All Comments on 'Four Little Words'

The ending was perfect - both with Laura Trulock asking her question (seems unbelievable that no one would have asked that question of MacNeal in all his years of teaching) and his answer - priceless! Love is one thing that cannot be bought, and can only be given freely. I hope all his students achieve that pleasure - though the burrito answer made me chuckle. I enjoyed the creativity in all the other responses as well - what would mine be? "Thank you, Mom, Dad." But "newspapers won't clean paint" - still has me wondering - in a good way.

I could have taken Professor McNeil's course when I was in law school.

This is one of those short but meaningful stories that stays with the reader for a long time afterward. Witty and fun but ultimately deep and haunting. Well-crafted, Areala-chan. Thanks for sharing it!

I'm really pleased to see a non-sexual piece get such a great response from the community!

Anon #1: Love your four words. :) And I would explain the whole newspapers and paint thing...but then it wouldn't be anywhere near as interesting now, would it...? ;)

LVGirl: The class Prof. MacNeal teaches at fictional Kensington is patterned after a real class at another law school, though I don't know how long it's been taught at that institution. What was your best memory from your law studies? :)

AverageBear: Your comments always warm my heart. Thanks so much for taking the time, and I'm glad you found it worth reading. :)

Everyone else: I want to know what YOUR four words would have been. Feel free to share here in the comments or private feedback. :)

*huggles*

Areala-chan

what a long time between submissions. Cameo's it seems. T

Seriously, one of the best short stories I've ever read. Congratulations on your grasp of dialog, characterization, pacing, intriguing premise and plot twist. I am envious of your ability.

My offering of four words?

It's worth the effort.

This piece is so good, so thought-provoking, that I'm headed now to the author's other submissions. Live always in gratitude.

And paint goes through newspaper. Just ask anyone who has tried to use newspaper to keep paint off of anything. And the four little words? They would have different meanings to different people. People value different things. Never be too sure, comes to mind.

There is indeed light.

I too will have to read your other stories.. Love what you do......

One of the worst ways to launch a story is how you launched this one. My name for it is THE 12 DAYS OF CHRISTMAS. 12 lords a leaping, 11 maids a milking, 5 gold rings! 4 turtle doves, 3 French hens, and a partridge in a pear tree. Lists ruin prose.

Start a tale with action or your thesis.

Certainly Makes You Think

Woodmanone

Thank you everyone who's commented thusfar! Keep 'em coming. :)

woodmanone: That's what I was going for. :)

NOIRTRASH: Well, I'll be bum-rushed, I got a JBJ comment! Appreciate your honesty, and sorry the story didn't work out for you. Can't please everybody, but it's important to know where I could have done better, so I'll take your two stars. :)

bruce22: Thank you so much! Don't have too many other ones to read, so I hope at least one of the others strikes your fancy too. Working on getting more up here. :)

snath: There is indeed. It's just a matter of digging upwards to find it sometimes. All the best to you. :)

Anon #3: "Never be too sure" is a very wise proposition. But that's the beauty of the exercise: seeing the values of other people can help shape our own perceptions. Thank you very much for sharing yours. :)

Anon #2: I hope you enjoy my other stories, though like I told bruce above, there aren't that many. Hopefully one appeals to you though. And I love your words. :)

jezzaz: I always live in gratitude for comments like yours. And yes, it IS always worth the effort. Creating something is always better than not creating something (well, unless you're talking about weaponized Anthrax or Bubonic Plague...if you're into creating stuff like that, you can just puck off, as the hockey team would say). Every creation shapes the world one way or the other. Even your comments. :)

TonyKiwi: Yeah, um, like the Eagles I never stopped writing for Lit, I just, uh, took a twelve-year vacation... ;)

*huggles*

Areala-chan

Sort of like a shorten epigram!

Boyd

But would it make any difference? Every pivotal moment in my life, upon reflection points to someone else pulling the strings. Chance, coincidence, serendipity, Providence; good luck with my bad luck; it certainly could have been worse... I find it difficult to take credit for much in my life. Exploring the hypnagogic state (between sleep and wakefulness) was certainly an eye opener! We don't construct thoughts; we pick them; quite a humbling experience, to witness this. So, my four words would be: Love finds a way.

Thank you for such an outstanding piece of work. It brought tears to my eyes.

Such a big theme for so few words but very well done. I wish others would take the same plunge you did and put something out there for others to enjoy. 5 stars.

My words?

What should be, is.

Though, physically, your professor MacNeal is very different, I couldn't help seeing John Houseman as Professor Kingsfield in your opening paragraph. I thought it was a very effective opening and was used in the opener for the TV version of The Paper Chase every week.

A run down of physical attributes is often very dull, but you used it to quickly introduce MacNeal and set the tone of the story from the beginning.

Definitely 5*. I'll have to check out your other stories.

rj

Don't be a jerk

'Tisn't all about YOU.

A wonderful story, thank you

My four words?

Don't be so serious

Oh what an excellent story.

Neat, concise and pointed.

There's a lesson there for all of us.

Thank You

HP

My only complaint is that McNeal seems far too wise to be a law prof. (/JKS)

My four words: "Don't ever turn away." Nice work.

Good, well written. Could have been exceptional if you omitted the last line, retained "Kiss her you fool" and omitted the seven paragraphs after "Four little words."

Without the explanations at the end the reader would have been in the same position as the students, having to find the reasons for themselves. The hug made it worse, it sentimentalized MacNeil's reality.

But still a 4.6+ on the lito meter.

You would change HIS thought process...how arrogant does that make YOU?

