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Showing posts with label #amwriting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label #amwriting. Show all posts
Saturday, May 25, 2013
"Pictures and Song" available on Kindle
My short story "Pictures and Songs" is now available on Kindle. If you like it, give it a 5 star review. If you don't like it, give it a 5 star review anyway.
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Friday, August 31, 2012
Another Short Story Published!
http://amwriting.org/archives/13658
I hope people enjoy it. I also hope it only offends those who think Christianity and Ayn Rand's Objectivism are compatible. Personally, I can't count myself in either camp, but I'm a big fan of Jesus, and I don't like mediocre writing, narcissism masquerading as virtue, or fools who can't tell the difference between selfishness and selflessness. I think the story captures at least some of that.
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Help edit "Parallel and Perpendicular"
I received a great deal of high-quality help the last time I posted a short story and asked for edits, so I thought I'd try it again. I owe a short story to amwriting.org soon. Any suggestions about how to make this one better before publication would be greatly appreciated.
Parallel and Perpendicular
Gary couldn’t sleep.
Whenever his wife
and son got into one of their arguments, it stressed him out. The fights were
exhausting for all the parties involved, but their son, Neil, would eventually
storm off to his room and decompress with loud music. Gary’s wife, Sofia, would
sit down at her computer and read the posts of her most distant acquaintances
of Facebook. Occasionally she’d sigh and tell Gary about one that particularly
bothered her, but mostly she’d retreat into the digital space, at once a public
place and her most private space in the house. Their daughter, Stephanie, who
was three years older than Neil, could now drive. When the fights began, she
would ask Gary for the keys. They would share a moment of eye rolling, and then
she would take off. She had a sixth sense about when it was safe to return.
Gary’s sixth sense told him he would be in big trouble with his wife if he
tried to escape during the fight, but even bigger trouble if he tried to
intervene, so he would quickly find a book, sit down in his recliner, and only
weigh in when Sofia asked for his opinion.
Tonight’s fight
started the way they generally did. They were all watching The Daily Show, a
show the whole family could enjoy together. They got to a commercial break, and
while Gary skipped through the commercials, Sofia looked over at her son. “Neil,
will you quit doing that?”
“Doing what?”
“You’re doing it
again.” Her voice was calm, but there was a dangerous undercurrent, like a
riptide.
“What?” Neil’s voice
carried the sneer he’d almost perfected at only 13. Gary marveled at that
sound. To the best of his recollection, he’d only mastered that kind of disdain
by 16.
“You’re digging in
your ear again. You know that grosses me out. Get a cue tip and do that in the
bathroom if you have to.”
Neil pulled his
pinky out of his ear. “I was not.”
“Neil, I just saw
you,” Sofia said.
Gary tried to steer
to safety. He smiled at Neil and said, “You were, buddy.”
“No I wasn’t. It’s
not a big deal.”
“Well, which is it?”
Sofia asked.
“What?”
“Either you weren’t
doing it, or you were and you don’t think it’s a big deal.”
“Or I wasn’t but I
still don’t think it would have been a big deal if I had been.”
Stephanie held out
her hand. Gary shook his head and continued to aim the remote. If he could just
get through the commercial break in time, he thought. He skipped ahead, but it
was too far. He tried to go back.
“Neil, I wish you
would just admit that you were doing it, say you’re sorry, and quit it. Then it
won’t be a big deal,” Sophia said.
“I wish you’d admit
I wasn’t doing it, say you’re sorry, and leave me alone,” Neil said.
Gary hit pause and
handed Stephanie the car keys. Then he got up.
“Where are you
going?” Sofia asked.
“I’m just going to
grab my novel.”
“I’m sorry, honey.
It’s not a big deal.” She looked back at Neil. “I just don’t like being lied
to.”
“And I don’t like
being falsely accused,” Neil said.
Gary headed off for
his book.
When he came back
down the stairs, their voices hadn’t risen too much, and they were still on the
original topic. Gary wasn’t sure what kind of omen that was.
“Maybe I touched my
earlobe or something, but I wasn’t ‘digging in my ear,’” Neil said.
“Well, this is
progress. Now you admit you were touching your ear. Neil, your pinky finger was
halfway to your brain. I think you don’t even realize you’re doing it.”
“Then why did you
call me a liar?”
“I didn’t call you a
liar.”
“Yes you did!” Now
Neil’s voice didn’t just rise in volume, it cracked in a way that might have
made Gary laugh under different circumstances. “You called me a liar!” he tried
again, this time without cracking.
“I didn’t call you a
liar,” Sofia explained in a voice straining for patience. “I said I didn’t like
being lied to.”
“That’s calling me a
liar!”
“No, it’s not quite
the same thing-”
“That’s a lie,
because if I said I didn’t like you lying to me, you’d say I was calling you a
liar.”
“I am not lying,
Neil. I’m trying to explain to you that-”
“I didn’t say you
were a liar, Mom.”
“Okay, you did, but
please don’t interrupt me Neil, because-”
“I did not! I said
you wouldn’t like me to call you a-”
“You just did,
Neil!” Now Sofia was shouting. “You said, ‘That’s a lie!’”
“Did not! This is
just like the whole ear thing!”
“Yes, it is. You say
you didn’t do that, either!”
“See? You are
calling me a liar, but you also said I don’t even know I’m doing it.”
“But you can know
you’re doing it when I catch you doing it, so just admit it and quit it.”
“But I’m not doing
it!”
Gary tried to focus
on his book. The words made a gray smudge on the page but refused to separate
into distinct shapes.
