FYV: Lesson 4: Domestic Goddess II

FYV:  Lesson 4  15 July 2013 What Is Your Storytelling Style?

Lesson 3: Prompt 2

Tell the same story using two different storytelling sSince I have posted one story “Reclaiming My House” in lesson 2, I have re-written it in a little different style.tyles.

Domestic Goddess

Domestic Goddess was not on her list of character traits. She couldn’t even classify as a Side-tracked Home Executive!  Madiho looked around the kitchen and hesitantly opened the door to the laundry room.  Unbelievable!  

What a mess!  No cute little elves had come to clean it!  Clothes were piled on every available surface - and the floor.  Tools spilled out of an open toolbox in one corner; a box of light bulbs teetered atop a pile of clean? dirty? clothes.  Cleaning supplies, old shoes, was this a bathing suit?  She reached up to move a quilt from a shelf and was startled as a black streak hurtled past, knocking her off balance.  “Macbeth!” She reached out to grab something – anything to steady herself.  Her hand grasped the edge of a basket and then she was falling …..

....

Slowly she raised herself to a sitting position and reached up to gently touch the goose egg rapidly forming on her head. “Ouch!” Her head hurt and she was dizzy. And what was she doing on the floor? - a stone floor at that!  Nothing looked familiar. She was in a large room that smelled of soap and  - wet clothes? Large black cauldrons and wooden wash tubs lined one wall. Baskets of clothes took up most of the floor space. “What a mess!”

Carefully she pulled herself to her feet and brushed off the gingham  apron. Gingham? Really?  Looking down, she giggled at the old-lady black lace up shoes on her feet. “This is too weird!” she muttered to herself.

“Madi? You in here?”  A young girl with long black hair and snappy dark eyes stuck her head in the door. She was dressed in a long homespun dress, covered with a gingham apon. “You cleaning? I’ll help you; I’m finished with the kitchen.”  She handed Madiho an empty basket, “You put all the  bed linens in this; I’ll just gather up this trash.”  Moving through a fog, Madiho picked up a bed covering that had fallen to the floor, then began to fill her basket. 

Her helper bustled around the room, chatting non-stop about people she didn’t know and things she didn’t understand. Whenever she had one basket filled, the girl handed her another one and pointed her to another task. Gradually the room began to take shape as they tackled the piles that surrounded them.

At long last, the girl stood in the center of the room, surveying their handiwork. She looked at Madiho and grinned. “Good job. You look like you could use a cup o’ tea. Come along.”  In the unfamiliar kitchen, Madiho watched as her new friend pulled a kettle of hot water off the spit in the large fireplace. In a short time she was sitting on the kitchen steps, a hot cup of tea in her hands.  She leaned against the wall, tired but surprisingly satisfied. Her friend's chatter turned into a constant buzzing and her eyelids drooped. She didn’t notice when the black haired girl took the cup from her hands.

..... 

 Madiho slowly opened her eyes as the sound of purring pulled her awake. She  was in the lounge chair on the deck; Macbeth, the black cat, settled on her chest, one yellow eye daring her to move.  “Ah, Mac, that was a good nap. Come on,  let’s go tackle that laundry room.”

“I never said I was a Domestic Goddess,”  Madiho remarked to the feminine shadow that flitted out of the corner of her eye.  She looked around the kitchen and with a grin,  opened the door to the laundry room. Unbelievable!

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