He rises at six to go to the grocery store,
hopes he will be early enough in the morning
to stock up on necessities. You know--
the usual. Toilet paper, paper towels
frozen vegetables. He forgot fresh green beans,
will get them next time. The dog will whine
and bark if he leaves her at home. I’m still asleep.
There a crowd jostles for products. He tries to keep
the recommended safe distance, backs away,
does the two step, glowers at those who invade
his space. He checks out, stows his bag in the car.
The dog wags her tail in joy. He has sprayed car doors
and his gloves with his homemade disinfectant,
drives home hoping he has left behind what
the pushing crowd may be carrying, a new hell.
I wake up, find chocolate cookies on the shelf.
 
Diane Wahto

On-line Read Around
 
The previous post of 3/23/2020 announced an on-line read around for this site beginning March 30, which is today.  I have received two entries, posted below.  This will be an ongoing challenge as we all “stay home” because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Here are the rules:

• 500-word limit, any genre.
• E-mail your entry as an attachment to Connie Rae White (craepa@cox.net).
• I will post the entries to this District 5 News and Events page for the read around.
• If readers wish to comment, please email the author personally. Comments should not be addressed to the District 5 site. If you would like your comment posted, CC Connie Rae on your comment, and I may consider posting an occasional valuable or interesting comment.

So, come on authors, get the juices flowing. Consider the first two entries below and kindly let the authors know your comments. Let’s build our community in this time of isolation.

​~ Connie White, President, KAC District 5

Don drove into the busy Walmart parking lot at 9:30 at night. He realized the news on television today had it right. The public is panicked in fear of shortages of medicines and even food. They are quarantined from work, from school - The government itself is panicked.

Don slammed his brakes nearly hitting an old man desperately shoving his cart to escape.

After parking, Don put his protective face mask on, then his glasses and latex gloves that were left over from his dental practice when he retired.  

Walking toward the entrance, Don noticed two high school girls approaching him as they stared at his protective garb. They then veered away starting to giggle.

Once inside he was startled so see all bread, eggs and toilet paper were gone. He hustled throughout the store buying what was still available.

At the checkout, Don patiently waited behind three boisterous, young-motorcycle-bikers. The large leader sneered at Don and yelled, “Hey old man! Don’t you know powdered donuts will rot your teeth?”

The hulk of a leader turned and got up in Don’s face, “Maybe I should take those donuts away from you!”

Don set his jaw and leaned forward with fierce eyes to meet the biker’s startled face, “Maybe instead, you should call your mother. I bet you haven’t been a man and told her that you love her want to help her so she won’t need to be afraid.”

Caught off guard, the biker stepped back just as a muscular black Walmart employee stepped in between Don and the biker. Good evening Dr. Marler...Please allow me to check you out so that you can be on your way. These gentlemen won’t mind.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant Barker.”

The gang members silently stepped to the side and watched Dr. Marler being checked out. Then Lieutenant Barker pushed Dr. Marler’s cart outside.

Crossing the parking lot, Lieutenant Barker said, “Judy told me while I was in Afghanistan on active duty, you were caring for my family’s teeth. You let her pay whenever she could. I explained to her that you were a Marine too.”

Dr. Marler nodded.

​Lieutenant Barker continued, “I wanted to thank you in person, Sir. Semper Fi!”

On-line Read Around

The previous post of 3/23/2020 announced an on-line read around for this site beginning March 30, which is today.  I have received two entries, posted below.  This will be an ongoing challenge as we all “stay home” because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Here are the rules:

• 500-word limit, any genre.
• E-mail your entry as an attachment to Connie Rae White (craepa@cox.net).
• I will post the entries to this District 5 News and Events page for the read around.
• If readers wish to comment, please email the author personally. Comments should not be addressed to the District 5 site. If you would like your comment posted, CC Connie Rae on your comment, and I may consider posting an occasional valuable or interesting comment.

So, come on authors, get the juices flowing. Consider the first two entries below and kindly let the authors know your comments. Let’s build our community in this time of isolation.

​~ Connie White, President, KAC District 5

I’ve been pondering how to keep District 5 active and in contact with one another in this time of isolation and quarantine with the Covid-19 virus. I’m hoping that you all are continuing to write, though I confess that I have not. Therefore, I am in serious need of some stimulation also.
 
Let’s begin by doing a writing prompt and virtual “read around” with comments. SOOOO, write a maximum 500-word piece; poetry or prose; fact, fiction, or fantasy on the topic: “What I’ve done while the country went crazy.”
 
