microstorytelling – Amanda Salisbury

I’m sharing this post today because it echoes how I feel and because it’s a blessed thing to remember former happiness.

-AS

Sundrop Contagion

Originally posted in the 6s community March 9, 2010 at 6:10pm

The sun is out, and I am, too, out amid the teasing breeze as the birds keep time with their song for me. I am as untouchable as that flaming, undying light that marks so much of human existence. My jubilation is intoxicating, contagious, well-endowed; and those around me need not know the cause of my mirth; though they guess, their attributions are poorly aimed. For the root of my joy is mine alone, though the heady exhilaration is necessarily, fundamentally embedded in all who experience it. The sun is like that, too. Her sundrops land whether or not she wills, but her energy is only hers and any imitation absolutely falls short of her glory.

In 2010 and 2011, I participated in a website devoted to stories written in six sentences: 6s. I wrote several in those two years, almost 85,000 words’ worth. At the time, only one person I knew in real life ever saw those flash stories (my mother) and so I wrote some things that I often censure in the rest of my writing here and elsewhere. Why? Because the people I see and deal with daily might see me with new eyes, and I haven’t been ready for the scales to fall off for them.

I mean, those stories are internet published. Some of them made it into a little book I auctioned at our family reunion. Still, few people I know personally read them.

People talk about ‘Facebook official’ and that rings familiar for me. Until I’ve exposed my layers to Facebook, I can maintain a measure (however small) of plausible deniability. Posting here links to Facebook, so it’s safe to say I’m claiming these words officially.

Some of these 6s stories are based in fact, some in fiction, and some with one foot in each grave. My natural writing preference is first person, which I’ve tried to give up because the internet said I should. You absolutely cannot trust what I write from first person (I, me, my) to be autobiographical. And I’m not terribly interested in parsing for anyone, least of all myself.

The best you can hope for in reading these is a better understanding of me as a writer in 2010 and 2011. Beyond that, beware of your presumptions.

I’ve scheduled these to post at odd times, but they’ll always show up in the 6s category. Happy reading!