On Friday, October 26, 2012 the annual SDF Halloween Party took place. Check out pictures from the event below:
“Dead Women Talking”
“Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Aging”
“Brute in a Suit” (tied, 3rd place)
“Tapping Into the Wire” (tied, 3rd place)
“Trees of Life” (2nd place)
“Math Goes to the Movies” (1st place)
On Friday March 23, 2012, the SDF Social Committee held a lunch to discuss SDF grants, how people have used their grants in the past, and other information. Please access the link below to download the presentation from that lunch.
This is the inaugural Christmas progressive story organized by the Writing Club. The author of each 100 word segment is indicated prior to their submission. Ho Ho Ho!
(JANET GILBERT) The snow was just beginning to fall, and Madelyn was just beginning to feel something in the neighborhood of festive as she left the annual holiday party at the Hopkins Press and trudged the four-tenths of a mile to the Education Building parking lot. Driving home, accelerating to the beat of “Jingle Bell Rock” as she rolled over the North Avenue Bridge, she glimpsed something perched on the outer railing. Like the curiously strong mint she had popped in her mouth moments earlier, the scene didn’t register right away. Fortunately she had leafed through Ungulate Taxonomy earlier in the week.
(SHANNON JACKSON)
Madelyn stopped suddenly in the middle of the bridge’s far left lane of traffic. The car behind her screeched to a halt within inches of hitting her back bumper. As the driver backed up and circled around her he flipped her his Christmas spirit. But Madelyn was too focused on the sight on the outside of her driver’s side window to notice. Her mind was not playing tricks on her. By golly, there was actually a reindeer perched on the rail of the bridge! A full minute passed before the sound of horns honking woke her from her trance-like state.
(SARA CLEARY)
Did no one else notice the majestic creature, bedecked in Christmas bells and covered in garland for its reins, in front of her? Madelyn opened her driver’s side door and stepped cautiously out of the car onto the pedestrian walkway of the bridge. Traffic blared by her as she approached the reindeer, who was snorting and pawing at the steel railing. Suddenly, a robust bearded and red-cheeked man in a red and white tracksuit pushed her aside. He was uttering a frustrated “Ho, Ho, Ho” under his breath as he hurried toward the reindeer.
“Prancer, get down here this instant!”
(MARY LOU KENNEY)
Madelyn arrived at her decision quickly—she would pursue her life-long dream of riding bareback on a reindeer. She had only to get rid of the man in the tracksuit.
“Out of the way, fatso,” she cried.
Climbing cautiously on the steel railing, she launched herself up and over, landing with a thud on the back of the patient Prancer.
Pawing the ground nervously, he crooked his neck to eye her with suspicion.
Satisfied with what the looks of his passenger, Prancer launched himself majestically into the air. Madelyn giggled with glee as she took in the sights of Brooklyn.
(SUZANNE FLINCHBAUGH)
As they flew over the Brooklyn Bridge, twinkling in holiday lights, the Statue of Liberty came into view, and Madelyn was overcome with solidarity for the Occupy Wall Street movement. “Prancer, let’s go visit the Zuccotti Park protesters!” Prancer, a proud, card-carrying member of the North Pole United Transportation Union Local#1225, nodded in agreement, and changed course for lower Manhattan. He had been following the OWS twitterfeed for months now and knew he was a member of the 99%. “Great idea, Mad! We’ll sprinkle North Pole magic snowflakes on the crowd-just so they don’t mistake it for pepper spray!“
(MICHELE CALLAGHAN)
The whole array–the city in its splendor and the panoply of tents and protesters–reminded Rudolph the lesson he learned in the Island of Misfit Toys: no matter what something looks like on the outside, it is deserving of love. He felt badly seeing the human race so divided and, using his red nose as a makeshift megaphone, trumpeted to the crowd below to be quiet.
“You are all forgetting the message of the season!” he cried out. “Santa comes to rich and poor alike.”
“Quite right,” said Santa, flinging armfuls of toys over the side of the sleigh.
(ANTHONY GILBERT)
As the deployment crews distributed gifts through the cheering crowds, Santa prepared the sleigh for launch. There was a long way to go and time was short.
Humming “Eastbound and Down” under his breath, Santa entered the co-ordinates for the next hop when he saw an incoming hail from base.
