Perspectives and Post Cards

They say a picture's worth a thousand words.  I was given three, and I made a short story within... what?  A half hour?  Obviously, it didn't reach the supposed word cap.  Not even close.  That's why they're short stories.

This week's class (the only one, praise be) was staring at three post cards and describing them.  Then, after we described them, we were supposed to include each image in a short story.  I described one post card, saying that, "Had I known about what the assignment was before I picked the card, I would have avoided this one like the plague."  I must admit that the descriptions beforehand felt very dry at first.  The question as to what exactly the point was eluded me until I started to actually write the story.

But that was quite a way away yet, I was sitting with contempt brewing in my veins until I was tasked to connect the cards... somehow.  How on earth was I supposed to connect a weird painting, a nearly frozen pond, and a picture of the Mackinac Bridge?  Well, I found a way.

I spring-boarded off the fact that one post card looked like it was a painting.  I first imagined-up an art gallery.  Given my pointedly dark taste for stories, I added a little dust to it.  Now there was a story behind the painting.  Why was it dusty?  Why didn't people view it?

As a sort of parallel to the unwanted picture, I added a character who equally didn't belong.  The narrator has a very strong and analytical personality.  He swears occasionally, yes, but I've heard it said that real people don't censor themselves, and he does it only in his mind.  He was, I pictured, wearing a brown and slightly ragged suit, in stark comparison to the black and white expensive outfits surrounding him.  We understood that he was different at that point, and then he needed a reason for being somewhere he didn't belong.

The answer: the painting.  It seemed natural to connect the two, especially since they complement each other so well.  So I set to work with the oldest motivation for a man being in a place where he didn't belong.  Women.  Or, in this case, a woman.

After I get the general idea down, I just sort of charge into the work.  I don't draw out an outline, not for a short story, because I start to lose my "writing mood" that I got myself into.  The freshness wears away, and it becomes stale.  Short stories have so little time to be engaging.  They need to say something, even if the characters themselves don't actually change themselves.

Try it out for yourself, if you like.  Let go.  Figure out which cardinal direction you're going in, like North, and just go.  Maybe you'll hit a river that takes you a little to the East, and you might have to backtrack down South until you can get around something.  That's okay, but you learn the terrain as you go.  There's always time for revision later, especially now that the 2012 panic is over and you don't have to worry about the "end of the world..." until the next one rolls around.

And if that doesn't work out for you, I apologize.  No refunds.  Buyer beware.  What works for me won't work for everyone, and I know already that it doesn't.  Writing is something, I believe, that sits very close to the soul.  It'll be different for everyone.  I encourage you to try.