The early bird gets the worm (and overcomes writer’s block)
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It’s so exciting watching June Kinoshita build up her story, 10 minutes by 10 minutes, that I couldn’t resist posting another of her pieces this week. (Check out “Life’s thread fraying” for another piece from the family saga June is writing.) “The early bird” was one of the phrases on our group list in the Saturday gathering, when our prompt was the homepage of sagmeisterwalsh.com.
“The early bird gets the worm,” intoned her English-language tutor. “Do you know what that means?”
“It means you must rise early and study hard to get good grades,” Michiko ventured.
Rather than praise her 16-year-old charge for her grasp of metaphor, the tutor shook her head sternly and said, “It means the young bride gets the best husband.”
Michiko sighed heavily. “You should be counting your blessings,” scolded the tutor. “Your father has arranged a superb match for you. The Tanaka family is so distinguished, I hear they are descended from imperial princes, and young Mr. Tanaka graduated at the top of his class. They say he will be promoted to a judgeship soon.”
Why must a woman’s destiny be decided by her family and her marriage? Michiko thought petulantly. By the age of 20, a woman was to be packaged up in a brocade gown so heavy with gold embroidery she could scarcely move, her face painted into a smooth white mask, all individuality erased, and her head covered by an ornate headdress to “hide her horns” of jealousy when her husband would inevitably stray.
Marriage is like that rose, she thought, her eyes resting on a luminous blossom out in the garden. It is held up before you as the ultimate prize, yet the petals are fated to shrivel and fall, leaving behind nothing but thorns.
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