A Comfy Kind Of Restless

Hey!

So we have come to the last part of the story!

(Here’s the rest-scroll down for the instalment you need)

Textfixer gave me these:

and off I went 😉

Violence   Vixen   Groan   Greasy   Binocular   Allowable   Expert   Guideline   Bounce

According to Abe and his colleagues at the FBI, this ex of hers had been violence incarnate.  He had kept tabs on every woman he had ever been with, but appeared particularly obsessed with Mary.  She’d never really talked about him, and always liked to come across as a self-assured ‘vixen’, so I was shocked when Abe told me it had got as far out of hand at one stage.

Abe said that the first sound Mary had made when they found her was a groan.  She’d been tied up on the floor of a greasy, run down kitchen in a back alley.  Apparently, she’d been beaten so badly her binocular vision was affected permanently – if I had known that I would never have performed with her.  It gives me palpitations even now when I think of how lucky we were every night…

Her ex was not the kind of man to let such a prized ‘possession’ go easily.  She was pursued across state lines many times and only had a few years of peace while he was behind bars for something else.

There were miniscule margins for errors allowable in the plan.  Gavrill was an expert at illusions, and meticulous in his planning; so I tried to quell my anxieties that night.  Gavrill had gone over every guideline with Mary and me numerous times, and we had managed to keep the specifics from Maria.  She had to believe her mother was falling to her death, too.  That was the part I really hated about the plan, but it needed to be that way to keep her safe.

As the night drew nearer, I knew I couldn’t watch.  Even with Gavrill’s assurances,  I couldn’t help thinking of his son and how bitterly he was still missed…

Mary and I planned to use my car afterwards to get her to that late flight.

When I heard the news I ran, and somehow expected it all to be part of her ‘farewell flourish’.  People were saying that the audience watched her head bounce up horribly, which ultimately caused irreparable damage and killed her very quickly.

Maria did not touch Mary’s limp body, and I have never seen her cry about it.  She’s just thrown herself into work and doesn’t want me to be sad, either.  “She died doing what she loved” she says.  She’s so much stronger than me.

As I watch Maria going through Mary’s routines in those same costumes, I can almost trick myself into believing we never lost her.  Mary’s expressions and mannerisms live on in our daughter as if somehow Mary’s spirit is woven into the ceiling of the big top itself; breathing her essence into everything Maria undertakes.

Thank you again to Michelle for choosing the inspirational photo, and I hope you will all join me after the weekend for another story based on a prompt (which I always need your help with, so please visit my Facebook sticky post challenge…link is below).

See you soon!

Pssst!!! I need inspiration for the coming weeks – follow the instructions on my Facebook’s ‘sticky post’ challenge if you want to help me out by choosing a picture and generator for me to play with!

Come visit the Facebook page and follow @ComfyRestless on Twitter

Copyright © 2018  Montaffera All Rights Reserved

Please do not use any of my content (posts, pictures, poetry etc) without my permission, but feel free to link back to my blog if something catches your eye. Thank you!

Hello!

(Here are parts one, two and three)

These are the words Textfixer pumped out for me today:

Phenomenal  Blame   Heroes   Dolphins   Invention   Jack-knife   Friend   Federal   Hectic

There was a phenomenal amount of press coverage when mum died.  Most of the tabloids seemed to hint at dad being to blame.  Like all tragic heroes in life, he still thinks that way.  His name was cleared pretty quickly, but he regrets not being there that night.

I was there, however.  I saw what she did.

“Even dolphins are not monogamous, it’s not an intelligent move to stick with just one lover” he’d said afterwards, gesturing towards the big pool across the grounds.  “It’s just an invention of your romantic mind to think she was all mine.  But I loved her.”

I couldn’t comprehend him at the time, and I still struggle with that point of view.  It had all seemed so simple as I watched her jack-knife to the floor.

Our circus family gathered round us, dad had a friend from university in some federal position that quickened the autopsy; and we were ok again.

Life soon became hectic as my talents were recognised (at long last).  I could do all of mum’s stunts, and I brought Marco on board to help; unfortunately, dad refused to perform with me.  It was not quite how I had envisioned it, but no matter.

Pssst!!! I need inspiration for the coming weeks – follow the instructions on my Facebook’s ‘sticky post’ challenge if you want to help me out and choose a picture and generator for me to play with!

Come visit the Facebook page and follow @ComfyRestless on Twitter

Copyright © 2018  Montaffera All Rights Reserved

Please do not use any of my content (posts, pictures, poetry etc) without my permission, but feel free to link back to my blog if something catches your eye. Thank you!

Hey 🙂

I still have no real idea where this story is heading, but it seems to be the father talking in tonight’s piece.

From Textfixer

(Here are parts one and two if you missed them)

Camel   Meat   Prime   Beads   Hangover   Mushroom   Melt   Behold   Illegal

“In my country, there are camel butchers!”

I am not convinced that this argument should have mentioned the animal’s meat; now not only the keeper but the beast itself was grumpy.  I swear that camel could understand everything us humans said.

This is a prime example of why I don’t live here.  Any time, day or night, there seems to be a passionate exchange.  I know these are performing people, but it wears on me.  The sequins and beads I can handle, but I like to retreat after the show, not earn a bruised hangover by having a punch-up behind a trailer – while high after Madam Vogera’s ‘special’ mushroom stroganoff…

I stood watching the strong words escalate, biding my time to step in and calm things down.  It is what I do, how I made their icy stares melt when Mary first brought me here.  I care about them all, I care about their troubles and see how hard they work.  I know they are family to each other in every sense of the word.  Lo and behold, just as I thought my services were needed, Ammon said something so ludicrous in his anger that  Gregor leaned against his camel and roared with laughter; which made Ammon follow suit.  Then there was the shaking of hands and a promise to share whatever illegal herb was to be added to that night’s evening meal.  I was again glad that I would be heading home for a microwaved meal and some tame television.

