Suicide was just a word, a vague concept. Something whispered, read about in books. Nothing that had ever come near my own world, but rather a specter keeping itself hidden and far away. I had not even read The Bell Jar, hadn’t thought of Sylvia Plath turning on the stove in the apartment where she lived every day. Had not been stuck with the picture of her putting her head into the oven with the gas jet running, her two young children sleeping in their beds on the other side of the wall.
Daddy Daddy, I said. Daddy, I don’t know what Tim is going to do. I’m scared. I think he’s going to do something to himself. Help me, Daddy. I need your help, Daddy. I said.
As I work on getting my third completed novel Out There, I have been playing around with several new ideas, and it’s possible that one has taken hold! I have long been intrigued by writing a full-length work that takes place within a time frame that is less than 24 hours (think Mrs. Dalloway, Ulysses, A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, etc.). I have become intrigued by the possibility of telling the entire story in separate pieces of flash fiction — each of which would be entirely free standing, but all of which together would tell the tale. Stay tuned!
photos of Sylvia Plath