You know the drill. I’ll post this Five Minute Friday contribution, link at Kate’s place on Facebook at http://www.fiveminutefriday.com and scan through the incredible work of my fellow writers. As I always say, you should try it as well — both writing and contributing or at least visiting the sites of this talented crew.
I’ve also been sharing other takes on the value of the exercise, taken from snippets found in Five Minute Friday: A Collection of Stories Written in Five Minutes Flat as an added inducement to join in. Here’s Alice’s take.
“Every Thursday night I try to stay up late, because there is a tiny excitement in knowing the FMF prompt! I let the word sink in my mind as I go to get sleep and let the word bring thoughts, emotions and verses in my mind. It’s a beautiful thing, how a word can trigger so many thoughts! Most times I realize that the verses and passages and memories of the incident were lying waiting for this word to bring itback to life. I look forward to writing five minutes every Friday on a word, just one word, and not just that, but also reading and discovering the thought process of so many other bloggers who have dwelt on that same word!”
So, let’s get into this week’s word, INCLUDE. The clock starts ticking now …
I actually had two thoughts when I was copied into the prompt. The first was the repetition from Ecclesiastes … There is a time to … and there is a time to … The second was the song, When the Saints Go Marching In.
First Ecclesiastes. My contribution is there is a time to include and there is a time to not include.
Let me explain. We all want to be included, but sometimes — especially after a loss, that inclusion is more an intrusion. We sometimes feel like the fifth wheel, intruding on the company we’re with — part of the group, yet somehow outside the circle. While it’s meant to help through a difficult time, often it has the opposite effect. So there is a time for inclusion … but there is also a time to not include, not because we don’t want the company but because it ultimately becomes awkward.
Now for the song. The only thing I definitely want to be included in at the end of my time on earth is the grand parade into heaven. I definitely DO want to be included with the saints marching through those pearly gates! … STOP
Wow! In at five minutes. That must be a first!
Happy Mothers Day!
THOUGHT TO REMEMBER: Society is haphazard and reckless. You must be grounded so you don’t get swept away in the hype.
The Light 
“… inclusion is more intrusion.”
I’ve seen this play out more often than not in the lives of my single mom friends. They go from being included when they were a part of a couple to becoming an intrusion in the group because their pain, their struggles with their ex intrudes on everyone’s “happily ever after” mindset or even some become jealous that these moms escaped and they didn’t. They feel like an intrusion, because they are. Exposing the harsh reality that sometimes it isn’t “happily ever after.”
I appreciate your take on this topic and I am grateful for your thoughts to consider amidst my own. God bless you!
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Thankyou for your share. I did that today on include but wondered was i cheating is the meditation part of the five minutes or not. More thought makes for less words. But my post on include changed by the time i wrote it. I usually carry the word with me throughout the day.
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Good thoughts. I’m finding that as cancer progresses, I’m all the more grateful that circumstances don’t allow ‘inclusion’; this vicious fight (that I intend to win) has left me with very little common ground to share. My wife says I’ve become hardened to a degree that’s uncomfortable to be around, rather like the prefect-centurion Rufus, as described by Tacitus, who as ‘all the more relentless because he had endured it himself’.
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You’ve already won!
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🙂
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I know that feeling. I was out of the box for many years after my daughter died. I felt like Moses coming down from the mountain and breaking the tablets. For i too experienced a great awakening and when i came down. I wanted to scream at all the parents complaining about their children. I wanted to say you should be grateful that your kids are healthy enough to give you a hard time.
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