Sophia leaned
forward. “I’ll tell you what you aren’t doing. You aren’t doing all your
homework. You aren’t doing the dishes when it’s your turn. You aren’t
practicing the piano even though we keep paying for lessons.” She was counting
things off on her fingers, and hesitated on the third, her mouth slightly open
to let Neil know she wasn’t finished. Then the fourth came to her. “And you
aren’t putting your clothes in the hamper.”
Well, Gary thought,
they got past the ear thing. Now we’re up to DEFCON 2.
Neil leaned forward.
“So that’s what this is really about? How I do everything wrong?”
“Oh, don’t be so
dramatic. I didn’t say you do everything wrong. It’s just that, when I come
home from work, and I’m tired, and I’m stressed, if you haven’t done something,
and I ask you if you did it, just admit it and do it. Don’t tell me you did it
when you didn’t.”
“Mom, did you ever
stop to think that maybe I’m stressed and tired, too, and that’s why I can’t do
all the things you want me to do?”
“Neil, I said I
understood that sometimes you won’t have done all the things you’re supposed to
do. That’s not the point. The point is that you need to just admit it and do
them when I ask.”
“No, that’s not the
point, Mom.”
Sofia fell back
heavily into the couch. “Fine. What is the point?”
“The point was that
you were accusing me of digging in my ear. All this other stuff is just a
distraction you just brought up.”
That is a pretty
good point, Gary thought. Wisely, he said nothing.
“There can be two
points, Neil. These aren’t unrelated. You say you didn’t do something I was
watching you do. Sometimes you say you did things you didn’t do. I think
there’s a connection there.”
That was also a good
point, Gary noted.
Neil fell back
against the back of the loveseat. “Fine. Fine. I will try to do everything you
want me to do.” He started counting on his fingers. “I’ll try to remember to do
all my homework. I’ll try to make sure I do the dishes when it’s my turn. I’ll
try to remember to practice the piano.” He hesistated on the third, his mouth
open. “Oh, and I’ll put my clothes in the hamper.” Then he exaggerated the
fifth, waggling his thumb. “And I will try to stop doing the things I don’t
even know I’m doing, okay?” He stood up. “But you don’t have to be such a…” He
pressed his lips together.
Sophia’s eyes got
very wide, then very wet.
Gary sat up quickly,
looked at his wife’s eyes, then turned toward his son.
Neil knew he’d
stepped in it. “…mean. You don’t have to be so mean.”
“Neil,” Gary said
softly. “Go up to your room. Right. Now.”
Neil opened his
mouth.
Gary pointed toward
the stairs. He pointed hard. Neil went.
Gary looked at
Sofia. She carefully dried her eyes with one finger, trying not to smudge her
eyeliner too much, rose slowly from the couch, and went to sit in front of her
computer. The sound of muffled punk music sloshed down the stairs in little
rhythmic waves, just loud enough to be sullen, but not loud enough to confront.
Gary went into the
kitchen, but he could still see Sofia over the bar. “Would you like a glass of
wine?”
“Do we have anything
stronger?”
Gary turned toward
the cabinet above the fridge. “Um, we might.”
“I’m kidding. A
glass of wine would be nice. Maybe some of the red from when the McCabes were
over.”
He poured it and
brought her the glass. She mumbled a thank you, then disappeared into Facebook
again. Gary went back to his book. The words resolved themselves, but the story
eluded him.
“What punishment
should we give him?” Sofia asked.
“For sticking his
finger in his ear and lying about it?”
“No. For… Oh, God,
do you think I was being a bitch too?”
“No, of course not.”
“I was. I was. It
wasn’t a big deal and I made it into this big thing.”
He could hear in her
voice that she was crying, and he rose to hug her, but she handed him her
glass. “No, I’m fine. I’ll apologize to him tomorrow.”
“I don’t think you
need to apologize.”
“No, I do. It was… I
do.”
Gary tried to think
of something to say while he took the glass back to the sink, but when he
turned around she was already heading up the stairs. Soon after, the music
stopped, and he thought maybe she’d gone into Neil’s room. He listened, but the
only sound he heard was the car pulling back into the driveway.
“Are they done?”
Jennifer asked when she came in.
“Yeah.”
“Was it bad?”
“It’ll be fine.”
Gary watched Jennifer roll her eyes, then head for the stairs. He called after
her in a barked whisper. “Hey!” She returned. “Hey, why didn’t we ever have big
arguments with you like that when you were 13?”
“Because I’m more
like you, Dad.”
“But you didn’t
argue with your mother, either.”
“Nope. Neither do
you.”
“True.”
“Love you, Dad.”
“Love you too,
honey.”
Gary read his book
for a while, but when he was sure everyone was asleep, he made his way up the
stairs. As he passed Neil’s door, he remembered checking on his son a decade
earlier. He felt an overwhelming urge to do so again. Carefully, he turned the
nob and poked his head in. Neil was turned toward him, his face serene and
years younger. The blankets were pulled up to his neck, but one leg stuck out,
almost perpendicular to his body, his foot hanging off the edge of the bed.
Disturbed just enough by his father’s presence, Neil swallowed and then made a
soft clicking sound in his throat twice, then fell back into a deep sleep.
