Home for the Holidays, Farnsworth?
A collection of holiday prompts written by the Wesley Writers Workshop
Edited by Sharon and Steve Fiffer
Copyright Wesley Writers 2011
Smashwords Edition
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Table of Contents
New Year’s Eve in Damariscotta - Bill Anthony
Marlene Goes for a Ride - Francie Arenson
Ice Cold Beer - Sally deVincentis
A Snowy Night in Ulm - Jim Dorr
New Year's Eve - Nan Doyal
The Right to Remain Silent Night - Sue Gelber
Farnsworth and the Eggnog Scam - Barbara Hetler
Snow Job - Pat Hitchens
In Service of the Salvation Army - Judy Iacuzzi
Of Ice and Men (Women, Too) - Sara O. Marberry
Just Relax - Kendra Morrill
Ice - Joyce Newcomb
Static - Katy Okrent
Unexpected Night Out - Marcia J. Pradzinski
In Florida, All You Really Need is a Jean Jacket - Pamela Rothbard
Snow Angel - Roberta Bard Ruby
Drifting Under - Dyan Taji
Snow - Christine Wolf
Introduction
A riddle.
What do you call a group of people who start out as relative strangers, agree to meet every Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday in another relative stranger’s living room, and, within a few weeks, are sharing the stories of their lives? Okay, maybe not always the stories of their lives—but definitely the stories of somebody’s life?
You call these people writers.
The Wesley Writers Workshop began in 2009 with eight people who gathered around our coffee table on a Wednesday night. Because others wanted to join the group—and none of the "Wednesdays" were inclined to stop attending, we added the "Tuesdays." Another waiting list became the "Thursdays."
In addition to taking turns presenting their short stories, novel chapters, and memoirs to the group, all the writers are given a weekly "prompt" and encouraged to write a two-to-three-page response. We recommend the writing be fast, off the cuff. Some writers use the prompt to jumpstart their ongoing work, some use it as inspiration for a brand new piece, others use it as a writing exercise—something to get them started moving words around on a blank page.
The prompt is always optional. After the main piece or pieces of the night have been read aloud by Sharon and discussed by the group, Steve asks, "Any prompts?" and one or two or more of the writers pull out notebooks or folded pieces of paper and begin to read. No pressure, no critique, no explanation. Just pure writing for the fun of it.
What exactly constitutes a prompt? When we first began offering the workshop, we discussed the prompts we would give each week. Sharon told Steve that she preferred something that might be interpreted in several ways, a word or phrase that would not be directive, but instead, evocative. She liked words like "measure" or objects like "kitchen table." Steve nodded in complete agreement, then emailed the weekly prompt to the group. Farnsworth was out of toothpaste.
"Who’s Farnsworth?" asked Sharon.
"We’ll find out," said Steve.
And so we did. Several men and a few women named Farnsworth started appearing weekly. Occasionally, Sharon’s words were used as prompts, too, and occasionally writers even combined a few weeks' worth of prompts in their writing. And those who rarely wrote prompts listened with enjoyment to the free flow of words.
At the end of the first year, when the holidays rolled around, we planned a dinner party for all of the writers—a potluck where all three groups would meet and share some holiday cheer. Everyone was pleased, but, truth be told, a little nervous about meeting the writer who sat in their chair on alternate nights. Who, after all would claim the comfy rocker at the party? The Tuesday? The Thursday? The Wednesday?
"We’ll need an icebreaker," said Sharon.
And so it came to pass…the holiday prompt.
At the party, the writers—even those who did not normally do prompts—fished out their pieces of paper and, as Sharon drew their names from a hat, stood up to read their responses. Fiction writers wrote memoir. Memoirists wrote fiction. Staid pillars of the community wrote dirty limericks. Ice broken.
As the holidays of 2011 rolled around, we asked the writers if they wanted to release their prompts into the wild. Eighteen writers agreed. Their pieces were written in response to the following prompts:
Snow
Farnsworth looked at the star.
Ice
More eggnog, Farnsworth?
So now, here are your alphabetically-ordered holiday treats from the writers of the Wesley Writers Workshop. Find your own comfy chair, sip your own festive nog, charge your Kris Kindle and join us around the coffee table. Happy Holidays, Farnsworth.
Sharon and Steve Fiffer, November 2011
New Year’s Eve in Damariscotta
Any more eggnog, Farnsworth told himself, and I’ll be a singing omelet without a Karaoke machine. He poured another cup anyway and sprinkled more cinnamon on top in two jerky motions. That was how bad it’d gotten by New Year’s that year. The longest dry spell he’d ever had with Lucy.
