Third 09May2922
Working Title: Flow (excerpts below; topic sentences only)
Words = 400
- I looked at my letter to my US Congressman.
- After a moment, I circled the US dollar sign in red.
- My next graphics were abbreviated.
- The third graphic was the much adored US dollar sign pointing to land masses outside the US, some the size of a chihuahua’s leg.
- My state of Oklahoma looks like a box.
- Decades later, I joked about a new fangled Aero desk chair:
Critique: Upon reading p. 332 of Janet Burroway’s Writing Fiction, I chose Exercise 1. To paraphrase, choose a term: science, religion, history. Write a short story. Do not mention the term. Make the reader understand the term. Make the reader understand the theme and emotion.
My first two attempts were awful. However, Burroway helped me focus on the importance of the title, then ending, and the middle that connects the two.
I drafted a second short story.
A third short story: On Monday, the draft above came into my head. I’ve published the first 4 topic sentences because I don’t want to publish the whole story. My theme: the money that flows from the US into offshore tax havens by dollar amount, by week, by state, and by month. A long-winded theme that does not fit Burroway’s instruction to express the theme in 10 words or less, but a theme I’ve been thinking about.
Flow is the title. I like M-F because of its association to mother-Xucker. Of course here it stands for Mon-Fri.
I like coffin because the setting is the tax payer funding that went into the Vietnam War.
The Aero chair metaphor is a joke I created for my husband, Stephen, who is thinking of retiring soon. In all, I like this 3rd draft short story.