Gary continued down
the hall, past his daughter’s room, and slipped into his own. Sofia had fallen
asleep with her book open on her chest and her end-table light on. Gary slipped
around to her side of the bed, gently picked up the book, placed the bookmark
in it, and set it down as quietly as he could. Sofia heard this slight sound
and swallowed once, then made a soft clicking sound in her throat twice. Gary
remembered, at one point when Neil was five or six, he went through a phase of
climbing into their bed after bad dreams, and because he made the exact same
sleeping sounds as his mother, Gary hadn’t been able to tell if he was there or
not sometimes.
Before Gary could
turn off Sofia’s light, she rolled over and pulled the covers up to her neck.
Then she pushed one leg out from under them and dangled her foot over the side
of the bed.
Gary went into the
bathroom. While sitting on the toilet, he contemplated the ways his wife and
son were so similar. Did that explain the tension between them? It must, he
decided.
He was entirely
unaware that his pinky finger was buried deep in his ear.
Friday, July 29, 2011
Short Story: "Painless Separation"
[This story was the Featured Friday Fiction on amwriting.org. With Johanna Harness' permission, I thought I'd put it up here, too. Thanks to @johannaharness for giving me this chance!]
Painless Separation
A few weeks ago, our relationship started to get rocky. No, not rocky. It got wiggly. Anyway, I knew a break-up was inevitable.
Noah and I had been together for over six years. I wasn’t his first (I was his third), but we were both so young when we got together, we basically grew up at the same time.
I remember when Noah introduced me to his parents. They loved me immediately. They coo-ed over me. “So cute!” they told him. That felt good. I’ll miss them, too.
Mostly, our relationship was… well, you know how, when people ask about a how things are going and you say, “Great,” but you don’t really mean exceptional? You just mean that there’s nothing wrong. Noah was very stable; considerate but not particularly affectionate, dependable but not passionate.
I mean, I had my little issues. His diet, for one thing. Noah loves candy. That always bothered me. He wasn’t heavy. In fact, Noah’s a skinny guy. But he was always looking for the next gummy bear the way a less moral man might keep an eye out for floozies. It irritated me. It wasn’t a serious threat to the health of the relationship or anything. But it was the one way Noah was inconsiderate, and because his sensitivity was my favorite of his qualities, that unwillingness to think about my needs bothered me just a bit.
Still, over-all, Noah was great to me. He was protective, but not in some annoying, macho way. And tender. I liked that a lot. I guess I’d always known we wouldn’t go the distance. Relationships that start when you’re so young almost never do. But I fell into a rhythm, I got comfortable, and I guess I let myself be lulled into a false sense of security.
Then, a few weeks ago, I could tell he was just not holding on to me quite so tightly. I thought about it a lot, of course. I suspected there was someone else. I wondered if I was being pushed out. But there didn’t seem to be any evidence. I just started feeling like I was …I don’t know, dangling there, somehow.
And the more I thought about it, the worse it got. Pretty soon I was hanging by a thread. His parents, who’d been so supportive at first, turned on me so quickly it shocked me.
“I think it’s time,” they’d tell him. I was right there!
His dad was the worst. Noah’s mom would just leave the room whenever the topic of our relationship came up. Like she wanted to wash her hands of the whole thing. That stung. But his dad was really in his face, actively trying to pull us apart. I don’t think I’ll ever fully forgive his dad. And the way Noah just let his dad talk to him like that, and never stood up for me… I thought I’d never be able to forgive him, either. But then…
See, it all came to a head the earlier tonight when his dad was getting in his face again.
“But it hurts!” Noah said. See? That was the kind of sensitivity I depended on. But now it had all turned to selfishness. No concern for me whatsoever.
“We won’t do it if it hurts. It can wait a little while. Maybe tomorrow night.” His dad said this in a completely calm voice. Like postponing a breakup for a single day was some great mercy.
“Okay,” Noah said. I was in agony. He was just accepting this one day delay without a word of protest? I couldn’t believe it!
I should have been outraged. Such an obvious attack on my pride should have motivated me to break it off first. I know that now. But it just made me more desperate, more clingy. Pathetic, I know.
Then his dad said, “Oh, I have an idea!”
My hopes fell. Brainstorming about our break-up and he’d had a eureka moment. How could it get any worse?
“What?” Noah asked his dad. And there was an eagerness in his voice that shook me to the core.
“Hold on,” his dad said, and ran out of the room.
He came back a moment later holding an ice cube. Both of us were confused.
“Lean your head back,” his dad told him. Then he used the ice to numb Noah.
It’s strange, because the cold didn’t just prepare him for the breakup. It calmed me down, too. This was happening, I told myself, happening right now, but somehow it didn’t bother me as much anymore.
Then his dad took a piece of string and looped it next to me, then around behind me, and then back around to the front. He gently moved the string back and forth until it slid up above me. Maybe it was just because of the ice, but this reminded me of the tenderness his dad had shown back when I first appeared on the scene. Despite all his calls for our separation, his dad was acting like he cared again. I couldn’t feel much, but it felt good, in its own strange way. In fact, it almost tickled.
Then his dad twisted the string in front of Noah’s face and pulled the ends in opposite directions, first very gently to get his hands a few inches apart, then one quick tug.
And, just like that, we were through. There may have been a sound, but I was so surprised I honestly can’t remember if it was a pop or a bam or a squelching or just silence.
Next thing you know, I was in free fall. There’s always that moment, right after a breakup, when you’re just untethered, spinning and bewildered. For me, it was very brief.
I hit bottom fast. But, to my surprise, I felt whole. I was different, but the same. Complete, but separate. We had ended. I persisted. Frankly, I still can’t wrap my mind around it. Maybe I’m still grieving. I don’t know. But that wasn’t the end of the breakup.
