Things My Mother Collected

Submitted into Contest #74 in response to: Write a story in the form of a top-ten list.... view prompt

46 comments

Drama Contemporary

Things My Mother Collected

A list by Dr. Alex Caldwell


1. Perfume


Some women have their signature scent. I thought my mom did, but it turns out that maybe her signature was her variety. There they were, three glass bottles, three little jewels sparkling on a polished silver tray on her worn white dresser. I thought I knew my mom. I thought the perfume in the short, fluted bottle, golden flowers and Swarovski crystals adorning the dome of its lid, was her scent—an ephemeral, flowery sillage, light and inoffensive. Whispers of Truth. I sprayed it in the air, watching the mist settle on the seafoam-green floral bedspread. If I closed my eyes it was like she was in the room with me. I half expected her to criticize my hair. 


Then I sprayed the next bottle, round and smooth like a polished rock, and realized that Whispers of Truth wasn’t her whole story. It was easy enough to mistake her other scents for something in the air—a hint of cinnamon or frankincense at Christmastime, a melancholy sandalwood on a cloudy day. I didn’t realize it was a presence she brought to the world, not the other way around.


My mom’s voice wafted in on a cloud of perfume: One for rainy days, one for holidays, one for everyday. The refrain bounced off the bed like a nursery rhyme. It could have been a nursery rhyme. I couldn’t remember her singing this to me, but here it was, lingering, her sillage.  


2. Asparagus


Everyone knew Jean Caldwell collected asparagus. When her birthday rolled around, or when she threw a Garden Club party and someone needed a hostess gift, something asparagus-themed was the reliable go-to.


My biggest question, in the beginning, was what to do with her asparagus—glass cabinets full of knick knacks and dessert plates, the asparagus dish towel still drooping over the door handle next to the kitchen sink, the asparagus potholder sitting on the counter near the stove. She even had a coffee mug, tall and narrow, that burgeoned into a tight, scaly ceramic tip. 


I didn’t want it (most of it, save the tea set painted with delicate botanical images of asparagus fern gone to seed), but it seemed wrong to just get rid of it when she’d been so proud of her collection. I could box it up, send a couple of pieces to Randi. The least my sister could do, after retreating into Florida's cloak of humidity and leaving me to sort out the house, would be to give a loving sanctuary to some of Mom's asparagus. And some for Til, maybe. It matches your hair, I'd tell her. My seventeen-year-old daughter would grimace and mumble an insincere "thanks" from behind those heavy green bangs. But she might appreciate it someday; this was her heritage. 


3. Magazines


The magazines were an easier question. I felt no compunction recycling the piles of grocery store magazines stacked in the bedroom I inhabited years and years ago. TV Guides from the nineteen eighties filled plastic storage bins. A rainbow of Cooking Light decorated the wooden racks on the light pink walls. 


"Ma, what do you keep these around for? When's the last time you opened one?" I did not hesitate to confront her about this when she was alive. It's something I brought up most visits. Was this our most consistent conversation? The thought made me angry.


"Last week," she'd insist. "You complain about the paper, but you don't complain about the pies."


The internet is full of pie recipes. Asparagus quiche, even, if an occasion ever called for it. I heaved the boxes into the blue recycling bin without stopping to look at the pages that were dog eared and paper clipped. 



4. Origami


The plastic shopping bag at the top of the laundry room cabinet, once I finally got down to the invisible, forgotten corners of the house, was a harder choice. I could easily have tossed it into the trash—run my hand through the hundreds of tightly folded paper packages to quickly check for hidden rolls of bills, then surrendered it to the landfill. 


But there was something about the deliberateness of the folds—these sheets of college-ruled binder paper, some of them beginning to curl at the corners, folded into flat origami envelopes—that hinted at their precious contents. 


I never took my mom for a writer. She never carried a spiral notebook around the house, never had a computer before her sixties. We never received personal letters in the mail, so I knew she didn’t keep correspondences. She didn’t even read much, except for her magazines. 


