Wheel for yarn

© Rochelle Wisoff-Fields

It was one of those old houses that still enclose the aroma of another time as if carefully locked inside to transfer you there.

She loved these places. It made her feel like entering a time capsule and travelling back through the ages.

A woman once lived here who knew how to spin wool for yarn. It was a quality skill to possess, and she probably made a living out of it.

Now, many aren’t even able to recognise what this wooden spinning wheel even does.

It’s a dangerous thing to forget our past; it blinds us to our future.

Also part of Friday Fictioneers

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Clean Slate

© Na’ama Yehuda

Love stories of the past are like wilted flowers. Their time – and season – has ended. They were wonderful while they lasted, but they had a due date. And it has expired.

We need to let them go. Throw them out so that we have space to bring in new ones. Fresh, colourful, scented, alive. Ones that remind us that there is a bright future ahead and it’s up to us to make it prosperous.

We can remember, but it should not affect us. Perhaps that is the hardest to master.

Some flowers last forever; those we should nourish.

Also part of Friday Fictioneers

Surreal instances

©Brenda Cox

They are like surreal instances. Like a bicycle clinging onto a wall as if it’s about to ride up against gravity.

Those thoughts of what you could have, would have, should have; they cause too much distress and eat you up from the inside. They tear you apart piece by piece because there is nothing you can do to change the situation or remedy anything. You can’t alter what did not happening. All you can do is look towards living the present as best as possible, and enjoying what is to come as much as you can.

Seize the now.

Also part of Friday Fictioneers

The secret of old buildings

©Roger Bultot

“Come, I want to show you something!” She grabbed his hand and rushed ahead full of excitement pulling him like a puppy out on a walk.

“Old buildings always hide a very interesting history. And this one is no exception”.

He looked at the large, brick-laden building that stood imposing in front of him. You probably wouldn’t even notice it had it not been for the huge glass windows that caught your eye.

“If we don’t care about our past, we cannot hope for the future,” she said. “It doesn’t look like much, but it has definitely shaped this town”.

Also part of Friday Fictioneers

Pretending to be

In a line from the 2014 Australian theatre production of George Orwell’s best-selling novel 1984, one of the characters that works for the Government, otherwise known as Big Brother, says: “The people will not revolt. They will not look up from their screens long enough to notice what’s happening”. Seventy years after the novel was written, this is more relevant and true than ever.

We are so busy trying to appear to be busy – constantly posting on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat and all other social networks that we are not aware of what is happening in the world around us. We are so caught up in exhibiting a virtual life that we miss out on actually living one.

It is as if Orwell predicted the future, way ahead of his time. But in reality, all he did was truly comprehend human nature and its weakness – the fact that it is overwhelmed by apathy, selfishness and greed.

Orwell’s 1984 (1984 (written in 1948) is described as “one of the greatest dystopian novels every written”. “It looks at a future where people are controlled into what to think, how to act and how to live by the Government, known as Big Brother. It uses telescreens, fearmongering, media control and corruption to control the masses”. The main protagonist, however, is an initially apathetic person named Winston who “craves something more than the controlled world he inhabits”.

Crawling out of apathy has actually become a challenge.

In our current world, we are so determined to show that “we are not afraid” that we have allowed our data to be accessible almost everywhere by everyone. We cannot travel without being documented in more than one way, everything we do is entered on databases that are interlinked and our entire existence is available on a screen. You are reading this very text on one such screen.

The point is to get off it. Go out and do something. Create a life rather than pretend to have one. Read, think and live.

The misappreciation of things

There is a saying that you don’t really appreciate what you have until you have it no more. In a post-apocalyptic world we will begin to understand how lucky we are nowadays to be able to do so many things with so little effort – from house chores to work to travel. Yet, we have forgotten the value of everything that truly matters: family, relationships, education.

We don’t have time – we say – to read books. To feed our minds with something of essence, that may change the way we think and the way we view things around us. Ironically, however, we spend the major part of our days skim reading on a screen pointless articles and posts on social media.

We claim we don’t have time – or energy – to visit a museum or an exhibition, something that would increase our value as people, that would give us some cultural education, that would help us realise where we come from so we can improve where we’re going. Yet, we have the time to waste by taking tens of shots in search of the perfect selfie to post on social networks in demonstration of our idyllic lives.

We know nothing yet act as if we know everything.

We stubbornly refuse to learn and, even more, be taught by elders.

We have become a generation of people who want everything and value nothing.

And it is a shame. Because we are the future of this world. And it is not looking too bright.

The fortune-teller’s prediction

©Fatima Fakier

“When you meet the one, you’ll see her in Venice”. It was a silly prompt from a fortune-teller at a fair when they were kids. They were not even teenagers then and not even thinking about love. Life was so much easier. Careless and stress-free. But then, both Michael and Lilly grew up. And they lost touch throughout the years. She went abroad to study and he was hired at a local company, working day and night. Life passed them by.

