Assignment: Write a miniature, however you choose to define the form.

            No one plans on growing up to be a miniature.  From birth, stories dream big.  To be a Great American Novel.  To be a War and Peace.  To be a Bible.  No story, playing in the yard with friends, says, “Some day, I’m going to take up a half page in the New Yorker.”  We come into the world with aspirations, to be hardbound, to have a table of contents, to snuggle with bookmarks, to call home a shelf with other distinguished volumes.

            Some of us, though, for whatever reason, never reached those heights.  Our parents told us we could do anything, but then, in our adolescence, some critic said we didn’t have the stamina or the endurance.  Sure, we could get out of the gate quick, but then, it was just a matter of time before we started slowing down, and lost energy and focus.  Character development was out of the question.  “You’ll never be a book,” they said, “but if you put some more work in, and you might be a decent miniature at some point.”

            But we are not ‘miniatures.’  Please do not call us that.  We are Particularly Short Stories.  I think the era of bigotry and petty name-calling is behind us.  We weren’t born to be books with chapters, and we find no shame in that.  We try to be the best Particularly Short Stories we can be.  And face it, in today’s ADD world, we’re probably all you have the attention span for, anyway.

            But still, the world disrespects us.  If we’re not the Talk of the Town, we’re ignored, simply text surrounding a cartoon with a talking dog.  When read, we’re rarely remembered.  We get e-mails saying, “She’ll enjoy you if you have more length.”  Imagine how that feels.

            So, before you scoff at us, ignore us, and impugn our character in public, please keep in mind, as short as we may be, we’re stories too.