In Winter We Shiver…

In response to this week’s 100 word challenge…which this week is shortened to 21 words, inspired by:

Remember remember the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason and plot.
I see no reason why gunpowder, treason
Should ever be forgot…

….and has to include the phrase “in winter we shiver”

here is my humble offering

Afloat on the river, in winter we shiver
Occasionally becoming stuck
The swan population, avoiding migration
Unlike our neighbour the duck

Click here to visit Julia’s Place for the 100 word challenge

A Recipe

A heart, not broken but bearing many scars
A spirit, shaken, then stirred by a lover’s touch
A mind concocted from doctrines since unlearned
A body whose burdened yoke became too much
Fears coddled and wrapped in a coating of care
Ambition simmering on a fearless flame
Imagination whisked by fresh inspiration
A recipe whose flavour will not twice be the same.

© Gill Simpson 2005

Romance, Yorkshire Style

Matty and Rosie were sweethearts
Up in t’West Riding o’ Yorkshire
Rosie were such a sweet little thing
“Me buttonhole” were what Matty called her.
The couple were engaged for donkey’s years
‘Til Rosie said “s’time we were wed!”
“What give up me nights in the boozer?
Me mates’ll think ah’m soft in th’head”
“Nay lad, tha’ll still ‘ave tha drinkin’
Ah’ll niver stop tha’ fun” Rosie said
“But think on’t, p’raps when tha gets ‘ome
Tha’ll appreciate me warmin tha bed”
Matty pondered a while then he grinned
‘Appen it wun’t be a bother
His lass were a sight for sore eyes
And it’d get him away from his mother.

The weddin were such a spectacle
Wi’ all them relations in suits
Rosie in white polyester
And Matty in newly soled boots.
They all had a right good do after
Down at the Old Duke o’ York
It were just nine months later that Rosie
Were paid her first visit by t’stork.
Young Matty were a right bonny baby
He weighed in at 9 ‘n half pound
Rosie were happy as Larry
And Matty bought his cronies a round.
Soon it were th’anniversary
O’ t’day Matty and Rosie were wed
He bought her some right pretty roses
And were ‘ome afore she went to bed.
Right touched were our Rosie to see ‘im
He bent and kissed her on th’ ‘ead
An’ e’d brung ‘em both a fish supper
Who said th’age o’ romance were dead?

© Gill Simpson 2006

Mirror

I see a face, reflected,
Bold lines across it drawn.
Laughter etched, and worries too
Memories past, not gone.
Eyes, the windows to the soul,
Reflecting all those years
Of love and hope and challenges,
Of hopefulness and fears.
I see the ghost of a young girl,
Shyly, hiding there,
With dreams she’s carried in her heart,
Hoping one day to share.
I see a face, reflecting
Truths I already know.
A future’s waiting patiently,
For the past to be let go.

Gill Simpson © 2011

Leaving Autumn

They danced through gentle early autumn’s breeze as the sun played on their vivid green faces The year marched stealthily toward winter. Sunlight visited rarely, and as their tree dispensed with its need for them, the autumn leaves donned their vibrant coats in red golden hues ‘til winter’s wild winds whisked them away.

In response to Julia’s Place 100 Word Challenge

I’m in the paper?

This morning at a union stewards’ meeting a bloke I only know from there told me he’d seen me in the Examiner yesterday. “Me?” I asked “what was I doing in the Examiner?” He said my photo was there, and I’d been receiving an award.

Having no memory of any award, or of having met an Examiner photographer recently I convinced him that I must have a doppelganger somewhere in Huddersfield, though wondered vaguely if perhaps I’d won something I didn’t even know about and a random photo had been sent in.

When I arrived at school and wandered into the staff room, a teacher said “Saw you in the paper last night!”

Oh dear, that other woman must really look like me if she’s convincing my colleagues too.

Luckily, one of my team had the foresight to clip the offending article and had brought it in to show me. Sure enough there I was…me…not a lookalike at all. I’d been presented with a Quality Assurance Mark for parenting support…over a month ago. I vaguely remember that there was indeed a photographer present. I thought that was just some corporate thing and since the award had actually been earned a year ago, it wasn’t exactly fresh in my mind.

Now, if I could only remember the name of the union bloke I was speaking to this morning, I’d apologise.

a foggy day

So, today was a day when “fibro fog” took over the buzzing, restless workaholic people are used to seeing at school.

It’s not an easy thing to explain, this fibromyalgia, and 14 years after it first took hold I don’t really tend to focus on it much.

It’s just the way things are and I know that occasionally, but only occasionally, I may need to make adjustments to the way I go about my daily doings because the fibro demons take over and render me weary, sore and unable to focus on anything of importance.

It’s only on a day like today that I’m reminded that I should be more empathetic with fellow sufferers. Usually, because I’m blessed with high adrenalin levels (a weird anomaly, since another of my listed diagnoses is chronic fatigue syndrome), caused apparently by an adrenalin drip feed where a body has manifested chronic pain, I can be impatient when others allow themselves to be laid low by fibro. Today I wanted to hug them all and tell them I’ve just had a timely reminder of how that can feel.

Tomorrow is another day..and I hope the sun will be shining

100 word challenge A-Z

Attempting to Be Clever whilst Deciding to have an Experimental First Go at the 100 word challenge. Having a slightly obsessive nature anyway, It’s Just a case of Keeping the Letters in My sights and a Need to Order them alphabetically. Perhaps this won’t work. It was not Quite the Rationale I Set out To Use in the challenge. I’d hoped it would be an opportunity to Voice opinions in a limited number of Words and to eXplore (cheat!) some long held, rarely used creative Yearnings to join the blogging community, instead here I am, rambling, with Zero literary expertise.

Inspired by Julia’s place 100 Word Challenge for Grown-ups

First faltering steps

So here I am, blogging for the first time. I don’t even have anything exciting to say here except that I intend to make use of this space to express views, share highs and lows, experiences and vague wonderings. I’m likely to be an erratic blogger, with random wanderings through whatever’s in my mind at the precise moment I decide to write summat…maybe nobody will ever read this anyway. Time will tell….