March 13, 2023, prompt: In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story about a place where children once played. It can be a field, a playground, or any place that attracted children to play. But now it is empty. Abandoned. Go where the prompt leads!
The great outdoors was our playground, as high as the sky and distant as the horizon. It was:
- a pond for winter ice skating or summer swimming
- the woods where we built forts and hideaways, smoked the stub of dad’s cigar and talked about boys
- where we raced across open fields or rounded up cattle on horseback
- lying in the cool evening grass searching for animals in a sea of billowy clouds
Our playground was free, limited only by our imagination. I wonder, “How will the today’s youth remember their playground when they are old?”
The “Carrot Ranch Literary Community where creative writers from around the world and across genres gather to write 99-word stories. A collection of prompted 99-word stories reads like literary anthropology. Diverse perspectives become part of a collaboration.” Read the recent Gloria Collection, I’m sure you will enjoy it.
Miss Judy Writes 
When I was a kid, we lived next to the cemetery. In an industrial town in the north of England, there wasn’t a lot of green space so the cemetery was our playground. We played hide and seek behind the gravestones. I suppose many would consider that disrespectful today but we never did any damage. We would disappear for hours on end. It sure is a different world these days.
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There was a cemetery by our school and we would sneek over there during lunch periods. Fun times!
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I could relate to much of this and more. Very nice reminder to try and get kids outside.
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That’s an interesting contemplations, Judy. My playground was similar to yours – outdoors and free, limited only by imagination – but in a different setting. Mine was the beach and the bush.
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I would have loved the beach, but we did have a beautiful lake.
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Lakes are beautiful too. 🙂
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