His dad picked me up and set me down on the bathroom counter, right in front of Noah. It gave me a whole new perspective on him. Noah wasn’t sad, and that should have hurt me. A lot. But he looked shocked, and I could identify with that.
Then Noah smiled and examined the new gap between his teeth where I’d been just seconds before. His smile grew a little, and his eyes, already wide from the speed of the breakup, warmed up as though someone had stuck needles in them and injected them with pure joy.
“Oh my gosh!” he shouted, his voice cracking on the “oh,” with the “gosh” bursting out like an untied balloon filled with awe.
And he was so happy, so overjoyed, so beautiful that I couldn’t hold a grudge. I forgave him. I forgive him and I love him.
When the tooth fairy slips me out from under Noah’s pillow and flies me off to whatever’s next, I’ll go away happy.
Painless Separation
A few weeks ago, our relationship started to get rocky. No, not rocky. It got wiggly. Anyway, I knew a break-up was inevitable.
Noah and I had been together for over six years. I wasn’t his first (I was his third), but we were both so young when we got together, we basically grew up at the same time.
I remember when Noah introduced me to his parents. They loved me immediately. They coo-ed over me. “So cute!” they told him. That felt good. I’ll miss them, too.
Mostly, our relationship was… well, you know how, when people ask about a how things are going and you say, “Great,” but you don’t really mean exceptional? You just mean that there’s nothing wrong. Noah was very stable; considerate but not particularly affectionate, dependable but not passionate.
I mean, I had my little issues. His diet, for one thing. Noah loves candy. That always bothered me. He wasn’t heavy. In fact, Noah’s a skinny guy. But he was always looking for the next gummy bear the way a less moral man might keep an eye out for floozies. It irritated me. It wasn’t a serious threat to the health of the relationship or anything. But it was the one way Noah was inconsiderate, and because his sensitivity was my favorite of his qualities, that unwillingness to think about my needs bothered me just a bit.
Still, over-all, Noah was great to me. He was protective, but not in some annoying, macho way. And tender. I liked that a lot. I guess I’d always known we wouldn’t go the distance. Relationships that start when you’re so young almost never do. But I fell into a rhythm, I got comfortable, and I guess I let myself be lulled into a false sense of security.
Then, a few weeks ago, I could tell he was just not holding on to me quite so tightly. I thought about it a lot, of course. I suspected there was someone else. I wondered if I was being pushed out. But there didn’t seem to be any evidence. I just started feeling like I was …I don’t know, dangling there, somehow.
And the more I thought about it, the worse it got. Pretty soon I was hanging by a thread. His parents, who’d been so supportive at first, turned on me so quickly it shocked me.
“I think it’s time,” they’d tell him. I was right there!
His dad was the worst. Noah’s mom would just leave the room whenever the topic of our relationship came up. Like she wanted to wash her hands of the whole thing. That stung. But his dad was really in his face, actively trying to pull us apart. I don’t think I’ll ever fully forgive his dad. And the way Noah just let his dad talk to him like that, and never stood up for me… I thought I’d never be able to forgive him, either. But then…
See, it all came to a head the earlier tonight when his dad was getting in his face again.
“But it hurts!” Noah said. See? That was the kind of sensitivity I depended on. But now it had all turned to selfishness. No concern for me whatsoever.
“We won’t do it if it hurts. It can wait a little while. Maybe tomorrow night.” His dad said this in a completely calm voice. Like postponing a breakup for a single day was some great mercy.
“Okay,” Noah said. I was in agony. He was just accepting this one day delay without a word of protest? I couldn’t believe it!
I should have been outraged. Such an obvious attack on my pride should have motivated me to break it off first. I know that now. But it just made me more desperate, more clingy. Pathetic, I know.
Then his dad said, “Oh, I have an idea!”
My hopes fell. Brainstorming about our break-up and he’d had a eureka moment. How could it get any worse?
“What?” Noah asked his dad. And there was an eagerness in his voice that shook me to the core.
“Hold on,” his dad said, and ran out of the room.
He came back a moment later holding an ice cube. Both of us were confused.
“Lean your head back,” his dad told him. Then he used the ice to numb Noah.
It’s strange, because the cold didn’t just prepare him for the breakup. It calmed me down, too. This was happening, I told myself, happening right now, but somehow it didn’t bother me as much anymore.
Then his dad took a piece of string and looped it next to me, then around behind me, and then back around to the front. He gently moved the string back and forth until it slid up above me. Maybe it was just because of the ice, but this reminded me of the tenderness his dad had shown back when I first appeared on the scene. Despite all his calls for our separation, his dad was acting like he cared again. I couldn’t feel much, but it felt good, in its own strange way. In fact, it almost tickled.
Then his dad twisted the string in front of Noah’s face and pulled the ends in opposite directions, first very gently to get his hands a few inches apart, then one quick tug.
And, just like that, we were through. There may have been a sound, but I was so surprised I honestly can’t remember if it was a pop or a bam or a squelching or just silence.
Next thing you know, I was in free fall. There’s always that moment, right after a breakup, when you’re just untethered, spinning and bewildered. For me, it was very brief.
I hit bottom fast. But, to my surprise, I felt whole. I was different, but the same. Complete, but separate. We had ended. I persisted. Frankly, I still can’t wrap my mind around it. Maybe I’m still grieving. I don’t know. But that wasn’t the end of the breakup.
His dad picked me up and set me down on the bathroom counter, right in front of Noah. It gave me a whole new perspective on him. Noah wasn’t sad, and that should have hurt me. A lot. But he looked shocked, and I could identify with that.
