Posted on by barbaramonier

One Paragraph

This is where I write, in the  back sun room of my house, a room with three walls of solid windows overlooking my yard and garden.  My laptop sits on a reclaimed-wood table I had made for me, having fallen in love with it at a local flower shop and cajoled the owner into giving me the name of the man who had made it.   And this is the way it all looks to me when I sit down to begin, when the picture of what I need to say remains out of focus, out of my reach.

Today I struggled.  Today’s particular form of struggle involved looking up an ungodly number of words in the thesaurus.  Really.  Ungodly number.

I finished the chapter I have been working on.  !!  And whereas I wrote more than a paragraph, it is one paragraph that will allow me to lay my head on my pillow tonight feeling like I have done something.

“As if it is the most natural thing in the world, as if she has done this a million times, Madeline reaches for the breast of a fifteen-year-old girl.  She squeezes the nipple, and she directs the breast from a position slightly above Dustin’s head into his eager, expectant mouth.  For a few fleeting seconds, Madeline feels she has been given a magnificent gift.  In a featureless hospital room, with an exhausted adolescent mother whose breast she holds in her own hand, she has been granted a moment of profound grace.”

Now the scene looks like this.

 

6 Replies to “One Paragraph”

    1. barbaramonier – Barbara Monier has been writing since the earliest days when she composed in crayon on paper with extremely wide lines. She studied writing at Yale University and the University of Michigan. While at Michigan, she received the Avery and Jule Hopwood Prize. It was the highest prize awarded that year, and the first in Michigan's history for a piece written directly for the screen. She has four published novels: YOU, IN YOUR GREEN SHIRT and A LITTLE BIRDIE TOLD ME, and with Amika Press, PUSHING THE RIVER and THE ROCKY ORCHARD. Her fifth novel, THE READING, will release in October 2022.
      barbaramonier says:

      Well, I have now been compared to JD Salinger, Kurt Vonnegut, and Hem. Heady company, albeit entirely MEN.

      Reply
    1. barbaramonier – Barbara Monier has been writing since the earliest days when she composed in crayon on paper with extremely wide lines. She studied writing at Yale University and the University of Michigan. While at Michigan, she received the Avery and Jule Hopwood Prize. It was the highest prize awarded that year, and the first in Michigan's history for a piece written directly for the screen. She has four published novels: YOU, IN YOUR GREEN SHIRT and A LITTLE BIRDIE TOLD ME, and with Amika Press, PUSHING THE RIVER and THE ROCKY ORCHARD. Her fifth novel, THE READING, will release in October 2022.
      barbaramonier says:

      Once in a while…

      Reply
    1. barbaramonier – Barbara Monier has been writing since the earliest days when she composed in crayon on paper with extremely wide lines. She studied writing at Yale University and the University of Michigan. While at Michigan, she received the Avery and Jule Hopwood Prize. It was the highest prize awarded that year, and the first in Michigan's history for a piece written directly for the screen. She has four published novels: YOU, IN YOUR GREEN SHIRT and A LITTLE BIRDIE TOLD ME, and with Amika Press, PUSHING THE RIVER and THE ROCKY ORCHARD. Her fifth novel, THE READING, will release in October 2022.
      barbaramonier says:

      Thank you.

      Reply

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