Day: August 10, 2015

From Below

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DAILY PROMPT
Through the Window
Go to the nearest window. Look out for a full minute. Write about what you saw.
Photo A.M. Moscoso

Photo A.M. Moscoso

There is only one window for me to look out of during the day and this is what I see:

A fence, trains and homeless people looking for a place to sleep or sit and be left alone

We’re below the street here.

You can’t see much but you can hear a lot: cars, buses, sirens,  people yelling.

Something about this hole in the ground brings out the devil in people.

One summer a woman stood on the railing above the tracks, she was high.  She was screaming she wanted to jump.

And from below some construction guys who were parking down here yelled back up at her, ” Jump Baby! Jump!”

They were laughing.

I left my place at the window, opened the door and yelled that the tow trucks were coming so they needed to get their free loading asses  and their  piece of !#@ cars out of here.

Towing is a very real thing around here- the trucks used to circle the streets like sharks waiting for people to screw up and before you know it- Hey Presto you’re at an impound lot with your checkbook or credit card out and paying through the nose.

I looked up and the woman was off the railing. I think she had passed out on the sidewalk.

Then the aide cars came.

All of that happened one Summer  years and even though the entire incident only took a few minutes from start to finish:

I think about it a lot.

I do everytime I look out that window.

Grandma Tilly’s Wishing Well

/ animar64 / 3 Comments
DAILY PROMPT
Three Coins in the Fountain
Have you ever tossed a coin or two into a fountain and made a wish? Did it come true?

I never throw coins into a fountains and make wishes because of what happened at the Old Well on my Grandma Tilly’s  property 50 years ago.

She had this well way back on her property- just passed the family cemetery and from there almost a half mile from the tree where people liked to hang themselves

Grandma Tilly figured about a dozen people hung themselves from that tree. Grandpa Wolfie was all for cutting it down but she was convinced those souls were caught in the branches and if she cut it down they’d walk around her property and make it creepier than it was already.

” I don’t think  that possible Tilly.” Grandpa Wolfie said once as they stood under the tree and looked up into it’s branches. ” I mean, there is that story about your Aunt Birdie burying that daughter of her’s in the basement.”

” Don’t you ever pay attention to what I say Wolfie? Birdie put her in the attic. In the trunk. You know that.”

” So the story goes. But we both know that  between your Murdering Aunt and this tree we’re never going to be able to be rid of this property and retire to Peru like we said we would one day.”

Grandma Tilly heaved a heavy sigh.

” I do wish this was a happier place. ” Grandma Tilly sighed.

” Well. I’d have to agree with you on that.”
So sad and dejected they  walk around the tree to the Old Well and Grandma Tilly pulled some change out of her pocket and tossed it down the well.
There wasn’t any water in it. There hadn’t been for years and nobody cared to find out why it went dry  because that’s where Aunt Birdie’s husband was supposed to have ended up.
That was bunk Grandma Tilly said in disgust.
He was the one that ended up in the basement.
Why did nobody listen to her when she talked? She’d yell.

” Can you imagine this place, carefree and happy. People laughing and all.”

“No. As a matter of fact I can’t Tilly”
Grandma tossed the coins into the well and made the wish and they walked that depressing dark path ( to be honest that entire property was dark and depressing)  to their house.
Just as they got to the front yard Grandpa almost had a heart attack and Grandma almost knocked her front tooth out of her head when she slammed her hand with her heavy wedding band over her mouth.
There was their house- it was painted white instead of the dull weather worn brown it was before  and there was a garden out front and there was laughter…
and there was also a sign above the door that said,
” Tilly Birch’s Lunatic Asylum.”
” Damnit Tilly! ” Grandpa yelled, ” we will never be rid of this place now! “