Show me!

Every writer has been admonished, “Show, don’t tell!” There are blogs and articles and arguments galore. It refers to the use of words. It refers to using description to bring events alive in the reader’s mind and heart, rather than flat narrative that tells the reader what’s happening and how they should feel about it.

It occurred to me that the rule doesn’t just apply to writers.

There’s a lot on social media right now, in words to this effect: “You should wake up! You should understand! You should learn more! You should do more!”

I try not to use the word “should”. It’s too often used by someone who wants to tell the rest of the world how to live. I admire (and listen to) people who show me examples, show me ideas, show me the truth. Who don’t tell me what I “should” do.

And it’s not always other people who tell us that.

My aunt and I once sat in her lovely back yard, sipping ice tea. She moaned that she had been invited to volunteer at a local charity group, but she hadn’t gone yet. “I know I should, but I just can’t seem to make myself find the time. I feel so guilty!”

I said, “Don’t ‘should’ on yourself.”

She looked torn between confusion and laughter, but I meant what I said. If you sincerely believe it’s the right thing to do, then do it. If you don’t believe it, then don’t. And if you’re simply hesitant or reluctant, figure out why and look for answers – all the answers you can find. Don’t tell yourself what you should do. Don’t tell me what you should do. Show me what you’re doing.

And don’t let someone else tell you what you should or shouldn’t feel guilty about. Figure it out for yourself.

You can tell me what you feel guilty about. I’ll probably put it in a book. But I won’t tell my readers what it’s like to be you – I’ll show them how it makes you feel and what it makes you do. As soon as you figure out what “it” is.

So to quote Eliza Doolittle:

Words, words, words!
I’m so sick of words
I get words all day through
First from him, now from you
Is that all you blighters can do?

Don’t talk of stars, burning above
If you’re in love, show me!
Tell me no dreams, filled with desire
If you’re on fire, SHOW ME!

Just finished a 1st Readers ARC copy of Hank Phillippi Ryan’s new book, “The First to Lie“. Hold onto your seat – this book isn’t a roller coaster ride, it’s the Wild Mouse! Starts out slow and easy, but then don’t think you’re just going to go down – you’re going for a ride!

It’s almost too many lies to take in. My head was in a whirl for the first half, trying to follow who was who, even when I thought I knew (I never did). Three-fourths of the way in, it all starts to come together, but just wait! There’s one last dizzying reveal (or would that be two?).

It’s coming out August 4th.

People in my writers group look at me funny when I tell them I warm up my muse by working on 100-word stories to picture prompts on “Friday Fictioneers”. That just doesn’t seem serious to some of them. Well, that’s the whole point – I’m playing. But I’m playing with my creative mind, preparing to get down to the serious stuff.

Since I retired, discipline isn’t the problem — I mean the discipline that used to be involved in just trying to find the strength to either write after a ten-hour day or get up at the crack of dawn before a ten-hour day. Once I retired, that just fell away. It takes no discipline for me to wake up to a new day, sit on my glassed-in breezeway (sunny or not), drink coffee and read a good book. Then, primed with caffeine and a dose of literature, I get dressed (pjs are deadly for me), sit at my desk and start with either the aforementioned prompt, a journal entry or maybe I’ll work on a friendly blog post. Then, as I said, I get down to the “serious” stuff of writing novels or short stories. (A lot of my short stories grow straight out of the prompts, etc., but for some reason, never the novels.) Sometimes I could cry to think of so much of my life being wasted on “earning a living”! But, of course, it was never really wasted – it all goes into those prompts, journal entries, blogs — and the serious stuff.

Maybe if I had tried warming up with prompts or journal entries from the beginning, I might have found the strength I needed. Because the real discipline is in getting the muse to stick around if the serious stuff starts to bog down in the middle. But that’s another story.

Another 100-word story from a picture prompt. This picture warms my heart when I look at it. Thank you, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. Strange how many of these I write in dialogue, and yet usually dialogue is the hardest thing for me to write!

“How long do you suppose she had this old thing?”

“I remember her typing on it before I was in school.  Every night with a glass of wine.  She said she was writing her own stories and offered to read them to me, but I never had time to listen.”

“Look!  A drawer full of envelopes.  They’re manuscripts.  There a note attached to each one.  ‘Thank you for your submission.  It does not suit our needs at this time’.  Look at the postmark on this one.  It’s from forty years ago!”

“Are they all rejections?”

“Looks like it.”

“Oh, Grandma.”

As always, please click on the frog and share your own story!

Here’s my story via this week’s photo prompt from Rochelle Wisoff-Fields and Friday Fictioneers.

The boy craned his neck, staring upward at the outlandish sign.

“Grandpa, how’d they put that car way up there?”

“Probably used some kind of a crane.”

“Why’d they do it?”

“You’d have to ask the guy who put it there.”

“Is he in that there diner?”

“I doubt it.  It’s been closed for a lot of years.”

“How come he didn’t take the car down, then?”

“Maybe he lost the crane.”

The boy pondered the sign for a moment.  “You know something, Grandpa?  I hope he never finds it.”

“Me too, boy.  Me too.”