I’ve journaled on and off since elementary school. Mostly off.

My first attempt was in a baby blue diary with a lock. I wrote only three entries. All short, cryptic, boring sentences because my main concern back then was will I ever get a boyfriend, and I didn’t want to risk someone reading my true thoughts.

Lynda Barry introduced me to a new way of journaling. I highly recommend her book Syllabus if you are struggling to keep a journal. Short entries with words and/or images are easy to do. It was about capturing the mundane because in the future, the mundane will be exotic. Of course, big moments can be captured as well.

This year, deciding to be brave, I photographed each daily drawing and posted it to Instagram which automatically posted it to Facebook and Threads.

If you follow me on Instagram, you can see new ones almost daily.

Spoiler alert. The answer to the cryptic messages in the baby blue diary is yes, I did get a boyfriend. If you look closely at my drawings, you can see him in 11 of them.

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Before I flew business class, I had no idea of the perks. Sure, I knew the food was better, the seats were spacious and allowed you to lie flat, and that flight attendants would snap the curtain shut if they thought anyone in coach could peer into first class.

What I didn’t know about business class was that you avoid the long TSA line with its winding rope maze and simply went straight to an agent.

My next flight on coach drove home the difference. Although there were at most five of us on line, the rope maze twisted and turned a dozen times. It felt vindictive, a punishment for being poor, for not flying a better class of travel. Or perhaps a rush of passengers would be coming shortly and TSA would need all those turns.

Research shows that equality makes people happier or was it that ignorance was bliss?

Coach meant no access to an airport lounge where abundant food and drink would be available.

At the first restaurant we encountered once past TSA, we scanned the Wahlburgers’ menu looking for breakfast items. A waitress came out and told us there served only one breakfast item. She reminded me of the men who stand outside strip joints hawking its pleasures to passersby, enticing them to come in. We fell for it and ordered our only choice. The waitress informed us it was too early for alcohol, not that we wanted any. When I asked for tea, she said, “We don’t serve tea. There’s a line at the Dunkin’, I’ll let you know when it gets shorter.”

Why is tea such an exotic brew in America? England and Ireland serve wonderful tea. If only American restaurants would invest in tea technology and know-how. I rarely order hot tea, not wanting to pay for disappointment.

If ever I am to rule the world, I would make it a requirement that restaurants must pass a tea-brewing test before they would be allowed to open. Do you have a list of mandates that you will issue if you take command of the world? If so, what’s on your list?

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This is a plan that I drew up in 2020 and rarely do. My resolution is to spend time each day, a minimum of 5 minutes, organizing/decluttering.

Wish me luck.

I drew the flowchart on paper during a Graphic Medicine monthly meetup in response to a prompt. You can view a recording of this event and draw to the prompt yourself. Graphic Medicine is wonderful organization that explores the interaction of comics and healthcare. Check out their website https://www.graphicmedicine.org/

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Early morning, I stumbled into the kitchen, desperately seeking caffeine, and saw a bag sitting on top of my computer. Strange. Inside the clear bag were dark brown chunks. Ewww, could that be poop?

I struggled to comprehend. Was my husband mad at me? Angry enough to leave dog poop on my computer?

My husband had left early for physical therapy so I couldn’t ask him why.

I went in for a closer inspection. The bag was closed with a thick piece of silver metal, the kind found on candy bags. I held the bag up. It could be chocolate. Unlikely but possible.

I put the bag outside on the railing, not wanting to risk throwing chocolate away. It would be safe there until my husband got home.

This left me plenty of time to stew. And stew I did.

As I brushed my teeth, I wracked my brain trying to figure out what I might have done to inspire such animosity, something so out of character for my husband.

As I started to get dressed, I hoped my husband would get home before I had to leave and take the dog to her vet appointment. I needed to find out why he did that.

As I pulled on my socks, I finally made the connection. Vet appointment — poop sample. Not hostile, sweet. He must have walked the dog earlier and collected a sample, then put the bag on my computer so I would know to take it.

A poop bag on my computer had been a symbol of love.

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Reading cognitive psychology studies, many are aimed at predicting who will become a writer, an artist, or “Creative.” Whenever I read one of them, I would evaluate myself against their criteria. I boiled these studies down into this quiz and now you can evaluate yourself.