Santa picked up the mic and flipped open a com channel, “Fat Man to North Base One, come back”. He could hear the dispatch elf’s panic even over the static.
“Perimeter is breached, hostiles in sectors 8 and twelve. We have been betrayed. All defences are compromised. Preparing evacuation.”
(PHILIP HEARN)
Panic turned Santa’s cheeks from rosy-red to cauliflower white. As the crowd of thousands unwrapped their Tickle-Me Elmos, Furbys, and HD-DVD players, Santa knew he had to act fast before their moment of joy became a moment ripe with the polar opposite of said joy.
Yielding his whip and hastily slurring a few of the reindeer names (“Blonner?”), Santa lifted his sleigh into the air to get a clear view of the perimeter.
Sure enough, Santa could see dozens of plump, white figures closing in on the oblivious crowd.
“So,” Santa said with shameless exposition, “Frosty’s come for his revenge.”
(KRISTOPHER ZGORSKI)
Santa couldn’t allow the holiday to be ruined, but what could he do?
Placing his finger aside his nose, an idea sprang to mind. An assault from the sky was the best and only option to thwart this attack by Frosty and his gang of snowmen. Lucky for Santa, he could magically fill his sleigh with thousands of holiday ornaments, thereby filling his arsenal with makeshift bombs.
Flying over the crowd of revelers, Santa began to drop ornaments onto the approaching army.
“Take that!” Santa said. “Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.”
All was going well until
(BRIAN SHEA)
the smell of gingerbread cookies penetrated Santa’s nose. When he hastily prepared his cache of weapons, he forgot to eat. An enemy reconnaissance team took note of this fact and set up a large-scale cookie-baking operation along Santa’s projected path in order to create a diversion. Frosty knew the jolly old elf’s one weakness and laughed manically when he heard reports of how Santa’s assault had slowed. He rubbed his hands together with glee, but held onto the thought that the Keebler elves could change sides at any moment since no snowmen could get close enough to supervise the baking.
(KATHY OBAGGY)
Santa has survived for eons not just for his generosity but for his ingenuity. Upon learning that elves, those misguided Keebler elves no less, were complicit in the attempt to thwart his annual ride, he knew instantly what he had to do. A few kicks on the pedal and the sleigh’s auxiliary engine was sending out flames hot enough to melt a snowman. A few laps around the moon produced a blanket of warmth sufficient to envelope the earth with balmy tropical air. The gullible Keebler elves immediately turned off all their cookie baking ovens and headed for swimming holes.
(JEFF COLOSINO)
On Christmas morning, all the newspapers in America lauded Santa’s crazy plan as a success. “Yes, Virginia,” wrote one columnist, “Climate change is real. And it saved Christmas.” Placated by the unexpected vacation time–”July-in-Christmas,” they called it–Keebler Elves Union Local 111 agreed to return to the bargaining table. Would there be another Christmas? There would.
…Or would there?
Spooning out the last, pulpy sips of his pina colada, Santa propped up his feet on Prancer’s back. Folks laughed when he bought that time-share in Greenland, but now it was the tropical paradise he’d always dreamt of retiring to.
(ROSA GRIFFIN)
And, retire he did! he’d gotten so used to the frozen tundras of the North Pole. “Greenland, here we come!” He and his posse packed up birth certificates and shot records and took off for “Your Ancient Land”.
This is the second progressive story organized by the Writing Club, this one based on a Halloween theme. The author of each 100 word segment is indicated prior to their submission. Enjoy!
KRIS ZGORSKI
It was a dark and stormy night when they finally approached the house at the top of Feverview Hill. As children, Vladimir and his friends had always been told to stay away from the mansion, though none of them could say exactly why. For as long as anyone could remember, their parents would whisper or leave the room whenever talk turned to that odd building on the hill. Of course, this only caused Vlad and his friends to become more curious; but it wasn’t until tonight, well into their adult years, that they would finally get a chance to explore.
ROSA GRIFFIN
But, on the conference call, not everyone was enthusiastic.
“You guys, meet me outside the termite-infested gate at 9 p.m. on October 31. It’ll be good for a laugh.”
Surprisingly, his sister, Inger, declined. She had constantly complained since childhood about the lack of intelligence coming forth from the mansion.
