Annie Observes

Today I showed Mom the picture I drew at school. I told her all about the sky and the swing set and the trees and the gravel and where the gravel turns to grass and where Jeffrey threw up once. She said that I am very observant. So now I am going to be observant some more.

I went outside after I had a snack of Oreos and milk, and I looked at our house. Our house has red bricks with lots of tiny lines in them. I tried to count them, but I kept messing up. I kicked the house, but that hurt my toe and made marks on my shoe. So now I’m thinking about how the brick makers put all those lines there. I think they would have to use a thread like Mom has in her sewing basket and stretch it real tight between their hands and make the lines before they put the bricks in the oven.

After awhile, I decided I did enough observing of the bricks, so I looked around for something else to observe. While I was looking all over the yard, Mom’s friend Lisa drove up our driveway. Her mini-van is red. She got out of the van, and she was wearing a green shirt and light brownish colored pants with brown shoes. I might draw this later.

I like Lisa because she doesn’t talk to me like I’m a baby. She doesn’t talk to Jolee that way either. Lots of people we know and people at the grocery store too come up and talk to Jolee like she’s some kind of baby since she’s in a wheelchair. So I always tell them she’s not a baby because she is older than me.

Also, some people who talk to Jolee and me ask what’s wrong with her or say they are sorry she’s that way. No one ever asks me what’s wrong with me, even though Dad says sometimes, “What’s wrong with you?!” when I spill my milk at dinner or throw myself on the floor when my Legos break apart. Jolee doesn’t spill her milk because she can’t hold her cup and she can’t throw herself on the floor, and Dad never asks her what is wrong with her. So why would people who don’t even know her ask her that? Don’t they know she can’t talk and answer them anyway?

I followed Lisa into the house, and observed that there’s a straight line from the front door to the back door, only the kitchen table is in the way. I told Lisa that if she moved the table in the kitchen that I could run all the way from the front door to the back door without stopping. But Mom heard me and said, “No running in the house.” Mom always says that.

Play Date


Today Sarah came over to play in the morning, and Mom said she was going to eat lunch with us and play more after that. I never had a friend eat with me, and I was so excited. Mom asked what I wanted to have for lunch, and I changed my mind a million times. Finally I decided on make-it-ourselves pizza with bagels, sauce and cheese.

I waited and waited, and finally Sarah came to my house. I was so excited that I screamed and ran around talking fast, and Mom made me sit on the couch for a minute to catch my breath and told me that I must calm down if I wanted to start playing. So I just kicked my feet back and forth for awhile while Sarah stared at me, and then we both started to giggle.

“Girls!” said Mom. “Go play quietly, now.”

We went to my bedroom and Sarah said, “Hey, what’s this?” when she saw my bookcase with books and toys on it.

“This is where I play sometimes and this is where Jolee sits.” I pointed to the yellow bean bag chair.

“Can I sit in it too?”

“Yes, but if Mom brings Jolee in, she will have to sit there because she can’t sit anywhere else.”

“Where is Jolee?”

“She’s taking a nap on Mom and Dad’s bed.”

“Why doesn’t Jolee walk?”

“I don’t know. But everyone talks too much about walking when they are around Jolee. I wish she could talk and play toys with me. I would like that more.”

“Why doesn’t she? Doesn’t she want to talk?”

“I think she does want to, but sometimes she can’t even hold up her head.”

“Oh. Well, does she have teeth?”

“Of course she does, I think. Mom brushes them, so they have to be there.”

Sarah didn’t believe me, so we tiptoed quietly into Mom and Dad’s room to look, moving like Tom and Jerry on the cartoons when they are being sneaky. Jolee was asleep on the bed, so we climbed on beside her. Her mouth was a little bit open, so we pushed her lips back. Yuck, they were slimy, and I wiped my fingers on the blanket. But there they were, real teeth.

“Count them.” Sarah commanded.

“No, you do it, it was your idea.” Then Jolee woke up and her body jumped a little bit like when someone scares you in the dark. I thought she wasn’t going to tell on us, but then she looked at me and started to cry.

Then Mom called to us and asked what we were doing. Sarah said that I wanted to show her Jolee’s teeth, so I made her come in and look.

Now I’m mad at Sarah because she blamed it on me, and I don’t want to eat lunch with her. I knew I didn’t want her to come to my house.

