Truth or Lie About You

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Write 4 things about yourself that are true and one that’s a lie. Then, go on to at least one other person’s post and guess which one is the lie.

Post your response (500 words or fewer) in the comments below.

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300 thoughts on “Truth or Lie About You”

  2. rebekkalynn9800

    1. I have a deformity in two of my fingers
    2. I used to hate writing
    3. I dislike bacon
    4. I lived in at least 4 school districts
    5. I’ve never broken a bone

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  3. pjbf1979

    1. I have a rare disease
    2. I’ve been good friends with a celebrity
    3. I’m estranged from nearly all of my family
    4. I am 2 degrees from Kevin Bacon
    5. I’m short for a man–5′ 6″ (168 cm)

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  4. JargenLithe

    I am a virgin
    I have a black belt in Taekwondo
    My right big toenail is 9mm thinner than the left
    My favourite book is The Amazing Maurice and his Talented Rodents
    I’ve never seen a Taco Bell

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  6. Musicalmuse99

    1.) I’m bi
    2.) I love theatre
    3.) I’ve been mistaken to be much older than I am
    4.) I’ve been catcalled by guys who were at lest 25 years older than me

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  7. ImAlwaysWrite

    1) My favorite colour is clear
    2) I’m British
    3) Whenever I sing it’s off key
    4) I can type practically anything with my eyes closed

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  8. asphillips2

    Okay, here we go 🙂

    1. I’m a twin
    2. I have one half-brother
    3. I have a baby sister
    4. My Dad is an asshole
    5. I love the Sprouse Twins

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  9. Sorrowbird

    Truth or Lie

    1. I am sitting in a chair,
    2. Eating a waffle,
    3. Typing this response using only my left hand,
    4. and listening to the Beatles.

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  10. Cassidy

    Let’s give this a try.

    1) I prefer writing poetry over short stories.
    2) I have my bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice with a minor in Music.
    3) I am an only child.
    4) I do not like pizza at all!
    5) I spent two years in the United States Army National Guard as a Corrections Officer.

    Can you spot the lie?

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  11. StephDizWrite

    Try to figure it out what is a lie or truth

    1 I have not published nothing yet I still continue to write
    2 I am the only asian American in my family
    3 I was adopted
    4 I often find do myself lost in my world’s that I create and find it hard to get out
    5 I do not have any rituals when it comes to writing.

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  12. Critique

    Some challenging curveballs have kept me busy and out of the loop. I’ve missed this wonderful group of writers and the exercise of writing.
    Wishing everyone a Happy New Year!

    Fact or fiction…..
    On a deserted highway an army jeep roared up behind our car and swerved in front forcing us to stop. Soldiers in fatigues jumped out, crouched, and at the tender age of eight I faced the business end of their machine guns.
    The first movie I saw was on a balmy summer evening at a drive-in theatre in Miami, Florida. Charlton Heston starred. Guess which one?
    I’m a sportsaholic. Football, baseball, hockey – you name it. Hands down my favorite sport involves two teams of seven airborne players and four balls.
    ‘I Saw Her Standing There’ always gets my feet tapping. I witnessed the British Invasion when the Beatles make their debut American television appearance on the Ed Sullivan show.
    I’ve lived in several countries but my home is north of the International Boundary.

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    1. snuzcook

      Happy New Year, Critique!

      Great list of possibilities. Hard to eliminate one in context of the other four if they are true.
      Here’s my vote:

      The machine guns = True (matches living in many countries and first movie in the 60s)
      The drive in movie (my guess Planet of the Apes) = True
      Sports including Quidditch = by process of elimination, False
      The Beatles = True (again, growing up in 1960s in US)
      Lived in many countries = True (bookend to #1)

      How’d I do?

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    2. Tysheena Jackson

      I’m so jealous you witnessed and lived during the British Invasion! The Beatles are my absolute favorite band to date but I’m going to go with the the seven airborne players one and four balls. Quidditch, much?

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  13. Tresix

    1. I was a 2-day champion on “Jeopardy!”.

    2. My birthday is on the anniversary of the Gunfight at the OK Corral.

    3. I had a short story published in Germany.

    4. I am big fan of rap music.

    5. I have playlists for different scenes that I write.

    5.

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  14. Tysheena Jackson

    (My first post never made it to the site, sucks, but here we go again– round two!)

    My parents were Christian missionaries when I was growing up. They’re not dead and haven’t left the faith; they just don’t do missionary work anymore. They raised the four of us overseas in between five foreign countries within a span of 32 years. My oldest memory is being six years old and running through the muddy “streets” of Ghana with my bare feet, and siblings close behind. This was completely normal for kids like us and all the other kids we grew up with. We were young and didn’t quite understand why Mom and Dad were constantly seeing strangers, and why the strangers were always sick. And why, when I was around 7, we were forced to leave all of our belongings behind and move to Algeria? What was so great about that place? We didn’t settle back into the states until I was thirteen in which my fragile self had difficulty transitioning into American culture.

    One day while my oldest sister and I were walking to a nearby supermarket, a bird pooped on my head in which I decided to cry. Now, if you must know, I was graced with a head full of black curly hair. THICK hair. Bows and barrettes were not a go-to for me. Long story short, my sister washed the bird poo out at a local drinking fountain where passerby’s wondered why the little girl was making such a fuss? I don’t have a bird phobia now– I actually quite like birds. I just can’t get the feeling out of me that one of these days a pigeon will poop on my even curlier and thicker mess of hair. After all, history does repeat itself.

    Fast forward ten years. I’m walking downtown to my job when a man pulls up alongside me in what would seem to be a failed attempt of a body traffic pickup (I can’t put the actual word here). Downtown Las Vegas… where there are hundreds and hundreds of people around… watching. In broad daylight. Let’s just say, he didn’t get the girl.

    I currently work at a company that will soon be the world’s first leading answer to male and female pattern baldness. We are not yet on the market, but are in Phase trials for both men and women. We hope to extend our help to those who suffer hair loss from cancer, too– the skies the limit for us!

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    2. snuzcook

      Glad you didn’t give up on your post, Tysheena!

      Quite a difficult choice. I’ll go with the last one–working for breakthrough on baldness.

      Fun stories!

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  15. Diana9573

    1. My new year’s resolution is to workout, but I don’t know if that’s going to “work out” if you know what I mean.
    2. My favorite band is Twenty One Pilots l-/
    3 . Although I like to write with some of my spare time, I also like to play my clarinet and ukulele. I am also very passionate about art, mainly drawing, though.
    4. I am a fourteen year old boy and I live in Chicago, Illinois with my mom, dad, and two sisters.

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    3. Tysheena Jackson

      Hmm. A 14 year old boy’s favorite band would be Twenty One Pilots and he’d mention it in a setting like this. But a TRUE Twenty One Pilots fan, regardless of age, would declare their love for them any day (I’m a huge fan, too)!

      So I’m going with #4.

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  16. BMagic

    1. I was born in Philadelphia, PA
    2. I am adopted.
    3. I met Pope John Paul II one day walking on the streets of Rome in 1984.
    4. There are football players that carry my last name.
    5. I am a legal assistant.

    Now, folks guess which one is a lie. Good luck.

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  17. rle

    Okay, let’s try this…

    1. I am the first born of my parent’s two sons. My younger brother and I rarely speak even though we only live three miles apart. We like each other just fine, but live two completely different lifestyles and share no common interests.

    2. When I was a senior in high school, we lost our home in a house fire. It was February 8th, 1989. Ironically, it was also Ash Wednesday.