Quiz: Are you destined for greatness as a fiction writer? 

WARNING: Potential side effects. Taking the quiz could lower your motivation to write, however taking the quiz probably reduces your motivation less than reading actual research articles themselves.

1. Did you have a happy childhood? 
   25 points for no 

2. Did your parents respect learning? 
   25 points for yes

3. Did you have a parent who was intellectually curious or very creative? 
   25 points for yes

4. Did your parents encourage creative activity? 
   25 points for yes 

5. Did you like school? 
   15 points for no

6. Do you have a massive vocabulary? 
   3 points for yes 
   5 points if you assent 
   15 points if you possess a prodigious lexis 
   -20 if you thought lexis meant a car 

7. Did you have imaginary companions? 
   Add 5 points for each imaginary companion up to 15 points

8. Did people chastise you for daydreaming? 
   25 points for all the time 
   5 points for some of the time 
   -10 points for never

9. Do you enjoy pretense? 
   20 points for yes

10. What’s your IQ? 
    25 points if your IQ is between 120 and 150 
    -50 points if your IQ is 150 or over (you might write brilliantly, but no one will understand you)

11. What’s your place in the family? 
    5 points if not firstborn (more successful poets were firstborns while fiction writers were later born)

12. What’s your MBTI (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator)? 
    25 points for ENFP or INFP
    15 points for INFJ, ISTJ, INTJ, or ENTP 
    5 points if you are Intuitive and not Sensory

13. How much do you read? 
    5 points for a lot 
    25 points for massive quantities

Results

• If you send me your score and a check for $999, I will tell you that you are definitely a born writer who will astound the world with your creativity.

No check, then I have serious doubts about your abilities — clearly not enough imagination.

Questions 1 thought 7 are based on Kohanyi’s theory that there are four factors that predict whether someone is going to be a creative writer.  Questions 8 through 13 are based on Kaufman’s analysis of creative writers. Questions 13 through 14 are based on Piirto’s Understanding Creativity. 

Kaufman, J. C. (2002). Dissecting the golden goose: Components of studying creative writers. Creativity Research Journal, 14(1), 27–40.

Kohányi, A., & le. (2005). Four factors that may predict the emergence of creative writing: A proposed model. Creativity Research Journal, 17(2/3), 195–205.

Piirto, Jane (2003). Understanding Creativity. Scottsdale, AZ: Great Potential Press.

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Each month, Furious Fiction gives a writing prompt, a deadline, and a chance to win!

For July 2023, they gave the following prompt for a story:

1. The main character had to be a child under 16 years old.

2. The first sentence had to have two colors in it. (They wrote colours because the Furious Fiction sponsors are located in Australia.)

3. The words prize, bumper, and impossible had to be in the story.

4. The story must be 500 words or less.

Having a prompt and a close deadline inspired me and I quickly wrote the story. I showed it to my writing friends who knew the prompt and they all said they loved it. Did I mention they are very good friends? I submitted my story and waited.

While I waited, I reread my story. There were a couple of tense mistakes. I wasn’t sure everything was clear. The ending felt a bit forced. I liked the main character,

A few weeks later Furious Fiction announced the winners. I scanned through the chosen entries, hoping to see mine. When I got to the end, I knew I wasn’t a winner. Not even an honorable mention. Still, I hit CTRL-F to search the page for my last name just in case I missed it … but no.

Furious Fiction made the right decision about my story. Their prompts are awesome. You should try writing to one.

Below is my non-award-winning prompt-conforming independently-published story.

The Color of Space

The world is blue and green and this babysitter’s hair is pink. Space is either blue or black depending how close it is to Earth. Drawing the whole planet takes time but I’m patient. There used to be nine planets but one blew up, old sitter told me. “You’re lucky. One less thing to learn. Only eight, not nine.” Eight is less than nine.

This sitter doesn’t have drawings on her body. She chews gum and won’t give me any. I wish old sitter would come back. I would point at a drawing and she would tell me a story. “Every tattoo tells a story, every one’s a prize,” old sitter said. Mom said that’s not true. When I asked for a tattoo, Mom said, “Impossible.” I tried to draw one with my crayon and it didn’t work. A pen worked and I showed Mom that it can be done. She said, “Impossible.” Adults don’t always make sense.