I picked a random envelope from the bag and untucked the crisply folded triangular flap. The paper rustled a sigh, whispering its secrets one rectangle of space at a time. 


5. Top-Ten Lists


The handwriting was definitely Mom’s. It was the same script I’d seen on grocery lists pinned to the refrigerator door under asparagus-shaped magnets, or the slips of paper she’d fold into my tin lunch box: “Good luck on your test,” or “To have friends you must show yourself friendly. Smile.” 


Her loose, looping letters, smooth and even, scrawled the title across the top of the page: Songs That Made Me Feel Things


I skimmed down the thin blue lines, labeled one through ten, and saw a few songs I recognized. Not songs that I could hear in her voice, but songs that had drifted across her record player or the family stereo over the years. I felt a twinge of pride to see “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes” on the list. When a lovely flame dies, smoke gets in your eyes. We played it at her memorial last month. It made me feel like I knew her, after all. 


It was nothing we’d discussed. She was 77. We probably should have discussed it, but the fact was we hadn't. She never brought it up, and who am I to say “Well, Ma, you’re getting up there now. We should probably talk about what you want your funeral to be like…” And it's not like she could say anything once she was on the ventilator. 


I set her list of songs down on the cool tile counter, plunged my hand into the shopping bag, and blindly fished out another envelope. Things I’ve Almost Forgotten. Again, it was numbered one to ten, like something you’d find in a magazine, or on Buzzfeed these days—those stupid articles where you have to click through 40 pages to find out the Top 10 Things You Should Never Say To Your Husband. 


But Mom’s list was all there on one page. The smell of her. How hard it was. What it felt like to be looked at…terse, but intriguing.


I returned the open envelopes to the shopping bag without re-folding them and set the bag next to my purse.



6. Loose-Leaf Tea


Tea was a bit of a ritual for mom. When we were home sick, or when I started having menstrual cramps, I could rely on one of her steaming concoctions. The steam would fog my glasses and, for a few minutes in my warm cocoon, I was blind to the world. 


Later, when I only visited Mom from across town, a Saturday afternoon, or a quick lunch break, she’d have a cup waiting when I arrived. We’d drink and nibble the butter cookies she always had on hand, and gossip. 


That night, after Paul and Til had gone to bed, when the house was mine and quiet enough for ghosts to roam between the leather sofas undeterred by the searing eyes of skeptics, I brewed a cup of the golden oolong that I’d taken home from her kitchen cabinet. I could hear Mom's voice: two minutes at two hundred degrees. I sipped on the smooth, nutty tea as I reached into the shopping bag and pulled out one origami envelope after another. They mingled there in my halo of lamp-light—the familiar taste of her tea, the familiar handwriting, the foreign ideas that seemed unlike my mother, except for the fact that each little packet was written like a top-ten list.


7. Memories


Some of the envelopes held collections of memories. The Ten Best Sunsets—I remembered that time at the lake where the sunset had been just as spectacular as the fireworks that followed, Randi and I under the big blanket, Mom and Dad joining in as the breeze skipped over the moon-chilled lake. Or in Things I Miss, I suddenly remembered the way Dad would laugh, cackle really, until it sounded like a dry cough.


Then there were the memories we had never shared. Hateful Things described the choir teacher who told second-grade Jean that she sang off-key and to sing more quietly. People Who Shaped Me described Patricia, who took her shopping for heels one lunch break. 


It wasn’t just Patricia. So many envelopes contained names I didn’t recognize. Mom had this whole life. I wondered if her right hand knew what her left was doing. I wondered if Dad and Patricia had ever met. I wondered who people like Lou and Bobby were. She never talked about any of them.



8. Regrets


The thickest envelope contained Things I Wish I Had Said. I took in the winding pen marks, some blue, some black, paragraphs crossed out, margins annotated, painstakingly wrought—hard to say, hard to write.


