't wait to lay down on it each night and I loathe, more than ever, leaving it in the mornings. Not sure that this is a selling point...

8. I am not entirely sure that babies are sentient.  Ever once in a while you see one with a spark of intelligence or personality in their eyes. I find that sort of fascinating. It makes me contemplate reincarnation. But most of the time - meh.

7. I am sucking it up and trying to learn how to photograph the aforementioned lumps of humanity. Babies and brides and their gawd-awful mothers. One of these days, when I retire at an obscenely young age, I am going into the photo business. If I'm going to make any money, I'm going to have to do babies and weddings. Them's the facts. I am, however holding fast with my prohibition against maternity photos. I'm seriously considering marketing myself as The Grouchy Photographer. The Grouchy Photographer doesn't like your mother and your baby is woefully average.

6. Women of America: pregnancy is not a disability. Neither is it some sort of noblesse oblige. It's just a fact. Of life. Get the hell over it. And stop showing me your belly. (Ok, this is more of a rant than a secret.  So sue me.)

5. Learned on Saturday that I can still make change. Thought I'd lost that skill. Good to know, in case I have to go with my fall-back position as Sonic car-hop.

4. Fog is sexy.

3. I have itchy scabs. (Won a fight with a rosebush and a chain link fence, although not decisively.)

2. Just bashed my hand on the side of the desk. Now my thumb is freakin' numb. (How many more do of these things do I have to come up with?)

1. Everyone had a Nellie Olsen when they were growing up. (Yeah, I read those books. Watched the TV show, too.) ((Wonder if there was ever a comic book incarnation?)) I recently came across the adult version of mine. Not the same person grown up, but someone just like her. And now, all these years later, I see the fear in her eyes. Maybe in another thirty years I'll learn to feel sorry for her because she can survive only by wounding the things/people she fears.


Well, that's it. Ten of the little buggers. Here's hoping that next week's prompt is easier.