I color the oceans. Old sitter used to draw monsters for me to color. I can’t draw monsters. They all look like snakes or dogs. This sitter doesn’t draw at all. She says she can’t. I’m not allowed to say stupid but I said it inside my head.

Sitter’s phone buzzes. This is opportunity, something you must grab. My dad says that.

I hold up my drawing. “Voila!” I shout. This is something you do every time you finish a drawing.

This sitter tells me to hush. “I’m on the phone,” she says as if I can’t see. “What did you hit? … Is it only the bumper?”

I close my eyes and walk around until I hit something. I’m a Roomba. “Suck, suck, suck.”

“What did you say,” she shouts.

I peek to see what she’s doing. She looks angry.

“No, I’m talking to the kid.” She stands up and heads for the kitchen.

Opportunity. I grab her bag and open it. There must be gum in there someplace. I don’t see gum but there’s gummy bears. I open up the package and put a bunch in my mouth.

They are not good gummies. I get dizzy. I lie down.

Everything is black.

I’m in outer space.

Share Kit’s Musings and Doodles

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When I was young, old women wore black dresses that fell to mid-ankle. Black, the color of mourning, seemed like a convenient color for them. They probably put on a black dress when someone dear to them died, and since old people die all the time, figured the time between deaths was too short for them to bother buying new clothes. It was clear to me how to avoid dressing like an old woman: avoid black dresses that fall to mid-ankle. 

Despite black becoming popular in New York City, sweeping the country, fading from the suburbs but still staying au courant in New York, I never updated my old-woman dress code. I was shocked when wedding dresses turned black, bridesmaid gowns turned black, there were New York weddings where everyone wore black. I thought it was a fad, that when I got old, black would return to being the color old women wore, and I would avoid it.

After all, I prefer comfortable clothes and bright colors. I look in the windows of children's shops and wish the clothes came in my size. I dress childlike, I thought, not old at all.

Then I read a fashion article. It said old women now wear bright purple, aqua, and orange. They dress as if they bought clothes in a children's store.

I was 53 and I dressed old.

I signed up for cable TV, watched What Not to Wear and every season of Project Runway. Christian Siriano, winner of season 4 of Project Runway, taught me that fierce meant fashionable.

When sufficiently educated, I bought two new shirts, or dare I say, blouses from Anthropology’s sale rack (sale on sale, 30% off sale price). The next day at work, a young woman complimented me on updating my wardrobe. Confused about fashion, I asked her, "How can something be beautiful one day and out of fashion the next? Why is last year's an insult while older fashions come back in style?" She didn't answer directly but simply wondered when she will stop following fashion and get locked into a style. I escaped to my office and whimpered quietly. There was no hope for me.

But then I remembered that young people are the hope of the future and headed to Kenyon College campus to interview them about fashion, specifically what to avoid.

In the cafeteria, much to my delight I found six students, ages 19 to 23, willing to answer my question, "What do old women wear?"

They answered: Lots of lipstick. Glasses hanging from chains. Loose dresses. Perfume.

Wait a sec. Young people wear perfume so I asked what it smells like. "Smells like old woman perfume," one answered. "Rosebuds," another said. In my youth, old women smelled of lilacs or lilies of the valley. I wrote down, Beware of floral perfumes.

The students continued their list. White sneakers. Muumuus. Extra-large t-shirts.

I asked, "Is there anything on the t-shirts.?"

Palm trees. Cats. Ornaments that dangle. T-shirts that say things.

A couple of the students had writing on the shirts, so I asked what was written on the old women t-shirts.

"Number one Grandma" (as if the grandmother bought that shirt herself). "If you think I'm cute, you should see my cats."

I thanked them for their time and wandered outside, my head lost in the midst of my t-shirt collection, reviewing, editing, mourning the soon-to-be loss of a tiger t-shirt with sequins. Head down, I bumped into a woman wearing a safari-styled linen outfit who looked to be in her late 20s. Perhaps a more mature but still young take was what I needed on this question.

