For Fun Exercise--We might as well make this one useful as well as fun.  A sort of show AND tell exercise.

We'll call it "An Unpleasant Task."

Wait.  That's too easy.

Not just any unpleasant task, one that only you know how to do.

Wait, that's too broad.  How about " An unpleasant task only you and all
sorts of other people–but probably not anyone else on this list–knows
how to do."

Example.  Do any of you know how to arrest a drunken driver?

I didn't think so.

But I do.  In one of my many past lives, I was a cop, and as a cop I
arrested more than a few drunken drivers.  I can't say it was all that
unpleasant, at least not for me.  Sometimes it was almost fun.  I
remember the last one, three weeks before I retired, pulled the chain as
the guys used to say.  I was on night patrol, alone, and I came across
this guy who had driven his 84 Buick about 100 years off the road into
an empty field.  It was sitting there, lights on, motor running, driver
still stupidly behind the wheel.  I left my squad at the curb.  First I
locked it, of course.  There once was another cop who forgot to do that,
even worse he left the keys in the ignition. Need I even mention it,
someone got into his squad and led the whole county for a merry chase.
So I walked out toward my man.  I won't tell you what he said when I
shined my light into his eyes, but it was a very popular four letter
swear word, and I don't mean damn.

Oh, maybe I better save this story for some other time.  I'm just trying
to give you an idea of the kind of detail I'm thinking about for this
exercise.  Who, where, when, how.  Objects, smells, sounds, direct
quotes.  Even if you have to make up a few.  Just so long as we don't
notice.  We really do notice, you see, when dialogue doesn't ring true.
That fellow in the Buick simply didn't say, "Good evening, officer."
Come one, you know what he said.

An unpleasant task could be anything.  Another one I had was when I was
teaching at Columbia College.  (Another of my past lives) The entire
English Department went to Mexico for the summer and left me in charge.
"While we're gone," the chairman told me.  "I want you to fire the
secretary."

That could be another good story.  Now that I think of it, it is just an
anecdote, but I could puff it up a bit, work in a little imaginative
stuff, and turn it into fiction.

Maybe you could do something like that too.  An unpleasant task.

Maybe it comes from one of your past lives.  Maybe you used to milk cows
and you still remember that nasty one that always did whatever a nasty
cow does.  Maybe you were the guy who cleaned out the grease trap at the
EAT EAT EAT Restaurant.  ( I really did have a restaurant with that name
in one of my stories!   All You Can Eat, Eat, Eat! )

Maybe your unpleasant job was something serious, even painful.   Maybe
it involved illness, death, or some other loss.  Maybe you had to clean
up after the flood, or the tornado, or the fire.

I haven't had the tornado yet, but the flood and the fire have been
around a time or two.  The night our garage burned; that was quite a
night.  But it could have been a lot worse.

You see, this is about telling a story.  And telling a story always
includes the detail.  You have to think of your audience.  Teachers,
editors and critics always tell you, cut this out, cut that out, don't
waste words, look for unity, don't ramble, don't do this, don't do that,
don't, don't, don't.

That's why a writers only true friend is the audience.  All the audience
wants is to be entertained.  Yes indeed, the audience wants to know
exactly what that drunk in the Buick said to me.  Yes indeed, the
audience really does want to know exactly what he did when the deputy
opened the lockup door.  The audience wants to know why the secretary
had to be fired, and was she young and pretty, or was she some poor old
lady who just couldn't cope, or was she, as it turned out . . .

Inquiring minds want to know.

It was terrible cleaning up after that flood, after that fire.  It was
awful firing that secretary.  It was pretty horrible what that drunk did
when we got him into the lockup, too awful to put on paper, but I'll
give you a little hint–he should have used the men's room instead.

This is why I call this a "for fun" exercise.  I get all charged up
thinking about these things.  I start thinking about my audience, those
wonderful all forgiving folks who want to know about everything, more
than I will ever tell them, but I will tell them as much as pleases me.
And that's quite a bit.

There's a reason we write.  It's not really to become rich and famous,
or even immortal.  It's fun.

That's why we say,   "Like to Write?"

Get to it.

Paul Pekin
 ppekin@megsinet.net