It was August and it was snowing... Writing prompt from @shewrites #amwriting #ukwriters #100daysofwriting

Today is day 56 of my 100 days of writing project. I'd really welcome feedback on his or any of my other pieces.

I was perusing the #amwriting hash tag on twitter earlier. I saw that @shewrites had posted a prompt "it was August and it was snowing..." I was
instantly intrigued and as I'd been struggling for inspiration and motivation for writing today decided to give it a shot.

If I'm completely honest I think this is a weak piece failing at the show don't tell part of writing, something I often struggle with. That said I could easily see turning the setting and the ideas I've used here into a much longer piece. This is definitely on the to be worked on further list.

It was August and it was snowing...


It's snowing. Heavily. The white stuff is coming down from the sky at a very impressive rate. I'm not sure I've seen it snow this fast before. It's been falling for a little less than 30 minutes and it's already a couple of inches deep. No one expected it to snow today and certainly not like this.

The kids on the estate are all off school at this time of year and the streets have been full of laughing, shouting and the sounds of balls hitting a wall for weeks. Today a different set up appears. Scarves and hats are the fashion of the day. Sledges have replaced footballs. And if after hearing their children begging for ice cream for days their parents gave in the kids would turn them down. It's a day for hot chocolate snuggled under a blanket after hours of cold wet fun in the snow.

It's snowing Oxford today. Not a big deal I'm sure you're thinking. But here's the thing: it's August. August bank holiday in fact.

This was a different Oxford to the seat of learning in the UK and the town in Mississippi. One that had only been founded 100 years before. It was August. Or at least it was millions of miles away on Earth.

At the Oxford colony on Neptune they called it August. But when a year on Neptune is 164 times as long as a year on Earth August meant different things every time it rolled around. The colonists were still learning what the weather did having not been there for a full year yet. They had learnt a lot but their weather forecasting needed work. Perfectly understandable given that meteorologists on Earth had had thousands of years to perfect the skill and hadn't managed. 100 years wasn't long in comparison.

It led to a few surprises and some accidents (although thankfully not for some years) but the Neptunian colonists had learned to expect the unexpected and adapt quickly

And so for a select group of children they could say they lived in Oxford. And on the August Bank Holiday weekend of 3012 it snowed.

♥ Emma