“What! Do you think you’re ‘Vlad the Impaler’ or something? Count me out!”
Once they heard that from Inger, who was always the bravest in their bunch, the rest started falling like dominoes. This venture was turning out to be a dud. He had better come up with a new
BRIAN SHEA
Strategy in order to complete his plan. Vlad should have known – Inger always ruined everything. He never wanted to include her, but had learned a long time ago that things would turn out much worse when she found out he went behind her back. She would have turned up at the gate with something up her sleeve, castrating him again in front the rest of the group. Vlad needed to come up with a way to have her take credit for a plan which would surely backfire. The time had come to put her in her place, if he could
JANET GILBERT
just get out of his itchy woolen kilt and into something substantially more protective for their upcoming tete-a-tete. He dressed quickly into the first suit of armor he came across in the halls of the haunted mansion and walked with great difficulty and cacophonous sound effects to meet Inger at the gate.
“Inger,” he said. “I’ve come to tell you–I think your plan is brilliant.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Vlad,” she said curtly.
“I’m in, Inger,” he said, clapping closed his mouthpiece with alacrity and confidence.
Inger made a sudden, fierce grab for his gorget.
KARA REITER
“Was I not clear?” Inger said, not letting go of her tight grip, “I DO NOT know what you are talking about.”
“Inger,” Vlad stammered, “I don’t understand”
“Shut up!” Inger yelled.
Inger chose the wrong thing to say. If there’s one thing that made Vlad’s blood boil, it was being told to “shut up.” He detested that phrase. It probably had something to do with the fact that his mother, Cneajna, God rest her soul, never tolerated such offensive language.
“Listen,” he said angrily, “Number one: never, ever tell me to “SHUT UP.” Number two: You can stop pretending
JENN D’URSO
that you don’t know what is buried under the oak tree. We both know what is out there, and I’m tired of keeping it a secret.”
Inger let go of him, and backed away in horror. “You can’t mean that, Vlad,” she cried. “You promised!”
“I’m digging it up,” Vlad declared, “unless you apologize. I’m sick of covering up your problems.”
“It’s not worth it,” she begged. “Please, don’t!”
But Vlad, hearing no apology, stuck to his threat. He grabbed a spade from his basement workroom and, shoving past her, made his way out to the crooked old oak tree.
KATHY OBAGGY
Vlad had an impulsive streak that often caused him regret if not great embarrassment. As he stormed out of the workroom, spade in hand, he saw only vengeance as he sprinted through the rain to the old oak tree. Let Inger suffer the way he had suffered all these years, desperately trying to erase the memory of those cold, wet ….. the thought of what lay buried under the tree fueled his rage. So frantic was his digging that he didn’t realize Inger was beside him, trembling, until she let out at shriek at the sight of that familiar green
MICHELE CALLAGHAN
pail. He hadn’t seen that in so many years. Why had his mother left him on that beach? What possessed her to go to the outback to follow Jack? Who was his real father? These and so many other questions flashed through his mind. But he dragged his mind back to Inger. Grabbing the dust-encrusted pail and the nearly disintegrated shovel that lay beside it, he pushed her aside and strode off.
“Wait, Vlad, wait!” she cried. “It wasn’t my fault, I swear.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he spat out the words. “We have bigger things to worry about now.”
HADLEY LEACH
Dawn’s rosy fingers began to streak the sky, but Vlad was no child of morning.
“We need shelter. I need . . .” Vlad continued, “This headache. The dig will have to wait, Inger.”
He received no response.
“Inger. . . ?“
She stood, pointing.
“There are more. They followed us.”
Vlad’s head pulsed, his thin top lip quivered.
“Then they are dead,” he snarled.
The name of his father hardly mattered. Always, only, the blood, flowing from generation to generation, and with it this ever present impulse: survival of the species, at any cost.
He leapt, moving faster than
ILAN ROTH
the north wind. In a single bound, he was able to vault over the outer wall of the barracks. Inger followed, a bit more awkwardly. She was only starting to feel comfortable with her newly discovered powers, the deep well of strength which Vlad had led her to discover.
“No sound,” whispered Vlad, almost inaudibly, “this place is teeming with the Resurrected.”
