Discard Table + Movie Credits

Prompt: Pick an incident that happened in the past month that has stuck with you, maybe for an unknown reason.

Rickety and warped you wheeled your dolly to the corner to try to claim the discarded Ikea table. The edges scuffed and dinged from a life lived, you proclaim “I’m taking it, will you help me load it?” and I would. The plastic painted legs with gouges stood outstretched on the dolly, waiting for an embrace. Wobbling off you threw a hand of thanks in the air, carelessly navigating the first sidewalk crack.

(now with a different tense or perspective)

You knew this table was yours. So much so you went home and grabbed a dolly. When you saw me and asked “will you help me load it?” you knew no one would say no. You may have seen yourself in the table, aged the same in table years, you both wobbled, you both had scars, here you both were on the curb. When the table was on your dolly, legs up like a dying bug, you only waved before dragging away the dolly on the uneven sidewalk.

■ ■ ■ ■ ■

Prompt: loose vs periodic sentences, somewhere meaningful

The credits, white, scrolling quick across the screen, need witnesses. They require us to view them in their accomplishment and see with our own eyes the persons who delivered the story to us. The viewer should show reverence, thanks, waiting with their jacket and half eaten popcorn, and call out the names like heroes. Every best boy and animal handler, boom operator or, more recently, covid coordinator packaged this movie up. You should sit for the credits if even a single scene would leave the theater with you, because then you are in debt and owe the names on the screen an easy, quiet, tribute.