KB's Basic Blog

                              “I want to thank you all for coming to my twenty-second birthday soirée,” I said beaming at the eager faces looking up to me, “I’m sure it is an honor for you all to be in attendance.” A busboy in his starched red shirt came to clear away the pizza trays.   I gave him my fiercest glare and he ran back to the kitchen, fearing for his job after crossing me during such an important occasion me. I made a mental note to speak with his manager after I finished my speech. “As you all know,” I began, “adventure is in my blood.” A twitter of excitement bubbled up around me. “I climbed the highest peak in Kansas when I was only ten, took a solo canoe trip across the perilous Marion Lake Reservoir at twelve and spent the summer of my fourteenth year exploring the dangerous depths of Washington Park Arboretum.” My words were met with the polite laughter of people who understood what struggles I had faced with each of these challenges. “As such, it should c

                                         TW: Violence.  I'm just in a strange headspace this week.                                                                 Tara listens to the intense whispers of those around her. "Please disperse," yells a Marine in front of her, "this is just a crash landing of a test ship." The crowd ignores him and continues to push and surge against the ramshackle barricade that the military has hastily erected when the ship crashed. It took only minutes for the first wave of pilgrims to arrive at the burning neon wreckage.  Tara was among them.  She lived a block away from the crash site and was eating dinner when the shockwave drew her eye to the kitchen window just in time to see fire streak the sky.  She had prayed every night for something like this to happen during her lifetime.  She prayed that something would take her away from this dreadful world forever. The crowd, breathing as a single entity, waits for something to happen