    3. I started a blog last August, but have only made one post. I really want to start posting more there, but somehow I never do. It’s rlewrites.blogspot.com if any one is interested.

    4. I never learned to swim. After repeated attempts at taking lessons, I gave up. Oddly, I love being around the water, but hate being wet.

    5. Someday, I’d love to make my living writing. Until then, I provide for my family as a patent attorney.

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    1. Beebles

      Hi rle, so … Ash Wednesday 1989 checks out, so that could be ok, the blog is there, so that’s ok, I think most of us would Iike to spend all day writing, so that’s ok. I’m not falling for the can’t swim one again, so I’ll let that one go, which leaves #1 – you are an only child! Strength and happiness, rle.

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        Beebles is sage, I’m going to jump on #1 also. What’s with the swimming stuff.? Everyone needs to learn. Children can start at one year old, they’ll love it. Be careful though. It must be horrible losing your home to a fire. I couldn’t even imagine. I’lll teach you, you needn’t worry. I have no cause to drown a patent attorney.

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    2. jhowe

      I’m going to say you’re not a patent attorney. Perhaps your brother with whom you rarely speaks is the lawyer, but not you. You seem more of an outdoors guy. Hold it, hold it… I’m feeling that you work with greenery of some kind. Or maybe not.

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    3. steelebob

      #1 I am guessing is the lie. I base this on the blog you wrote, which by the way, I am anxious to read more, the story, true or not, is very intriguing and hopefully you’ll write more.

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  18. ReathaThomasOakley

    Busy days with sons and daughter-in-law but wanted to honor the Monday commitment. I see there are several new posts. I will read and comment as soon as I can. This turned out to be more fun than first anticipated.
    What I said:
    1. I’m fluent in Portuguese.
    2. I never learned to swim.
    3. I dislike writing about myself.
    4. I lived in an actively haunted house.
    5. My earliest memory is from when I was two years and four days old.

    The truth:
    5. True. My brother was born when I was two years, four days old. That is my earliest, clear memory. I have this vague recollection of being carried and getting a shock when I reached over and touched a grocery store cooler. I also recall having my photo taken while I was talking on a toy phone. My mother told me both things happened before I was two.

    4. True. Several people, other than my family, heard the sounds of someone walking across the floor in the room above the living room before the bed springs creaked as if someone was lying down. The room and bed were mine and years before a woman, friend of my mother’s family, died in that bed, in that room. I always felt she was a kind and gentle spirit.

    3. True, but snuzcook saw the deeper truth, the Annie stories are my covert self.

    2. True. My mother always feared I would drown with the ocean so near, so I was never allowed to learn to swim. Sorry, Kerry and Beebles.

    1. Another sorry, Kerry, but this is false. You are absolutely correct about the large Brazilian population in south Florida. My son, who is with the Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo (OSESP), the São Paulo State Orchestra, was playing with another group in Ft. Lauderdale a few years ago and the hall was packed with patrons speaking Portuguese. So, jhowe, igonzales81, snuzcook, and Amaria got it right. I guess I don’t get a dollar.

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  20. Beebles

    So my Monday is almost over and I have to announce that my only divinateuse was Reatha. Hedonist playboy I ain’t. My missus joked that if anything, it was the other way around, that i saved her. Special mention must go to Amaria who suggested #1 and since I actually enjoyed this, she must be somewhere near the truth of it. Tragically the Manor House is true, but there are jollier stories to tell and beautiful skies to enjoy, and if anyone needs a break from the cares of the world, we have a self-catering let out back, overlooking the horses and a distant church spire lost amongst the trees. Mates rates will apply. 😉

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  21. Rene Paul

    I was born in a hospital that’s no longer there, in a state that causes some people to ask, “Where is that?” I simply inform them that Rhode Island is on the Atlantic Ocean.

    I fell in love with my future wife while she was seated on the floor at my best friend’s house, leaning back against my legs – Ironically she was born in the largest state in our union – anyway, she looked up at me, our eyes meet, I felt some sort of tingling, I thought I was ill. later I learned it was love at first sight.

    It wasn’t really ‘first sight’, a few of us boys had thrown water balloons at them while that were outside sunbathing a few weeks earlier.

    It was the summer of ‘69’. I went to her 8th-grade graduation. It was the first time I meet her parents. We started to date, she was 14, a freshman in high school, I was 17, a senior in a different high school. Her mother thought I was too old for her, I had a driver’s license and a ‘69’ Chevelle. I loved her parents. We always went to Las Vegas together. We even went on our 25th wedding anniversary to Hawaii for 10 days with them! I miss them. I Graduated from a Catholic High School in sunny California and received a Bachelor of Science degree from Cal Poly Pomona.

    I’ve started 4 novels and haven’t finished any of them. I get bored after 100 pages or more. I write to keep my mind sharp. My Father-in-law always said I was as sharp as a bowling ball. I truly miss him. He was a funny man that could sing with the best of his generation. A real character.

    The rose of Texas and the Rooster of Rhode Island married five years after that faithful illness. We now count our 3 children, their spouses, and six grandchildren as our family.

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    1. Kerry Charlton

      Rene, you discovered the secret of finding the perfect woman, finding one at the age of 14. I had a harder time, I blatently stole my red head, at the age of 30. It was quite a shocker to all our friends. We are celebrating our 50th wedding anniversary this coming December and they all said….. “it won’t last.” HA!
      Eight children between us and fourteen grand children The last sentence is false, the rose of Texas would have destroyed your proud Rooster in one night. Kerry [By the way, the children are all great friends].

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    2. Tysheena Jackson

      #1. You were born in Rhode Island but perhaps not in a hospital? I know that is a long stretch but everything seems so believable. Also, you had a brand spankin’ new ’69 Chevelle in 1969– that’s wonderful! I imagine automobiles were much cheaper back then.

      Can’t wait to find out the lie!

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  23. Hiba Gardezi

    Monday’s almost over where I am so:
    ReathaThomasOakley, Beebles and Kerry Charlton, you’re geniuses!
    It’s also amazing how two of you knew I prefer football.
    Amaria, I wonder why no one else suspected two and jhowe, I’m not so sneaky!

    Can’t wait to know what you all lies about!

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  24. UnclePizza

    Been gone a while – work, family, and health all conspired to consume my time these last several months (all good outcomes though). I see the prompts have taken an odd twist, but if I’m going to get my muse back I can’t just sit back and wait for the perfect time to start writing again. So here goes:

    The young muse hid behind the bushes and looked through the window at her charge. He sat still at his desk, arms crossed as he stared blankly at the screen. Not long ago there were some short bursts where his hands flew rapidly across the keyboard before erasing everything with a firm, prolonged push of the delete key. Now…nothing.

    She felt bad for him. But it wasn’t as if she’d abandoned him for no reason, right? This was all his fault, and…how could he?!. After all the things she’d done to help him over the years – the little ideas that suddenly blossomed into stories, the characters that would pop into his head from “nowhere”, even the way dialogue would suddenly gel out of the haze – after all that! He lied to her! And now, now, she was so mad that, well, she’d actually forgotten what the lie had been!

    Still, she thought as she watched him struggle, he really was good to her, and maybe, just maybe, she should forgive him and start helping him again. But how could she forgive him if she couldn’t remember the lie?

    Was it the story about when his dad brought a lion cub home from the zoo and gave it to him as a gift? The way he tells it he was only five years old and his family was living in the Canary Islands in the early 1960’s. The story ends with his mother forbidding his father from bringing the lion cub into the house and making father and young son take it back to the zoo.

