What? Friday Already?

Where did this week go? I was at an out of town cross country meet yesterday afternoon, but home all morning. Most of today I did laundry and worked on writing for my class. I do mean work, too. I finished the assignment tonight, but still have some exercises to do. The instructor set the scene of a baseball game which included a single mom, her six year old son who is the catcher, a close score, and a helicopter reporting on an accident on the adjacent freeway. The mom had a name, so did the boy. We had to write a paragraph in the first person point of view where I am one of the people in the story and am telling it. Then I had to write it in the third person(he, she, they) I am the narrator and not a character of the story, but know what the character I am talking about is thinking and feeling. Then I had to write it as if I were a camera taking it all in--just the facts, maam. As if that weren't enough, the instructor, Ann is her name, set the scene of a woman named Martha who is waiting for the bus on a stormy winter night. As she gets on the bus, her ex-husband gets off. We had to write several paragraphs about this setting, but each from a distance. We started off in Martha's head and what she was feeling (up close). Then we moved a little further off and wrote as Martha again, but instead of her feelings, her observations.(not quite as close) Last of all we wrote about the scene from above it all, comparing it to similar experiences we might have had. (far off) And these were only the exercises.

The assignment was also about Martha. We had to chose a point of view, a tense, and how close we were. Then we had to write a five sentence paragraph using what we had chosen. I will post mine below if anyone wants to read it.

This entire lesson was hard, especially when I had to express the emotions and feelings of the strangers I supposedly knew intimately. Writing as an observer was much easier. One thing I discovered was I kept writing from pain, not joy. Got to work on that.

I am taking my laptop into the shop tomorrow. It is doing crazy things. Thought I had better get it checked out before it crashes. So, there will probably not be any blogs for a few days. Hope everyone has a great weekend. We have a flood warning for the rivers around here because of the expected heavy rains. We'll see how accurate the weather people are this time around.

So, I'm shutting down and going off to sleep in my freshly made bed, a granddaughter is sleeping on my couch, and a pregnant cat naps under my house, or as my granddaughter says, a cat about to have children.

Be blessed,
Jan

Assignment 4

First person point of view
Present tense
Close location

Martha?

"Jack Frost nipping at my toes" I sing to myself as I slowly turn into an icicle, but nothing is going to stop me from enjoying the snow I love. At least that is what I think until the bus glides to a stop and the warm air from the opened door hits me in the face. Looking up the steps and into my purse at the same time, I don't see him, but he has already seen me. "Martha?" he asked in amazement as I push by and he steps out the closing doors. Tears fill my eyes, not from cold but from pain, as I recall that night so long ago and the word he whispered as he heard me say I wanted out of our marriage,"Martha?"