Author: mapelba
Winning is for losers.
Your application for admission...has been given careful consideration.... Unfortunately, you were not selected for admission to the graduate program... Way back when I worked for a bank, I won $100. Every month two employees' names were chosen at random. If those employees had the bank bumper sticker on their car, they each got $50. If …
Won’t you cling to my Valentine?
Valentine's Day 1993 I decided to cook. I'd been dating my tactophobe boyfriend since September and had yet to cook for him. Maybe if I cooked, he'd finally kiss me. I didn't believe that, but I wanted to. In the morning I went to a wedding. The wedding took place in the bride & groom's …
Enhance Your Writing
"I don't want any padding," I say. He looks away. He looks back. "I'm sorry. What are you looking for again?" I didn't expect a male salesperson for this, but I tell myself that it is no big deal. I'm a modern girl. And if women can be police officers and CEOs then men can …
Is there a wardrobe that leads to Publicatiania? (a tornado to The Agenterald City? pixie dust to Never Rejection Land?)
"I remember you dated a woman who lived there," I said. My dad was driving us past Orchid Springs a maze of condos behind cypress trees and Spanish moss. "She was from England." "It was one date," my dad said. I sat in the backseat with my child and husband. I wanted to say, "But …
Girls don’t start fires, do they?
Tonight I listened to people talk about fire--an escape from fire, an attempted suicide by fire, art made with fire. A few weeks ago, my mother-in-law's church was set on fire. I learned that over 80% of arsonists are men and that most kids who play with fire are boys. In the eighth grade I …
Don’t you think you should apologize?
"Your friend C. isn't allowed to come over anymore," my mom said. I was in the 7th grade and living with my mom for the first time. And we were living with a couple--a drummer and a graphic designer. I looked up at my mom. "C. said something inappropriate to S.," mom said. I looked …
Dorothy shouldn’t’ve gone back to Kansas.
In the backyard, I sat under the kitchen window behind a hibiscus bush. The hibiscus bush grew up to the gutter along the roof. The space was a cave. One side white scuffed wall, the other side and roof branches, leaves and red flowers, the floor black dusty dirt. Jill, the german shepherd, sat in …
I’m dreaming, right?
Lots of writing books say not to start with a dream. They say not to end that it was all a dream. They usually say leave dreams out all together. Nobody likes to read about someone else's dream. Do you think that is true? On Thursday I told the school director that I wanted to …
500 wrong words
Can you write a 500-word sentence? 500 exactly. Shelly Lowenkopf mentioned a fellow named Barnaby Conrad and his 500 word sentence. I couldn't resist the effort. Janie Hopkins, her curves and wayward hair, waited by the Hamilton train tracks just within sight of the high school where her boyfriend, or the boy she hoped would …
Marta Pelrine-Bacon 