    Or was it the broken arm in Nigeria, again in the 1960’s. He said that his arm was splinted wrong by the local medic, and that by the time his father was able to get him to a hospital on the other side of the jungle (a week later) the arm had to be re-broken – with no anesthesia available. (Oooh, she thought, true or not, that sounds horrible!)

    Maybe it was the story he told about when he was driving across the US after graduating high school and his car broke down on a “shortcut” that he was taking in the desert southwest. According to him he was trying to save four hours of driving but paid for it by having to hike for four days without food and getting water by chewing cactus pulp.

    If not the desert story, maybe it was him telling her about how he lived in the woods of the Pacific Northwest, felling the giant timber for several years before a logging accident convinced him to take on less risky work.

    Then again, it could have been the story about how he got his pilot’s license because he was scared of flying and decided to face his fears head-on. Then, license in hand, he went on to take aerobatics lessons, and now he does spins and loops just for fun. (He’ll remind her that he said less risky work earlier, not less risk fun.).

    Ah, thought the young muse after pondering the tales. I remember which is the lie, and now that I know, I can forgive him. She left her hiding place behind the bush and crept back into the house through the open kitchen window, and as she tiptoed into her charge’s workspace she heard his fingers begin tapping the keys once more.

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    1. snuzcook

      Oh, wonderful stories! what to choose? There is a hint of a certain notorious celebrity with the initials CHM in various places in this tale, but I don’t know that it is intentional.
      I’m inclined to disbelieve the hobby of doing loops and spins in the sky. Though I wouldn’t put it outside the realm of possibility for the future.
      Nicely told, by the way!

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      1. UnclePizza

        Hmm…I’m drawing a blank on who CHM might be, so I suppose any parallels are certainly unintentional. And I really do have a small plane that I take for spins (pun intended!) over the NM desert!

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    2. jhowe

      Very imaginative way to tackle this prompt. I’m going to go with the desert shortcut as the lie. Four days of cactus pulp sounds difficult to pull off, though if it’s true, I’m sure the taste is still with you.

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        I’m with Beebles on the Lion. It must have been a nightmare to have your arm broken without anything to ease the pain. Is that when you took a liking to Jim Beam? By the way, we have missed you a lot, Uncle. Your story is with your usual mastrerful manner.

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        1. UnclePizza

          The lion incident really happened – apparently the rules were different 60 years ago, especially off the coast of Africa. Sadly (for the five-year old me) no so different when it came to Mom Rules!

          And I was only 7 when the broken arm incident happened, so it took a while to discover booze (and all those other things we discovered in the 60’s/70’s). In hindsight, though, I think that experience may have been at the root of the extreme distrust/disdain that I had for adults and authority figures that was a big part of my teenage rebellion years.

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    4. UnclePizza

      Good to be back folks. Sorry I got back so late that I don’t really have time to go comment on everyone else’s posts. I did read them all though and had a few smiles, especially watching people try to guess. It will be a few days before I get back here at the soonest and it will likely be a new prompt (BTW, what’s up with them lately?) – work is continuing to consume my time.

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  25. igonzales81

    I have to say, this sounds like an exercise I’m always helping my students with, the old “break the ice” to class introductions. Not that it’s a bad thing; I find them interesting and diverting. So here goes.

    1. I ran a daycare for several years, mostly to help my sister, who was a single mom with a pair of young children.

    2. I worked on a crab boat in the Bering Sea, one of the most dangerous occupations, but left it because it wasn’t fulfilling.

    3. My favorite movie of all time is “The Sound of Music,” because I saw it when I was very young and had a child-crush on Julie Andrews.

    4. I’ve watched every zombie-apocalypse show and movie ever made, and can quote from them volubly.

    5. My idea of the perfect day always ends with me in a hot bath, watching Jeopardy and heckling the contestants with my rubber duck.

    I think that covers a lot of ground. Sadly, I’m leaving town Monday for a hidden retreat deep in the Cascades, where Internet is unknown. Maybe I’ll make the big reveal before I leave. Or it could just stay a mystery.

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    3. Kerry Charlton

      Okay Igonalez81, the crab job sounds real enough. Who wouldn’t fall in love with Julie Andrews. I’ll pick #5 because if you said a sub marine, I would have believed it. A ducky, no.

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    4. Beebles

      Hi Igo, I was always falling in love with Ballerninas (well twice) when I was younger – god that sounds so middle class – so I understand #3. Day care fine, and what is life without a talkative rubber duck, so I’m stuck on crabs and zombies. Given #2 is like soooo Discovery channel, I’ll believe that is the lie.

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      1. rle

        I’m going with #2. Maybe you’re like me and never miss an episode of Deadliest Catch and wonder what it might be like to work on a crab boat. BTW, Sig Hansen is my favorite captain.

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    6. gamingtheblues

      1. Maybe the lie because it is so innocuous. but..
      2. Totally believe it.
      3. Hmmm Possible…
      4. This is harder….EVERY zombie show.. and movie…maybe an inadvertent lie? ;0
      5. I REALLY want this one to be the lie because it is what my heart said…but my brain is calling out #4 because there are a lot of obscure zombie movies and shows that are cult status and to quote from them all…..
      soo

      #4 is the lie.

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  26. DKeeley

    Truth. Stranger than fiction?

    ~ One day I discovered that I had fallen in love with a woman much younger than myself.

    ~ When I was sixteen I joined the Army. National guard actually, as I could not go active duty being so young at that time. They still required of me to get my legal guardian to sign me away, which was easy to do. One year later I was a dope on a rope.

    ~ I am banned from Austria and they tried to extradite me for prosecution. They failed, but if I ever return I could be arrested on sight.

    ~ Once upon a time I won a regional young authors competition. Life took me away from the one thing I truly enjoyed doing. Now I am trying to rekindle that fire.

    ~ Today, I am no longer in love. Not even sure that I believe in it anymore. I wonder if the universe enjoys stomping on my heart.

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    1. Kerry Charlton

      I will pick #3, I just don’t believe it. I’m sorry you’re no longer in love. The funny thing about love, you can’t seek it, it comes to you and most often you have no idea what’s going on till your smitten.

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    2. gamingtheblues

      This reply is heartbreaking. I feel like you used it as I did to do some self reflection/purging. So..I am going with hope and calling out #5 as the lie.

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  27. Priya

    Five things about me

    – I stole a child once in the supermarket for a short time
    – I’ve never skipped dinner
    – I told my friend I had sent that Valentine card but I hadn’t
    – I believe in aliens
    – I never got married

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      1. Priya

        Actually, number one is through. It was the 5-year-old child of my mean aunt (no, she really is mean). I saw her in the supermarket and thought how nice it would be to pay her back.
        That child was glad to see me. So, I took her and bought her ice cream. We stayed away for half an hour while I knew my aunt was freaking out. After she had enjoyed her ice-cream I sent her back and told her not to tell our secret.

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  28. cosi van tutte

    Dad came to visit.

    I haven’t seen him before. Not once in my life and now there he was at my front door.

    Smiling bright and guilt-free. “Hi! You miss me?”

    I should have slammed the door in his face right then and there. I smiled without any happiness. “It’s hard to miss what you don’t have. What you never had.”

    “True. True. So very true.” And, without waiting for my invitation, he came inside.

    As if this were his house instead of mine.

    “Mm. Nice place you got here. Very nice place. Got anything good to eat?”

    “What do you want? Why are you here?”

    “Get me something to eat and I’ll tell you. Come on, Joe. Don’t just stand there like you’re dumb. I came all this way to see you.”

    “I didn’t ask you to.”

    “Least thing you could do is feed your poor famished old man.”

    I went into the kitchen.

    I didn’t want to give him any of my food. He didn’t earn it.