I sat with lukewarm tea in the asparagus cup and read all about the things my mother could not say.


1.How did you do that? It’s what I should have asked when Herb figured out how to program the VCR, when Jill came out with that picture-perfect bouquet, when the girls came home with laptop computers. I wasn’t taught to learn new tricks, and it’s embarrassing to ask. Still, I think of everything I could have learned, could have been able to do for myself. I wish I were better at asking.


2. Whatever. I hear kids these days say it. What I hear is “I don’t care. I’m rubber, you’re glue.” But I always cared. I was always glue, and so I was always scared.


3. No. I wasted a lot of time myself saying yes. Organizing this banquet or that. Before that there was Bobby, in the back seat of his car. I wanted to say no, but my voice froze. I wanted to tell the girls it’s ok to say no, but I couldn’t say no and interrupt the stream of cartoons. It’s rude to interrupt.


4. Enough. It’s like no. I’m drowning, but I can’t say I’ve had enough water. I’m outgrowing my pants, but I can’t say enough butter cookies. I couldn’t tell Herb “Enough golf already. Stay with us. I want to be enough.”


5. I was wrong. Would it have changed anything? It could have softened hearts along the way, especially with Herb. Men are weak; they need to hear it  bad listeners, so they need to have it spelled out for them. It didn’t have to be so hard.


6. Will you go out with me? I’m sorry it wasn’t more common in my day. We girls had our chance one dance per year, and even then I couldn’t muster up the courage to ask out Howard or Lou. It’s not that I’m complaining about the way life turned out. Herb was lovely for as long as he lasted. I loved Herb. It’s not that I wish I’d ended up with either of them. I just think I might have been a more confident person overall if I could have gotten the hang of this one. I don’t know. Chicken or egg? If I’d practiced back then, maybe I would have asked Herb out after we were married—dinner and dancing. Lord knows it would have done us good. Maybe I would have been able to start something with Jim before he got sick. You never know until you ask. I should have done more asking.


7. Thank you. Thank you. I’m good at that formal thank-you card. Queen of it, in fact—the one who will sit next to you at a wedding shower or baby shower and write down all the gifts so you can say your proper thank-yous. But I can’t for the life of me just take a compliment. “You look nice today, Jean.” I’m much more likely to say “Oh, phooey, I need to lose five pounds,” than I am to say a simple thank you. I don’t mean to argue. I just wish I could believe a compliment.


8. Listen to me! Sometimes I know things in my bones, but I don’t insist. I should have insisted, like when Herb put all that money into the dot-com bubble, or when Alex married Paul. We’re all fine. She’s fine, but I wanted better for her than that. I tell myself I couldn’t have made a difference. Could I, if I was more honest and less judgemental?


9. I miss you. Being lonely is not anyone’s fault is not a personal shortcoming. Why is it so hard to admit to being lonely? I don’t want to be a burden on the girls. What’s Randi going to do, drop her life in Florida? Randi could call more. All it would take are three words. The simplest bridge to construct, but those words are like nails in my throat. I can say it to Herb, now that he’s gone, now that it’s too late. I should have said it before. I need to say it to Patricia. I need Patricia.


10. I love you THIS much. “I love you” was never hard, but it was cheap. Saying just how much was always the hard part. Where are the words? I’m not the best at finding words, but I know they’re out there. So much I get a lump in my throat like I’ve just swallowed a full moon? I’m not poetic like Alex or direct like Randi. So much that I leave you alone even when it hurts? So much I could stick you in a pie and eat you for lunch? I’m still looking for the words.


9. Shadows


Inside each of us is a forest. I always thought of my mom’s as a place where sunlight filtered through groves of white-trunked birches, casting a shadow of lace on the packed earth, maybe a place where animals could smile and talk. 


Maybe more accurately, her forest was an asparagus garden where thin, coiffed stalks blossomed into frilly fronds. 


