Down the Rabbit Hole

Playdates and the Power of Description

"Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise"
Day 793 May 9, 2016
Prompt: What, do you think, creates the most delightful usage of language in literature? Descriptions, dialogue, rhetorical devices, style, voice? Anything else?

The authors that I admire the most are the ones I believe to be descriptive artists. These writers can describe a place or setting with such exquisite detail and attention, that I am virtually transported there through the magic of their phrasing and use of language. For example, when James Lee Burke writes about the bayou in New Iberia parish, I can see the tall cattails swinging at the water's edge in that moonlight southern night. He delivers me in an unparalleled way to a place I've never been but can come to know through his words.

"I drove north along Bayou Teche to Carmouche's home. The house was dark, but next door the porch and living room lights were on at the Labiche house. I pulled into the Labiche driveway and walked across the yard toward the brick steps. The ground was sunken, moldy with pecan husks and dotted with palmettos, the white paint on the house stained with smoke from stubble fires in the cane fields. My face felt warm and dilated with alcohol, my ears humming with sound that had no origin." An excerpt from Purple Cane Road, James Lee Burke

In much the same way, Stephen King masters the task of taking me into dark places. King has so often found the right mix of words to describe his disturbing nightmares so compellingly that they take life. You can feel the terror as a visceral thing in your gut, leaving you uneasy hours after you close the book. Who can forget the lasting impression Pennywise made on them the first time they read about that manic clown?

"And George saw the clown’s face change.
What he saw then was terrible enough to make his worst imaginings of the thing in the cellar look like sweet dreams; what he saw destroyed his sanity in one clawing stroke.

They float,' the thing in the drain crooned in a clotted, chuckling voice. It held George’s arm in its thick and wormy grip, it pulled George toward that terrible darkness where the water rushed and roared and bellowed as it bore its cargo of storm debris toward the sea. George craned his neck away from that final blackness and began to scream into the rain, to scream mindlessly into the white autumn sky which curved above Derry on that day in the fall of 1957. His screams were shrill and piercing, and all up and down Witcham Street people came to their windows or bolted out onto their porches." An excerpt from Stephen King's "It".

Description, for me, is one of the most powerful forces in literature. I have tremendous respect for those writers who have perfected tool. They are artists with words. The power of their descriptions transcend time, and even translate across language barriers. For example, in case of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, for whom English was not the language he wrote his masterpieces in, his descriptions are so acute and beautiful that they read perfectly even after suffering translation into multiple languages.

“Then, for more than ten days, they did not see the sun again. The ground became soft and damp, like volcanic ash, and the vegetation was thicker and thicker, and the cries of the birds and the uproar of the monkeys became more and more remote, and the world became eternally sad. The men on the expedition felt overwhelmed by their most ancient memories in that paradise of dampness and silence, going back to before original sin, as their boots sank into pools of steaming oil and their machetes destroyed bloody lilies and golden salamanders.”
― Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

I spend a lot of time thinking about description in my own writing. I think about how a place or situation affects all my senses and then try to convey as much of that experience into words that justly represent those qualities. It isn't easy though these writers I've mentioned make it seem effortless.


"Blogging Circle of Friends "
DAY 1272: May 9, 2016
Prompt: Title: A Popularity Contest. Take this any where you want. Write a story, a poem, an essay, or a rant. Have fun. Be creative.

Clara glanced at her phone to check the time. She had less than an hour. She raised her eyes and confronted the tired, unadorned face in the mirror. She groaned aloud. She looked every bit like a woman pushing forty-three who spent far too little time in the gym or the cosmetic department for that matter. Clara rubbed concealer under both eyes in a last ditch effort to mask the dark circles before applying the rest of her make-up.

She stopped midway through her mascara to call up to her daughter.

"Jenny, we are leaving in five minutes."

She prayed Jenny's six year old mind had reasoned that sneakers, and not white patent leather heels, were proper footwear for a play date at a playground. It had been a discussion she had failed to have with her in advance of today, one of several she thought about now.

Clara went back to her face. The blush and gloss and bit of color on her lids did make some improvement and she felt her mood, if not her anxiety, lighten a little. Having waited well into her thirties to have Jenny, Clara was one of the older Moms among Jenny's circle of friends. She was also one of the few that worked full time, a discrepancy Clara felt more acutely than the age difference. Most of the other moms showed up to school for pickups looking fresh from the or comfortably dressed, ready to engage with their children over how their day had been. Clara, on the other hand, often rushed in at the eleventh hour, hobbled by her heels, her work clothes rumbled, her cell phone pinned between her shoulder and her ear. She tried to disconnect, but often failed miserably. At school functions, her phone often buzzed so loudly despite being on silent mode, that she was certain every parent, teacher and administrator could hear the offensive noise.

The truth was, Clara had worked hard to find the balance between raising a child and having a successful career. Most days she felt she was doing a pretty good job at both but still felt the judgment every time she walked into a PTO meeting late, or had to skip school function for work. There were also the days she felt inadequate. The other moms always seems so much more youthful and engaged, free to be more... cool? Was that the word?

Jenny's best friend was a girl named Samantha, "Sammie" as she was known to all her peeps. Sammie's mom was definitely the "cool mom", sporting a nose ring and a cherry red jeep with a "Shoreline Roller Derby" sticker on the bumper. Clara often saw her striding across the parking lot at pickup, instantly envious of her black hair tied in a knot at the base of her neck, her doc martins and torn cut-offs.

Gabby's mom was the other end of the spectrum. She never missed a PTO meeting or a chance to volunteer. She was indelibly cheerful, smiling warmly at Clara over the bake sale table as she accepted her tray of store-baked cupcakes, careful not to let the judgment show on her pretty, Mary K perfected face.

"Mom...let's go!" Jenny appeared in the doorway, bouncing in excitement, her pretty features glowing. Clara was relieved to see the pink sneakers on her feet.

Three minutes later they were in the car, headed to the park.

Gabby's mom had organized the play date as soon as the weather had turned warmer. She had billed it as a relaxing afternoon when the Moms would be able to "hang out", while the girls played in the park. Clara didn't feel relaxed though, she felt nervous. As she drove and Jenny fiddled with the radio, Clara agonized about finding common ground with the other moms and being the "odd mom out". She realized with growing dismay, that this play date felt more like an audition for a part she knew she wasn't 100% right for. It felt like a popularity contest she could never really win.

Jenny found a song she liked and was soon dancing in her seat and singing along with all the carefree abandon of a happy six year old. Jenny was happy. Clara thought, "I have a happy child, who has a lot of good friends." Clara thought that had to mean she was doing something right after all. As she rounded the bend, Lighthouse Park came into view. She pulled in along side Sammie's Mom's jeep. Without waiting, Jenny bolted from the car, racing toward the little group of girls. She stopped just before reaching them, turned, and ran back.

Clara's heart burst with gratitude as she realized her daughter was coming back for her. Jenny slipped her hand in Clara's and looked up, smiling. "Come on Mom, let's go find the other Moms for you."

Clara looked down at her daughter. "Yes, she thought, I am definitely doing something right with this amazing kid".