    He didn’t deserve it.

    But I wanted to get away from him. If only for a few minutes.

    I made him a sandwich and took my good old time making it.

    I was tempted to make the world’s worst sandwich on purpose, filling it with things like cottage cheese and clotted cream and beets and parsnips.

    He didn’t deserve a good sandwich. Not after everything he did. Not after everything he did not.

    But it would have been a waste of good food.

    I made him a simple peanut butter and jelly sandwich and carried it out to him.

    He arched an eyebrow at my choice. “Really? You’re gonna feed me kids’ food? Come on! Didn’t your mother teach you anything about real food?”

    “It’s all I have.” For you. I almost said it out loud, but chose the high ground and refrained.

    “Well, that’s just pathetic.” But he ate it anyway.

    I sat down in the living room and picked up the newspaper.

    He tracked me down and sat beside me. “I came all the way over here to see you and you’re hiding behind a newspaper. I bet you aren’t even reading it.”

    He was right, of course. I was just staring at an article. It might have been about oil fields in Alaska or about how many times the Detroit Tigers have failed to get to the World Series.

    It was all just black letters arranged in black lines.

    I set the paper down. “So. What do you want?”

    He grinned. “I want to play a game with you.”

    “I’m sorry, but what?”

    “A game. Four truths and a lie.”

    “That should be easy. They’re all lies.”

    “Do you want to play?”

    “Sure.”

    “Good! The rules are simple. I will tell you four statements. Three of them are true. One is a blatant lie. You have to guess which is the lie.”

    “Okay. Start.”

    “1. I was born in Belfast and raised in Belgium. 2. I don’t like rock music, but I don’t like classical. 3. I left your mother shortly before you were born. 4. I’m deeply sorry.”

    “You made it too easy. Number four is the lie.”

    His expression turned serious. “They’re all true. I never should have left your mother. I was scared. I wasn’t ready to be father. I ran away from her and from you. I kept thinking about her, about coming back to her, about seeing you again. But I wasn’t ready to face her. Or you. I knew the hurt would be too strong. I knew there would be a whole lot of anger. I didn’t want to hear it. And so I kept running.”

    He looked down at the newspaper. “I don’t want to run anymore.” He glanced up at me. “Can I stop? Do you want me to stop? Or should I spend the rest of our lives in running away from what could have been?”

    “No. What should have been. You should have stayed with us. You should have been there for me and taught me how to ride a bike and how to swim and how to be a worthwhile man.”

    “I’m sorry.”

    There was a door between us and it was up to me to close it or leave it wide open.

    I wanted to slam it in his face and bolt it shut.

    But there were no lies in his face or in his words. Only truth.

    So.

    I tore the door down.

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    1. snuzcook

      Nice way to use the prompt idea for a story–and you’ve created a really engaging scene. Really enjoy the passive-aggressive interplay between the characters. But no fair ;0) unless the four also are an invitation speculate your truths.

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    2. Beebles

      Another imaginative use of the prompt, Cosi. Built up that feeling of resentment very well – something I’m working on in other stuff – and left a great will he won’t he taste in the mouth right up until the end – or until Ned, as my fingers want to type – whichever comes first I suppose. my kind of symbolism too.

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        If I could pick one little falsehood from this story, it would be the peanut butter and jelly sandwich. t think it would be your nature or anyone’s nature to fix the best sandwich possible. Why do I feel this way? I have no idea but it’s what I would do. Then why? Perhaps to show a missing father, he never really was needed after all. Brilliant piece of work,

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    3. igonzales81

      That was a very good story. I’d imagine a lot of us have people in our lives that we feel that way about. But the thing that really didn’t ring true was that bit about an article on the Tigers; nobody bothers to write about the Tigers anymore.

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    5. Papa Troll

      This story struck a chord for me. My father was never there, and then he died when I was 8. So, for me, there’s no chance of this ever happening, but I did fantasize about a guy knocking on my door, informing me that he was my real father and he just found out, and how about a game of catch? Alas, it is a fantasy. For my kids, I am determined to do everything I can to be there for them. What I love about your story is that all these feelings came forward. Thanks for that. Always great to reaffirm your convictions. Great story!!!!!

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    1. gamingtheblues

      Hmm This reply feels almost like a cry for help.. If so, I will say that writing your feelings in story form, giving form and shape to emotions and inner demons is very cathartic and people on this forum can be helpful, caring and responsive. But to do so, you need to engage more fully, and invest more of yourself into the story.

      The lie is #4 but more so out of self deprecating humor than a lie in earnest I think.

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    2. Beebles

      Hi Shaeza, this is slightly off the point, but i found myself looking at the word pretty for a long time, probably because your post was so thought provoking. It ended up as one of those occasions when if you look at something long enough it stops looking like what it is, ever had that? Anyway, I could not make those letters into pretty no matter how hard i tried. I found that strangely ironic. I believe all of them in one way or another.

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  31. Amaria

    1. I went on a trip to Puerto Rico on my own as a gift to myself for earning my bachelor’s degree in college.
    2. I am still single with no children.
    3. I met a man from Tokyo who played the guitar.
    4. I have lived my whole life (thus far) in New Jersey.
    5. I have walked through New York’s Time Square holding a fellow college student’s hand so we wouldn’t get lost in the crush of people.

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    2. snuzcook

      Okay, I’ll make a fool of myself and take a guess even though I am not really familiar with your writing. #1 tells me you are interested in seeing new places, or maybe have connections with friends or family far away
      #2 says that you are not yet ready, or have not had the opportunity to settle down
      #3 says again that you are value people who come from other places and maybe have different gifts
      #4 tells me that you are not adventurous, or are limited by circumstances from seeking out big changes and new experiences
      #5 tells me that you embrace the excitement of new experiences and connecting with people

      So I guess #4 —

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    3. Beebles

      Hi Amaria, well it is a well known fact that even though there is a big guitar mine on the southern tip of Rishiri island in the Hokkaido prefecture, the Japanese export all their guitars to Korea as many Japanese are in fact allergic to Roderigo’s concerto d’aranjuez, so I think #3 is the lie.

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        IK’ll go for number 4, I spent my summers on the Jersaey coast at Avalon, but I’ve lived in five major cities in 4 states and I can’t imagine never leaving New Jersey, the garden state. You can only eat so many veggies!

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  33. snuzcook

    (This is blantantly self-indulgent in its length–but I am a Boomer, and we just have to turn everything into a long story…)

    Hudson leaned toward me, his thin little recording thing-a-ma-bob propped up on the table like a lucky coin that hasn’t yet fallen. Now that he is in college, I can see ever so clearly his Grandfather’s twinkle about the eyes, his Grandfather’s wisp of hair across the forehead, his Grandfather’s impatience underlying his self control.

    “Are you sure you want to hear all this?”

    “It’s wonderful stuff, Gran. Imagine, growing up in normal suburbia and having so many amazing experiences.”

    “They never really seemed so amazing to anyone else. My mother, for instance, was very unimpressed.”

    “Tell me again about the UFOs. You said you saw then flying over…right there in the middle of the intersection?”

    “It was November. I remember it was the beginning of Thanksgiving break from school. I must have been about 8. I was riding in the car with my mother. It was dark, and we were sitting at a busy intersection waiting for the light to turn green. I looked up, and there were two or three bright lights streaking across the sky. Even in the dark, and with all the bright street lights around, I could see the lights as big as anything. And around them were a lot of other smaller lights streaking along beside it, winking like sparks from a roman candle. I tried to get my mother’s attention, but the light changed just then and she ignored me.”