What makes the world go round I ask? Your dreams and revelations are unique as are mine, as was every student in this story. As a teacher, a mentor, you would not answer a question from one you are teaching? A perfect ending! So now I ask YOU to take the test...what would YOUR four words be? I gave 5 stars not sure I would give 6 but for sure it rates 5...without question

our own four words

John Huston in 'The Paper Chase'. "You will teach yourselves the Law, I will teach you how to Think"......... thanks for sharing.

"Kiss her, you fool" are the very words I tell myself when I think of my wife of 42 plus years. 5* is my rating of this story. Thank you.

Unfortunately, my four little words would be "She's not the one".

But I got over it.

heart

Thought-provoking tale. My four words to my younger self, "Use your brain asshole."

Don't let her go.

in 'The Paper Chase'

I've never encountered a story like this - one short page - that has such depth, ingenuity, and wisdom, all at once. This breathed with life, each word feeling like a snapshot of a past, truly capturing a moment, not just a story. Every word matters and builds the scene vividly.

I'm rarely moved to tears, and almost never emotionally connect with characters in one page. Here, however, Professor MacNeal seems more real than people I've conversed with for years.

Thanks for sharing, for including such powerful thoughts in such a short, inspiring story.

Wow! It actually made my eyes moisten, just a bit. No other Lit story has ever made that happen. It struck a chord, in a number of ways.

...and the best. It speaks to us all the missed opportunities we can’t go back and change. Five stars.

Nice quick lovely story. Reminded me to think about the people around us who are so close, but we don't bring them closer when we should.

but those that try are more rewarded than not, TK U MLJ LV NV

I will do better

so much packed in so little space.

My hat's off to your accomplished writing. Superb!

So much to say and to condense it all to 4 words.

Life sucks. Live it.

Learn more, Hate less.

Learn more. Understand it!

Anything I can think of would just be trying to get my younger self to understand more the world and the people in it because as Orson Scott Card once said in "Speaker For the Dead", "Once you understand what people really want, you can't hate them anymore. You can fear them, but you can't hate them," When you understand more about how people act the way they do and how little things just cause other things to happen you worry more about just doing the best you can instead of being needlessly upset or angry at other people or the world. I think I was already well on the way at that age but I'd want to cement how important it was in my younger self's mind.

Every now and then I come back to this, and every time I agree with everything written here.

A beautiful short story, that always resonates in my mind for hours after reading it. A very well thought out flash story.

You did a superb job with this story, thank you so much for posting it.

One of the best stories on the site. Thank you bebop for pointing it out. My four words: Run from that woman!

With apologies to Anonymous 09/14/16

What an excellent story.

Neat, concise and pointed.

A lesson for all.

Now pour another drink.

Very nicely done writer

An amazing story that I love to come back to from time to time.

That was unbelievably well written. This could be the genesis for a decent little movie.

Absolutely totally f'in awesome!

An interesting and poignant little parable. And to me it is close to home in a good way. I was sixteen and I DID kiss her and 58 years later we have enjoyed a wonderful life together!

mate

Oh.

Just wow.

This was simply amazing to read! My gosh I wish there were more like this.

Best story in here.

Simple, poignant

A wonderful gem of a short that I’m glad I stumbled across

Is it too late? Was it too late at the time he wrote it?

Say I love you

The two last lines are the money quotes, and the hard hitters. Masterfully done.

If I could give this 12 stars, I would

Do Itashimashta

Excellent job. Thank you for sharing this.

Fantastic story.

Simply put it’s excellent

nice job

Nice story. There is absolutely no class like that in law school. And usually, the final exam is the total grade in a class. No midterms, unless things have changed in forty years.

I was intrigued by the title and so I read. I'm in life's autumn now and while reading I wondered what my four words would be. They came to me unbidden: Let The Sunshine In. Thanks for an enjoyable read.

I loved this little story.

But the *actual* four little words meant nothing. As Professor MacNeal intended, the four little words written by the students, as well as the four little words he wrote, were personal and aimed at themselves, not at us. They were, in fact, unimportant to the story.

No, the power of this story was the creativity and execution of the event my MacNeal himself. A teacher with a profound enough understanding of life—good for some, bad for others—to conceive of this "exam". And the class must have been marvelous.

In life, there is nothing harder or more important to deal with than ethics. He must have been an excellent teacher. I'm sure he focused on the dilemma of choice, not on the outcome ... not lecturing on what kind of outcome must be chosen for what kind of dilemma. It wasn't rote and recriminations. It wasn't even right and wrong. And certainly not about legal and illegal.

It was about one thing: thinking.

I was lucky enough to have had a few such teachers. I would like to think I was one myself (working in higher education my entire career).

MacNeal himself was the magic of this story.

There are in this world a vanishingly small number of people that divert and evolve peoples lives onto better and more fruitful courses. They are the Suns that are generally unseen but whose gravity is felt in the orbits of everyday lives, they are the single Teacher of a subject that alters their pupils recognisance of the World and their place in it. We are woefully long on politicians and their platitudes of all hues, but damned short on driven, brilliant Teachers that change existences into full, happy lives of all ages. Thank you Mr Herman, you were mine.

Regards, Ppfzz.

I can't believe, this short story shows much more about life and emotions as already written in it, phenomenal.

***Thanks for the read.

In any other category, I'd feel bad about breaking up the 69, but I think it's okay here. This is a lovely tale. I've read it many times and I still marvel at how well written it is. Thank you for sharing it.

It will always hurt! Thank you so much for this great story.

I did. And it worked!

Fantastic !

POWERFUL!