kaolin fire presents :: writing :: fiction

"Comma.0"

words

My mother always used to enunciate commas when she came to them. "Add the eggs, comma, butter, comma, and flour," she'd say. That wasn't the only thing odd with her, of course, but odd enough that that was the only punctuation she'd enunciate in such a manner. She wouldn't, for instance, go around saying, "Look, comma, you dip dash stick period. Pay attention exclamation mark." Just commas, almost as if they were her own way of taking a gulp of air; like she was a bullfrog and commas were flies--her eyes instinctually tracking them, her diaphragm forcing out a "comma" when one was in range. There just wasn't anything she could do about it, and I count my lucky stars I didn't inherit anything quite so stultifying. End of paragraph.