In the fall, Mom’s asparagus garden grew into a loose, feathery hedge that completely hid the back fence until she trimmed it to the ground before winter to make way for spring’s tender shoots. Those, too, she would trim every day. Asparagus, it occurred to me, was a frequent act of negation, of being consumed. 


I had always judged my mom by her positive space alone. Most people do this with each other, I think. It’s easy to see the light fall on someone’s shoulders and attach in strands of auburn hair, shining like the silver filaments that would be her final destiny. It’s easy to confuse the light with the person, without noticing the shadow she casts. We see the shadow as something else, as part of the world, and not something that she brings to it.  


Mom was the president of the Garden Club. She knew that shadows can nurture, like the dirt she heaped over one corner of the asparagus garden. Her sweet white stalks never saw the sun. Sunday stalks, she called them, reserved for special dinners. Without sunlight, they never developed the bitter chlorophyll taste.


I always thought I became myself in opposition to my mother. My forest was denser and darker than hers, the paths more narrow, the brambles more snarled. Now I saw it was from her that I learned the art of cultivation.


10. Doubts


Not everything that grows in the shade is sweet. I didn’t want to let my secrets become my regrets. I wanted to be angry at her for being weak, but I found myself admiring her for knowing what she wanted, or at least putting in the work to figure it out.


I wanted to call Randi and say “You’ll never believe this…” I wanted to go into Matilda’s room and watch her sleep, arm limp over the edge of her bed, hair cascading like moss over her pillow. And Paul...I wasn’t sure what I wanted. I wanted to swallow the moon whole, but I had no appetite.


I wanted to be mad at Mom for what she’d written about Paul—about me and Paul—but somehow I was not surprised by it. She’d said as much in our afternoon teas without using those words. It rang through the choice morsels of gossip she shared: “Randi and Dave are redecorating their beach house. They’re making some driftwood sculpture. I’m glad they have something to pursue together…” Accusation always ran rampant in her negative space, between the lines.


I sipped my now-cold tea and wondered, were I to write such a list, which unspoken phrase would be at the top. With Paul, things hung in the balance between “I miss you” and “enough.” 


Mom spent her life wondering about her relationships and her place in them; she may have found out too late. I didn’t want to wait around. I wanted to know. That was the scent she left with me.


January 01, 2021 06:32

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46 comments

Scout Tahoe
19:32 Jan 02, 2021

I love this story so much. I read it and I connected. I'll have you know that.

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A.Dot Ram
20:13 Jan 02, 2021

Wonderful! I am so serious that I consciously (or stream of consciously) wrote some of this in a Scout Tahoesque style.

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Scout Tahoe
20:15 Jan 02, 2021

Haha, I wish. This is all you. "Scout Tahoesque style" "A.dot Ramesque" style is better.

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I'll just be over here, crying... You're amazing.

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A.Dot Ram
17:14 Jan 04, 2021

You're amazing for saying so.

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Ann Sable
23:45 Jan 02, 2021

Oh wow, I loved it so much! (Have not read the rest of the stories yet though) It amazed me how subtly the top 10 list turned into the full story, while still remaining a list. I enjoyed the shadows of different plots: the complicated relationships of the narrator, the mother's story, et cetera. The sort of unfinished nature of them gave some additional dramatic realism I really enjoyed. Thank you very much, and I am off to read the rest of your stories :D

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A.Dot Ram
00:15 Jan 03, 2021

Oh, thank you! I'm glad the shadows were more intriguing than annoying. I hope you'll let me know what you think of the rest.

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Ann Sable
16:37 Jan 03, 2021

Sure, I am looking forward to spending the rest of the evening today reading your works :) I think the intriguing of it achieved two things: it intensified the realism of the story, which made it even more enjoyable for me, and also it made more curious in other stories of yours. I think I will be able to say more though, only after finishing reading the others, to see how they fit together, but I am already a big fan :DD

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Kristin Neubauer
15:50 Jan 01, 2021

This is amazing.... when I looked at the prompts, I didn’t have the faintest idea of how to tell a story through a top ten list. You have not only told one story, but several - the story of the narrator’s mother, the story of her death, the story of their relationship, the story of the narrator learning about her mother. Wow. I also love the simplicity juxtaposed to the complexity.... the simple act of going through the belongings of a deceased parent next to the complexity of the parent herself. And all written with such clarity and poig...

