The Flash Fiction Challenge on Chuck Wendig's blog yesterday was: Write a story in three sentences.
Whaaaaatttt????? But I love lots and lots and lots of sentences!!!!! Haven't you seen my Facebook posts??? Oh, ya. No, he hasn't. Plus, it's supposed to be a challenge, so I guess if he had seen my page he'd certainly not choose to change it. Though, he'd likely rub his hands together while whispering with childish pleasure,"Excellent....."
Anyhooo, I went ahead and stepped up. Took on his challenging challenge. And--though it's not the greatest short story ever--it was fun! And peeking at most of the others, I've discovered that actually, you can write a story with three sentences! And it can be good!!
I'll share mine with you here, and I encourage you to check out his blog to read some of the others, and possibly step up to the challenge yourself! Not only will you get a kick out of it, you'll also be eligible to win a copy of his e-book, 30 Days in the Word Mines.
My Three Sentence Story
It’s not true that being autistic means I don’t want friends. I have ideas and thoughts that tumble around in my brain and when I catch them I want desperately to share them with someone; a friend would be nice. But my ideas won’t come out of my brain, and they never fit in with the people around me–though they would give them something to consider–and so with years and years of practice I learned to be my own friend, which is more than you can honestly say.
So, that's my three sentence story. And you know what? I kinda like it!!
As a matter of fact, I started liking it enough to call my brother, Dar, to see what he thought. You see, of everyone I know, he's the most like the character I imagined when writing my three sentence story, and I wanted to know what his opinion was.
Besides, I miss him!
So I called my son, Jory, who's staying with Dar while my mom travels for work. Asking him to hand the phone over to his uncle, I said a quick hi to my bro. "Hey Dar! How are you?"
"I miffff," he responded immediately.
"I miss you too! Hey, I wrote a three sentence story today and I want to know what you think of it. Can I read it to you?"
"Yeff." His answer was quick, but then I waited while I heard my son reminding him to hold the phone on his ear. Once I felt his attention return, I began reading.
After finishing, I asked with trepidation,"Sooooo.... do you like it?"
"Might." He answered.
"You might? You might like it?"
"Yeff. aaaaaa ummmm might."
I laughed and thanked him for listening. My son came back to the phone.
"I guess he might like it," my son was laughing.
While saying goodbye to my boy and putting the phone in it's cradle, I was smiling to myself.
Years ago I wouldn't have imagined that I could have a conversation with my brother on the phone. No way. Yet today I called him expecting to get an idea of his opinion. Wanting it and expecting it.
It seems that he was willing to step up to a challenge too!
We all have challenges. Whether it's sharing our opinions, communicating in general, getting around town, accepting ourselves, or writing three sentence stories. And we all know that the best way to get beautiful things out of those challenges is to accept them and say "YES" to doing something proactive about them!
So for those of you who are ready to accept a three sentence story challenge, go ahead and give it a try, HERE.
As you can see, it's been an amazing and insightful gift for me. Getting to participate in a challenge, chat with my brother and learn that he's not as impressed with my story as I am. And then, share it all with you.
And in only three sentences!!!
tee hee!!!
Hugs, smiles, and love!!!
Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)
 |
| My brother, Dar. |
