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Victoria MacDonald

Author on Reedsy Prompts since May, 2021

Stories (9)

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9 Stories

202 karma pts

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Infinite Learning Curve

Victoria MacDonald

Submitted to Contest #157

Infinite Learning Curve My bladder summons me out of a dream. I grumble at the familiar arthritic pain as I limp down the hall to do my business. Gazing out my picture window at another summer morning, I see a young couple, fresh and nimble, strolling hand in hand. I imagine morphing back to my twenties. There were euphoric, magic moments, but oh, so fleeting. My father often quoted the famous words, “Youth is wasted on the young.” So interesting how that truth has finally...

11 likes

Three Perspectives

Victoria MacDonald

Submitted to Contest #140

MY SIDE OF THE STORY...I remember meeting Lorraine one blindingly sunny day at Shoppers Drug Mart. My head throbbed, and I leaned heavily on the shopping cart for support. I’d overdone it on the vino again. About ten years younger, she beamed from behind the cosmetics counter as I entered the store. I was buying perfume and mints as cover-up, and offered a “Cheshire Cat” smile to disguise my self-loathing. “Hi! I’ve seen you shop in here a lot. Do you live in the neighborhood?”“Just up the street.”“Oh wow, me too! I love living nea...

5 likes

Meeting My Parents

Victoria MacDonald

Submitted to Contest #100

As a young woman in my early twenties, I was desperate for my parents to meet and approve of Peter. I was euphoric, madly in love. My mother, a no-nonsense psychiatrist, was harder to win over than my father, so I focused my rehearsed speech on her.“I hope you like him, Mom. He is very polite and very kind to me. And he told me he loves me. Isn’t that wonderful?”“I see. Well, I’m preparing a Thanksgiving dinner. You can bring Peter if you want. Be here by 6:00 on Sunday.”“I’ll ask him. Thanks, Mom.” Her invitation provoked a wave of anxiety....

22 likes

Woodstock Festival - Summer of '69

Victoria MacDonald

Submitted to Contest #99

It was the summer of ’69. I wore beads and bell-bottoms, oozed love and peace with a pasted-on smile, and chanted, “Far out…Groovy” at every opportunity. My boyfriend George was “jazzed” about an “outta sight” concert called The Woodstock Festival. “Let’s split this scene and go! It’ll be unreal! We can’t miss it!” I hid my anxiety about leaving the comforts of home. “Far out,” I smiled.So George persuaded his buddy, Ray to be our driver. We packed camping gear, canned food, and, most important, our stockpile of grass, hash, and LSD.&nb...

7 likes

Food For Thought

Victoria MacDonald

Submitted to Contest #96

FOOD FOR THOUGHT Have you ever been voluntold? When it happened to me, I felt swept away by an undertow, with nobody to rescue me. New in recovery from alcoholism, I was eager to gain approval by helping others. Lorraine, sober for five years and working as a counselor in a woman’s shelter, introduced Jean to me at a meeting. Jean had just finished an in-patient treatment program for drugs and alcohol, and was living in a transitional home. “Jean could use the support of someone like you, with a solid year in sobriety,” said Lorraine. ...

6 likes

Taking Stock

Victoria MacDonald

Submitted to Contest #95

Taking Stock Adolescence, as far as I’m concerned, is a tumultuous period of insanity. I would never want to relive those days. Thank God, when faced with a dilemma, I was miraculously able to make one wise decision. Healthy choices were rarely the norm. In 1965, when I was fifteen...

9 likes

Earning Respect

Victoria MacDonald

Submitted to Contest #94

Earning Respect “I double-triple dare you!” challenged my long-time friend, Nadine. She knew me well, had endured my tendency to stuff anger, adopt a victim role, and complain to anyone other than the person who had, in my mind, injured me. She was tormenting me, ridiculing my passivity, telling me how to stand up for myself in no uncertain terms. I’d griped to her non-stop about my mother-in-law, who’d accepted a birthday invitation for dinner and a movie, but had abruptly changed her mind and asked me for the cash instead. The nerve! But I...

9 likes

Social Lubricant Gone Wrong

Victoria MacDonald

Submitted to Contest #93

Social Lubricant Gone Wrong “Victoria, you’ve GOT to come to the party! Norm’s retiring!” “I’ll try,” I hedged, hating the prospect of mingling with co-workers. It was the last day of school. Depleted, burned-out, I wanted to retreat for the summer holidays and start my vacation by drinking the large bottle of wine that one of the parents had given me. I routinely wallowed in the melodrama of loneliness like a soap-opera star. Weekends were solitary, dreary, wine-hazed pity-parties-for-one, as I sprawled on my sofa to watch TV shows about...

12 likes

Toads, Chipmunks. Ants and Snakes - A Tribute To Early Mentors

Victoria MacDonald

Submitted to Contest #92

Toads, Chipmunks, Ants and Snakes – A Tribute to Early Mentors (Words: 1,858) In the spring of 1958, not long before I turn eight, my mother announces at the dinner table that we own our very own cottage. She explains that she has found a great bargain through a friend at work. The lady who sold her the property is leaving the kitchen table and dishes for us to use, as well as some cots, a dock and a boat. “We’ll drive up north to see it next weekend,” she adds. My father lifts his goblet of wine for a toast. My mother, older brot...

13 likes