A train of thought is chug-racing through my brain, and I needed to sit down quick and type to keep it on track.
After several years of scattered Lit and Writing courses, some things have sunk in and established themselves as a part of me that comes out in writing. Or, maybe I’m just more aware of them. One of the items was “borders,” the lines that are crossed in story by the characters, and the multitude of ways they appear within it. That little element has been showing up more and more lately.
Another, that of “space,” is just beginning to jell and take form, live, and walk around within my narrative. It’s evident that a majority of my stories, postings, inspirations come from the bits of time I spend outside on my back step looking around the back yard. (My husband always said that we bought this house because of the back yard, and now I appreciate his foresight!) This morning, while pouring a cup of coffee and looking out the kitchen window—something I’ve done a hundred times in this sequence—I realized that the backyard was “framed” in the space of the window, thus making the actual acre of space into an area of just a couple square feet. Just recently in a story I had the protagonist being watched by a neighbor out of her window as she passed by:
“Mrs. McHale looked up from her bread baking to spot Rachel in the distance passing the small space of her kitchen window.”
I’m not sure where I’m heading with this thought, but the relevance between the two views of the same scene mean something. The whole picture is changed by the position of the viewer; the “big picture” of Rachel crossing a field changes shape and form by the distance from which it is seen. Yeah, I know, this is a simple fact of life, but in this particular scene, the importance lies in the fact that our view of Rachel becomes one of sympathy, perhaps, as she becomes so small in size that it takes a longer period of time for her to cross the maybe 30 inches of distance.
It’s a writing tool, I would think.
Hmmm. Gotta think some more on this one.
(NOTE: I do have pictures taken of this phenomenon with my digital camera, which would have offered a visual of the effect, but unfortunately have not as yet had the time to learn the part about transferring the digital info from camera to computer. “Pictures? Writers don’t need no stinkin’ pictures.”)
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology
Excellent. This is really a post about character.
It is? Well shoot, that means I still don’t have a grasp on space.