Writing – The Craft of

Bear Descriptions

/ Lisa / 2 Comments

People around here joke that we measure rain in feet, not inches. I walk to work. Add those sentences and you see why I use an umbrella. Recently, I had to order a new umbrella. This one is not the kind that folds up in my backpack. It’s old-fashioned, long, big, and sturdy. (Somewhere, the shade of Amelia Peabody is nodding in approval).

This time of year there is a lot of bear sightings because the bears are stuffing themselves before hibernation. My husband calls me a bear magnet because of all the interactions I have with them. When you think that to get to work I walk one-and-a-half miles through their habitat, it’s not surprising.

So as I walked along this morning, my mind wandered like usual, and I wondered how a bear would perceive an umbrella. Since it’s black and long, would it scare him, make him assume it’s a rifle? I doubt he has a word for ‘umbrella’. I doubt he has a word for ‘color’ or ‘black’. I started trying to figure out how I would describe something, if I had to break it down to its barest minimum. A stick like night?

Sometimes in writing, description can carry on too long, or be too much. I think we writers have a tendency to not trust the reader to understand what we are saying, so we repeat ourselves, rewording slightly, to make sure readers get it. That can kill an otherwise wonderful description.

Thinking about the bear made me wonder if describing something from the eyes of an animal might make a challenging writing exercise. Like the umbrella. But then I realized I’d drive myself insane. I suggested a ‘stick like night’ above. But the bear wouldn’t have a word for ‘night’ any more than he would have a word for ‘black’. Yes I know, bears don’t have words, but for the purposes of writing challenges, I’m continuing with the analogy. So ‘bear’ with me please.

In some ways it would be like trying to describe something to a person who speaks a different language. I think it would end up looking like a game of charades. Back to the bear. Would he understand that the umbrella is not a rifle, if I opened it? Well, that would probably be equally terrifying for him. But can we describe more accurately through action? There’s another writing challenge. Instead of having simple narrative in your story that describes the scenery, bring it alive through action or interaction.

I like the idea of taking an object and trying to strip it down to the most basic, simple description. I’m going to try this with a few things lying around and see what I come up with. I challenge you to do the same.

Lessons at Dinner

/ Lisa / 2 Comments

My dad was great for using time around the dinner table to teach to a captive audience. Sometimes his lessons were simple, like how to count change. Usually however, he would either ask us questions that had no ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer, or make a statement. He’d give us time to think, come up with our answer, and be prepared to debate our response. Because there was a lot of debate. Or arguments, depending on which side of semantics you stood. 

He was equally good at lessons on other types of semantics. For instance, if you said ‘So can I!’ he’d invariably respond, ‘Which eye do you want soaked?’ That old chestnut still irritates me. But not as much as when I had a story to tell and his other common line came into play.

I’d rush home from school with a very important, very good story to share. Especially after I’d embellished it some and made it an even better story. Somewhere in the middle of the telling I’d say, ‘It was exactly like…except that…’

Can you hear the response?

He’d interrupt to say that whatever I talked about wasn’t, after all, exactly like something because I’d just pointed out a difference.

I’d stumble to a halt, the flow of my really good story blocked. There’d be a moment of silence while I gathered the threads of the tale together.

‘Well, okay, but see, it really was exactly like…except for…’

And here would come the interruption again.

Today I heard someone say, ‘He never talked! And when he did…’

Wow. Dad’s voice rang so loud and clear. 

Now, thinking about it, I believe the true lesson I learned during those dinner table debates and the early story telling was this. 

How to edit.

And with that, here’s one of his famous statements. He took a glass of milk, put it in front of us kids and told us we couldn’t touch it. Because to touch it we’d have to go half way. And then half way again. And again. And because there was always another ‘half way’ to go, we would never be able to touch the glass. I can remember saying ‘I’m touching it right now!’ Nope. There was still an infinitesimal half way to go. Someone once told me that he was actually teaching us some law of physics. 

Sorry, but no. I felt that darn glass under my finger. And I’m still prepared to defend that with some rude semantics if need be.

He's really not touching that glass. He may think he is, but he's only half way there.

The nephew’s really not touching that glass. He may think he is, but he’s only half way there.