Inger nodded, sensing in Vlad’s face the gravity of their situation.
As the first few rays from Apollo’s chariot broke through the night sky, the two young lovers moved through the dense undergrowth of weeds, which now covered
JENNIFER MALAT
the streets of Istanbul. They moved silently through the alleys of the ancient city, the screams of the unfortunate souls caught by Satan’s minions echoing off the walls like a ghastly parody of the muezzin’s call. They had but one goal: to retrieve the sacred Key of Enlightenment from where it lay in the long-forgotten catacombs below the MacDonald’s on Sultan Mehmet Street.
As they made their way towards the sacred relic that would end the plague, Inger’s mind drifted back to the halcyon days before the dead had risen from their sleep to heed the unholy summons of the
COURTNEY BOND
Diabolical Turkey McNugget, Overlord of Samonella, who had been released from his magically sealed crypt in the catacombs after a disenfranchised McDonald’s employee mishandled a vat of fry oil, which leaked its putrid contents onto the crypt’s magical lock, allowing the beast within to slip free. Fortunately for Inger and her friends, Turkey McNugget was not currently at the crypt, as he was otherwise occupied with whipping Satan’s undead minions into a frenzy and reopening some defunct Turkish prisons. Armed only with Inger’s shiny blue evil eye, recently purchased on sale from the beautiful and extremely helpful street vendor, Dilara,
SARA CLEARY
Inger and company hesitated at the crypt entrance before plunging ahead in the darkness. The stench of grease and mystery meat permeated the stone walls. Inger shuffled her way across the floor, sliding deeper and deeper into the center of the catacombs. She could feel the weight of the evil eye dangling around her neck; it’s blue, shiny surface gleaming with anticipation. Suddenly, a light flickered amidst the rubble at the far end of the room. She heard someone gasp behind her as a pair of neon red eyes appeared from behind the stone. Her adrenaline rushed as she stepped forward.
KELI STRICKLAND
Inger trembled with fear as she approached the shadowy figure awaiting her on the other side of the crypt. Even the evil eye seemed to quiver a little bit, doubting its own strength. As she crept closer, Inger witnessed a shock of yellow hair and watched in terror as eight tiny smaller figures rallied around their leader. Kate Gosselin and her crazy band of sell-out zombie children approached as Inger froze in the center of the room. Soon, Kate + Eight would add several new members to their book tour. Inger felt her legs give out and everything went black.
This is the very first progressive story organized by the Writing Club. The first 100 words came from a story which was sent to Journals by someone who wanted their book reviewed by one of our journals. Brian Shea chose 100 words at random from the story, then added the next 100. The author of each 100 word segment is indicated prior to their submission. Enjoy!
If I laid here all night, no one would blame me. Ninety-nine percent of the world would too, thought 98 percent probably wouldn’t be here. Maybe if I slowed down a little I could conform better to this planet. Of course 99 percent of the people are unhappy or maybe content at best. Do I want to float through life and be like the others? Do I want my epitaph to read off the side of a cereal box? Or am I part of the 2 percent that would work until they drop?
No, I think not. I am not (BRIAN SHEA) going to play their game. I won’t give in to the idea that the one with the most toys at the end wins. I know I could easily reach that goal, but what cost comes with that achievement? Besides, the women I have tried to meet can’t make up their mind whether they want an arrogant rich guy or a sensitive poor one. I think I might try to trip them up by mixing my arrogance with a careless outlook on my future prospects. I might not make my life better, but maybe I will learn a thing or two.
(SUSAN VENTURA) I have a friend Bob who is both sensitive and rich-the total package. Having been brought up in a family that dabbled in dysfunction and a pervasive pessimism he is surprisingly untouched by his dark past. Somehow arrogance doesn’t occur to him. He does not know what women think of him and is ignorant of their admiration and their hopeful schemes. Bob does not see how lucky he is to have escaped the fate of his birth. Whether accomplished by stupidity or happenstance it was not a planned escape and he didn’t understand its portent until he met her.
(HADLEY LEACH) Her. At half his age we all assumed her to be a modern day Lady Audley. Gold digger, white trash, bitch. Bob couldn’t see it, of course. To him she was simply Helen. Whip smart, he’d claim, when we’d call her conniving. “That’s Helen,” he’d laugh, brushing off our censure of “secretive.” Turns out he was right . . .