Send your entry to Connie White as an email attachment (craepa@cox.net) by midnight Monday, March 30, one week from today. Depending on length and number of entries, I will repost them to the blog for comments, and we will proceed from there.  Later, Ray (Griz) Racobs will post a photo challenge for us.
 
Dan Close is continuing to work on programs for us once we are able to meet together again. In the meantime, let’s write!!
 
Also, watch Save the Date for meeting times again, when these can be scheduled, as well as special presentations by members. If you have a reading or other scheduled event, please send them so we can post them.
 
Bob Dean’s new book, The Aerialist Will Not Be Performing: ekphrastic poems and flash fiction to the art of Stephen Schroeder, is now available. The price is only $25 for 42 full-color paintings and 164 pages, not including notes.  Bob highly recommends Turning Plow Press to anyone looking for a publisher.

~ Connie White, President, KAC District 5

In view of recent Corona Virus announcements, and the fact that the majority of us attending club are elderly AND our meetings are held in a residence for such, the March monthly meeting is being cancelled and the program rescheduled for April.

The feeling of medical experts seems to be that restricting activity for a few weeks should break the cycle, and by next month the crisis may be over.  For most of us, the symptoms might be negligible, but our activity might threaten the lives of those more vulnerable.  

Thanks for your understanding and apologies for any hardship caused by the cancellation.

Elements of Flash Fiction
 
Microfiction. Nanofiction. Short-shorts. Dribble. The multitude of names for flash fiction are almost as wide-ranging as the word count. But a safe definition of flash is that it’s a brief story of 1,000 words or fewer. In this short workshop we will examine the essential elements of flash fiction, paying particular attention to voice, ‘the sentence,’ and ambiguity. After reading some examples, we will dive in with some writing exercises designed to free your imagination and get you writing in the exciting genre of flash fiction.
 
Presented by Tyler Dillow
 ​
Tyler Dillow teaches composition and technical writing at Wichita State University. He is the current Poetry Editor and Art Director for Mikrokosmos/MOJO. His work has been featured in X-R-A-Y Literary Magazine and Heavy Feather Review.
​

Lots of empty spaces on the calendar. Sign up at the next meeting - if you are sweet, grab a salty friend's hand and do it as a team. Thanks!

Elements of Flash Fiction
 
Microfiction. Nanofiction. Short-shorts. Dribble. The multitude of names for flash fiction are almost as wide-ranging as the word count. But a safe definition of flash is that it’s a brief story of 1,000 words or fewer. In this short workshop we will examine the essential elements of flash fiction, paying particular attention to voice, ‘the sentence,’ and ambiguity. After reading some examples, we will dive in with some writing exercises designed to free your imagination and get you writing in the exciting genre of flash fiction.
 
Presented by Becca Yenser
 
Becca Yenser is the author of the poetry chapbook, Too High and Too Blue in New Mexico (Dancing Girl Press, 2018). She teaches composition at Wichita State University, where she is co-Editor-in-Chief for Mikrokosmos Literary Journal, and Arts and Culture columnist for The Sunflower. Her poems, fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and photography appear in Anti-Heroin Chic, Voicemail Poems, Pom Pom Lit, Dostoyevsky Wannabe, The Nervous Breakdown, Hobart, CHEAP POP, Paper Darts, 1001 Editors, Fanzine, Eclectica Magazine, decomP, HOOT, Entropy, Filter Literary Journal, Toasted Cheese, and Madcap Review. 

KAC District 5 met February 8th to discuss the ins and outs of KAC writing contests and how to use them to improve our writing skills. Roy Stucky, 2019 Prose Writer of the Year and Roy Beckemeyer, KAC Poet of the year, presented their thoughts on the subject and then we opened for a discussion and Q&A session. Approximately 25 members and guests were in attendance.

The Two Roys (Stucky, background, Beckemeyer, foreground).

Roy Stucky, Prose Writer of the Year, 2019.

Diane Wahto, past president, KAC D5, and Duane Johnson, current president, Kansas Authors Club.

Guest Martin Eby and KAC D5 member Reggie Jarrell.

KAC D5 member David Cook making an observation.

Kansas Authors Club District 5 Monthly Meeting on Saturday February 8, 2020, 1:30-3:30 p.m., will feature THE TWO ROYS (Roy Stucky, KAC Prose Writer of the Year, 2019, and Roy Beckemeyer, KAC Poet of the Year, 2019) presenting "THE KAC ANNUAL LITERARY CONTEST: A FULL-SPECTRUM WRITING WORKOUT"

The Roys’ Bios
 
The author of Transapparent, a literary novel; Library Dog, a youth novel; Truth War, 2017 Stageplay 1st place; and editor of the anthology HWG Journal#2; Roy Stucky lives in rural Kansas.