Some Thoughts on Teaching a Writing Course

Some time ago I discovered that assignments could teach. If I could design a writing assignment that caused a learning writer to write in scenes or to focus first on character, I could stop talking once I had described the assignment. I designed such assignments, and they taught the learning writers more in the doing than any lecture or lesson or post-story criticism could have done.

That was interesting: start from the beginning rather than the end of the act of writing. Most of my experience in class had been with workshops where we wrote stories, turned them in, and then received critical commentary, often called constructive criticism. In these critical sessions we received correction on what we had not done and congratulations on what we had done.

These sessions became an art form in themselves, capable of teaching a great deal. Some of our fellow writers even became quite proud of their ability to provide critical commentary, rightly so. For someone like me who could not be stopped--at least not right away--the commentary provided some interesting discussion of writing that might well come into play on the next thing I wrote--rarely on the piece under discussion.

We tend to continue methods and lessons we learned from our best teachers and our favorite writers. But then I asked myself, what is it I most want to teach to learning writers? What do learning writers most need to learn? I had been reading books on writing and reading stories and novels with an eye then to what learning writers most needed to learn.

For example, John Gardner, in a generous paraphrase of E.M. Forster, said that plot is more than just one damn thing after another. He also said that every writer needs to learn how to create profluence, the ability to make readers want to turn pages and keep reading. You have to find a way to interest readers. That's natural enough, and clearly something every writer ought to know in their bones if not their heads.

Could I make an assignment that taught students, in the doing, that lesson? I thought probably so, and I tried it. Gardner also said the most basic plot is that someone desires something, goes after it, and gets it or doesn't get it. This creates profluence. Once we know what the character wants, we wonder whether or not he or she will get it. By the end of the story we should probably know this or know why. Further, we should have an idea of what it means, of what kind of loss or gain is involved in the getting or losing.

Kurt Vonnegut said that every character in a novel should want something, even if it's just a glass of water--if the world is to be whole and true. Desire and frustrated desire seemed to me a significant aspect of our lives. What we want and what we'll do to get it, and what will be done to us in the getting or losing. So I thought, here's the form of an assignment: Someone (a character) wants something, goes after it, and gets it or doesn't get it.

But that didn't cover all of the possibilities. What if the character decided not to go after it, that the prize was unattainable, wasn't that a story? And in any event, wasn't it possible that such a character might attain the desired object in spite of not going after it? Why should I want any learning writer to produce exactly the same form of desire? Isn't that what makes differences in characters, the very lifeblood of fiction--or one vein in the lifeblood?

What if the character got the desired object but discovered he didn't really want it, or she had mistaken what it would mean to possess it? So here's how the assignment was shaping up, more or less: Someone wants something, goes after it or does not go after it, attains it or does not attain it, and knows or does not know that he or she has attained the object.

That began to imitate the act of fiction as Gardner describes it: choices made along the way. Character is fate. Will the character take the meatball from the offered platter or not? But there are other aspects to the writing of fiction. Let's reduce this to absurdity and say that the character, a young man, wants a saxophone that sits in the window of a music shop. How do we convey the desirability of the object, or even the obvious lack of desirability?

What comes along with the sax? The color, the shape, the musical tone, the dent in the bell, and so on. Recordings of great saxophonists, the posture of those who play the saxophone under a spotlight on the stage, the lives and excesses of the sax world. All of these are part of the desirability and dangers of the saxophone, and the writer should at least think about these threads of imagery that might be strung through the story of the man who desired a sax.

But that's not quite enough yet, because there has to be a world for this character to inhabit, someplace he lives, his pad, his room, his apartment, his home, and this will tell us something of the nature of his desire. There must be space between his home and the music shop, and in that space there must be streets and sidewalks, dogs and people, and, most of all, there must be weather. There must be somewhere sun and moon, sky and cloud, tooth and nail.

Here is the assignment so far: Someone wants something. Goes after it or does not go after it. Gets it or does not get it. Knows it or does not know it. Be aware of all of the potential imagery, visual, aural, tactile, and so on, that comes out of the desired object, whatever it is. These should recieve some attention throughout the story, as if it were a ribbon threaded through the length. Let us know through what kind of weather the character moves, and something of the world in which he lives, including sun, moon, sky. An animal should make a brief appearance.