Her list contained only one item: weird comfortable shoes with thick soles and vents on the sides.

I asked her age, and she replied 43. 43! She's ten years younger than me but I thought it was only people 20 years older or younger than me who blurred together. When I read her the young people's list, she balked at the extra-large t-shirts. "Young people wear them," she said. Ha ha, I thought, you're next.

Not letting my age perception screw up my survey, I called my niece Jessica, 22.

She rattled off her list. House dresses. Semi-platform sneakers without laces or Velcro. Vests. Brooches. Layers. Linen. Curlers. Kerchiefs. Mock turtlenecks.

Whoa! That can't be. Not mock turtlenecks!

I asked her if there were any on her list that she would wear and she answered yes. Item by item we went through the list. Brooches, layers, linen, and after a little hesitation, even curlers made the list of things she'd wear.

My 89-year-old mother wears curlers, unhappy with the straight hair we both possess. She often wears pink, something she couldn't wear when she was young and her hair red. Pink is the new black.

Then I saw it. What an idiot I'd been. You don't look to the young to see how to grow old.

Hello, comfortable shoes. Over here, mock turtlenecks. I'm adding sequins to my tiger t-shirt because it, like me, is fierce.

This was written when I was 53. I still agree with its sentiments. Just need to be reminded from time to time.

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On my mother’s 91st birthday, I brought her a cupcake with a lit candle in it, and told her to make a wish.

“I wish I am alive on my next birthday,” she said before she blew out the candle.

The warning that if you tell your wish, it won’t come true immediately sprang into my mind, but it was too late to forestall the consequences.

But a year later, she was still alive. Her wish had come true.

This scientific study, sample size of one, definitively proves that telling people your wish before blowing out your birthday candles does not prevent your wish from coming true.

On your next birthday, tell people what you hope for, what you long for, and who knows—your wish may be granted!

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Tulani Bridgewater-Kowalski threw out the prompt: haunted Victorian pencil. I didn’t know then that this is the name of a song by A Winged Victory for the Sullen.

Amy Turner provided the time frame and length. “The submission window for 50-Word Stories closes tonight.”

Jaime Kinyon and I accepted the challenge. We four started writing. An hour later four fifty-word stories about a haunted Victorian pencil had come into existence.

1. The lead ached, etching out the last of its existence onto the bleak and papered landscape, creating a world from which it might take flight. Exquisite valleys were sketched and scattered below the falling stars, filling the page. A hand crumpled, flinging the pencil across the desk; its task incomplete.

2. The scratch of lead against faded wallpaper reached her ears. Incessant and insistent, scribbling tales of dark secrets and lost treasures. Could the punishment of creaking wood and drafts be insufficient, such that the ruinous house never grant her a night’s peace? Must everything in this blasted place be haunted?

3. The haunted pencil wrote in elegant Victorian script the true identity of Jack the Ripper, the details of his crimes, and how he escaped justice. A teenager found the pages, couldn’t bother deciphering them, and threw them out. Ignorance triumphs once again.

4. Her remnant of their intense relationship was a Victorian travel desk. She stroked the battered surface and raised the lid for a new notebook. The desk contained the nub of an old pencil that she couldn’t bring herself to throw away. Inside the notebook in shaky writing appeared: I’m here.

I am always amazed that the same prompt can result in such different stories. The strengths of each writer shine through.

Which is your favorite?

Three were submitted to 50-Word Stories and one was accepted by the editor, Tim. Read the one Tim published.

Do you agree with Tim?

In my opinion, they all should have been published.

About the writers

Jaime Kinyon has the SubStack blogHer writing also can be found on Medium. She wrote story #1.

Tulani Bridgewater-Kowalski founded The Writers Room. She wrote story #2.

Amy Marie Turner’s debut novel Voyage of the Pleiades is available at these places. You can read her SubStack blog. She wrote story #4.

When I opened the Famous Explorers card deck, disappointment reigned. I bought the deck at an estate sale, hoping for little information snacks about famous people. Looking through the deck, I noticed that there wasn't a single female explorer. The deck should have been named Famous Male Explorers.