A KAC member since 2016, Stucky has been awarded 17 places and 16 honorable mentions in poetry and prose in KAC’s annual state literary contests. Roy was Prose Writer of the Year in 2017 and in 2019. 

Stucky uses his bachelor’s in Management Information Systems as a network administrator. Much of his writing is lyrics for the band Mirror Covenant. Roy's author page is at mirrorcovenant.com/author.

In addition to being a reading addict, Roy has been a tractor driver, Mensa member, roofer, photographer, logger, alternative energy retailer, computer programmer, cabinet maker, chess pretender, house painter, dairy farmer, inventor, hunter, web designer, and “a frightful bore who excels at the latter.”

Roy Stucky can be contacted at
mailto:rstucky@mirrorcovenant.com
and (316) 833-2504 in Pretty Prairie.

_________________________________________
 
Roy Beckemeyer has authored four poetry books, Mouth Brimming Over (2019, Blue Cedar Press), Stage Whispers (2018, Meadowlark Books, 2019 Nelson Poetry Book Award winner), Amanuensis Angel (2018, Spartan Press), and Music I Once Could Dance To (2014, Coal City Press, a Kansas Notable Book). He serves on the editorial boards of the online journals Konza Journal, River City Poetry, and Heartland! Poetry of Love, Resistance, & Solidarity. Roy and his wife, Pat, live in Wichita, Kansas.

Beckemeyer joined KAC in 2010 and has held positions in District 5 and state levels, including KAC President (2016-2017). He has been awarded 47 places and 22 honorable mentions in poetry and prose in ten years of entering KAC’s annual literary contests. He was Poetry Writer of the Year in 2013 and 2015 through 2019.

Roy is retired from nearly 30 years with the Boeing Company and has a Ph.D. degree from KU. In his retirement years he has traveled extensively, edited two scientific journals, conducted research on the systematics and distribution of dragonflies, and is an authority on the Paleozoic insect fauna of Kansas, Oklahoma, and Alabama; he has named over 20 new species of fossil insects.
​
Roy Beckemeyer may be contacted at 
royjbeckemeyer@gmail.com,
and his author’s page may be found at 
https://royjbeckemeyer.com/. 
​________________________________________

"THE KAC ANNUAL LITERARY CONTEST: A FULL-SPECTRUM WRITING WORKOUT" - Excerpts from the handouts:

"Competition is a fact of life for authors. There is a finite pool of readers...the Kansas Authors Club (KAC) Literary Contest..provides authors a proving ground...You can hardly buy better writer training than to author something for each Contest category. ...The Contest is ...the author's marketplace in miniature...Winning a category award is akin to a publisher accepting your manuscript."

"Contest-winning is a consequence of the systematic writer-training the Contest provides. Contest-winning is thus a long-term proposition. Year after year you submit as many of your strongest entries in as many categories as possible. This is the simple and obvious fact that works you never enter cannot win. If a piece did not win, ask yourself why. Compare it to one of your winners. Look for weaknesses. In winners, look for strengths. Use these close inspections of your writing as the basis for revision, for rewriting."

Want to hear more? Come to the February meeting. Free. Visitors welcome. Q&A after the presentation. Writing Tips. Writing Prompts. 

• Kansas Authors Club District 5 Monthly Meeting is open to the public.
• When: Saturday, February 8th, 2020 at 1:30-3:30 p.m.
• Where: Larksfield Place, 7373 E. 29th St. N., Wichita KS (just west of Rock Rd. on the south side of 29th Street). Park in the Visitors lot and enter the Welcome Entrance walking left through the main dining room to the Lakeview Dining Room.

​The meeting was called to order at 1:31 by President Connie White. The program committee shared the report from their meeting that had just adjourned. They announced that the February meeting would cover entering the KAC contests, and the March meeting would cover flash fiction. Treasurer Ray Racobs reported that the account currently stands at $8129.10. Roy Beckemeyer reminded everyone of a poetry meeting at Watermark that would occur on January 12 at 2:00.

Amy Ackerman presented the program on blogging. She shared why she went into blogging, how to choose a blogging platform, and how to write a welcome post. Attendees then had a chance to write their own welcome post. She also shared a few of her favorite posts from each of her blogs.

The meeting was adjourned at 3:30.
Respectfully submitted by secretary Amy Ackerman