    “But how did you know they were UFOs? Couldn’t they have been something like a meteor shower? Or even one big meteorite that was just really bright?”

    “No, I knew it was an invasion force because there was nothing on the news the next day. If it was something wondrous like a natural phenomenon, everyone would have been talking about it. But since no one mentioned it, it must have been because of mind control. There was a lot of mind control back then in the sixties. But for some reason it didn’t affect me. I could see things that other people didn’t see.”

    “Like what?”

    “Oh, well, like a few years before that. I must have been four or five. I looked across the street where Old Mr. Nelson had a shed on his property. His house is gone now, but back then he had cows, right there on our street. Anyway, I looked across the street and there on top of his shed was a huge white bird. It was a big as the shed, and I saw it as it was just landing, with its wings all stretched out. It was so immense I wasn’t really sure what it was! I ran inside to tell my parents, but they were busy. When I finally got my Dad’s attention, he went and looked. He didn’t see it, and he said it was probably just a stork or something. For days I looked through the encyclopedia trying to find a bird that might be like what I saw, a stork or a goose or something. But I never found anything as big as that, and pure white. I decided maybe what I saw was an angel. After all, I didn’t really see its body, only the wings. And there was something special about Old Man Nelson and his way with plants and animals. I figured it was some kind of visitation that no one was supposed to see. But I saw it. I could see things.”

    “Amazing. Was there anything you remember from later in life? Something that wasn’t from your early childhood?”

    “I saw my cat’s spirit transform and fly away. That was when your uncle as a little boy. Our old cat had been quite ill and we knew he was going to die. That morning after your uncle went to school, I could tell that he was very poorly, barely breathing. I put a towel over him in his box and put him outside on the deck under the big fir tree, where the morning sun could warm him and he could get some fresh air. I heard a little noise from him later, and I checked on him. As I approached, I saw a bright yellow bird—not a goldfinch, mind you. Something bigger. It was just rising into the branches of the tree. I saw it flit from branch to branch and then fly away. I knew it was old Ernie’s spirit, finally free.”

    “A bird? Isn’t that kind of, well, ironic for a cat?”

    “Oh no. It makes perfect sense. You know how cats chatter when they see birds? It’s jealousy. Cats have a deep desire to fly.”

    “I see.” A shadow crossed Hudson’s face, that same skeptical shadow that I sometimes saw on his Grandfather when he was wrestling with the various kinds of truth in the world.

    “Don’t feel badly. I know it is hard to believe. Your uncle didn’t believe me when I told him that day either. He loved that cat, and he said his cat would never turn into a bird. He would have turned into a lion.”

    There, I got a smile out of Hudson. But our time was up. His lunch hour was over and he had to get back to town to his part time job. He started to get out of his chair.

    “You must have time for just one more. I don’t want to forget to this one. Did I ever tell you my most favorite story, the one that I’ve always felt was the most magical?”

    There was that shadow of impatience, and Hudson looked at the clock behind me, but he was hooked on the stories. He sat back down and folded his hands on the table.

    “When you were born your parents were living in San Diego. They called to say they had gone to the hospital, and there was some concern, they said. You were being a little reluctant to be born and the doctors were going to have to intervene. Anyway, at exactly 5:25 in the morning I was just watering my flowers—it was going to be a hot day. I had checked my watch because I was waiting for a call. Just then a Great Blue Heron landed on the garage. They are messengers, you know—messengers from the spirit world. She landed not ten feet from me and just stood for a few minutes as I watched with the hose pouring out all over the patio. She tilted her head and looked right at me with one golden eye and nodded. Then she flew away. About half hour later your father called with the good news. We had a boy.”

    “And I was born at 5:25. I never heard that story before.”

    “That’s because I didn’t tell anyone. That was just between the heron and me. And now you.”

    Hudson left a few minutes later, in a bit of a rush since he was nearly ten minutes past the time he meant to leave. As I watched him pull out of the parking lot, could hear sirens coming from the direction of the interstate, coming from the direction where Hudson would have been if not for that last story. The junkos at the feeder this morning had been right. And I was glad I had listened.

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    1. Kerry Charlton

      Hello Snuz, I don’t see anything in your story that I don’t believe. With your personality, I don’t think it possible you can write a lie even if you’re supposed to. So I’ll go with the only lie possible…….. You broke the rules of the prompt and wrote only the truth. That’s what boomers do. They’re too close to the Miracle Generation and too afraid to tell a lie.

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      1. snuzcook

        Aw, well…there are three true and one or more false. But I love that you thought me incapable. Truth is, to paraphrase a line out of the movie version of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, I’ve been know to spin cow muffins into fine Egyptian cotton. ;0)

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    2. jhowe

      Well Snuz, I thought your lie was going to be: I participate regularly in the WD prompt without fail. Just kidding. Man, this is a tough one. I’m tempted to go with 1 because it’s the only one without birds. But I believe that one. I also believe you saw the big white bird. I’m going with the cat’s spirit as the lie. I’d also like to add that this is a brilliant way to do this prompt. I tried to think of a way to turn mine into a story but failed.

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    3. ReathaThomasOakley

      This is so wonderful a read. You took this prompt, that I almost ignored, and created a great story, filled with truth. Don’t stay away any longer!

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    4. Beebles

      Neat snug, all hung together really well. Agree, great way to approach it. I think many of us had misgivings at first but I’m hooked. If I had to go with a lie, it would be the angel, i thought the junkos but then thought they could have been the inspiration.

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    5. gamingtheblues

      That was beautifully written. I found it an imaginative and warm way to do this week’s prompt. Reading it was like drinking a nice cup of hot chocolate with a spritz of cinnamon on top.

      I think the lie is the accident prediction.

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    6. cosi van tutte

      Hi, snuz!

      There were so many parts and moments I really liked in this story, but I especially loved this line: “You know how cats chatter when they see birds? It’s jealousy. Cats have a deep desire to fly.” I believe it. When my cat does his high-flying run around the house, I swear he almost flies. 😀

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    7. snuzcook

      The truth: (I’ll probably be offline for the big reveal so I am giving you the skinny now)
      What is truth? These were true at the time through the eyes of the beholder. It was no less true when years later more accurate explanations brought a different perspective. We are shaped by the truths we choose to keep, and by the beliefs we choose to use to give context to those truths. (or are the truths shaped by the beliefs? Hmmm….)

      Leonid Meteor Shower November 18, 1966 – I was a bit older than 8 during the great Leonid Meteor Shower of November 18, 1966—and it wasn’t Thanksgiving break. But I did see it as described through the car windshield at a busy, brightly lit intersection. AND I was shocked that no one within my circle of contact seemed to be aware of it the next day. I believed that mind control had a part in that, but it was more a form of disinterested blindness than imposed secrecy.

      Trumpeter Swans migration – Where I live in the Pacific Northwest we are on the flight path of the large white trumpeter swans. They normally land in open fields or wetlands. It was four decades later that I finally saw a migrating flock of these huge birds fifty miles north of our town. As a child I had apparently seen a single lost bird who landed on top of the neighbor’s tool shed obscured by trees. A bird 5-6 feet long with a wingspan that reportedly can exceed 10 feet would look like a heavenly visitor to a five year old.

      Tanagers migration—Ernie’s demise fell upon May 1st. After some research, I discovered that Western tanagers, a medium-sized golden to tangerine-colored bird, passes through our town for a very small window of time right around May 1st each year. I had never seen one before that day, but I have looked for them and seen them half a dozen times in the decades since—always on or close to May 1st.

      Ancient tradition supports the belief that great blue herons are messengers of the spirit world. It has been my experience that their eyes are a bit more rose-gold that golden.

