Flame, Glass and Ink are Poems, essays, and reading notes by Stefania Joori Suh

Category: prompts

  • Prompt 72

    What are your thoughts on the concept of living a very long life?

    I heard that Cher has publicly defied growing old. Sometimes, youth comes with beauty, which is what Cher has achieved under the spell of medical magic. Has she made deals with spirits or consulted Dr. Faust?

    The Greek gods knew too well that aging is a mortal’s Achilles Gun. So when the immortals favored selected mortals, they deigned to bestow eternal youth on them either by giving them ambrosia or throwing them in the amber of a fire. But then you have to make deals with whoever promises you with the gift of youth.

    Cicero said nature has its things in place, and each age of human life has its place in nature. So, not acknowledging it is asking for trouble, such as Vampires. There are also Madonna and Cher, who may be vampires in the beautiful woman’s hiding. They are strong-willed, successful women with money to purchase their tickets for youth. Besides, they never reveal their actual ages in public. Are they ashamed of being considered as women of their ages? Don’t they also advocate women’s rights? Isn’t agism another tacitly recognized form of discrimination in our society?

    Regarding aging, I also think about the movie Logan’s Run, where people aged 30 and over become executed under the pretext of being rejuvenated. It’s a society of youth and a cult of beauty. If you are not young, you are not beautiful anymore. That is a formula in our world today.

    I am growing old, and to be perfectly honest, I am also scared of it because I can see the streaks of my hair being shades lighter. As a working woman, looking young is essential to survive in the workplace, whether you agree or disagree. But I don’t want to become a Vampire by making a Mepistolean pact. I want to be like Cleopatra, whose age can not wither, nor custom can stale her infinite varieties. Mind you, Plutarch, in his Heroes, commented on Cleopatra that her intelligence and manner of speaking were the jewels of her beauty. Or like Sophia Lauren, who still looks divinely beautiful without looking like a Vampire because it matters how your inner self looks.

  • Prompt 71

    What could you do differently?

    Plane Dreaming is now planespotting. Image Credit by Me🤓

    “If” is such a big word with such a short syllable. There’s even a book titled What If, packed with hypothetical answers to scientific questions. In my Book of Life, these are my what-ifs.

    I could have continued to pursue a flight attendant career shortly after graduating from college. I once applied for a position with United Airlines in college. I made it to the open interview, where only two people were selected. I took it as a sign of not calling it a vocation, so I decided not to pursue my childhood dream. But my inborn wanderlust calls me to the vision of being a flight attendant working skybound, traveling, and meeting people worldwide.

    I could have acted differently when my team manager told me last Thursday that she would soon leave the firm this month. She was one of a few commendable supervisors/managers I have worked with. She asked me if I could work with her at her new firm. Ecstatically, I said “Yes!” because I felt insecure about my future after her departure. Being a neurodivergent, I can thrive under a patient and understanding person. My current team manager is a neurotypical supervisor who lets me work independently and contribute to the best of my abilities. While I was grateful for her kind gesture of inviting me to join her at her new firm, I should not have expressed my acceptance forthwith lest I should burden her with the weight of responsibility carried to her new place. I could have acted professionally courteously and instead congratulated her on her new future, not giving her the impression of latching on to her.

    There’s no use cryng over spilled milk, and I feel like the sorry milkmaid. Foolhardy maybe, foolish not. I could become more mature, now that I have reached the second stage of my life. But I don’t want to be harsh on myself for not being what my parents and brother and some people think I should be. Earth moves around Sun, and the Sun comes up from the east and goes down in the west. Not to acknowledge the nature of things is to ask for trouble. Likewise, I don’t want to pine for things I regret not having done or being the way I want, for life is too short to hold my what-ifs in the chapters of my life.

  • prompt 70

    If you had a freeway billboard, what would it say?

    Made by Me 🌻

    Life is an alternative cause between hope and despair, joy and sadness, and gain and loss, as gallantly depicted in Verdi’s La Traviata.

    I made the above billboard to serve as my logo for the new stage of my life this year. I hope to maintain it as a narrative for the rest of my life.

    In participation of creative experience, I shall rekindle the love of writing; however bad or good it may be, to leave my legacy of existence that I exist in the actualization of who I am, lest my life should vanish in the dust of the wind, like Lucy Maud Montgomery, who disciplined herself to devote herself in writing every day at the desk even if she didn’t felt like doing it. After all, didn’t Aristotle say we are what we repeatedly do, and excellence is not an act but a habit?

  • Prompt 69

    Do you spend more time thinking about the future or the past? Why?

    When I was young, I used to think about my future, jotting down the years ahead and thinking about what I would be.

    Now that I have reached the time from the wonder years, I look forward to futures, while setting my foot on present. Although I am not as faithful as I used to be, I still regard the Bible as the source of practical wisdom that has survived for thousand years:

    Matthew 6:34 Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

    Waking up every morning is like every birthday to us, and we can live these moments to the best we can, doing our daily tasks. I know I am also afraid of what tomorrow will bring, but it never knows, and honestly, I don’t want to know. Saint Teresa of Avila knew it hundreds of years ago:

    Let nothing disturb you,
    Let nothing frighten you,
    All things are passing away.
    God never changes.
    Patience obtains all things.
    Whoever has God lacks nothing;
    God alone suffice    s.

    God bless you all. ⭐️✨🍀🧚‍♀️

  • Prompt 68

    What is the greatest gift someone could give you?

    One of the reasons I like Charles Dickens and Charlotte Bronte is their happy ending with the most unexpected gift in the bliss of munificent largess that turned around their lives as la dolce vita. Likewise, (and frankly speaking) my Dickensian style of the greatest gift could be a recovery of my father’s stolen ancestral land in the will left by my grandfather.

    A Shakespearean play, it may seem, my father’s land was forfeited by his half-brother, who falsely attested to the probate court that my father was lost in contact and, therefore, presumed to be dead. We have recently learned about it and still can’t believe this preponderance of lies. With the purloined land, the half-brother enriched his family, helping his two sons to set up their businesses. The promised land would have significantly helped our family, and we would have lived in a better environment with a Dickensian happy ending.

    That happened to Charles Dickens. It was a small estate inherited from his paternal grandmother, which released his impecunious family from a debtor’s jail so that they could settle down in a fixed abode. So, yes. I should be so lucky if we could get back our land. That could be the greatest expectation.

  • prompt 67

    What colleges have you attended?

    Those were my green salad days on the following Sylvan campuses with pleasantness on memory lanes.

    Bergen Community College in Paramus, New Jersey– It was more of a preparatory school for me to prepare for a four-year university. English is my second language (“ESL”) – and the most beloved-and the college had an excellent ESL program equivalent for TOFEL or CELT. I was enrolled in an Honor Program, which helped me to transfer to the higher-level of university.

    Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey – I lived in the dorm and loved everything about the school. My major was English, so you can guess my initial intimidation of the subject as an ESL competing with native speakers. But I was on a Dean’s List in my senior year, and I am very proud of it. I loved reading Renaissance and Victorian literature classes in their original forms, which were exhilarating. I joined Army ROTC as a student cadet and the NJ Army National Guard at Rutgers. I also joined the Color Guard and Scabbard & Blade, a military honor society. I was a very active student and miss those days.

    New York University, New York, New York – While working as a legal secretary at Dorsey & Witney in New York, I attended evening classes for a certificate in Paralegal Studies at NYU. The instructors were all practicing NYC lawyers passionate about sharing their practical knowledge with us. I graduated from the six-month program with good grades, and it was an enriching experience.

    Looking back under ever foreign palm trees in California, I miss the east coast where all my college years and my prime times are buried.