A moment from this week: walking along the river, I saw some ducks happily floating along in the spring sun. I took a photo of the moment, for the photo friday theme "wet" - and then remembered another floating moment:
Courage
There was almost no one in the pool. Then a young girl stepped into the water, and started to swim along the edge - and then towards the artificial small island in the middle of it, throught the "deep" water. She is french, I realized when i heard her speak - it was just one word, but it was easy to understand: "courage". Same in french and in english, only pronounced differently. It even exists in german, but isn't really used there: Courage. Seeing her, it made me think that the word has coeur in it: "heart", in french.
And so she took heart, and saw. saying to herself with each stroke:
"Courage"
"Courage"
"Courage"
That's how she arrived there at the palm island, despite her fear.
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Which again, made me think of another floating moment, one that turned into a published flash fiction once:
Sky Blue
She loves shiny, colored things. Her glasses are pink. Her bikini is green. The gun in her hand is sky blue. She aims it at me, there, on the shallow side of the pool. There’s a wild mix of joy and thrill playing on her face.
Our eyes meet and I realize that I will be the one to remember this moment, while she will forget about it. But I don’t get splashed: she is ordered back before she can shoot. “Time for your swimming class,” her father tells her.
She lowers the blue gun. Water drips from its plastic barrel while her father inflates her beginner’s armbands.
Later, I see her in the water, struggling to coordinate her arms and legs. The blue gun is gone. The moment still floats.
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(first published in Metazen, which isn't online anymore, but the waybackmachine has a copy: Metazen/Sky Blue)
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