The deck contained 52 cards but only 14 explorers. Thirteen cards were unique and then copied for each suit. Lewis and Clark were lumped together on one card, perhaps to avoid the unlucky number of 13.

Who are the women explorers who should be in the deck? The only female explorer that I could immediately think of was Sacagawea, though I had no clue how to spell her name.

With a little investigation, I found more. Here are three: Sacagawea , Nelly Bly, and Bessie Coleman, who easily qualify as famous or should be famous explorers.

Sacagawea

My knowledge of her was limited. With research I quickly uncovered some bleak facts.

I was horrified to learn Sacagawea was a victim of sex trafficking. Abducted from her family by the Sioux, she was sold to a white man, Quebecois trapper Toussaint Charbonneau, when she was only 13. In 1805 she started on the expedition with Lewis and Clark when she was 16 and carrying her infant. Her gift with languages and cool head were crucial to the success of the mission though she was unpaid. Her husband received a generous payment for their work.

Nellie Bly

Nellie Bly should be the patron saint of air travel. To recreate Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days, she traveled with only one small bag. It would have fit under the seat in front of her if there had been commercial air travel at the time. No checked luggage.

In 1889, her editors didn't think a woman would be able to do it. They thought she would need a male companion in order to travel. Only by threatening to take the story elsewhere did she get them to sponsor her.

The first to beat the 80-day timeframe, she circumnavigated the world in 72 days.

Bessie Coleman

Determined to be an aviator, Bessie Coleman was unable to get training in the USA because she was a woman of African American and Native American heritage. She learned French just to fill out an application to study in France for her pilot’s license. In 1921, she became the first African American woman and first Native American to qualify as a pilot.

Competing in dangerous airshows in the USA, she became famous and was known as “Queen Bess” or “Brave Bess.” Her early death prevented her from reaching her goal of starting a flight school for black aviators.

A Famous Explorers card deck should rescue from the dustbin of obscurity women and other people who should be famous. It could easily have 52 unique cards.

In Colombia, archeologists found an eight-mile stretch of cave paintings in Serranía de la Lindosa. Tens of thousands of images were painted in red ocher by prehistoric artists 12,000 years ago at the end of the last ice age.

The images include animals that are now extinct, like mastodons and giant sloths. Seeing how art is able to capture a world that no longer exists led me to think about technology that has become obsolete.

When I was 25, a 21-year-old man I was dating told me that I was lucky to have started working at the birth of computers. I should have told him that the first mechanical computer was designed in 1822, but I didn’t know that then. There was no internet, no search engines at the time. True, I have seen and used punch cards, paper tape, cassette tapes, heavy disks that required two hands to lift and stored only 16K of data, but he was only four freakin’ years younger. If the term cougar had been in use then for women dating younger men, it would have been applied to me. Our relationship felt a little scandalous.

Technology keeps changing. Mores keep changing. I keep changing.

In 12,000 years what will people remember about our world? About you?

My advice: Find a cave and start drawing.

During the winter, eagles took over an osprey’s nest though they haven’t laid eggs in it. It’s more like their second home.

An osprey, a snowbird1, returns from Florida or even farther south to find a squatter in their nest.

The osprey conducts attack maneuvers that seem aimed at intimidating the eagle so they’ll vacate the nest. Last I heard, it seemed to be working. The eagles haven’t been seen in the nest for a few weeks.

This type of conflict seems to happen a lot on the Cape.

• “They winter where they summer”2 versus the snowbirds

• The single homed versus the multiple-home owners

• Renters versus owners

• Vacationers versus year-round residents

• Cape Codders versus washashores (people who move to the Cape)

I live off a dirt road and each winter we are surrounded by seven empty houses. When our neighbors leave for the year, I feel abandoned. It feels scary to have no one living close by. During the winter my sense of ownership expands. These empty houses seem to sit on my land. When my neighbors come back in the late spring, I feel like intruders are trespassing. During the summer, I am happy to have such wonderful people around.

Transitions are hard. Ownership is an illusion. Be kind to your neighbors.

For the latest scoop on the battle and to learn about birds on Cape Cod, listen to Mark Faherty’s weekly bird report on WCAI.

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