Friday, February 1, 2013

Flash Fiction Friday--A Life Story


 Interviews   
KRISANN GENTRY



It’s an interesting question, and honestly not one I’ve been asked before, so I’ll give you one for finding that. But no, you’re right. My real name isn’t Shane Amos.

It’s Seamus McLeod. I’ve always hated it.

Kids were mean, you know? And they’d say the most idiotic stuff, not even being bright about it, like, ‘Seamus is a shame-to-us. Seamus riding on the bus.’ Dumb kid stuff that shouldn’t matter.

I told my mom I wanted a cool name. I’d be going by Sam from now on.

She didn’t even turn to me. “You were named for your great grandfather,” just kept scrubbing at some dishes or some such.

Irish guilt is wily and strong. I can’t shame a dead man by not accepting at least part of his name. There I’m trying to escape this idea of shame and it’s coming right back, shaming me into keeping it around.

So I told her, “Fine. Samus, then. Sam for short.”
But I wasn’t allowed to play video games. I didn’t know there was a game called Metroid with a hero called Samus. I didn’t know SHE WAS A GIRL.

So, yeah. I didn’t go by Samus very long.

Shane Amos was what I started using in boarding school. It stuck pretty well, and since I found nearly all my bandmates there, after I’d been doing open mics in pubs and such, we formed the group around the sort of stage name that became the only name I heard myself called by.

So that’s how we got our band name too, Shane Amos and the Blanks. If we’d known then we were gonna be inducted into the rock & roll hall of fame all these years later, we probably would have thought about it a bit longer, I think.



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Want to make one of your own? Next week's prompt is NON-FICTION.

Write a short essay from the starting point, "Family Traits." 



3 comments:

  1. Nice one. I started working on one of my own last night, but it was getting too late and I couldn't really keep my focus, so I ended up not submitting.
    Josiah's submission doesn't seem to be coming up right. Do you know how I can get to read it? Linda's is really great, love the twist at the end.

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    1. If you do finish, please still share! I'll make sure it gets added.

      Josiah's is loading fine for me; he decided to be cheeky and write a one-line story. Maybe that clears it up? :)

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    2. We had a late entry! Check out Jonathan's too! I think you'll really enjoy it.

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