Writing Remembered Promises

[Lady Asphyxia]

[size=1]Well, some of you [those that participated in the thread, at least] would probably remember the story in Piles of Paper about the old man who littered his house with lemons.

I decided to expand this idea [finally], and this is the result. I'm not too sure about it, but I figure at least it's done. So here's the story.

It's 750 words, because it's for an assignment. So...yeah.

[center]___________________

[b]REMEMBERED PROMISES[/b][/center]


If you step into the front room of 21 Jacaranda Drive, the first smell to assail your senses will be the familiar citrus tang of lemons, followed by the smell of pipe tobacco, and finally, of pillow mints.

When you look around the room, you?ll notice that these smells are far from random wafts of wind. Mr. Carmichael had deliberately and effectively created these smells by quite simply littering the room with lemons, tobacco, and pillow mints. When Mrs. Wenton asked about this, Mr. Carmichael just shrugged.

?Memories,? came the grunt. Mr. Carmichael turned his back on her then, his hands shaking as he used his cane to make his way back to his seat.

Mrs. Wenton sniffed once, her thin bony hands clutching her Social Worker?s clipboard to her chest. Her brown eyes scanned the living room, face set into a mask of disbelief. There had to be at least two decades of [i]National Geographic[/i] magazines stacked in the living room alone. The pages were starting to curl with the humidity, and the citric acid all the lemons were giving off.

?Please, Mrs. Wenton, take a seat.? Mr. Carmichael?s voice was forceful; more suited to a middle-aged business tycoon than to a nonagenarian who littered his house with?[i]fruit[/i]. She perched on the edge of a simply hideous armchair. The pattern was probably from the 1950s, in a brown, red and green plaid. She noticed that part of the stuffing had come out of the arm, and inside was a breath mint. There was a lemon pushed down in the crease.

?May I ask you a question, Mr. Carmichael?? she asked, clenching her teeth and speaking in as sweet and unaccusing voice as possible. She hated these old coots, she really did. She didn?t understand why they wouldn?t just give up and move into a home. Oh, she hadn?t always felt that way. When she?d began her career as a social welfare officer, she?d dreamt of helping these poor people, of providing them with comfort and understanding. But she?d wasted twelve years of her life trying to help people who didn?t want help, of listening to complaints and insults with her teeth gritted and her smile plastered in place.

?Certainly, Mrs. Wenton.? His tone was pleasant, gentlemanly. If he hadn?t been such a stubborn old coot ? at least three case workers had tried to get him into a rest home, with no luck ? she probably would have liked him.

?What, exactly, is the reason for your, erm, unusual decorations?? She used the coffee table in front of them as an example. The top was littered with lemons and tobacco. There seemed to be breath mints covering every inch of the glass shelf underneath the table.

?Well, Mrs. Wenton,? Mr. Carmichael clasped his hands and looked her directly in the eye. ?I read in the National Geographic, Issue 172, 1987, that smells were often connected to memories. They did this survey, and 55 percent of respondents had a memory associated with a at least one of six smells they were given.?

She wasn?t impressed by his memory. ?And what does that have to do with you??
A melancholy sigh escaped his lips, and he looked toward a framed photograph perched on the mantle of the fireplace. The woman in it was young, laughing at the person taking the photograph. Her hair was mouse brown, and up in a bun, but the smile in her face illuminated her entire expression.

?There?s a history of Alzheimer?s in my family. My wife passed away four years ago, and her biggest fear was that she would be forgotten. I promised her that I would always remember her, but Mrs. Wenton, I can feel in my bones that I?m coming down with the disease. I know the signs, Mrs. Wenton. I?ve read all about it.? The fear on his face was evidence that there was no doubt in his mind about what was happening to him.

Tears filled his eyes as he went on. Much as Mrs. Wenton had grown to despise the welfare system and the job she was trapped in, somewhere in the pit of her stomach, a flutter of pity ran through her. ?But I love my wife, Mrs. Wenton, and I will do anything I can to prevent her from being forgotten. If that means littering my house with fruit and tobacco, then I will.?

