Moral Mondays:The babies are crying again

High rise apartments

Image: Pixabay

 

The babies next door are crying again. Four-bloody-a.m.

They’re twins – twin bullet heads, twin sprigs of straw hair – and you can’t tell which is the boy and which the girl. Their mum Dawn is shouting – high pitched, whiney, split by hacking coughs – and other, smaller voices join in. That’ll be Shay and Ty. Ty’s three and still wears a nappy in the street, heavy to his knees. Shay’s seven and roams the estate shooting cats with his air rifle.

I press my pillow to my ears and promise myself I will never, ever grow up to be like Dawn.  

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Written for Nortina’s Moral Mondays. See the moral – this week “Don’t take on more than you can bear” – and write a story in 100 words or fewer. See here for full Ts and C.

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33 thoughts on “Moral Mondays:The babies are crying again”

    1. Thank you Brittany! Possibly not a nice world to be immersed in – especially at 3 in the morning! – but glad the writing worked for you. Thanks very much for reading 🙂

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    1. Ah, thank you, Jane. Yes, you’re right – I try not to think of all the things I thought I was and wasn’t going to do when I ‘grow up’. Though actually, if our ideas about what’s right and wrong for us don’t develop over time, it would be worrying – it would show we’re not learning, not growing. 🙂 That’s my excuse for not becoming a full on eco warrior, a soldier or a builder (just some of my career ideas when I was a teen!)

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      2. Haha! Me neither. Not quite sure what came over me and I think the idea probably lasted for a couple of days after an army recruitment talk at school. Those were the days when they sold the forces as a career option where you probably wouldn’t get shot at – anywhere other than Ireland, of course. I soon remembered I can’t stand being shouted at, loathe being cold / wet / tired and would rather like to go the whole of my life not being shot at or having killed anyone. Yes, my unreasonable nature put paid to that career 🙂

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      3. That recruitment campaign amused me: “Join the army. See the world.” No mention of what purpose the army was there to serve. I don’t suppose you’ve ever heard Arlo Guthrie’s album Alice’s Restaurant. It’s the soundtrack for a film I saw when I was at Art College. You may not feel like listening to it, but if you do, there’s a lovely bit about him trying to join up. In fact I loved the whole album, but that may have been because I saw the film, and got into a really heated classroom discussion about it, disagreeing with the tutor on every point. He ended up looking as if he wanted to kill me.
        Happy days… 🙂

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      4. Ha! Can’t imagine you arguing with anyone about anything, Jane 🙂 No, I don’t know Arlo Guthrie, but the song sounds intriguing. You should see the new ads for the army – even worse in their way. They bang on about peer pressure a lot, about young people becoming the best they can be (wearing khaki, of course). And they are clearly aimed at working class, urban kids – no cynicism in exploiting the lower classes for cannon fodder, then.

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      5. Excuse me, young lady (harrumph) surely you’re not suggesting that the ruling class should get themselves blown to smithereens! Where would you all be then? The country would go to the dogs 🙂

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      6. Yes, true. Who would be left to keep Harvey Nick’s and Harrods going? And who would we vote into parliament if we ran out of old Etonians? Foolish of me, ma’am. I do apologise 🙂

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      9. All in all, puttingworking-class children into uniforms and sending them halfway across the world to be blown to bits is the only sensible thing to do if we want to uphold our worthy capitalist traditions 🙂

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      10. Fewer consumers to buy all the plastic and electronic crap no one really needs, though. Fewer people to berate as scroungers and hold up as excuses to cut more benefits. Hmm. Maybe we should rethink this. 🙂

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  6. Great piece of fiction for this prompt. You are very right, having too many kids, when you can’t take care of or support them all is too much to bear. There is a thing called birth control. Love your take 🙂

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    1. Thank you – you’re very kind. I love my son but souldn’t imagine having four or five of him – or more – around the house! I think I would become like my character Dawn – shouting all the time. And that’s depressing for eveyone. 🙂

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  7. Wow! What a visual! Dawn sounds like the “baby momma” “welfare queen” stereotype — so often demonized — but you can’t help but to have sympathy for her. Great writing!

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    1. Thank you, Nortina. Yes, it’s a tough life she’s chosen for herself and her kids – and the neighbours! And I’m glad she’s earned some sympathy too 🙂 Thanks for another great challenge

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