Then Noah smiled and examined the new gap between his teeth where I’d been just seconds before. His smile grew a little, and his eyes, already wide from the speed of the breakup, warmed up as though someone had stuck needles in them and injected them with pure joy.
“Oh my gosh!” he shouted, his voice cracking on the “oh,” with the “gosh” bursting out like an untied balloon filled with awe.
And he was so happy, so overjoyed, so beautiful that I couldn’t hold a grudge. I forgave him. I forgive him and I love him.
When the tooth fairy slips me out from under Noah’s pillow and flies me off to whatever’s next, I’ll go away happy.
Monday, June 27, 2011
Fun with Words from Twitter
When I sat down to do some writing tonight, I thought I'd get a little help from the various folks tweeting using the #amwriting hashtag. I asked for each person to give me their favorite verb, or the first one to come to mind. Only one generous soul offered; she gave me "Smooch." I was going to follow up by asking for a list of nouns, but one fellow had already tweeted "#amwriting shit" and "#amwriting gibberish," so I decided he was offering those before I'd even requested them. It seems the folks on #amwriting today are actually, well, writing, so I didn't get any other replies (yet). Instead, I scrolled through my own newsfeed and copied down two lists, the verbs and nouns that jumped out at me from each tweet. I avoided proper nouns, generally, but somehow two slipped through: "Starbucks" and "Shaq." If someone has a theory about why these two words seemed like common nouns, I'd love to hear it.
These lists turned out to be really fun to play with. As you scroll through them, you'll notice that a huge percentage of the words from either list can serve as both nouns or verbs. I placed them in the lists as they were used over the last few hours. Two words that made both lists ("Retweet" and "Google") were used both ways. Two others ("Fart" and "Sleep") were used once, but in such a way that I couldn't tell if they were being used as nouns or verbs. It's great English-teacher-geek-fun to plug each word into this formula and see how many work: A _______/ To ___________.
Also, as you read through the lists, your brain will naturally want to connect the words and make a story out of them. On the one hand, this is a marvelous demonstration of just how creative the human brain is. On the other hand, it illustrates the way we can deceive ourselves because we're compelled to create a narrative where none exists. These were all from different tweets, and even when two are connected, a reader couldn't possibly imagine how without context. For example, the noun "Dementor" is included because I follow a very funny person who tweets as though he is Lord Voldemort from the Harry Potter series. (Or maybe he really is. Who am I to judge?) But could you guess which of these words went with his tweet mentioning Dementors? Try to guess. Similarly, One of my verbs is "shampoo." Not only does it meet the aforementioned noun/verb test, but it was connected to a word on the noun list. Can you guess which one? I'll put the answers at the bottom.
I'm teaching a class on poetry a couple days a week for the Upward Bound Program, and I think I'll have them do an exercise with these lists. Feel free to use them, or the same activity, as you see fit. After all, these words aren't mine. Enjoy!
Verbs:
Encroach
Subjugate
Smooch
Lock
Gather
Meet
Survive
Evacuate
Hate
Threaten
Prefer
Veto
Retweet
Run
Tote
Sing
Strike
Swoon
Prolong
Fart
Sleep
Transform
Accuse
Squish
Hold
Apply
Google
Storm
Propose
License
Argue
Cancel
Fool
Assure
Send
Throw
Yell
Spoof
Teach
Model
Fear
Weigh
Balance
Thank
Show
Shampoo
Save
Forget
Grope
Still
Listen
Nouns:
Dryer
Shit
Gibberish
Whiskey
Expectations
Security
Retweet
Debt
Cheese
Cookies
Family
Starbucks
Gun
Cyberpunk
Karma
Ass
Defense
Fart
Sleep
Patience
Accountant
Butterflies
Portrait
Affair
Flake
Immigration
Law
Google
Shaq
Photo
Horror
Compilation
Summer
Reading
Lithium
Reason
Dosage
Concerns
Sandbox
Paper-doll
Noise
Community
Corruption
Work
Island
Commandment
Lyrics
Babble
Mug
Vacation
Cancer
Bid
Pain
Leadership
Metaphor
Crotch
Insect
Slut
Dementor
Music
Service
Answers: "Dementor" went with "Sluts", and "Shampoo" went with "Crotch".
@Lord_Voldemort7 tweeted:
"Dear Sluts, Nobody wants to see your public groping. The only way I'll support your PDA is if you're french kissing a dementor."
@iimaniDavid tweeted:
"'People who speak in mixed metaphors should shampoo my crotch' -- Jack Nicholson in the film As Good As It Gets"
These lists turned out to be really fun to play with. As you scroll through them, you'll notice that a huge percentage of the words from either list can serve as both nouns or verbs. I placed them in the lists as they were used over the last few hours. Two words that made both lists ("Retweet" and "Google") were used both ways. Two others ("Fart" and "Sleep") were used once, but in such a way that I couldn't tell if they were being used as nouns or verbs. It's great English-teacher-geek-fun to plug each word into this formula and see how many work: A _______/ To ___________.
Also, as you read through the lists, your brain will naturally want to connect the words and make a story out of them. On the one hand, this is a marvelous demonstration of just how creative the human brain is. On the other hand, it illustrates the way we can deceive ourselves because we're compelled to create a narrative where none exists. These were all from different tweets, and even when two are connected, a reader couldn't possibly imagine how without context. For example, the noun "Dementor" is included because I follow a very funny person who tweets as though he is Lord Voldemort from the Harry Potter series. (Or maybe he really is. Who am I to judge?) But could you guess which of these words went with his tweet mentioning Dementors? Try to guess. Similarly, One of my verbs is "shampoo." Not only does it meet the aforementioned noun/verb test, but it was connected to a word on the noun list. Can you guess which one? I'll put the answers at the bottom.
