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Drabble Corner

Michelle Swisz

Our Drabble for March, on the theme of Invisible Accomplishments, is entitled First Day of School, by Jessica Michaan.

First Day of School
by Jessica Michaan

The classroom sounded like a zoo. Desks were moved, books were dropped, new shoes squeaked on polished floors, but above all, eight-years-olds squealed, giggled, laughed, talked. Most of them hadn’t seen each other during the whole summer vacation and they found they had a lot to share. The teacher had a hard task in getting them to quiet down.

But in the front row, with her pencil out and textbook open, Orly sat quietly, looking forward and biting her tongue, fulfilling her promise to her mother to be a good girl this year. Whew! Only 165 more days to go…

In a couple of days, I'm getting new carpet put in, and in preparation, all my books are in boxes so the installers can move the bookcases. One of my kitties is jumping from one box to another to another—very distracting, but very predictable. Crash, thump. He's OK.

Now I know what our theme is—distraction. The distraction from writing, or from keeping our attention (or at least our eyes) on our date when someone with a pretty or handsome face or body walks by, or from attending to our lives, our health, when there's very often a brownie or some Haagen Dazs vanilla ice cream only a few feet away. Distraction is not the same as temptation, though—temptation, I'm thinking, is when you have to fight actually doing something about the distraction, and distraction is when you just can't think of anything else, even if you'd never really do it, whatever it might be.

Distraction can keep us from connecting, and if that happens for long enough, from remembering the connection at all. A lot of things can distract—hurt, being in love (the "love is blind" thing), falling in love with someone else. It may sometimes, or evermore, feel that the old thing was the distraction, and the new thing is what's best. How do we know which is which? Never mind, that's one for another time. Here's another question for another time: Are our bodies distracting our souls from their journeys, or are our bodies having the journeys our souls need for their perfection?

Our theme for April, then, is Distraction. And here are our Guidelines once again, for Drabbles— in summary, 100 words exactly, excluding the title, and due in by the 10th. (so Distraction Drabbles would be due in by March 15). One more thing—if there is any trouble with sending an email with a question, comment, or submission, please do try until the email goes through. See you next time!