Some of the members of WFoD participate in NHWP’s first-Monday activity known as Writer’s Night Out. At each such gathering we take turns providing some sort of writing prompt or challenge, take 10 or so minutes to answer it on paper, then run around the table(s) sharing our output.  It’s a lot of fun, and very good exercise of the writing muscle. I invite whoever cares to, to share their own stuff here for the edification of the rest.

Here’s my piece from the last WNO session, on 2nd July. Jeff provided the challenge, which was (roughly) to provide some sort of representation of good or bad public (mis)behavior via an anthropomorphic being or entity. (I hasten to add that not all the challenges are as philosophically abstruse.)

So I wrote the following scene:

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“Moishe, calm down. You’re not making any sense.”

“I know what I saw. And I saw a golem.”

The Rebbe rolled his eyes slightly, and he took another bite of his sandwich. “How do you know it was a golem?”

“How do I know? How do I know? Rebbe, do you know what a golem looks like?”

The Rebbe shrugged, tilted his head, then nodded. “Yeah, I guess I do.”

Moishe turned to Hesh. “Hesh, do you know what a golem looks like?” Hesh nodded.

Moishe beckoned the waitress. “Rebecca, do you know what a golem looks like?” Rebecca paused.

“What’s a golem?” She said.

“Pfui,” said Moishe, turning to the Rebbe. “Rebbe, you know and I know that everybody – almost everybody – knows what a golem is. When you see a golem, you know you’ve seen a golem.”

The Rebbe took another bite, and a sip of his tea, and chewed. Moishe and Hesh sipped their own teas from their glasses, and nodded, nearly in time with the Rebbe’s chewing. Finally he swallowed the last bit of his sandwich, and drained the last of his tea from the glass. He wiped the corners of his mouth with his napkin, then looked at Moishe, then at Hesh, then back to Moishe.

“So,” he said, “what do you think you should do?”

“What do I think I should do? Rebbe, I came to ask you what I should do. What should I do?”

The Rebbe signaled Rebecca for the check, and shrugged. “So it’s a golem,” he said. “And what has it done so far?”

Moishe shrugged. “I don’t know that it’s done anything, but if it’s a golem, it’s gonna do something, and it’s not gonna be good for us, even if he – it – thinks it’s helping us.”

The Rebbe nodded. “That’s the way it works.”

“So,” said Hesh, “didn’t the golem in the story get destroyed, finally?”

“Eh, maybe, maybe not,” said the Rebbe. “And anyway, only who made it can destroy it. Do we know who made it?”

Moishe shook his head.

The Rebbe nodded. “So we wait and see, and when whoever made it gets antsy, we’re home free.” He paid the check and left.