I'm teaching a class on poetry a couple days a week for the Upward Bound Program, and I think I'll have them do an exercise with these lists. Feel free to use them, or the same activity, as you see fit. After all, these words aren't mine. Enjoy!
Verbs:
Encroach
Subjugate
Smooch
Lock
Gather
Meet
Survive
Evacuate
Hate
Threaten
Prefer
Veto
Retweet
Run
Tote
Sing
Strike
Swoon
Prolong
Fart
Sleep
Transform
Accuse
Squish
Hold
Apply
Storm
Propose
License
Argue
Cancel
Fool
Assure
Send
Throw
Yell
Spoof
Teach
Model
Fear
Weigh
Balance
Thank
Show
Shampoo
Save
Forget
Grope
Still
Listen
Nouns:
Dryer
Shit
Gibberish
Whiskey
Expectations
Security
Retweet
Debt
Cheese
Cookies
Family
Starbucks
Gun
Cyberpunk
Karma
Ass
Defense
Fart
Sleep
Patience
Accountant
Butterflies
Portrait
Affair
Flake
Immigration
Law
Shaq
Photo
Horror
Compilation
Summer
Reading
Lithium
Reason
Dosage
Concerns
Sandbox
Paper-doll
Noise
Community
Corruption
Work
Island
Commandment
Lyrics
Babble
Mug
Vacation
Cancer
Bid
Pain
Leadership
Metaphor
Crotch
Insect
Slut
Dementor
Music
Service
Answers: "Dementor" went with "Sluts", and "Shampoo" went with "Crotch".
@Lord_Voldemort7 tweeted:
"Dear Sluts, Nobody wants to see your public groping. The only way I'll support your PDA is if you're french kissing a dementor."
@iimaniDavid tweeted:
"'People who speak in mixed metaphors should shampoo my crotch' -- Jack Nicholson in the film As Good As It Gets"
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Learning to Read Like a Writer
[I've been given a opportunity to write a piece for amwriting.org, a blog for and by writers who follow the #amwriting hash-tag on Twitter. My piece will appear on the 30th. Since it's a bit of advice for writers, I should also take some other advice I give students: Whenever possible, get some fresh eyes on your work. So, here's the piece I plan to submit. Please let me know about anything I should fix, cut, or improve before this hits a site with a broader readership while bearing my name under the title. Even if it's just a little typo, let me know in the comments section below. This is the second draft, after some great help from a couple of writer friends. There's still time for more tweaks, though, so keep 'em coming!]
Here’s a secret writers need to learn in order to master their craft: Writers need to learn to read. They don’t need to consume all the books on the New York Times best sellers list just to see which kind of monster is producing the most sales. Writers need to learn to read differently from readers. Writers need to understand that reading is part of practicing.
Part of my job as a high school English teacher consists of teaching students to become better readers by teaching them to identify the purpose of their reading. Are they reading for pleasure? Are they seeking information? Are they analyzing an argument in order to be persuaded or to refute the author’s position? Good readers can do these things. And that’s enough.
But it’s not enough for writers. Writers are artists, and artists need to be able to examine the works of their peers and betters in a different way.
Consider, as an analogy, film. When one of my sixteen-year-old students goes to see the newest big Hollywood blockbuster at the Cineplex this summer, he is satisfied by the experience. As a viewer, he was looking for entertainment, and the movie delivered. Done and done. Now, the cinephile goes to the movie theater and watches the same film (not anything high-brow, but something competently-made) and is also entertained. But she thinks about the structure of the story, the characters, the setting, the themes: She is, in short, a reader of film as text, and because she can do all the things we try to teach good readers to do when they pick up a novel, she gets a lot more out of the movie. She does not, however, come out of the theater talking about the tracking and handy-cam shots, diegetic and non-diegetic sound, side lighting and back lighting, fast cuts and slow fades. These were the techniques that gave the movie its punch and made it satisfying, but they aren’t her business.
They are the business of the movie critic. The critic studied film back in college. She can not only tell you that The Conversation is her favorite Francis Ford Coppola movie, but she can explain why in great detail. She watches movies for a purpose, but it’s not to be entertained or to be informed or to be persuaded. At least, those aren’t enough. She watches movies because it’s her business, her livelihood, to evaluate them based on her vast knowledge of the way they are made, as well as what they make her think and how they make her feel.
And then there’s the film director. He watches movies differently than the casual viewer, the cinephile, and the critic. He watches to learn. For him, watching movies is part of his artistic education. It’s practice.
Writers need to do the same thing. When we pick up a novel, we can remember why we fell in love with books when we were young. We can enjoy being transported to new places, getting to know new people, and absorbing new ideas. We can even evaluate the works in the same way critics do. But we cannot afford to stop there. We need to read differently. For us, every choice of simple or complex vocabulary, every choice about following the basic rules or breaking them, every choice about revealing the minutia about a character or hiding it serves as a lesson which will make us better writers. This is because we recognize all these things for what they are: Choices. Choices made by writers. Writers just like us, only better. Admitting that last part is absolutely essential to becoming better writers ourselves. As long as we hold fast to the same choices we’ve always made, believing we are God’s gift to our readers, then not only is our writing a waste of time, but our reading is, too. Arrogant writers aren’t just obnoxious; they’re missing out on vital time to practice.
