Writing Prompt #3

You receive an unmarked envelope with a check for $5 000 000 inside. Its a legitimate check. What do you do with it? Do you ever find out who it is from? How does it change your life?

Five million dollars. The cheque was made out in my name, but the envelope was completely bare and gave no hint as to its origin.  It was mixed in with my mail for the day, but it has been obviously hand delivered.

I stared at the cheque not knowing what to do. Five million dollars would change my life, but who was it from. Somehow it felt wrong to use the money without knowing where and from whom it was sent. Who would give me this kind of money? No one I knew had access to these kind of funds. There must be strings attached, I thought.

Still highly suspicious, I nevertheless could not tear it up. Instead I opened an offshore bank account, choosing the Isle of Mann for their interest rates and tax benefits, and deposited the cheque. Now that it was safely deposited, I had some breathing room to consider the next steps.

I decided quite firmly that I would not spend a single dollar of the money. There's an old saying, "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth." But this was one horse I just could not accept blindly. What if someone came looking for it years from now. What would I do? No, the money would stay where it was, untouched.

However, I am not a saint. The interest on the money,now that I would use. 0.5 % interest on five million dollars is still a princely sum of $2000 per month. I would then donate half that every month to a random charity, leaving me with a monthly income of a thousand dollars. With a thousand dollars extra every month, I would be able to pay off mine and my parents home loans. With those home loans taken care of, I would be free to use my salary to take my family on a yearly holiday, all over the world. My parents, my husband and children, would experience everything life has to offer, everything that's within my power to give. We would travel to world historic sites marvel at all that came before. We would holiday at rarely visited places and when the quiet gets too much, adjourn to the hubbub of New York, Paris, London.

In my will, I would stipulate that the original money be left alone in a trust, and only the interest will be available for us. The monthly income will be my legacy to my children. The amount not so large that they can afford to be lazy or entitled, and yet large enough to provide a cushion when they fall. Even if I never find out from whom the cheque came, I would be grateful every single day for the rest of my life.

Writing Prompt #2

You find out that you will die in five years or less. How did you find this out? What would you do in those five years?
 /** NOTE : obviously this is a fictional account as I have not been given 5 years to live. **/

 
"Five years to live." The words left the doctors lips and crashed into my brain leaving me reeling. They began a looping echo while I stared stupidly at him. His lips continued moving and random sounds reached my ears, but it was as if he had suddenly switched to speaking chinese.

I had gone in for my regular checkup and had mentioned to the doctor that my headaches were getting worse and that I had failed to have my monthly hormonal changes for the last 3 months. He had ordered an MRI. "Just to be safe", he said. When it was done and I was back in his office awaiting the results, he looked at me gravely and said the words that everyone dreads but never truly expects to hear. "Tumour."

He said it was still small, just sitting on my pituitary. In fact, it may not even be cancerous. However, the odds of that were slim, given my previous hypothyroid-like symptoms and my malfunctioning reproductive hormal system. The surgery would be a small quick procedure to remove the growth, and we would only really know in five to ten years whether it would metastasize to the rest of my brain. I would live a normal life for those first five years. After that, well, it was anyones guess.

Once the shock wore off, days later, I began to plan. If I only had five years left to live, by god, I would live them! I would travel to all the far-off places I had ever dreamed of : Ireland, Russia, St. Kitts and Nevis, The Maldives, Bhutan. I would take my family with me and make as many memories as I could. Memories to last them a lifetime. I would write, every day. I would give my dream of becoming an author my fullest attention and effort.

My diagnosis would have given me financial freedom. My dread disease and life insurance would pay out allowing me to stop forcing myself out of bed every morning to get to a job only to travel back home in the evening, exhausted. I would have the freedom to try, and possibly fail, at anything I chose, giving myself the opportunity to possibly succeed beyond my wildest dreams. I would not waste time doing something simply because it is practical and brings home a paycheck.

I would go back to studying. Maybe I could get a teachers diploma, allowing me to work half days and get a break during school holidays. With the extra time, I could study other subjects, just for the fun of it. I would work as a teacher, filling those eager faces with a love of learning.

If I were told I had five years left to live, I would prepare a lifetimes worth of letters, emails, messages, to remind the ones I love that though I might be gone, the love will always, always remain.

Writing Prompt #1

Describe an important item from your childhood. Why was it important and where is it now?

When I first read this title, I immediately drew a blank. An important item From my childhood? When I closed my eyes to think, the first thing that popped into my mind were my bookshelves.

It seems a strange choice, I know, but there it is. Let me explain.

As a child, I was an extremely avid reader. Reading was my joy, my refuge, my first love. When the children at school or at home were cruel, my friendships in my books never failed me. When the world was difficult to understand, there was always a quote or a saying to provide explanation or solace. I was never alone so long as I had a book. I went on adventures with my friends : "The famous five", "The secret seven" and "The three investigators". I solved mysteries with "Nancy Drew", "The Dana Girls" and "The Hardy boys". And I fell in love along with Jessica and Elizabeth from "Sweet Valley High".

I primarily read from the library, bringing home 7, 10, 16 books at a time and devouring them in the two week period. And slowly, over time, my personal collection of books grew. Old baby favourites like "Cuddles Bath Time" and "Dandy Duck" began to vie for space next to "Rumpelstiltskin", "Old Friends, New Friends" and "The good-bye day".

One day, my dad brought home two blocks of wooden shelving. They were old, slightly rickety and filthy, but the wood was solid underneath and he promised we could fix it right up. Fixing those shelves became a family project. While dad banged in nails and supports, my mom, my brother and I used damp cloths to clean up the layers of dust and dirt that coated those old shelves.

When they were finally clean and sturdy, we all got out the paint brushes and had a ball painting them white. And while my mom complained about the smell for days afterward, you could tell she was proud of it as well.

When the paint was dry and all was ready, my dad drilled holes and fixed in the L-brackets that would support the shelves and fix them to the wall. We then all pitched in to neatly set our books onto them.

I think it was the first project we had done together as a family.

When circumstances forced us to move out of the family home, we took just 4 things away with us: Our beds, our clothes, the gifts my mom parents had given her on her marriage and those old shelves.

For many years after that, they stood proudly on their legs of bricks in my parents garage. And so that garage became my refuge. "Mom, I'm just going down to the garage", I would say, and disappear in there for hours.

Today, twenty years after we moved, those same shelves under a new coat of paint and some new legs, stand proudly in my own home. They form the place of my refuge, still. They now form my library.