Date:         Thu, 9 Apr 1998 22:19:51 EDT
From: masked *t*i*n*k* <mbarker@MIT.EDU>
Subject:      EXERCISE: And then there was...

On the news recently, I saw a mother who had immigrated to America and
worked three jobs at once to "get ahead" scramble into her house (in
California?) on the edge of a mudslide and grab frantically for bits
of her life in the 20 minutes that the emergency crews had given her
to rescue what she could.

So, here's the exercise.  Pick a number from one to six, please?

1.  mud slide
2.  flood
3.  forest fire
4.  volcano
5.  earthquake
6.  tornado

(pick another natural disaster if you like...heck, you may use an
unnatural disaster if you prefer...the IRS, for example?)

All right.  Now, imagine your character (what?  you don't have a
character on tap?  all right, do yourself--or maybe the old woman down
the block, or the youngster sitting at the bus stop...just pick one)
has been given the chance to scrabble through their belongings for a
very short time before the rescue team drags them away...

What do they take?

What do they look at, think about, discard, ignore?

Show us that scene, make us feel the clock ticking down, the
desperation, the smell of the disaster looming and the very human
desire to save...well, what?

Oh, you want something else?  Okay, pick a number...

1.  one sock
2.  one glove
3.  an empty envelope
4.  a pressed flower
5.  a key
6.  a book of matches

There's an object.  What does it mean to the character?  What event in
their past has invested this object with such meaning?  And, in the
face of natural disaster, do they know where it is, do they hunt for
it, do they simply toss it aside, or what?

write?
tink