Farnsy hadn’t seen her since that little incident out at the lake when her husband, Earl, dropped by unannounced and she popped out of the back room there. Nossir, Farnsy hadn’t seen hide nor hair of her until just before Thanksgiving, when he almost bumped into her standing in front of him right there in line at the Stop and Shave, quickly recognizing her cute little buttinski, as she once called it, and the "Moxie" earrings he’d given her the summer before. When she turned to look over the breath mint and lip balm display and saw him standing there, she cooed to him smooth as silk, "You planning to arrest me, Officer?" just as though no time had passed at all. It was their little code for fantasizing.
"Miss, now I’d have to have cause to do something like that," Farnsy said stiffly in his official voice, so that Winona, who was right behind him and whose nickname, "the Walrus," had followed her since her first day behind the lunch counter in the cafeteria at the Lincoln Academy, could make note of the fact that there wasn’t anything to the rumors of their affair.
The only other time he saw Lucy after that was from his cruiser as he headed down Main Street from Newcastle on call early one Friday evening, looking for a fella they said was hanging around the Greyhound bus stop "acting kind of loopy" was the way Betty in Dispatch described it. This time, Earl was with her. She was dragging him in the direction of that book talk over at the Skidompha Library on the history of Moody’s Diner that some Colby professor was giving. Probably one of the "going-out-together" and "self-improvement" things that Earl’d agreed to as one of Lucy’s conditions for their getting back together. Told Farnsy later that she got the idea from reading that five-dollar Oprah magazine getting her hair done. Farnsy thought old Earl looked just like one of his trapped lobsters scratching for any way out.
Farnsy picked up the Hood’s Eggnog carton and poured what was left into the little tea cup with pine cones painted on it--the one he got for his ex when he was on a fishing trip up to Moosehead Lake just before she took off with that summer fella. It seemed just right for the occasion. Then he poured in just a scootch more Bacardi’s, sprinkled on some nutmeg, said, "Bottoms up!" muttered, "Some friggin New Year’s this is—" then gulped it down in one swoop. No sooner’n he put the tea cup back on its little white saucer with the moose scene than the phone rang. He looked over at the kitchen clock. 11:55.
"Jeezum Crowbar, who could it be this time a night?"
O gawd, Farnsy thought. Just my luck, an accident on Route 1 and here I am full of eggnog, a regular walkin’ soufflé. Soufflés have eggs? he wondered. That made him smile as he picked up the old black rotary phone receiver. It felt particularly heavy in his hand.
"Occifer Farnsworth," he blurted out, "how can you help me?"
"Oh, Farnsy," she whispered. "Listen to you. How many eggnogs you had?"
"Whadda you care?" he counterpunched.
"Oh, Farnsy, you know I care, I still care. Oh God, you don’t know how hard it’s been all this time?"
Farnsy was working up a full head of steam now. "Luce, that’s not the only thing that’s been hard now, don’tchaknow…."
"Seriously, Farnsy, Earl’s out cold here and I can’t take this any more."
"I saw you at the Skidompha, him on your leash there."
"Can I come over there and talk, Farnsy?"
"So what am I, then? Just your rainy day fella?"
"Farnsy, I tried, I really tried, but it’s just not working. Earl’s Earl and always will be and I don’t know what to do and will you look at that, now the ball’s dropping in Times Square and I’m here all alone and you’re there…You are alone, aren’t you?"
"No, Luce, I got a line of gals here stretching out the door and all the way over the bridge into Wiscasset like I was givin’ out $15 lobster rolls at Red’s Eats…What do you think?"
"Can’t I just drive over there for just a teensie-weensie minute? Give you a little special rub-a-dub, if you know what I mean?"
"Oh, Jesus, you know this ain’t right, Luce, just ain’t right, with Earl there out cold. Wait…" Farnsy’s heart did a little skip just thinking of what that might mean. "You did say he was out cold, not out cold as in dead’s a doornail, right?"
"Well, he is kinda blue, Farnsy…"
"Don’t joke with me Lucy, this is serious."
There was a pause. Farnsy listened to her footsteps, then heard her say, "Oh, Earl’s alive alright…" And Farnsy heard the unmistakable massive rumble of human flesh that could only be the sound of old Earl right there, conked out on his La-Z-Boy, snoring into the phone like a man sawing a cord of wood before the first snow of the season.
"You need more proof, Officer?"
"Nope. Come on over then and we’ll sort this out, Luce. New Year’s and all…"
"Oh, Farnsy," she sighed, "I’ll be over just as soon as I find that nightie with the cutouts…"
"Jeeze Louise, Lucy, this is a party line we got here…Now if you’re listening in there, Mabel Purdy, you just disregard what you just heard. This is an official police matter we have here. A proper investigation."
"That’s not what folks’ve been saying around here now, Officer Farnsworth. We all got eyes, you know. I hear tell…"
"That so? Well, Mabel, then here's a little New Year's Resolution for you: how 'bout you mind your own beeswax?"
Marlene’s red Mercedes convertible rolled down Sheridan Road. Bette Midler blared on the radio. The stereo system for the car, which she’d acquired a week ago supposedly for her 70th birthday, had the capacity to hold 52 CDs. "One for every week of the year," the guy at the car dealership had joked.