      Hudson, his recording thing-a-ma-bob, and all the miraculous communications around him, are entirely fabrication.

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  34. ReathaThomasOakley

    Four plus one equals me

    1. I’m fluent in Portuguese.
    2. I never learned to swim.
    3. I dislike writing about myself.
    4. I lived in an actively haunted house.
    5. My earliest memory is from when I was two years and four days old.

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    1. Hiba Gardezi

      I’m guessing it’s #5. How would you know the day if the memory is so early? Not so sure though. #4 maybe. Because you don’t hear that much. But then again, how many people know Portuguese? I don’t know.

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    2. Beebles

      I’m torn – which is embarassing because you seem to know me so well – not nice, just unskilled by the way. I can understand #3 and I’ll just go with #1 – sort of rings a bell. Everyone likes a haunted house so I’ll go with that. #2 or #5?? #5 is so exact, I’ll go with #2 – all those lakes.

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        Nah you’re wrong. A lot of people who lived in South Florida, were fluent in Portuguese. During WW11. Pan American flew constantly to Belem, Brazil, carrying supplies for Europe. Belem was a major cog in air transportation to fight the war. I know first hand, my ex-wife’s father was a Pan Am Captain in the 40’s and lived in Belem at that time. Send me the dollar.

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    5. snuzcook

      What a selection! I wish I had been more actively reading on this site over the past year so I knew you better. I am going to go with #1, tho I suspect #2 could ring true but if so you made a point of learning to swim so it wouldn’t hold you back from your travels. I believe #3 is misleading–I suspect you may dislike writing about your self overtly, but love (as do we all) writing about our covert selves. #4 I believe without hesitation. And #5, as they say, is too specific to be made up.
      Now, how far off the mark am I?

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    6. igonzales81

      I’m gonna go with 1. Met someone who spoke Portuguese for twenty years, and he still couldn’t converse with a native speaker. I hope it’s not 4; I’d love to hear about living in a haunted house.

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  35. Hiba Gardezi

    1. I once jumped out of a flaming car. We were pulling into the drive way when the car stopped and it burst onto flames.
    2. I once offered a robber a big green flower shaped plastic ring. He told us no one could leave and he ordered everyone to give him their valuables and all I had on me was this. I didn’t have experience with burglars and I didn’t know if they liked big green rings so I brought it forward. He didn’t like it.
    3. I’m fifteen.
    4. I love basketball

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    2. Beebles

      Hi Hiba, well if I’d lied about #1 we’d have been travelling at sixty. You come across as such a beautiful soul that #2 is perfectly plausible. Anyone who has ‘their room’ (previous prompt) and is worried about the state of it must be a student or a teenager. 🙂 So I agree with you – basketball sucks.

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    3. Kerry Charlton

      Hiba, I do know you’re fifteen, so I’ll settle for #4 also. No one could think up number two unless it was real. But mt choice of a sport for you would be soccer.

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  36. Everlasting

    Four of these are true… But one is a lie.
    Can you figure out which is the one I made up?

    1. I haven’t been on Writer’s Digest in what I assume to be at least two years. It’s been a while. Haha.

    2. One of my hobbies is actually English-style horse riding, but I am far from rich enough to purchase and board a horse of my own.

    3. I enjoy listening to an old-time artist by the name of Dodie Stevens, and will often find myself listening to ‘Pink Shoelaces’ for reasons I cannot explain.

    4. Sweet potatoes are one of my favorites foods, and as such, will often take up the most space on my plate on Thanksgiving Day.

    5. I was one of the few (or so it seems) hoping Glenn would be knocked off by Negan in the new season of ‘The Walking Dead’.

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    2. Beebles

      Everlasting – new to me so I’ll believe #1. Does English style mean going yoicks and tally-ho as opposed to yippee and yeeha? #3 is a nice touch if its a lie and I know none of the characters on Walking Dead. So #4 is the lie, but how can you not like sweet potato – its fab!

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        1. Kerry Charlton

          PS. I’ve very impressed you do percision horse riding, I think it’s a beautiful and wistfull sport. Ask Beebles to give you a horse, I’m sure he has a spare around his manor house and at least 40 horses. Tell him to send it prepaid freight.

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    3. Hiba Gardezi

      Well, I’ve been on WD for about that long (though I took some breaks) and haven’t seen you, so 1 is true. For some reason, I think that 2 and 3 are true, too. Now it seems to be a war between 4 and 5 for me.
      I love potatoes. So 5?

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      1. Everlasting

        @Reatha #4 was indeed the lie. Haha. I’ve just never cared for Sweet Potatoes, for some reason.

        @Beebles Well, I was going to say ‘not quite’ on the explanation for English Style riding, but that’s… Basically true. Haha.
        Also, I’ve just never cared for Sweet Potatoes. The texture, for me, is quite off-putting.

        @Hiba #4 was the lie. Sweet Potatoes always have the smallest area on my plate. I eat a small dollop’s worth, and I’m done. Haha

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        Okay Papa, I’ll bite. “I’ve never done this before is the only truth.” [Otherwise you’d be a scallywag and there are none on the site.]

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  38. gamingtheblues

    I think that this is a rather interesting prompt that is more about self reflection and insight than showing off writing prowess.

    1. I was a sweet and sensitive boy growing up, and so was rather viciously bullied all the way from elementary through high school. Teased and tormented, I was left feeling ashamed of who I was. So much so in fact, that I closed off all my emotions for more than a decade. I literally felt nothing, to the point of falling into the dangerous “religion” of objectivism, most poignantly captured in Ayn Rand’s “The Fountain Head.”

    This continued into my adult life until finally I was sitting with my girlfriend at the time, watching her crying about me being a robot and dead inside when it hit me. No. Literally she hit me. Slapped me in the face in such a moment of outrage and disgust where I felt what she was feeling. Suddenly I realized what true empathy and emotion was, and how it was wrong to turn yourself off to the world. I reverted back to the real softy I am inside and have been happy ever since.

    2. It turns out I am such a great EX-Boyfriend that a number (read: More than 2) of my ex-girlfriends have set me up on dates with their best friends who were getting cynical about the state of the dating community and men in general.

    3. For my “First time,” I flew from one coast to the other, by myself for the first time, to meet a girl for the first time, when I was 17. She was 25,owned her own house and had a bottle of wine all ready. I took a week off from school to do this and stayed the entire week. The best thing about it? My parents paid for the Plane ticket for me.

    4. I have wanted to be a writer ever since I was a little kid. I wrote stories about vampires, and space ships, ect… I was even told by my English Teachers in High school that they were excited about “finally” having a writer in their class. I knew…just knew I could make a living doing what I love. And I do! Sort of…. I mean I guess it counts getting paid to write weird fan-fiction requests like “I want you to write me a love story about Batman being in love with the Joker but they can’t pursue their forbidden love because Batman is married to a dog.” …… Yup, living the dream. (By the way, that is an actual request I had)

    5. Finally, something a bit more personal… my laughter is almost completely silent. When people say something funny that really tickles me, I just curl up and look like I’m going to be sick because there is literally no “laugh” sound that comes out. Just chest heaving, and a soundless open mouth with air chuffing. I have had to explain on more than one occasion that there really is nothing wrong with me.

    Soooo….what do you guys think???? 😉

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    1. Beebles

      OK … so I’ve never heard you laugh so #5 is ok, #4 would be such a big whopper, but as with the best lies there could be elements of truth, mmm, #3 is just way out there, so much so I want it to be true, #2 is completely believable, so #1, I think the lie is #1, such an epiphany jars with me and doesn’t contain the detail of the others. But then … you thought it was the manor house, shows how wrong you can be … 🙂

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      1. gamingtheblues

        I enjoyed the breakdown you gave of the thought process for each “tale” =) And I admit to a little sheep behavior on my part…. I WAS going to attack either the archeology tale, or the fact that you were stacked 😉 but then was swayed when reading other people’s thoughts on the manor house.