I read this on Wikipedia about camel meat.  I’m not going to try it any time soon, though.

I wrote today’s piece with eldest going absolutely crackers in the background, so I think the tenses are out and I was also quite surprised it hung together at all…

I am hoping tomorrow’s words boost my imagination and I figure out what the point is behind all this chat the two speakers have given us so far.  C’mon subconscious, do your stuff 😉

Pssst!!! I need inspiration for next week – please follow the instructions on my Facebook’s ‘sticky post’ challenge if you want to help me out and choose a picture and generator for me to play with! Thaaaank Yoooou!!

Come visit the Facebook page and follow @ComfyRestless on Twitter

Copyright © 2018  Montaffera All Rights Reserved

Please do not use any of my content (posts, pictures, poetry etc) without my permission, but feel free to link back to my blog if something catches your eye. Thank you!

Hi!

Today Textfixer gave me ‘hoopla’ in the mix!  Weird…

We are on to the second instalment of this week’s story; here is part one if you need it.

Hoopla   Salt   Humility   Innocent   Crusher   Forlornness   Block   Feather   Cursed

It’s not all hoopla stalls, and it’s more salt of the earth than villains that make up circus life.  I’m not best friends with an elephant, nor do I have a pet monkey. (My dad used to read me Enid Blyton’s books too, you know).

I face stereotyping a lot: people are surprised that I chose this.  I’m not going to embrace a false humility, I’m proud of what I do.   I wasn’t forced into it as some poor innocent, nor was I running away.  I have talents outside of the tent, but the business of putting on a show is my first love. 

Never be the crusher of someone’s idea of a dream life, even if it looks wildly different to yours.  We work hard here, but we follow our passions.  The thrill of a crowd-gasp reverberates deep in my soul, I’m not going to sit around like dad does: wallowing in my forlornness, trying to block out emotions that should be expressed.

The world looks at its best from high up.  I can see the lie of the land, rise above the mundane – soar although I wear but one feather on my head…

It’s a physical poetry.  It should not be sullied by superstitious nay-sayers and claims that its cursed.

Freedom is living with little regret.  Something my father refuses to learn.

A different voice today.  I wasn’t expecting that!  She seems suitably theatrical though, I might grow to like her 😉

See you tomorrow for part three…

Pssst!!! I need inspiration for next week – please follow the instructions on my Facebook’s ‘sticky post’ challenge if you want to help me out and choose a picture and generator for me to play with! Thaaaank Yoooou!!

Come visit the Facebook page and follow @ComfyRestless on Twitter

Copyright © 2018  Montaffera All Rights Reserved

Please do not use any of my content (posts, pictures, poetry etc) without my permission, but feel free to link back to my blog if something catches your eye. Thank you!

Hey there 😉

One of my regular readers, Michelle, gave me this picture as a prompt today, and asked me to use Textfixer as my generator to guide the story I compile this week.  I think this may be another fun assignment!

I first got Textfixer to give me five words that could make up the title:

Words: thin, diametric, complicated, expressive, cloth.

I liked the sound of Expressive Cloth because I thought there could be many connotations when related to a circus environment.  I then researched Circus Roncalli a bit (as it is the name on the side of the trailer in the pic) and Wikipedia said that ‘Roncalli’ is also the legal surname of the popular Pope John XXIII.  Another ‘cloth’ reference…

‘Godsent’ then came up as one of my nine-word mix, along with the name Mary.  The universe is having fun again, obviously! 😉

Dial   Fugitive   Sideways   Comrade   Companion   Godsent   Hot   Live   Mary

I tried not to be jealous, dial down the fugitive feelings of inadequacy and age that always accompanied my witnessing of rehearsals.  As I watched her nimble body twist sideways and fly between the apparatus as if suspended on strings, I knew I was failing.  Every muscle was reminiscing.  I longed to climb that ladder again.

“Comrade!” he boomed from somewhere to my left, “you are thinking of her mother, no?  Every day I see that look on your face: how you are her companion up there in spirit.  Pulls at the strings of my heart!” he thumped me on the back.  “I salute you for letting your daughter carry on the traditions!  Her talent is godsent, my friend.”

I nodded, did not trust myself to speak.  Gavrill knows only too well what it is like to lose a loved one to this business.  I gripped his shoulder in solidarity, and made my way back to the trailer.  Hot tea awaited me; along with a summary of my fortune, if I refused to live better with my grief.  I didn’t need a woman festooned in scarves to tell me this; my memories of Mary were becoming harder and harder to bear.

Lots of backstory in just 201 words, eh?!  Wonder where my protagonist will go from here.  Come back tomorrow and we’ll see what nudges Textfixer gives me…

Pssst!!! I need inspiration for next week – please follow the instructions on my Facebook’s ‘sticky post’ challenge if you want to help me out and choose a picture and generator for me to play with! Thaaaank Yoooou!!

Come visit the Facebook page and follow @ComfyRestless on Twitter

Copyright © 2018  Montaffera All Rights Reserved

Please do not use any of my content (posts, pictures, poetry etc) without my permission, but feel free to link back to my blog if something catches your eye. Thank you!