The Perfect Story

It is in here (pointing to my head). I feel it is coming closer to exit me through my fingers. I feel it push down my arm. I sit down. Ready. No more detours. Focus.

It feels closer, but still not there yet. I need coffee. I get up and make myself some coffee. I boil the water. I add the coffee to the filter where I will pour the boiling water into. It will pass the coffee and run down to the glass pitcher.

The story is pressing the blood down to my fingers. I hurry into my keyboard and sit down. The water is boiling as I write “Soon the winter is over.” Now it is coming.

I quickly get up to turn it off and hurry back to the keyboard. I read the line “Soon the winter is over.” Something is missing with that sentence. Boring.

In the kitchen I pour the water over the coffee beans from some exotic place like Ethiopia or Kenya, I forget which country it is from. Briefly, I think about Africa. I would love to visit one day, it is said to be a beautiful place but I never took the time to visit it.

The coffee smell fills the room with its aroma. I should invent an air freshener built into an alarm clock that would emit this scent when the alarm goes off. I, for one, would find it so much easier to get out of bed.

Back to work. “Soon the winter is over.” I correct it slightly: “Soon the long cold winter will leave us.” Too long. “Soon the cold winter will be over.” That is more like it.

Except this winter wasn’t cold. It was one of the warmest winters for many years. Climate changes and the price of heating seem to have treated us well this winter. Last year heating was so expensive that I had to turn the temperature down to save some money. It was a long winter.

“Soon the warm winter will leave us.” The reader will think I am in Africa. Maybe I will pick coffee beans to roast my own coffee. That would be amazing.

I Googled it and found a trip that included making your coffee. A travel agency, I never heard of, offers an all-inclusive trip to Rwanda where you will be staying on a coffee plantation. Private room with a bath and breakfast in the morning and fine dining in the evening.

You will learn about coffee, collect the best beans from the fields and later roast them. They offer safaris and much more.

Sounds like a rich man’s option to experience being poor except you have your luxury room, so in fact, you will not experience that at all. It comes with a heavy price tag but I wonder if the coffee you make is included in the price— it doesn’t say.

“Soon the mild winter will leave us.”

Note to myself. Write about the future and not about the past. We all need to look forward. Too much in the world is focused on history instead of solutions for tomorrow.

“Soon summer is here.” Yes, that is better.

Note to myself II. Write something even if it is the worst text you ever made. You can always delete it later but you need to get started and get words out. Your fingers are excited to get started but your brain is holding you back.

“Soon summer is here and the flowers will break the cold surface and shine in the sunlight.” Now we are getting somewhere.

Note to myself III. Africa could be a great destination this summer. Not to make coffee but to explore some part of it. I should consider this possibility later.

“The winter was long and dark. Now we will open our windows and feel the first warm rays from the sun while we smile at the flowers. The air will be filled with life and we will take an afternoon nap on the porch while the butterflies will start the wave of good fortune and peace in our time.”

Note to myself IV. Yesterday I bought a T-shirt at the local brewery. Their name is Two Thumb. On the T-shirt, they have written in big letters “I have Two Thumb inside me.” Maybe a theme for a story. I need to correct their spelling error though.

It is flowing. The words are coming through my arms faster than my fingers can write them and some words are lost in the process. But I know, this first part will be rewritten and maybe deleted later in the process.

Outside my window, the cow is looking at me but I do not see her. It is my good friend Queen Ireland as her red hair makes her look majestic. We often chat during the day.

In the distance, the postman is making his way up the small path to my house. I need to level out the bumps in the pathway but I seem to forget it every time he has left.

“I dream of world peace. Every morning we will wake up to ‘Imagine’ by Lennon and a healthy breakfast. I dream of a place where we can live in harmony and nobody needs to be hungry. I dream of a world where we all stand together to make paradise come true.”

Note to myself V. Don’t write anything so sweet that most people will end up with a diabetes shock. Keep it real. Keep it possible.

I look up from my writing and see that the postman soon will turn into my driveway. I look out at Queen Ireland, she looks back at me. During the long winter, she stays inside and I have occasionally gone over to visit her in the stable to make sure she is good.

I hear the postman’s little wan screeches as he slows down.

I open my front door. “Hello Pat, how are you today?” Pat is like an old friend. When there is snow outside he might be the only one coming all the way out here during a week or two. “Time for a coffee today?”

“Oh hello there. Good, good. Wife is back from the hospital — it was nothing serious and tonight I will get a homemade meal again.” He had been alone for about a week as his wife one evening felt pain in her chest. He called the ambulance. Not sure why the hospital had kept her for a week if nothing was wrong, but maybe he is not telling me everything. “I have time so if it is no bother, I will gladly accept your offer.”

“It was some scary days but already the day after she was sitting up and I thought she would be home the same day. Maybe she talked them into keeping her there — you know, like a holiday for her. She read a book every day and I even think she had time to chat with all the others on the ward.”

“But now she is back. She said she missed me. She knows I missed her, but it is not something I am saying all the time. She asked what I wanted for dinner tonight — I have missed her food.” He smiled and licked his lips.

“How is the writing going? I already told my wife about you. I expect to get a copy when you are done.” I think I happened to mention to him about a project for a novel I had.

“It is moving slowly. I think the winter was too long. I am just starting up. Not sure where it will take me.” I smiled at him. “I wrote ‘Soon summer is here’ to get started. So not so far away.”

“I know how that is. It is just like writing those Christmas cards. I never knew what to write and ended up with more or less the same as the year before. It seems you do the same. I dropped making those Christmas cards but I promise the wife a book made by you, so you have to hang in there for one more book.”

It was hard words from a postman — thinking I had reused that sentence. As soon as he left, I deleted everything.

I pull up a new document. A blank page. The cursor blinks, it is ready. I place my fingers on the keyboard.

The brain is working. Focus silently Fingers dance over the keyboard. The cursor disappears while I type.

I do not see it. Envision the story. It takes me away to new places. Exploring an exciting wild world.

Thank you for reading my little fictional story on how to kickstart a new story. Do let me know what you think, I appreciate your feedback.

You can also support my writing by offering me a coffee >> This story is fiction. No AI has been used.