EXERCISE: On your marks! (300 words)
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writercisesOriginal Posting March 15, 2018
Okay! Let's see. I've poked a bit at the notion that you might want to do some brainstorming ahead of time, just to limber up the brain and get some ideas percolating. How about this? Something I've noticed helps me when I'm looking for ideas is pretty simple.
Listen to yourself. And to your friends, family, TV, movies, blogs, news... What stories do you tell? What stories do you listen to, watch, enjoy? Which things move you?
Go ahead. Pick out those family stories that get retold every time the clan gets together. Or maybe it's that story about the time when the dentist drilled your tooth before the Novacaine really set in? Or...
You can decide whether you just want to do a straight memoir -- this is the way it happened -- or mix and match, turn your 4th grade teacher into a troll from the depths, add in the aliens... well, whatever. Still, those stories, especially the ones that you find yourself telling to people, are great little story seeds to mix into your stone soup (and don't mind the mixing of metaphors, they are pretty resilient). Go ahead, make a list, make notes when you have been talking with someone, jot down which of the bits and pieces sliding across Facebook really got your dander up and made you think...
There you go. A small collection of ideas, but... all you need is one a week, for the next six weeks. A short sketch, a dramatic moment in life, maybe it's that oddball weekend that you visited Las Vegas and won... oh, you're going to tell the story. Okay!
Where are you from, how did you get where you are, what happened then? What was the most amazing thing that happened in high school? Did you ever have any friends who...
Grab those little life stories that we all trade around all the time. Then polish, twist, and...
WRITE!
Okay! Let's see. I've poked a bit at the notion that you might want to do some brainstorming ahead of time, just to limber up the brain and get some ideas percolating. How about this? Something I've noticed helps me when I'm looking for ideas is pretty simple.
Listen to yourself. And to your friends, family, TV, movies, blogs, news... What stories do you tell? What stories do you listen to, watch, enjoy? Which things move you?
Go ahead. Pick out those family stories that get retold every time the clan gets together. Or maybe it's that story about the time when the dentist drilled your tooth before the Novacaine really set in? Or...
You can decide whether you just want to do a straight memoir -- this is the way it happened -- or mix and match, turn your 4th grade teacher into a troll from the depths, add in the aliens... well, whatever. Still, those stories, especially the ones that you find yourself telling to people, are great little story seeds to mix into your stone soup (and don't mind the mixing of metaphors, they are pretty resilient). Go ahead, make a list, make notes when you have been talking with someone, jot down which of the bits and pieces sliding across Facebook really got your dander up and made you think...
There you go. A small collection of ideas, but... all you need is one a week, for the next six weeks. A short sketch, a dramatic moment in life, maybe it's that oddball weekend that you visited Las Vegas and won... oh, you're going to tell the story. Okay!
Where are you from, how did you get where you are, what happened then? What was the most amazing thing that happened in high school? Did you ever have any friends who...
Grab those little life stories that we all trade around all the time. Then polish, twist, and...
WRITE!