"No Thank You!"
Prompt number 21 from Writing Down the Bones Deck, by Natalie Goldberg
Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones Deck Prompts - Write "No thank you" and keep going. Every time you are stuck repeat those three words and continue.
No, thank you. I am not interested in you teaching me about my culture, telling me what I think is important from a cultural perspective, or even what you think is important about the culture.
No thank you for thinking you know what is best for me as a woman.
No thank you for thinking I am incontinent because of my age. A couple of friends may have some difficulty with that but it is not everyone.
No thank you for thinking you know more about me than I do because I am a Native American woman and you lived for a while on a reservation or in a village, or you had a girlfriend that was Native.
My most recent no thank yous!
Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones Deck Prompts - "No thank you" can take you all over the place. Into an article you just read, politics, streets, wars, marshmallows.
I'm just giving you a hint:"No thank you" to going out to lunch, Perrier, high heels, push-ups, earrings, all male candidates, high taxes, expensive health insurance, diapers, foot pads, donuts, cement, floors, kidney beans, parallel parking, sweatshirts, miz Pollyanna, Alka-Seltzer.
It doesn't have to make logical sense, just get rolling. And, of course, you can drop into scenes, whole situations.
Get stuck? "No thank you" again. The important thing is to keep the hand moving and find your own voice.
High heels, no thank you.
When retired, the heels flew
to Sally, who could use a few
It's tax time and I say no thank you
and if I pay, so pay the billionaires too
as they don't pay their fair share, who knew
Donuts, or alka-seltzer, no thank you
no sugar for me, and no beef stew
allergies to beef, mint, and coconut boohoo
Politics and war have been a definite "ugh F--k no" thank you
It is a scary time and I may not live to see how we come through.
~~
Authors Note: I know too much about politics and I have never seen anything like this in my 71 years. A scary time, and I hope I'm wrong. We survived once but will we survive this time?
About the Creator
Denise E Lindquist
I am married with 7 children, 28 grands, and 13 great-grandchildren. I am a culture consultant part-time. I write A Poem a Day in February for 8 years now. I wrote 4 - 50,000 word stories in NaNoWriMo. I write on Vocal/Medium daily.
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Comments (10)
Well done, Denise. I love these prompts, as you know. They always inspire and make great reading. As for Mr. Trump he will make America an enemy of the rest of the world (except maybe Russia). He is incapable of thinking in any format apart from money and money is the root of all evil.
Powerful Denise. Excellent writing. A note to your note at the end… trump’s (unfortunate) send term is far worse than the first. Will we survive? I sure hope we do. All I know is that whoever comes in after him will have a huge mess to clean up. It’s going to get ugly. Very sad.
I hope we survive this too. Also, as a pathological people pleaser, I have a hard time saying no but I'm trying
Sometimes it's hard to say No Thank You, but when we finally do, it's for our good.
Awesome work Denise! Thank you for sharing! This was really inspiring! I might have to make a list of my own as therapy! Lol 🤣 Do you mind? 🫶🏾💖
Fabulous!!! Great closing question!!! Loved this line, *High heels, no thank you.."
Ugh, doing my best to stay away from people who know better what I should or shouldn't do. They are as bad as those who know for sure what will happen in the future. What comes to mind is: oh, you say you don't want another child but just you wait a few years, you'll change your mind... Well, no, I haven't. No 'thank yous' going their way!
I enjoyed your story! Respect. 💚
All we can do is pray for the best. You are 71 and you still have many good years ahead of you. Good job.
This is great! Yes you’re allowed to think your own thoughts you don’t need anybody telling you what’s best! I always found it weird when people tell me what to do like they know my life better than me even though they just met me lol. Anyway, great work! Very cool and very well written!