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    2. Tysheena Jackson

      You’re great at consulting imagery in your writing– but I think #4 is a lie. I don’t think you’ve always loved writing; I think you fell upon it at some point in your life (hopefully i’m not wrong). I was going to say #1 but something in me said that it was true. Can’t wait to find out the truth!

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    6. gamingtheblues

      In case anyone is still wondering about truths and lies in mine.. As Beebles intuited a bit, with the best lies are elements of truth.

      1. Truth- A bit of reflection on my prior self here 😉
      2. Truth
      3. Truth- My mom actually made the choice to pay when I asked, not my Dad 😉
      4. The lie! Or..some of it. I do not make a living off of writing at all. It is at the moment only something I enjoy doing. And have never written a story by request.
      5. Totally true! You should really see the weird looks I get.

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  39. pinkbamboo

    This sounds like a game than a prompt to me so here goes. 5 facts about me, 1 is a lie. Figure out which.

    1. When I was younger, I had an online boyfriend. He “cheated” on me with my real life girl friend and I caught them when I accessed his emails. I didn’t speak to her for a year.

    2. I was talking on the phone for a year with an unknown man. I don’t know his name or how he looked like and I never met him. He would just call me when I’m bored and we talked for hours.

    3. I had experimented with a dead bird, a rope, three matches and a knife.

    4. I made my own monopoly paper game to play with my cousin. We got into a disagreement and it ended up with me dragging him across the floor by his hair.

    5. The only time I was drunk, I fought with my cousin, threw up and cried but woke up with no hangover.

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      1. pinkbamboo

        Did not realize I had two cousins stories up there but yeah, both are true. #2 is also the truth – the short story would be :- my friend dialled a number by mistake and that person called back, she giggled and said it sounded like a girl but it’s a guy .. so i got curious and did the miscalled thing and he really called back .. and since then everytime i miscalled, he called back .. and we would talk … i never revealed my location or name though but looking back, that was kind of dangerous..

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    7. Priya

      I’ve got the feeling that number 2 is a lie. Somehow I don’t believe that of you, especially not when you had an online boyfriend before. You would want to know how someone would look like, seems to.

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      1. pinkbamboo

        #2 is true though. I just got my nokia phone back then and he just calls me back everytime to talk. I thought it was flattering and I was alone during extra classes. He provided me some company between breaks.

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      1. pinkbamboo

        #1 is true. My online boyfriend was up to some shady stuff and he gave me both his passwords so I can trust him. Fast forward few months later, I decided to just log in his email and BAM … an email from my own friend saying things like “I dreamed that we were kissing by your locker” … and she always turned her nose up at romance …

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  40. HelenL

    As they say, truth is often stranger than fiction, so I challenge you to figure out which one of these statements about my life is pure storytelling:

    I was born into a family consumed with my older brother’s diagnosis of autism. This was back in the fifties, when very little was known about the condition. Doctors advised my parents to put my brother in an institution and forget they ever had him. My father not only refused to do this but proceeded to become one of the world’s leading autism researchers who literally “wrote the book” on autism.

    Through my dad’s work, I got the opportunity to meet many famous people. Gene Roddenberry spent time in our home, as did Temple Grandin, and I’ve met Sylvester Stallone, Paul Newman, and Robert Redford. I didn’t get to meet Dustin Hoffman, but my brother did. In fact, Hoffman used my brother as one of his models for his role in “Rain Man.”

    Another interesting thing about my childhood is that I was a child actor. My mom started me doing commercials when I was just a baby, and then as I got older, I began to do bit roles in movies. You can see me briefly in a little-known film with Marlon Brando called “Morituri.” When I got into junior high, I gave up my acting dreams to pursue writing.

    Lastly, the thing of which I’m most proud: I once beat the author Tom Robbins in a game of Scrabble!

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    1. Beebles

      Helen, if its the autism then hats off as it feels well researched, and that would go with the famous people thing. I am rooting for for Morituri, merely because I considered a similar lie myself.

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        Helen, since you wrote four things about your life, I’m going to go with the idea of them being all true with the lie having been left out. Am I anywhere close?. Kerry

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    3. Tysheena Jackson

      What an interesting life you have lived. They all pretty much tie into one another. But if I’m going to have to pull the plug on one it will have to be number 3. I’m not sure why? The rest sound like they could have happened… but I feel as if number 3 was sort of a roll of dice. If I’m wrong, I apologize and congratulate you on having the opportunity to meet such wonderful people!

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  41. Beebles

    Mmmm, not really my kind of prompt. Funnily for a writer I don’t like talking about myself, or writing about myself, I rarely even like to use the first person in my writing. Almost feels like a cheat. Almost.

    Could be something to do with my embarrassing youth, well not embarrassing as such, just mis-spent, travelling (you get to travel a lot when you’re an archaeologist), partying (you get to party a lot when you are an archaeologist) and running several women at the same time, most of the time (you get … the picture). Broke a few hearts and left a lot of mess for others to clear up. It’s going to make a good tale one day, just not in the first person.

    It took one hell of a girl to bring me to heel and my wife is one hell of a girl. When I first met the girl with the ankle bracelets, the cutest upturned nose and an arse to die for, I knew it was a toss-up between me and Miles. Miles had a retro car (no indicators, just flags) and come-to-my-tent eyes. And she almost did. But he made one fatal mistake, he took his shirt off. Beneath that smooth and well-oiled, hash toting charm, he had a body made of dough. I was stacked, case closed.

    I’ve written a few scripts in my time, nothing serious, but I did get some stuff performed in the Sherman theatre in Cardiff while I was at College. Lately I wrote a script for actor Jim Broadbent and spent a great day with him and a French sound engineer (J.B Pilon) in a tiny studio in north London, recording, then drinking coffee and smoking tabs on the rooftop overlooking the city. We were JB, JB and JB. Found out we went to the same school, me and Jim that is. He was expelled for booze and most of my year was expelled for drugs.

    I’ve lived in a manor house for the past twenty years, a long drafty yellow brick building outside a small village on the edge of the fens. It is a cold and foggy place in winter. In one of our gardens there is a large chestnut tree, four hundred years old if a day. We call it the hanging tree and for good reason. Ten years ago our neighbours awoke to see a young local lad swinging from one of the crooked boughs. Flowers used to appear there every year for a time. And there are other stories … but that’s the fens for you.

    I make that five statements about me and my life. Four true, one a bare faced lie.

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    1. Kerry Charlton

      Okay, I’m not sure I found it but perhaps your fabulous wife didn’t come with ankle bracelets, however I believe the cutest turned up nose and the prime grade arse. Can you send pictures of the latter without pis-ing her off? We all would appreciate it, maybe. Well, I would.

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      1. Beebles

        Afraid the bracelets were there. As to photos i’d be a dead man, though somewhere out there is a picture of the night i proposed, me dressed as Scipio Africanus and she in a leopard skin bikini.

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        1. Kerry Charlton

          Beebles, please read Everlasting above, I promised you’d send her a horse to ride everyday. She writes real pretty. Be sure it’s pre-paid freight. Kerry

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    3. HelenL

      I’m going to dispute the manor house, too – not because it’s not probable, but because you didn’t tell us about it with quite the relish you gave your other tales.