Mr. Carmichael took a deep breath. ?Because a promise to your wife is a promise forever.?[/size]

[Mimmsicle]

[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Lady Asphyxia [/i]

[size=1]?May I ask you a question, Mr. Carmichael?? she asked, clenching her teeth and speaking in as sweet and unaccusing voice as possible. She hated these old coots, she really did. She didn?t understand why they wouldn?t just give up and move into a home. Oh, she hadn?t always felt that way. When she?d began her career as a social welfare officer, she?d dreamt of helping these poor people, of providing them with comfort and understanding. But she?d wasted twelve years of her life trying to help people who didn?t want help, of listening to complaints and insults with her teeth gritted and her smile plastered in place.
[/size][/QUOTE]
[COLOR=darkred]My only objection to this lovely piece, is this paragraph. It feels like it should be divided into two, after the "Oh, she hadn't always felt that way".
It gets lost otherwise, somehow. In my humble opinion ^_^;

It is a very sweet piece, despite the bitternes balancing in it [lemons, very nice symbolism].
I realise that it was for an assignment, but if you should ever go back to it, it could benefit even more from fleshing out.

There's no end to the possibilities ! ^__^

- Mimmi[/COLOR]

[KarmaOfChaos]

[color=deeppink]
Nice work Asphy. Especially the last line. Even the worst of stories can be saved with a particularily powerful last line, so your story, which despite its wonderful imagery and tone seemed lacking something, was brought together very well.

The array of objects you chose are interesting not only in their seemingly unrelatedness to eachother, but the fact that each of these smells, mint, lemon, and tabacco, are all very strong, invading smells. Curiosity is piqued about what kind of woman this was, to be associated with such strong smells.

The bitter lemon of a hard worker, tabacco--the tomboy, and mint, the piercing yet sweet little something almost like tough love.

Good stuff!

-Karma
[/color]

[Mitch]

[size=1][color=red] I thought it was good, but needs fleshing out in points. First off, remember this--"omit needless words." If there's a word, and it's not needed, and it's just taking up space, get rid of it. Especially things like adverbs, adverbs as well as adjectives aren't the writer's friend. Concrete nouns and strong verbs are a writer's friend.

So, looking through this quick, I'll give you some ideas.[/size][/color]

[quote]Certainly, Mrs. Wenton.? His tone was pleasant, [strike]gentlemanly[/strike]. If he hadn?t been such a stubborn old coot ? at least three case workers had tried to get him into a rest home, with no luck ? she probably would have liked him.
[/quote]

[size=1][color=red] Bleh, I'm out of time.

Okay, what you need to do is make this longer and more fleshed out. The ending didn't work for me. It leaves you with a feeling it's way too short and it could go on a lot longer.

I'll edit this later. Gotta fly.[/size][/color]

[Brasil]

The POV shift is a tad jarring.

The first two paragraphs are second person and then we jump into third. It doesn't feel natural, unfortunately. I do see what you were trying to do, immerse the reader, but with the change, any immersive effect is lost. I would suggest reworking the opening into a third person POV.

"Mrs. Wenton was assaulted with the aroma of citrus and tobacco when she entered...(etc)"

Obviously, that's a very rough suggestion. You would make it more elegant, but I think that's how you can make the introduction fit with the tone of the third person narrative.

Also, I would make Mr. Charmichael [i]sound[/i] aged. I know you make a mention of how he...breaks the mold, so to speak, but it's not enough to make the reader believe he's an old man, suffering from Alzheimer's. You know, this is probably because I recently watched 2001, but take a look at HAL throughout the film.

His character progression goes from stable, to...deranged...to harmless and absent-minded.

Interestingly, this character progression can also apply to Mr. Charmichael, provided you have an interest in pursuing it.

I think we can all agree that as we grow older, we go from stable to batty to absent-minded. I mean, it's really what Alzheimer's is: someone begins degenerating into a removed state of mind, and that removed state of mind isn't adequately portrayed in this piece, I think.

Mr. Charmichael seems just a bit too self-aware at the end, when we are told just how much Alzheimer's is going to hit him.

To remedy that, I think if you toned down his self-awareness, the Alzheimer's would come through much more clearly. It would be almost...making his dialogue more vague.

You know, yeah. Go watch 2001 and pay close attention to HAL. I think you'll be able to get an idea of Mr. Charmichael a bit better after [spoiler]HAL is disabled[/spoiler].

Hope that helped.