“Bob, There’s this thing . . .” she started, tentatively at first, then gathering courage: “Tonight, I disappear. New case, new life: Helen’s over. I can only tell you so much. Only . . . Escape this! Come with me!”
(ILAN ROTH) For a split second, Bob actually contemplated the idea. A vision of the two of them splayed out on some white-sand beach in the Florida Keys took hold in his mind’s eye, and he felt the words “Okay, let’s do it” actually begin to take form beneath his Adam’s apple.
Then reality hit, like a brick. He remembered the numerous times that following one of Helen’s impulses had turned out badly, and usually just for him: the drunken fights, depleted bank accounts, and of course that night in Monte Carlo.
“You’re on your own,” Bob stated finally, and turned away.
(MYRTA BYRUM) Helen heard those words “You’re on your own” and couldn’t believe her ears. How could Bob not go with her? We’d had such great times and now the adventures that she longed for would need to be shared with someone else… but whom?
She scrambled through her contacts list and spent hours searching Facebook friends … surely there must be someone out there with a spirit full of adventure, unencumbered, and ready to GO!
Finally after staying up half the night, looking at hundreds of photos, and reading unrelated funny stories, she picked one. A strange looking character who seemed (KRIS ZGORSKI) if nothing else, like he would be a unique companion on this crazy adventure. Sure, he wasn’t going to be Bob, but Helen hoped that she would be able to respect Bob’s wishes and move on; and Simon St. James seemed like just the man to help her do so.
She picked up the phone and began to dial. Her hand was shaking from nerves, so that when the phone started ringing, she couldn’t really be sure that she had even dialed the correct number.
“Hello” said the groggy male voice.
“I’m trying to reach Simon St. James” Helen said.
(JANET GILBERT) “Wrong number,” the man said viciously, snapping down the handset with the abruptness of a crocodile’s jaws on an unsuspecting Fulvous Whistling Duck, its favorite everglades snack. In that instant, Helen knew it was Simon, the reclusive survivalist. She hit redial with the steely confidence that emanates only from women of a certain age.
On the third ring, Simon picked up.
“Don’t hang up,” Helen said, adopting the resolute tone that always worked with her incorrigible coworkers. “I’ll be at the airboat dock at seven with the urn. It’s what Bob wanted.”
“Helen, it’s not about Bob anymore,” Simon said.
(CHRISTINA CHEAKALOS) Helen was not just tough, but smart. She knew Simon was nuts, and not in the harmless Euell Gibbons way. He was trouble, on or off the grid. But she was dangerously bored and looking for trouble. She packed a cooler with wine, cheese, apples and a knife. Simon was late. But Helen had brought mosquito repellent, and the urn. Rocking precariously on her Jimmy Choos, she opened the urn and cursed at Bob’s ashes. Suddenly Simon appeared, not on the dock but like the slime he was, from beneath the water. He grabbed one of Helen’s ankles and pulled.
(JEFF COLOSINO) It only took two weeks for city police to call off the search. But Harbor Detective Banks had to admit: it didn’t add up. Dockworkers turned in a knife, a wine bottle, and a bunch of apple cores they found by the water, right where Helen was last spotted.
A diver showed up at his door, holding a barnacled vase he’d hauled from beneath the same dock. On its face, someone had painted: BOB.
”Sea lions,” said Banks. “They’re real clever sons of bitches.”
Moments later, flipping on the siren in his cruiser, Banks knew where to look first: Simon’s.
(JEN MALAT) It was the apple cores that tipped him off. Simon’s may have been the main hideout for the city’s most cunning aquatic criminals, but it was innocuously housed behind an organic grocery store. The window displays were filled with every kind of apple a Baltimore foodie could want, and sea lion smugglers had sophisticated palates.
Harbor Detective Banks pulled up in front of the building. Sneaking into Simon’s was pointless – getting out was the tough part. If anyone could explain the connection between the knife, the barnacle-encrusted vase, the empty wine bottle, and Helen’s dockside disappearance, they would be here.