Is this too restricting? Not at all. In fact, as Richard Hugo says in The Triggering Town, such limitations distract the conscious mind long enouigh to allow the unconscious mind (Jung's theory at the heart of the operation) free reign. While the dog is chewing on the bone, the thief gets into the house. These limits and structural columns in the fiction actually help the learning writer to shape something that looks and feels like a story, that makes the reader turn the page, and engages our apetite for suspense.

What is the benefit of this? Nothing teaches a writer how to write a good story so much as writing one. Nothing benefits a learning writer more than having the direction on the front end of the story rather than after the fact. No sense of failure can be implied or imputed. Did you do the assignment? Yes, you did. All of the elements are there, and, moreover, it sings a little in the process. And furthermore, the assignment has left no mark on the story; no reader would know from what's on the page where it began--what Eudora Welty calls the jumping off place.

The release and confidence the assignment gives the writer reaches into language. Everything is better than what the learning writer could have accomplished before he or she began. At the end, no one needs to tell the writer to develop a plot, that the story lacks shape or life. The teacher is freed to be a studio art teacher: Look here, at this bit of sky, think you could accentuate that? How can we make this a better one of those? I like the bird chirping in that tree. There is no need for criticism that makes the writer feel a failure and wonder why he tried in the first place.

And in fact less criticism encourages the writer to think for himself or herself, and encourages the writer to reach once more into the void and pull out a story. On the down side, for some, there is no lording it over the learning writer. No one has the power over the writer's work but the writer. We don't say, now that you have written a story, I will tell you what is wrong with it. We say, look how that worked? Wasn't that fine?

This is essentially the process I followed in creating assignments. Another, for example, came from stumbling on Anne Beattie's "The Burning House," which is startlingly wonderful in the creation of a single evening, essentially one scene with a few rhythmic breaks. Weather comes in the door and through the radio. The world is breaking down even as it is beautifully depicted in its nature and context. And nothing is more important for a learning writer to learn than that the basic syntax of the language of fiction is the scene.

I don't have them read the story--at least not yet. I really don't like to be leading. Instead, I tell them to write a scene that takes place indoors. Three characters are involved in some activity. One of them is related to another though you shouldn't tell us how. You should just know it. During that activity, a fourth character arrives carrying or wearing something unusual.

Throughout this scene, the flow of time should be unbroken. One character may leave the room or scene or building, but we should continue with the main character in an unbroken movement of time. Though we are indoors, you should bring in the weather outside in some natural way. You may even take the main character and one other character outdoors in the same movement of time. Use one color three times, though you may vary the word or the hue.

This accomplishes something else the Beattie story demonstrates: how to handle more than one or two characters naturally, how to get them on and off the stage. The assignment doesn't follow the Beattie story strictly, but it uses some of the basic elements. I also add that someone should say something that surprises the main character, though you shouldn't point out that the main character is surprised except through some action, gesture, or response--and it should be subtle.

The learning writer sets out to accomplish this task and in the process learns or tries out what it is to make a scene, handle characters, and move through time and space. This is what I mean by the assignment teaching the learning writer, and, again, it doesn't require that we then tell a student that he needs to show, not tell, that she needs to write in scenes. It takes us at our word and shows rather than tells what this means.

I have seen that this works and that the writing of learning writers is better when you teach with the assignment rather than post-story criticism, which may have the unintended effect of teaching learning writers that what they do well is not as important as what they don't do well. And that the act of reading is essentially looking for mistakes. This approach tells the writer what kind of object they are making beforehand, and then looks to see how it works after.

I suppose one assumption from which I work is that it is better for a writer to be confident in his abilities and imagination than hesitant--though I am sure that there are those who think every speaker should be made to stutter. I'd like the learning writer to know the shape of the thing she's making. And I think it's important for the writer to depend more on himself for judgment than on me. That's what's necessary in a later stage, when you confront the bare page and start the story, knowing now what it is, and having been introduced to the language of fiction.

That's the idea of the studio teacher, and it's a good one.

Bob

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Z, Darkness

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B, a boy of 17, identified as the newly hired waitress no one had met Miss A, even as she stepped onto the path on which he walked at a distance of no more than 75 yards. B wore camp-issue tan t-shirt and shorts; new employee A wore a red summer dress, her shoulders bare, her honey hair swinging free.