Until chance – or maybe karma – reunited them on a plane to Venice. It was time to fulfil the prediction.

 

Also part of Friday Fictioneers

The Earth’s laughter

©MCD

“The Earth laughs in flowers” said Ralph Waldo Emerson. And you can see it with the first bright, sunny days, flowers all around us begin to bloom filling life with colour. And with that, hope, light and optimism. For where the earth continues to bloom, so does the belief that things will become better.

It is the reason we are so happy and radiant when someone surprises us with flowers. Or why our mood immediately changes when we find colourful, blooming flowers in our garden or on our balcony.

But like all beautiful, worthwhile things in life, they need commitment, effort and determination.

Have in mind, though: “When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower” (Alexander Den Heijer). And like The Little Prince so rightly reminds us “It is the time wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important”.

“All the flowers of the tomorrows are in the seeds of today” – Indian proverb.

 

Drawing a line, closing a door

There is a saying that “you don’t drown by falling in the water. You drown by staying there”. The allegory is linked to keeping your mind fixed upon the past. It’s the same as knocking constantly on a closed door and expecting it to open.

It is true that our hearts and minds often fail to coordinate on sentimental issues – you know what you need to do but you feel differently about it.

We need to close some doors. To draw a (final) line and move on. Not because what they offered was not good or worthwhile. But because they no longer lead anywhere.

We experience things in life to become better, to mature, to have a fuller existence. To live and not just be. But some things aren’t meant to last. Some are even meant to be your path towards something even better. You never know what wonders you will experience tomorrow, unless you let go of the past and embrace the present.

“When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us” – Alexander Graham Bell

 

Also part of Daily Prompt: Learning

It’s not easy being Greek

For the past five years, Greece has been the centre of news around the world. Not so much because of its spirit of democracy and ethos imbued by our Ancient Greek ancestors. But because of the shame, deceitfulness and financial mismanagement brought about by their predecessors. Media around the world have vilified the country that thus far was praised for all the principles and values it had introduced to the modern world. Yet, we ourselves proved unable to live up to them.

It is not Greece alone that is in financial trouble. The whole of Europe is, and most of the world too. But Greece is an easy target. The advertised ‘300 days of sunshine’, the Mediterranean diet, the mythical island beaches, the relaxed and ‘easy-going’ way of life are so easy to despise and scorn, and all the more easy to contradict with the lack of responsibility and order, especially as regards public finances. The source of all our troubles.

Foreigners cannot understand how Greeks can still fill restaurants and cafés, as if nothing is going on around them. But Greeks themselves justify their outings, by arguing that staying indoors and damning their misfortunes is not a solution that will lead anywhere.

And they are right.

Because it is not the “ordinary” Greeks who can do much to change the situation, other than adhere to the harsh measures imposed. Those brought upon them by others. Others, who, are supposed to represent them, but once in power, forget all electoral promises and turn the other way. The lay Greeks are the ones who witness their country’s demise and all they can do is shout, exasperate, and eventually just let it go, because somethings will never change.

This attitude is what has caused over 200,000 young Greeks to search for a future abroad. For many, their dreams and expectations were too big for what the country (now) had to offer. It is certainly not easy to get up and leave. To abandon everything you are familiar with, the life you are accustomed to, your friends and family. But it is even harder deciding to stay. It takes more courage to remain and continue to fight in a country that is constantly proving to be against you in every way.

There are many Greeks who choose to stay. And they should be respected all the more for that. Because they are still trying. They are the ones who believe that “if everyone just leaves, who will stay and fix the country?” They are the ones who still dream, but are determined to compromise on a few things in order to survive. They may not be acknowledged as much as they should, nor are they compensated for the work they do. But they choose to stay. Why? Why would you stay when everything and everyone around you screams go?

Because you still hope. You believe deep down that things will change for the better. And that you will be part of the wheel that will set it all in motion.

There are young Greeks, in their early 30s, educated, full of thirst for life and willing to work. There are those who decide to strive on their own, and, since they can’t find the work they want, they will create it themselves. In a period of crisis, struck on all fronts by austerity measures, stifling bureaucracy and high taxes, these Greeks persist in having their own way. There are many who have launched their own business, determined to change foreign perceptions of their country, making it a model to emulate, rather than one to avoid. It is these Greeks who have been dubbed the crazy ones, the radicals, the dreamers. The ones who people look upon with both admiration and sympathy. But aren’t “those who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, usually the ones that do”?

It is not easy being Greek nowadays. And it is certainly not easy being Greek in Greece. But there are still many who insist, persist, and resist all negative waves pounding their way. Maybe it is through them that Greece will arise again. After all, it was Socrates who said that the secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but in building the new. And that is just what we need. A new start.

See also related reports with examples of Greeks who try to accomplish more in their own country in English and Greek.