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  42. Kerry Charlton

    MAYBE SO, MAYBE NOT

    I see that Brian has started off the year on a mischievous note. Far be it for me to spoil his fun. I always have enjoyed a challenge of the mind. It’s up for you to decide if the previous sentence is one of the five, I’m not going to make it easy for you. Don’t think I’m a “lay down Patsy”. Now that the opening volley has been fired, let’s get on with it.

    I started out life with a bang, walked early, talked early and generally made a nuisance of myself, especially wanting my Mother’s attention. She returned the activity when she could. Having an older sister who was a second mother to me, didn’t seem to spoil me much, at least I thought so. An older brother showed me the way. Four years senior, my attempts to keep up with him were a total farce.

    Bill ran like a deer, I like a John Deere. He was thin as a rail, wirily and tough as nails, while I was plump, heavy set with a look of innocence on my face. In self defense, I learned the art of setting my brother up, then my face gained an evil twinkle.

    I look back on the issue with some regret but not a whole lot. I wondered how Mother put up with me and didn’t find out how for many years until I asked her to reminisce with me. I would start out asking …… “Do you remember having picnics, just the two of us in the side yard?”. Her answer…… “Not really.” Blow number one.

    Second question……. Do you remember my crawling up in your lap and you reading the Sunday comics to me?” Her reply, “I did that?” Groan! Third question….
    “We would sit for hours, just the two of us, gazing at the clouds and you told me which were castles in the sky, elephants on parade or perhaps a merry go round or a cuddly Teddy Bear. I know you remember that.” Her smile,…. “Vaguely.”

    When she saw my face clouded with disappointment, she softened and announced,
    “Got You!” Then I realized where my devilment came from. My Father was highly educated, Mother, the tenth grade. She could out think him most of the time. It was many years, when Mother started to write a weekly column for our newspaper, that I realized who had the intuition and the most brain power in our family.

    I was very shy as a youngster, bookworm mostly and forced myself after high school to be conversant, have confidence, especially with the girls who crossed my pathway. I learned to understand girls, it certainly was a helpful thing, when in later life, I was surrounded by five daughters, and then nine grand daughters.

    Let end this with a quote from Maurice Chevalier,

    “Thank heaven for little girls, for they grow bigger every day.”

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    1. jhowe

      Ok, I think I can detect the lie. If it’s true you walked early and talked early and made a nuisance of yourself, then you were likely not shy as a youngster. But then again, if you were sluggish and plump, maybe it did take you a while to grow into your suave self. But were you sluggish and plump? That’s the question. I don’t think you’d stretch the truth about your mother being the most intelligent… heaven forbid. So it must be the quote. It might be a hair off.
      Thank heaven for little girls
      For little girls get bigger every day!

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    2. Beebles

      Well it should get easier. Can’t see you as a shy bookworm. I recon you’ve always been out there – and it seems to contradict the earlier statement or arriving with a bang – os I say, you were a go getter from the off, Kerry.

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        Well Beebles, I appreciate the comment, however, I didn’t utter a word that anyone could understand until I was two. I had to take speech lessons when I started school, because the teachers didn’t understand me either. I was well over a year old before I took my first step. Now, at my age, I’m just beginning to hit my mark, while the early birds are dying off. There are advantages in being a slow starter, even if I did miss a lot of girls along the way. I did end up with a fabulous red head. “Na Na, La Na Na!”

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    4. ReathaThomasOakley

      Ah, Kerry, I’m too late getting involved here, so I saw your “confession”, which I would have totally believed. Your past always sounds interesting.

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        Thank you snuz, I always wait for you to say hello and comment. My life is no more interesting than most people
        It’s how I react to events. My wife says I’m too much on the drama scene and I call her “Hollywood” from the sun glasses she wears. It’s Mexican standoff. Oops, a Hispanic standoff. Huum. Doesn’t sound right. Political B*** S***
        .

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    7. igonzales81

      I’d have to say I don’t believe you ever tried to keep up with your older brother. You just don’t seem the type to measure yourself against others. I have a brother who’s four years older than I, and I spent my childhood picking fights with him. And winning. Most of the time. Well, some of the time. He fought real dirty.

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      1. Kerry Charlton

        My brother was also 4/years older. I picked fights every day and lost every fight until I was 21. My brother and I planned a double wedding three weeks away from the fight and he told me not to marry my girl
        I wipped him bad.but turns out he was right.

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        1. Kerry Charlton

          Hello writers. I case you didn’t read my comments, the part about walking early and talking before i was one, are totally false. A late bloomer I am.

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  43. jhowe

    1. In high school, I once pulled down another boy’s gym shorts while he was preforming a routine on the parallel bars. Everyone, especially the girls in the gym, laughed as the boy froze in mid-swing. The resulting fallout was tremendous and I barely escaped getting expelled.

    2. As a young boy, a friend and I made a raft from logs and sticks and took a trip down the Kalamazoo River. The current started getting stronger as we entered a forbidden area at a paper mill. The raft started to fall apart and we had to dive in the water and swim to shore just before the debris from the raft went over a dam. The property was protected with an 8’ tall fence and we were on the inside. A security guard rushed toward us and we managed to scamper over the fence and escape, tearing our clothes and our skin on the barb wire at the top.

    3. I’ve been known to embarrass my kids, sometimes without even trying. Once, we stopped at a farm with a sign that said, ‘Free Kittens.’ My daughter picked out a white one and was cuddling it when I asked, “How much is the cat?” The woman said they were free and she didn’t want money. I told her I’d feel better if I paid for it. Finally, she said, “How bout a dollar?” And I said, “That seems a little steep.” My daughter ran to the car with a red face.

    4. I almost had a world record in coin snatching. I attempted to catch 100 dimes from my forearm in 1976. I dropped one. Even if I’d succeeded, I didn’t have the proper witnesses, but it was still a thrill.

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    1. Kerry Charlton

      I got it John, number four is false. you did catch 100 dimes. I know for sure number two is accurate, With a buddy I built my own kayak from scratch. I would launch it in the Coral Gables waterway and paddle it six miles to Biscayne Bay in Miami. We built the seats too high and if one leaned suddenly, it would capsize. Once a sea cow lifted the kayak clear out of the water and up-ended it. Boy it was scary.

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      1. jhowe

        Is a sea cow the same as a manatee? It’s great how we got away with so much back then. Now days, a mother would have a conniption if their kids did some of those things.
        #4 is actually true.

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    8. snuzcook

      My 100 pennies is on #1. I think you would certainly have visualized doing it, and as someone else said you might have had it tried on you. But I’m gonna say that your adventurous nature tend toward that kind of stunt.

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  44. nerdgasm

    1. I am very short.
    2. Everything about pickles make me puke.
    3. I broke my foot when I jumped from the second floor window.
    4. Instead of going to prom, my date and I ordered pizza and watched scary movies in our fancy duds at home.

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  45. southPaw49

    1. truth or lie- I need a block for writer’s block
    2.truth or lie-I hate winter
    3. truth or lie- my Christmas decorations are all put away
    4. truth or lie-going snwshoeing

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  46. thejim

    Truth or Lie

    1. – Truth or Lie – I personally don’t think this is an actually writing prompt.
    2. – Truth or Lie – I fell this is more like a lame Facebook question, one that I would never participate in.
    3. – Truth or Lie – I am a squirrel.
    4. – Truth or Lie – I think that lately the prompts have been lacking substance.

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    6. snuzcook

      Now, I wonder if you aren’t being very clever. After all, being a squirrel can have many different definitions. I personally know quite a few squirrels who do not have bushy tails or live in trees.
      I’m thinking all four are true!

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