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Inconsequential people of various sizes and ages as well as trees in full foliage were strewn about. He could not at that moment see the small beach on the North end of the Chesapeake Bay down the hill to his left, nor the sun at his back, but took as articles of faith their existence. What became arranged in his mind as the only matters of consequence were 5 yellow cabins--C, D, E, F, and G--on the left side of the path on which she progressed toward him.

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He calculated that if he B ran full speed behind points C, D, E, and broke out between points F and G, he would arrive at a point on the path X through which she passed in exactly 30 seconds, and counting. B's legs flew, moving past C, D, and E, leaning into the turn immediately after F, racing toward point X where he expected to see A approaching, at which moment he would be the very first to introduce himself and win a little bit of heaven in the good old summertime.

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B had predicted the rate of travel for A precisely but had incompletely imagined a space of 15 feet between F and G in which had been planted, in some past period of stability, a concrete bench H equadistant between F and G. He recognized in a flash that his diagram had become ridiculously twisted.

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His right shin, designated here B prime, leaped out at the instant B recognized this error, striking the wide, gray seat of H and breaking not only the progress of the body in motion but the skin, at the very least, of B prime. So abruptly did B strike H at B prime that he spun 3 times and dropped on his back in the center of the path on which oncoming A stepped over B with simple grace and the mincing words, "Excuse me."

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Recumbant B remained in the path, which he now, far too late, designated Y. The region of B prime which had struck H began to bleed profusely. In that moment he understood how frail are all the plans and deeds of man. Still, but ever so briefly, in the mind of B there glowed a vision of A's tanned thighs stepping over him before all points collapsed into Z, darkness.

FOUR MEN WRITING SHORT SHORT FICTION

Matthew Meduri
Daniel Von Holten
Matt Gammertsfelder
Christopher Bair

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NEW STORY CHALLENGE: Cause & Effect

Forget plot & character; focus on a principle of both elements: cause & effect. This must be written in third person, though you may have an ‘I’ narrator not present in the story. In order to do this right, imagine three very specific examples of cause and effect before you even start to write, preferably not at your screen or paper. In one, include a piece of machinery of any kind—machinery in the broadest sense. In another, an animal, but don’t have the animal mangled or hurt. Consider weather in one imagined series. Clear your head of the examples and sit down to write a precise, analytical cause and effect sequence. You may have from one to three people in the story, treated as people, as bodies in stasis or motion, and not as characters. Use one color consciously, at least once. But remember, it’s a story too—of a very unusual sort—at 500 or fewer words.

Matthew Meduri

The Woman

Rain again, autumn rain. Like on the day I met that woman for the last time, the day I started feeling nervous and skeptical about him. Before she and I met, I thought I might be in love with him. We understood each other and did what we wanted. I still don’t believe that woman. How could I? I don’t even really know her. I mean really know her. All that she said, everything she told me could be a lie, an utter and miserable lie.

Why? Why do I feel skeptic? What is my reasoning?

She must be delusional, the way she talked and talked. It started out pleasant; I met her in line for coffee. Somehow our petty chitchat turned in the direction of him. Maybe I mentioned I lived with someone, him. I can’t remember, but I think she directed it. She knew him from a past life, another place.

We planned to meet for coffee again at the same place another day. This time she talked about our commonality, about plans. Then she turned dark. First, it was a subtle hint. A hint turned into a remark, and a remark became a hate filled rant. I had nothing to say until I finally could take no more and I had to leave. She apologized defensively, saying it is what I needed to know about him. She freaked me out. I left trying not to think about any of what she said to me about him. How could I? It may not even be true. It wasn’t true. At least I don’t think it is.

The rain blurs the window, but I still see his empty parking space. I want to disregard what she said but it weighs too much on me. I want to tell him also that I met her and all the terrible things she said about him. But when I look at him walking around the apartment, smiling, or talking, I notice certain qualities about him. They slightly resemble something of what she said. It’s strange—and I’m acting strange. Well, it feels that way. I think he can tell that I know something, but he won’t say it. He couldn’t be capable of what she said he did. He is too sweet.

The woman’s voice has slowly left my thoughts unpleasant and unwanted. I need to tell someone about her but when I try to call a friend, I don’t mention a thing. It isn’t true and that woman is crazy. So why am I still skeptical?