Three Things Thursday!

1. I’ve reserved a room for us at the Provo Olive Garden (504 W 2230 N, Provo, UT 84604). It’s under my name (Carol). 7 pm. Bring 100-250 words to read. Depending on # of people, we’ll decide the amount to share. Make sure you mark your piece at 100 words, 150, and 200. We’ll also do a freewrite or two–short ones–that we can share tonight, too.

 

2. from Cheryl Van Eck

I love #FirstWorldProblems. Things like “I have too much dip for my chips. But if I open a new bag of chips, then I’ll have too many chips for my dip.”

So tragic.

What does this have to do with writing? World building.

For many of us, we live in a first world country, which means sometimes our biggest problem is that we have two hours with nothing to do and all 1,000 satellite channels have nothing good on.

But if your character also lives in a first world country, then it means they aren’t generally worried about having water to take a shower, or having a place to sleep, or having food to eat.

What if that changed? What if your character was plopped into a situation where nothing was taken for granted? Think of Ron in the final Harry Potter book. It had never occurred to me that Ron, who was known to be “poor,” had actually led a pretty pampered life. And when that was taken away from him, he cracked under the pressure.

And for a bonus point? In the comments, write your best #FirstWorldProblems!

3. Brenda Bensch

How do you start writing? I mean, right from the very beginning, without any prior experience, the very first day? One way is to write FROM the very beginning. About YOU. Anne Lamott suggested “Start with your childhood… Plug your nose and jump in, and write down all your memories as truthfully as you can.” The claim is that from such memories, you may glean powerful stories, or story ideas, with gripping plots and even important themes. You may need to write a lot about all your early memories to get there, but keep on truckin’ !

So, stuck? Write about YOU!

Finally–my thoughts and prayers go out to anyone who may have lost someone they loved on September 11, 2001. We were all changed by that day. I usually cancel classes, don’t go anywhere, stay at home and watch the horrific footage of what happened 13 years ago. This morning, Carolina and I awoke and lit four candles at the time that first airplane hit the first tower. Tonight, I’ll spend some time with good people, good writers. A moment of thought for all who were lost.