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A.Dot Ram
18:44 Jan 01, 2021

2021 is young, but so far you've made my year with that comment. Yeah, this story is pretty epic, almost overwhelming with everything going on, the the top 10 list is a very elastic format with lots of between-the-lines space built in. I think that's why I was drawn to it. Also, I was listening to Octavia Butler's Parable of the Talents earlier this week in which the top- level narrator is reacting to her mother's journals, which are the main plot. I knew I wanted to try something in that vein.

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08:30 Jan 01, 2021

This writings is beyond the usual factious writings. What i learned in your writings is the way how you built paragraphs literary as of i thought it when i were a high school student. First you write the theme on the first line of the paragraph . example from your paragraphs titled Doubts " Not everything that grows in the shade is sweet." is the main theme of your paragraph and then you will describe it by step by step. And all your steps are similar. Each titles given to each stanzas are the lists of the main title "Things My Mother Col...

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A.Dot Ram
23:32 Jan 02, 2021

Thank you! I'm glad you were able to appreciate this on a stylistic, technical level. Of course fiction has a lot more wiggle room than your typical five-paragraph essay, but sometimes those fundamentals come in handy for unpacking ideas. One square at a time, like origami.

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Shea West
03:30 Jan 09, 2021

Anne!!! Just all up in my feels tonight, this was so lovely. Number 8 was such a great subsection of the list that felt so right. I'm sharing this story with my friend who wrote a non-fiction piece the other day about her own mom...it made me think of this. She wrote about what she wish people would ask her, and it was all about her mother. Things like, "What did your mother carry in her purse?" and "What ordinary things was she good at?" It's a reminding that we care about those who have passed, but all those little details get lost in the...

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A.Dot Ram
19:15 Jan 09, 2021

This is great. I live all the sharing and would be happy to read your friend's story too if it's published.

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Shea West
23:05 Jan 09, 2021

I'd love to share it, she's currently undergoing chemotherapy and lost her mom to cancer years ago.https://composingkaterose.com/?p=104&fbclid=IwAR06SphMCVBPMNZ9505huiIbJLmgd3y_WCqGs7eLsf9sfWirJH6X3_bHo7E

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Shea West
23:05 Jan 09, 2021

I'd love to share it, she's currently undergoing chemotherapy and lost her mom to cancer years ago.https://composingkaterose.com/?p=104&fbclid=IwAR06SphMCVBPMNZ9505huiIbJLmgd3y_WCqGs7eLsf9sfWirJH6X3_bHo7E

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Shea West
23:05 Jan 09, 2021

I'd love to share it, she's currently undergoing chemotherapy and lost her mom to cancer years ago.https://composingkaterose.com/?p=104&fbclid=IwAR06SphMCVBPMNZ9505huiIbJLmgd3y_WCqGs7eLsf9sfWirJH6X3_bHo7E

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Vanessa Marczan
23:28 Jan 07, 2021

Hey mama, it may look as though I have just randomly gone through and liked a whole bunch of your stories, but I truly do love your work. I am a huge fan of yours and always look forward to your next submissions! 👏👏👏 Keep it up!

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A.Dot Ram
08:19 Jan 10, 2021

I am a fan in return!

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Julie Ward
20:16 Jan 06, 2021

I've been saving this story for a quiet moment. I read the first paragraph a few days ago and knew it was going to be special. There is so much going on with this story and you wove each strand so beautifully with such incredible detail. As I read each section, I felt like I was unfolding an origami envelope, with beautiful handwriting on college-ruled paper. I loved it, Anne, you surpassed my expectations. (Although that's no surprise.)

