Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.
— Oscar Wilde.
This is the first post on my new blog. I’m just getting this new blog going, so stay tuned for more. Subscribe below to get notified when I post new updates.
Retracing over a Route
On queue, Jasper was stepping out of the front door, the sigh of the emerging moon, long and fretful, gracing him. Tracing a route he had travelled countless times before, Jasper embarked on the streets of his village, a collage of grey newspaper strips overlapping one another, decorated with potholes and cracks. First he passed the local convenience store, then the pub, then the grassy bank he used to ride his bike on with his brother and lastly, an outdoor café spot, where during the day customers would be seated under the umbrellas, enjoying the fumes of coffee, despite inhaling the fumes of heavy traffic too- he could picture his brother sighing now.
His brother had always hated how their lives had become indistinguishable from that of humankind, destroying the planet instead of conserving it. Becky’s café was the last checkpoint until he could turn onto a public footpath. After overhearing the conversation with the constable that day, Jasper knew he would have to find his brother for himself, which was a difficult task already without the added obstacle of pitch blackness. He pulled at the strings of his backpack as he marched forward, clutching onto his torch tightly.
Merely remnants of omitted memories, specks of magic dust hung low in the air, discreetly acting as a translucent elixir while the young elf steered through it with an overwhelming sense of purpose. The pastel colours of the elixir spheres were gradually dimming in overlapping waves of a perpetual choreography and the crunch of the gravel and tree roots issued a meditation ground, letting his roaring thoughts momentarily escape his head and salute the wisps of the clouds. On day one it was Divine. On day two it was Warden. On day three it was Aslan- his beloved brother. The selection of these like-minded individuals couldn’t be a coincidence. The sticky air mingled with the elixir, an exploding scent of fresh fruits, comprising primarily of lemon and pineapple. It was sweet to the point of turning sickly.
As the hours passed, the trail became coarser and deadlier. The passing of a ghost mistaken for the tickle of mist in the early morning light. The mistiness altered the surroundings, making every outline of the trees seem slightly out of focus and tilted, like a quickly taken photograph. Silver masks of ghosts would fleetingly appear in the air in front of him, but as soon as Jasper would blink, they would diffuse themselves into the atmosphere, pretending as if to never have been there in the first place, so he didn’t question it. Jasper followed the transient row the silver faces created for him, coming to a halt at a signpost where they disappeared entirely.
Even though his destination was scrawled in the to-do list section of his brother’s notebook that he had just taken out of his bag for good measure, there was a second of hesitation. Then the second ran out and Jasper was headed in the direction of the ‘Pennine Way’ arrow, ready to see his brother and checking the first instruction off the list, one step closer to finding out what was in store for him on the trail.
https://creativewritingink.co.uk/writing-prompts (July 18th)
The Escapist
Each evening, Dove could be found sinking away into her grandmother’s leather armchair, accompanied by the friendly blue light of her LED lamp. It was the captivating blue of a forget-me-not, illuminating the pages of a weathering journal that had been passed down through several generations of the family of distinguished wand-makers.
Before Dove’s grandmother had passed away, she would read it to her granddaughter as a bedtime story. For the continuation of the happy tradition, Dove now was harshly accustomed to doing this for herself- just as with every other task in her life, alone and unbothered.
Inside the journal were tales of bravery, modelling how to overpower fear and conquer skewed battles. Not that Dove ever felt she would find a use for these lessons from her great ancestors. One foreordained night, it was in these tales of abandoned cities, released monsters and unclimbed mountains that Dove was rocked into a deep slumber, clutching onto her unwinding dreams like an abandoned child holding a tattered teddy bear.
Rudely awakened by the tapping of glass at her bedroom window, Dove rubbed her eyes, feeling groggy. That goddamn tree branch again. Except, this time, the outline was doubling in size by the second, its finger becoming a hand, its hand becoming an arm, grappling with the handle, noisily breaking open the window after a short-lived fight. Rumpelstiltskin? Dove shrieked.
The shriek rose from deep within her soul as if to be unleashing an inner demon, while the blood immediately was sucked from her face. The shriek was silenced by Rumpelstiltskin’s bony hand enclosing around her mouth. She met its eyes. It wasn’t Rumpelstiltskin. It was Humaira.
“WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING?” Dove yelled, blood coursing through her veins.
“I’m sorry, I tried calling you,” Humaira explained as if that were even an explanation. As if this girl wasn’t already a nuisance enough. As if being forced to pair up with her in their wizarding school couldn’t be pitted against a worse destiny! Tragically, Dove had been assigned as a mentor by Mrs. B. Aura, the Head Witch, for helping the unmendable little groot from the year below in ‘Healing’ spell-casting, since she was falling behind in multiple classes.
“What do you want from me?” Dove pressed, switching on the lights and rubbing her temples dramatically.
With the light cast upon her, Dove could now visualise the little groot’s watery eyes that had grown wide in terror, the cold sweat formed on her forehead glistening in the moonlight being admitted by the opened window. On the nape of her neck, the hairs had bristled and goosebumps ran the length of her bare arms. She was still in her pink pyjamas- a lovely picture of a unicorn on the front. Fluffy slippers on her feet. Yet, as much as her outfit brought distaste to Dove’s lips, she couldn’t help but feel sorry for the poor girl.
“Tell me, what’s the matter?” Dove sighed, pulling the girl to sit at the foot of her bed.
“T-they t-t-took Marques,” the girl sobbed, her gasping making her body tremble, rising and falling, parallelling the ribbit of a frog.
“Who did?”
Body armour comprising of Dove’s coats and their pyjama bottoms, the girls were now forest explorers, the lights of their wands providing solace in the darkness. Among the thick tribe of oak trees, the giants whose roots inhabit the Earth and whose leaves inhabit the Heavens, the two little figures were winding an increasingly difficult labyrinth. Somewhere in the distance, the trickling of a stream. Humaira was confident in her path. They surged forward.
A rocky wall. Using Humaira’s shoulders for support, Dove pushed herself up skillfully. In turn, she gripped Humaira’s arms to hoist her up as well. With a gut feeling of hesitation, Dove turned around…
Before them stood the most breathtaking remnants of an ancient temple. On queue, vines started spiralling the stone columns rapidly, propelled by a powerful gust of wind and a sacred blue wave of light began to wash over them from the door, its Gods sensing their looming presence. They were awestruck. As a matter of fact, it was a familiar shade of blue light. It was the captivating blue of a forget-me-not…
Introduce Yourself (Example Post)
This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.
You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.
Why do this?
- Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
- Because it will help you focus you own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.
The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.
To help you get started, here are a few questions:
- Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
- What topics do you think you’ll write about?
- Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
- If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?
You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.
Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.
When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.
