Wednesday's Words on a Friday

On Wednesdays, assorted people have been taking monthly turns at putting up a selection of six (or twelve) words which is called “Words for Wednesday”.

We have taken over this meme from Delores, who had been having computer problems.
This month the meme continues here, at Elephant’s Child with words supplied by Margaret and Sue.

Essentially the aim is to encourage us to write.   

Each week we are given a choice of prompts: which can be words, phrases, music or an image.   What we do with those prompts is up to us:  a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore...

Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog.  I would really like it if as many people as possible joined into this fun meme.  If you are posting on your own blog - let me know so that I, and other participants, can come along and applaud.
I’m hopeless at poetry so I always do a story.

It’s a fun challenge…why not join in?

This week we have two phrases to work with:

1. A little of what you fancy does you good
2. Absence makes the heart grow fonder

Here are my stories:

1. I'd heard it said that absence makes the heart grow fonder, but I knew that wasn't always true. It certainly wasn't true right now, for me. George had been gone for a while and I sure as heck didn't feel any fondness growing in my heart for him. He was off somewhere chasing his youth, cavorting with that skinny redhead who had shamelessly chased him until he caught her. I'd cried bitter tears while signing the divorce papers his lawyer had mailed to me.

Yesterday, he'd phoned and asked if I could pack up the rest of his clothes for him. "Of course," I'd said, through gritted teeth, "I'll pack everything into that big black case and leave it on the front porch for you."

 I'd begun with the small things, underpants, socks, ties; carefully singeing each item on the backyard barbecue, then laying them out to cool. Then I worked my way through his side of the wardrobe, slashing and ripping apart his hand-made shirts and dropping the remnants into the suitcase. Only his suits remained. I snipped the buttons off the jackets, then cut the legs off the pants, turning them into obscenely short shorts, which I balled up and tossed into the case.

I took the jackets and pants legs into George's office where the big heavy-duty shredder stood. Capable of cutting even thick cardboard into confetti, it should do this job nicely. I turned it on and fed first the jackets, then the pants legs into those whirling, slashing teeth, while imagining the two of them driving into a speeding train, or perhaps drowning on a sinking boat.


2. I sat on the couch feeling disgusted with myself. I'd been trying on my summer shorts and discovering none of them fit anymore. My own fault, I knew. A whole winter of "treating" myself had done the damage. 

I thought of my childhood, when treats were rare and random. We never knew when they were coming. Out of the blue, instead of the fruit plate for our afternoon snack, there would be a slice of chocolate cake, or apple pie. Sometimes, oh joy!, a couple of truffles from a box Mum had brought back from town. 

My sister Jeanette, that goody two-shoes, would eat slowly, savouring every mouthful, before rinsing her plate and hands at the sink, then going back to whatever chore she'd been doing. I tried to copy her, but always ended up gobbling the sweetness and begging for more.       "No, Elizabeth," Mum would say. "A little of what you fancy does you good, more quickly becomes a habit, and once you start having these treats on a daily basis, they're no longer special." I would sulk and slam doors on my way out to feed the chooks.

Later, when my marriage broke down, I'd been miserable and had "treated" myself, telling myself that I deserved this little bit of happiness daily. But today, staring at the pile of shorts and tops I could no longer button up around my now fat body, I realised mum had been right. The cream cakes, the biscuits, the chocolate truffles were no longer "treats". I barely tasted them anymore, eating purely from habit. 

I walked into the kitchen and fed the rest of the cake into the garbage disposal unit, followed by the cream biscuits.  I put the truffles into the freezer.