Lenny, her husband, hadn’t liked the joke. He hated anything to do with technology. He’d winced when the salesman had mentioned Bluetooth.
Truthfully, Marlene hadn’t understood what he was talking about, either. She knew Bluetooth had something to do with the phone, but she had no idea how to work it. Likewise, she understood that she could load 52 CDs up through the trunk. Although she only owned about 15. Bette Midler, Barbra Streisand, some Mozart and Michael Buble. She loved that Michael Buble.
She thought about him now, as she drove down Sheridan Road. Michael Buble, who she’d just seen on Oprah, seemed so gracious in person, so sophisticated, so like her first love, Frank Sinatra. Boy, had she loved Frank Sinatra, back when she was young and had her whole life stretching before her like, well, Sheridan Road, she thought as she clutched the wheel. She drove carefully. Ice was everywhere and the last thing she needed was an accident, especially a fatal one.
The second to last thing she needed was the Mercedes, as much as she deserved it, which she did, faithful mother and wife for 35 years. Raising three kids--having really wanted only two--and putting up with Lenny and his penny-pinching ways. She’d driven that blue Volvo wagon ‘til it drove itself to the dump.
So no, she didn’t understand the Bluetooth hook up and no, she didn’t have use for the new-fangled stereo system and no, the low sports seats were not good for her sciatica, but yes siree, she deserved that car.
"How bad does it hurt?" Lenny had asked when she’d inched herself into the car for the test drive.
She did a so-so with her hand out the window.
"Ignore the pain," Lenny had responded. The top had been down in the show room. The car had looked especially sharp with the top down, which is probably what had drawn Lenny to it in the first place. True, she’d turned 70, but her sons had given Lenny and her a trip to Portugal. Not like she had any interest in Portugal, but enough was enough. She was fine. It wasn’t like she was having a midlife crisis and would have selected the sports car for herself.
It was Lenny. When he retired five years ago, a dam unleashed. He went from tightwad to big spender overnight, unable to hang on to anything--money, cars or houses---for more than a month or so. In the five years since he’d sold his stores, Marlene had had four addresses, the most recent being here on Sheridan Road. Each time Lenny promised that the move would be the last, that he wasn’t going to flip anymore, that he wouldn’t sink the profit back into real estate, but he just couldn’t help himself, it seemed. One of the reasons her back had gotten so bad was all of the packing and unpacking.
Now, the car. She sat forward towards the steering wheel to give her back a stretch. She was only going a few blocks to show her son her car, but even so, she’d cramped.
Which was, ironically, one of the reasons that Lenny had given for getting rid of their last apartment, his last car and, as he’d announced last week just before they set out for the dealership, their burial plots.
"What do you mean? You flipped our plots?" Marlene had said.
"I didn’t flip them," Lenny clarified. "I sold them."
"What’s the difference?" she’d asked. She’d just come home from playing mahjong and she plunked her keys--the keys to her now former Lexus SUV--onto the kitchen counter. "Enough is enough, Lenny. You’ve got to re-buy them. If there’s at least one thing I know, I’ll need it’s a plot."
Lenny shook his head. "I don’t know about that." He looked up from his book. Every day since he’d retired, Lenny did the same activities in the same order. He played tennis, ate a piece of rye toast, drank a cup of coffee, scanned the paper, called his three kids and read a book. Now and then, he sold off major assets. "I think," he continued, "I’ll feel cramped underground. I was thinking we might do better in a mausoleum."
"That makes no sense," Marlene responded. She pulled a box of Pringles from the chips cabinet. True, the salt was bad for her blood pressure, but the thought of having nowhere to go should she O.D. on salt wasn’t helping her, either. "Either way you are in a box. I’d call that cramped."
"Yes, but in a mausoleum, they slot you in real nice, one on top of another. It’s like an apartment building for dead people. It’s the whole idea of underground that’s not sitting well with me."
"So you just up and sold our plots? That’s what you did with your day? Thanks for consulting me." Marlene had liked the plots, with the little tree hanging over them. She told this to Lenny, describing the tree with her hands.
"You were busy with your game. Besides, they were offering a good deal. I had to act fast."
"A good deal?" she counted out five more Pringles and put the lid on the can.
Lenny continued. "It just so happened that they were running a special. We made out like bandits."
"And what are we going to do with all that money?" Marlene said, still munching. "I can’t take it to my grave. I don’t have one."
"I know what we can do," Lenny said. "I thought it all through. We never really got you a proper 70th birthday present and I saw the perfect thing on my way home today. Toss me your keys."
Marlene tossed before thinking to ask why. Her mistake, she thought, as she drove down Sheridan Road. Cramped herself--speaking of cramped--in the car she’d gotten for her 70th birthday with the money they’d saved on her death.