Spark
“Imagine your ideal lifestyle.”
Cleopatra, golden, beautiful, a queen--no, emperor--her people before her, her lovers beneath her.
She blushed. That wouldn’t do. Instead, she imagined away scraps of kindergarten art projects and discarded wrappers from snacks squirreled away between mealtimes. A life without refuse would be a start.
“Think about what kind of house you want to live in...”
A palace adorned with treasures sent by wannabes and groupies with only one thing in mind: her.
“...and how you want to live in it.”
Naked, mostly, covered by bronzed, muscled bodies, hand-picked for her pleasure. Alternatively, in silk blessed by the sacrifice of a thousand worms, gifted by maharaja hoping for favor. Or, she supposed, in glittering gowns to remind them all why they bowed to her, were beholden to her, wanted nothing more than to call her Friend, not just for what she could give them but for who they became when she smiled upon them.
She knew this was likely too much to ask.
So she fantasized a day where she could walk through her entire house barefoot without stepping on something hard, or gooey, or stooping to pick up something dropped by someone else. What energy she’d have! Who knows what she’d do.
(A few ideas crossed her mind.)
“So seriously consider the lifestyle to which you aspire.”
That the author’s words smacked of warning was not lost on her. She’d grown up on fairytales and myth, so she’d always been careful with her wishes. Head in the clouds, feet on the ground, grasp the golden mean because otherwise you never know what you might get.
Well, now she knew. She read carefully to make sure she understood the rules.
“When deciding, it’s important to touch it, and by that, I mean holding it firmly in both hands as if communing with it.”
She visualized her whole life in a little globe, set in her palms, with a little home, and little people, and little things within. The things she loved, and the things she tried to.
“When something sparks joy, you should feel a little thrill, as if the cells in your body are slowly rising.”
Maybe she wasn’t holding firmly enough? She squeezed harder, and nothing, then harder, and nothing, then harder again, until, surprising even herself, she crushed the orb into innumerable motes of diaphanous dust.
“...don’t forget to thank it before saying goodbye.”
She stared down at her empty hands. They sparkled.
After everyone was in bed, she lit a fire in the fireplace they never used with the last logs of the thorn tree they cut down when they moved in, and the prettiest pages of a magazine she’d splurged on in the checkout line for kindling. She held the book steady in her hands, lovingly, with a spirit of gratitude and purpose. She breathed deep, and then she tossed it into the flames, an offering, its words reconstructing themselves into embers, floating up, up, into the dark.
Cleopatra, golden, beautiful, a queen--no, emperor--her people before her, her lovers beneath her.
She blushed. That wouldn’t do. Instead, she imagined away scraps of kindergarten art projects and discarded wrappers from snacks squirreled away between mealtimes. A life without refuse would be a start.
“Think about what kind of house you want to live in...”
A palace adorned with treasures sent by wannabes and groupies with only one thing in mind: her.
“...and how you want to live in it.”
Naked, mostly, covered by bronzed, muscled bodies, hand-picked for her pleasure. Alternatively, in silk blessed by the sacrifice of a thousand worms, gifted by maharaja hoping for favor. Or, she supposed, in glittering gowns to remind them all why they bowed to her, were beholden to her, wanted nothing more than to call her Friend, not just for what she could give them but for who they became when she smiled upon them.
She knew this was likely too much to ask.
So she fantasized a day where she could walk through her entire house barefoot without stepping on something hard, or gooey, or stooping to pick up something dropped by someone else. What energy she’d have! Who knows what she’d do.
(A few ideas crossed her mind.)
“So seriously consider the lifestyle to which you aspire.”
That the author’s words smacked of warning was not lost on her. She’d grown up on fairytales and myth, so she’d always been careful with her wishes. Head in the clouds, feet on the ground, grasp the golden mean because otherwise you never know what you might get.
Well, now she knew. She read carefully to make sure she understood the rules.
“When deciding, it’s important to touch it, and by that, I mean holding it firmly in both hands as if communing with it.”
She visualized her whole life in a little globe, set in her palms, with a little home, and little people, and little things within. The things she loved, and the things she tried to.
“When something sparks joy, you should feel a little thrill, as if the cells in your body are slowly rising.”
Maybe she wasn’t holding firmly enough? She squeezed harder, and nothing, then harder, and nothing, then harder again, until, surprising even herself, she crushed the orb into innumerable motes of diaphanous dust.
“...don’t forget to thank it before saying goodbye.”
She stared down at her empty hands. They sparkled.
After everyone was in bed, she lit a fire in the fireplace they never used with the last logs of the thorn tree they cut down when they moved in, and the prettiest pages of a magazine she’d splurged on in the checkout line for kindling. She held the book steady in her hands, lovingly, with a spirit of gratitude and purpose. She breathed deep, and then she tossed it into the flames, an offering, its words reconstructing themselves into embers, floating up, up, into the dark.
This is a flash fiction with excerpting.
Source: Excerpts found in Spark Joy by Marie Kondo.
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Elizabeth Ditty lives in Kansas City, where she is attempting to raise two children with good hearts and strong minds with the help of their father and Daniel Tiger. Her work can also be found in Memoir Mixtapes and L’Éphémère Review. Additionally, her set of children’s stories, “My Sister the Werewolf,” is available in the Bedtime Stories app. She haunts twitter and instagram at @ditty1013.
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