Word count: 10,001
Here are a few of my choicer tidbits from the first week. The setting is a suicide hotline, and it’s kinda sorta semi-autobiographical. Which doesn’t excuse a passage like this.
She felt like she was on guard in the night, when everyone was asleep except for people who needed help. She was a sentry in the long dark tunnel that often seemed to have no light at its end.
If you can get out of this tortured prose without injury, I salute you.
The first person couldn’t be counted on not to give some attitude if forced to be placed on hold due to another caller’s higher crisis level.
In my defense on this one, “persistent” is used as a noun in the story.
Midnight all the pumpkins turned back into princesses, and the really persistent persistents knew it.
Can you tell I’m being completely lazy with descriptions?
One of the only other men in the room besides Mike, a balding man who looked like he might sell kites on Haight, turned to Dana and said “He’s past that point in his life.”
Too many Richard Wiseman illusions, perhaps.
She stared at the note, reading it or maybe burning the afterimage onto her retina.
And now for an attempt at humor. You have been warned.
He made signs resembling a drowning deaf person’s last wish, but that Dana interpreted to mean “Do not put her on the phone with me.”
Now I’m being a good girl. I’m not going back and editing anything. And it doesn’t all entirely suck. I am, however, starting to wonder what’s going to happen when I run out of material from my time on the hotline. Am I actually going to have to make something up?
Monday I’ll have my first guest post for you, a report about National Disability Mentoring Day. I send you off with something relaxing to watch on your writing break, which should be seen in HD and fullscreen.
If you do run out of material, I worked on a crisis line too, I’ve got LOADS of stories. And I’m willing to share them for FREE. That’s right, *dingding* FREE! LOL
“He made signs resembling a drowning deaf person’s last wish”
I laughed.