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A.Dot Ram
02:17 Jan 07, 2021

Thanks. I did realize partway through that the whole story was like origami, but I started with the literal folded paper. Great catch.

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Philip Alexander
20:09 Jan 03, 2021

I like this phrase a lot -- Without sunlight, they never developed the bitter chlorophyll taste. I firmly believe that your narrator is investigating her Mother in an asparagus-shaped house. This was wonderful. The way you weave characters together, along with explorations of them in an intimate prose are deep, colourful and entertaining. Great job.

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Bianka Nova
18:20 Jan 03, 2021

I've been wanting to read something of yours for awhile. Finally got to it and I think I picked a good one. Although, the number of wins and shortlists tells me all (most) are. :) Loved this story and how everything is tied together. The daughter picking up the habit of the mother to write top 10 lists, but she ends up doing it in a completely different way and taking her life in a different direction. I think you managed to get really deep into the essence of the main characters (mother and daughter in this one), but I'll definitely be bac...

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A.Dot Ram
18:28 Jan 03, 2021

Thanks for checking it out! What do you most recommend from your portfolio?

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Bianka Nova
19:22 Jan 03, 2021

It was a pleasure ;) I'm not sure. What kind of story do you feel like reading? Some suggestions might be: - Stuck with you - a lot of people seemed to connect to this one because of the pretty authentic characters, although the story itself is nothing super special - A darker timeline - the darkest and most dramatic story I have, also first time I used the 2nd person POV. It may feel a bit confusing, but I like how it turned out - The assignment - if you need a good laugh or maybe even Got Milk? - if you need a laugh, combined with some ...

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06:49 Jan 03, 2021

This was really great. I love your writing. I love how you did top ten lists within the top ten lists! And it was all so poetic. My least favorite was #9, you kind of lost me, and my interest. I didn't exactly get it. But that may be my own failing. :)

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A.Dot Ram
08:22 Jan 10, 2021

Thanks for this comment. In hindsight, #9 makes a big leap and references another story with the same character. I also pulled just about every possible nutrient from asparagus, which is certainly not to everyone's taste-- no faking on your part! I hope #10 pulled you back in.

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David G.
18:01 Jan 02, 2021

You write beautiful prose. A lot of this is almost poetry. I always look forward to reading your stuff. The end bit about Paul and her self-reflection about her own marriage came a little out of the blue. Perhaps find a way to subtly introduce Paul earlier in the story? Just an idea.

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A.Dot Ram
18:34 Jan 02, 2021

Thank you. I'm kind of with you on Paul. I've been thinking about it. Somewhere above #8, right? I snuck the other family members in. He should have a place, too. He's harder.

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David G.
20:44 Jan 02, 2021

Maybe put in a reference to Paul in number 2. Perhaps she is considering taking the asparagus pottery home, but thinks maybe Paul will object to it, or that he doesn’t like sentimental objects like that. Or maybe that’s not in character for Paul. It depends on who Paul is, I suppose.

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A.Dot Ram
21:26 Jan 02, 2021

There lies the challenge-- coming up with yet one more story to hint at in about one line. I considered asparagus, also loose leaf tea and memories. At this point I'm going for something noncommittal :-P

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David G.
21:36 Jan 02, 2021

That’s probably the right call!

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A.Dot Ram
23:34 Jan 02, 2021

Ok, I got Paul into #5 and #6 before my story got frozen. I'm glad you said something. It was bugging me a little bit, and hearing that validated by someone else gave me enough motivation to fix it.

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A.Dot Ram
06:38 Jan 01, 2021

This format begged for something experimental. I hope you enjoy. These characters and themes appear on others of my stories as well, so they're starting to build on each other. Here's the chronology of them for anyone who cares: 1. Landscape of the Soul 2. Things My Mother Collected 3. The Heart Beneath the Bib

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