(KARA REITER) Harbor Detective Banks knew he had to devise a plan for his escape from Simon’s. But he couldn’t think now. His stomach was grumbling and all he could think about were all the different kinds of apples in the organic grocery store. He made the decision that feeding his hunger was the most important thing at this point. Case? What case? Helen’s dockside disappearance? Who was Helen? None of that mattered to him. He walked into the store. There they were. The apples: Gala, Pink Lady, Mackintosh, Granny Smith, Fuji. You name it they had it. It was decision time.
(SHANNON JACKSON) He grabbed a shopping basket and headed towards the apples. Harbor Detective Banks was browsing Gala apples when a woman across the aisle weighing bananas caught his eye. Her resemblance to Helen was striking. If he didn’t know any better he would think it was her. She placed the bananas in her shopping cart and proceeded to the checkout counter. Abandoning his notion to pacify his grumbling stomach, the detective left his basket as he positioned himself next to the newspaper stand to get a better look. He studied the woman as she paid for the last of her groceries.
(OLAKUNLE OMOLABI) He shielded his face from her with the latest fashion magazine and inspected her intently. The longer he watched her, the more he felt that he’d been wrong all along. How could he have doubted it?
That was Helen.
Despite her best efforts, she couldn’t completely disguise the delicately ungainly jaunt that was her signature. Her newfound short blonde hair was an interesting touch-a marked divergence from her once wildly flowing crimson mane.
It was that hair that had once lured him to her. Banks hated himself all over again for not seeing her for what she was then, (ROSA GRIFFIN) a cheat, a liar, a working drunk. Helen had put him and his bank account through the wringer. The way you couldn’t tell that she had this hidden life that Tom didn’t know about. But, he never got it until too late.
“Hey, you! What have you been up to?”
He smelled the alcohol on her breath disguised weakly by mint as she leaned over him. He jumped up so suddenly that they nearly bashed heads.
“What are you doing coming to the same surgeon that I do, Helen? Why are you still in this hemisphere?” He felt his (LISA KLOSE) heart quicken and clarity ensued. There was no future with Helen. She was just an unfortunate distraction from the life he had long been destined for…a life of professional intrigue.
Like Helen, Tom too had a hidden life. He was a former CIA agent and had left the Agency for her.
Tom was resourceful, intelligent, and fluent in fifteen foreign languages. His unique political, surveillance, and psychology skills where prized by the Agency. His achievements in foreign espionage were unparalleled.
Tom contacted his handler and announced his return. His handler replied, “Your assignment, should you choose to accept it, is (SARA CLEARY) an extremely dangerous one. We’ve discovered a mole in the Agency at the highest level. She’s someone I believe you know on a personal level.”
Tom knew instantly who he was after — the very woman he had chosen to escape. Helen.
He hung up the phone feeling dejected, lifeless. He had made a point to leave Helen behind and now he was being asked to focus his entire professional life on her. He sighed loudly and took out his wallet to locate her phone number. Their dance wasn’t over yet.
Join your colleagues and fellow SDF-ers for the Annual SDF General Body Meeting! At this meeting you’ll learn more about SDF, the SDF committees, how you can get involved, and also, get some free food.
Yes, FREE FOOD!
From Kate Maskarinec (Kate.Maskarinec@villagelearningplace.org):
Hello, all!
As you may know, the annual Charles Village Festival will be happening this year on Saturday, June 4 and Sunday, June 5; the Village Learning Place will once again be a part of the festivities (the children’s activities per usual)!
The VLP tent/area will be open from 11am-5pm on both Saturday and Sunday, and it is traditionally run by VLP staff and volunteers. So, I am seeking willing volunteers once again this year to help with the fun that is Festival! (It really is more fun than it is work!) I’m looking for folks to help out on both Saturday and Sunday- don’t worry, I’m not asking you to work the whole day, only a shift or two! (shifts are 11:45am-2pm or 2pm-5:30pm). Adults, young adults, and teenagers welcome (this includes Disco Spawn)!
We’ll have a moonbounce, story hours, face painting, games, activities, book giveaways, and two special guests this year: magician and balloon artist Jon Jensen as well as storyteller Diane Macklin. They’ll be performing on Saturday and Sunday, respectively.
If you’re able to help out, please let me know as soon as possible; feel free to recruit friends and family members and bring them along for the ride as well!
Thank you! I hope you’ll be having some Festival fun with us this year!