Malcolm Gladwell, in his book Outliers, talks about a group of psychologists who studied violin students in Germany. They divided the students up into three groups based on ability as determined by their teachers, then tried to figure out what made the great ones great, and the mediocre ones mediocre. What they found was that the great ones practiced more. Not just a little bit. A lot more. In fact, they found a magic number necessary to become a virtuoso: 10,000 hours of practice. At a good clip, that takes ten years. They also didn’t find too much deviation from that. None of the virtuosos got by with very little practice, and none of the mediocre violinists practiced for 10,000 hours and remained mediocre.
Then, the psychologist began looking into other fields, and they found that the same magic number held up in every endeavor they examined. 10,000 hours. Athletes. Computer programmers. Ballerinas. Composers. And yes, writers.
The quality of those hours matters as much as the quantity, and that’s why writers need to change the way they read; it’s the difference between 10,000 hours of entertainment versus 10,000 hours of practice. One of Gladwell’s examples of 10,000 hours is the early Beatles before the British Invasion, when they were just a struggling rock band trying to find gigs. They worked in strip clubs in Hamburg, Germany and would often play for eight hours straight to non-English speaking audiences and compete for attention with the strippers. Not only did this give them a chance to compose songs that are probably on your ipod right now, but they also had to learn dozens, probably hundreds of covers, and not just of rock and roll songs but of Jazz standards and other genres. What Gladwell doesn’t discuss is the influence of the music Lennon and McCartney were listening to, both before the Beatles formed and during this time. I would bet good money that these guys were not only reading the crowds to see what was working, but they were also listening carefully to the music on the radio and on the albums they bought, and listening in a different way than you or I. They were reading the music to become better musicians.
My preferred example (as a die-hard NBA fan), would be a basketball player. If a basketball player practices his shot for 10,000 hours, he will get to the point where he can sink his free-throws a very high percentage of the time, he’ll know where he can hit the highest percentage of three-pointers, and he’ll make some very tricky moves under the hoop on a drive. And he will lose. Why? Because he didn’t spend some of that time reading the scouting report about, and watching tape of, his prospective opponents. His 10,000 hours were spent becoming an oddity, a guy who could mop the floor with you at HORSE, and in its own way that is becoming a virtuoso. But he won’t be a great basketball player, because he didn’t learn to read his opponents.
Sure, the analogy is imperfect. Writing is at once less collaborative (despite great writing communities like #amwriting, we do our work in isolation), and less competitive (we don’t go head-to head with another author or team of authors. It’s not a zero sum game. More good books can generate more readers.) Maybe we’re less like players watching tapes of their opponents to learn to beat them and more like players watching the greats to learn from them.
So pick up a copy of Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games and learn from her choice to write the book not only in first person, but in the present tense. Crack open Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and learn from his choice to eschew dialogue tags and conventional punctuation, then follow up with All the Pretty Horses or No Country for Old Men to reassure yourself that it’s not a fluke that just happens to work brilliantly but a conscious and careful choice he’s not always bound by. Read Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones and learn how a premise that seems doomed to be saccharine and trite becomes beautiful and powerful because of careful choices of characterization and intentional withholding.
Then go grab that guilty pleasure book on your nightstand. You know you have one. This is the huge hit by that debut novelist that fills you with rage when you read about the sales figures, and you grouse about it so publicly and with such vehemence that you can’t possibly admit how much you enjoyed the book yourself. Now, when you are flying through that weak prose, that thin characterization, or that awful adverb-filled dialogue attribution that makes you want to throw the book at the wall, stop and figure out why you don’t. Sure, it’s fine to identify the things you don’t like about the book. Note those choices so you will make different ones. But also acknowledge that there’s a reason that book is in your hands, and other copies are in a lot of other hands at the same time.
If you’re willing to do that, to learn from your betters (and yes, that hack on the New York Times best sellers list is your better, at least in some way), then reading becomes part of your practice time, part of the 10,000 hours you need to rack up in order to become a true master of the art. Writing is practicing your shot. Reading is watching tape. You must do both to be great.
Here’s a secret writers need to learn in order to master their craft: Writers need to learn to read. They don’t need to consume all the books on the New York Times best sellers list just to see which kind of monster is producing the most sales. Writers need to learn to read differently from readers. Writers need to understand that reading is part of practicing.
Part of my job as a high school English teacher consists of teaching students to become better readers by teaching them to identify the purpose of their reading. Are they reading for pleasure? Are they seeking information? Are they analyzing an argument in order to be persuaded or to refute the author’s position? Good readers can do these things. And that’s enough.
But it’s not enough for writers. Writers are artists, and artists need to be able to examine the works of their peers and betters in a different way.
Consider, as an analogy, film. When one of my sixteen-year-old students goes to see the newest big Hollywood blockbuster at the Cineplex this summer, he is satisfied by the experience. As a viewer, he was looking for entertainment, and the movie delivered. Done and done. Now, the cinephile goes to the movie theater and watches the same film (not anything high-brow, but something competently-made) and is also entertained. But she thinks about the structure of the story, the characters, the setting, the themes: She is, in short, a reader of film as text, and because she can do all the things we try to teach good readers to do when they pick up a novel, she gets a lot more out of the movie. She does not, however, come out of the theater talking about the tracking and handy-cam shots, diegetic and non-diegetic sound, side lighting and back lighting, fast cuts and slow fades. These were the techniques that gave the movie its punch and made it satisfying, but they aren’t her business.
They are the business of the movie critic. The critic studied film back in college. She can not only tell you that The Conversation is her favorite Francis Ford Coppola movie, but she can explain why in great detail. She watches movies for a purpose, but it’s not to be entertained or to be informed or to be persuaded. At least, those aren’t enough. She watches movies because it’s her business, her livelihood, to evaluate them based on her vast knowledge of the way they are made, as well as what they make her think and how they make her feel.
And then there’s the film director. He watches movies differently than the casual viewer, the cinephile, and the critic. He watches to learn. For him, watching movies is part of his artistic education. It’s practice.
Writers need to do the same thing. When we pick up a novel, we can remember why we fell in love with books when we were young. We can enjoy being transported to new places, getting to know new people, and absorbing new ideas. We can even evaluate the works in the same way critics do. But we cannot afford to stop there. We need to read differently. For us, every choice of simple or complex vocabulary, every choice about following the basic rules or breaking them, every choice about revealing the minutia about a character or hiding it serves as a lesson which will make us better writers. This is because we recognize all these things for what they are: Choices. Choices made by writers. Writers just like us, only better. Admitting that last part is absolutely essential to becoming better writers ourselves. As long as we hold fast to the same choices we’ve always made, believing we are God’s gift to our readers, then not only is our writing a waste of time, but our reading is, too. Arrogant writers aren’t just obnoxious; they’re missing out on vital time to practice.
Malcolm Gladwell, in his book Outliers, talks about a group of psychologists who studied violin students in Germany. They divided the students up into three groups based on ability as determined by their teachers, then tried to figure out what made the great ones great, and the mediocre ones mediocre. What they found was that the great ones practiced more. Not just a little bit. A lot more. In fact, they found a magic number necessary to become a virtuoso: 10,000 hours of practice. At a good clip, that takes ten years. They also didn’t find too much deviation from that. None of the virtuosos got by with very little practice, and none of the mediocre violinists practiced for 10,000 hours and remained mediocre.
Then, the psychologist began looking into other fields, and they found that the same magic number held up in every endeavor they examined. 10,000 hours. Athletes. Computer programmers. Ballerinas. Composers. And yes, writers.
The quality of those hours matters as much as the quantity, and that’s why writers need to change the way they read; it’s the difference between 10,000 hours of entertainment versus 10,000 hours of practice. One of Gladwell’s examples of 10,000 hours is the early Beatles before the British Invasion, when they were just a struggling rock band trying to find gigs. They worked in strip clubs in Hamburg, Germany and would often play for eight hours straight to non-English speaking audiences and compete for attention with the strippers. Not only did this give them a chance to compose songs that are probably on your ipod right now, but they also had to learn dozens, probably hundreds of covers, and not just of rock and roll songs but of Jazz standards and other genres. What Gladwell doesn’t discuss is the influence of the music Lennon and McCartney were listening to, both before the Beatles formed and during this time. I would bet good money that these guys were not only reading the crowds to see what was working, but they were also listening carefully to the music on the radio and on the albums they bought, and listening in a different way than you or I. They were reading the music to become better musicians.
My preferred example (as a die-hard NBA fan), would be a basketball player. If a basketball player practices his shot for 10,000 hours, he will get to the point where he can sink his free-throws a very high percentage of the time, he’ll know where he can hit the highest percentage of three-pointers, and he’ll make some very tricky moves under the hoop on a drive. And he will lose. Why? Because he didn’t spend some of that time reading the scouting report about, and watching tape of, his prospective opponents. His 10,000 hours were spent becoming an oddity, a guy who could mop the floor with you at HORSE, and in its own way that is becoming a virtuoso. But he won’t be a great basketball player, because he didn’t learn to read his opponents.
Sure, the analogy is imperfect. Writing is at once less collaborative (despite great writing communities like #amwriting, we do our work in isolation), and less competitive (we don’t go head-to head with another author or team of authors. It’s not a zero sum game. More good books can generate more readers.) Maybe we’re less like players watching tapes of their opponents to learn to beat them and more like players watching the greats to learn from them.
So pick up a copy of Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games and learn from her choice to write the book not only in first person, but in the present tense. Crack open Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and learn from his choice to eschew dialogue tags and conventional punctuation, then follow up with All the Pretty Horses or No Country for Old Men to reassure yourself that it’s not a fluke that just happens to work brilliantly but a conscious and careful choice he’s not always bound by. Read Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones and learn how a premise that seems doomed to be saccharine and trite becomes beautiful and powerful because of careful choices of characterization and intentional withholding.
Then go grab that guilty pleasure book on your nightstand. You know you have one. This is the huge hit by that debut novelist that fills you with rage when you read about the sales figures, and you grouse about it so publicly and with such vehemence that you can’t possibly admit how much you enjoyed the book yourself. Now, when you are flying through that weak prose, that thin characterization, or that awful adverb-filled dialogue attribution that makes you want to throw the book at the wall, stop and figure out why you don’t. Sure, it’s fine to identify the things you don’t like about the book. Note those choices so you will make different ones. But also acknowledge that there’s a reason that book is in your hands, and other copies are in a lot of other hands at the same time.
If you’re willing to do that, to learn from your betters (and yes, that hack on the New York Times best sellers list is your better, at least in some way), then reading becomes part of your practice time, part of the 10,000 hours you need to rack up in order to become a true master of the art. Writing is practicing your shot. Reading is watching tape. You must do both to be great.
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