character studies
This girl right here is on summer vacation, my friend, and I’m not trying to brag, but I 100% understand if that announcement sounds gratuitous. Maybe it is, but I’m mostly just excited to reflect on the fact that I have been sending out this humble little newsletter for over a year.
Since I have been in full survival mode for the end of the school year (hybrid returns, job-hunting, grading, data analyses, program evaluations, and more), I completely lost track of the fact that the one-year anniversary of Sun Showers came and went. I started this newsletter back in April of 2020, fully floundering in the confusion of lockdowns and quarantining and working from home and wiping down groceries and tentatively wearing a mask to the store and a complete lack of social interactions. I knew I wanted to build some structure into my amorphous weeks (beyond binge-watching The Handmaid’s Tale) and find a way to feel a little more connected to an artistic community. I wasn’t quite sure how to do that, though. “I wonder,” I thought to myself, like probably 75% of millennials scrolling through their inboxes, “if I should start a newsletter?”
I remember, when I shared this little idea (a weekly newsletter with writing prompts) on my Instagram story, looking for any bites of interest to see if it would be worthwhile, a fellow teacher-friend replied that “this is such a teacher idea.” At first, that surprised me. I had been thinking only about my artist-self, not my educator-self, when I initially had this idea. I thought I was trying to fulfill a need for artist/writer-Ashley, not educator-Ashley. However, I should have realized that those selves are not dispirit; they both exist within me simultaneously, much as I pretend they are separate halves of a whole. But artist-self and educator-self were both looking for structure and connection, and thus Sun Showers was born.
So, now that educator-self can relax a bit and artist-self can come out to play a little more, I want to finally thank you, friend, for reading this weekly labor of love. Thanks for the replies and shares and affirmations over this past year and two-months. You are lovely, and all my selves appreciate you so much.
prompt #43:
Let’s take five minutes to flesh out a character. You can do this character study on someone you’ve already written (or are currently writing) about, or it can be a brand-new birth right here on the page.
You can write in the first or third person (or, hell, the second—why would I stop you? Go for it!), either revealing the character or embodying their voice. Get detailed. Focus on appearance (hair, height, facial expressions), personality (tone, pleasures, flaws), and history (family, secrets, trauma). (Yes, that’s a lot to get into five little minutes, but see what you can do.) Who are they? Who are their people? Include the big stuff, and also the little things. What funny, odd quirks in speech and manner make your character unique? Paint a picture with words to reveal (or discover) who this character is.
After five minutes are up, read over what you’ve written. If this is a character you’ve already worked with, see how you can incorporate any of these facts or insights into your already-existing work. If this character is new to you, see if you can place them into a story, song, poem, or whatever else your medium of choice may be.
If you’d like to share your character study or the work it inspires in next week’s Sun Showers, reply to this email. I’d love to see what you have.
ashley's piece:
One thing I never liked about Precious is that she was too proud. She always acted like she knew a secret that was only hers to keep, like the rest of us were a bunch of fools, like everything was big pile of nothing compared to—what? I don’t know. Apparently something more worthwhile. I’m not normally so dismissive, but I hate being made to feel like I’m less than someone. I have an MBA, for gods sake. What did she have? A sexy husband?
And, of course, I know I’m supposed to speak kindly of the dead—or the missing—whatever she is, but there’s nothing but kind words out there right now. I don’t think there’s any harm in evening out the scales a little bit, in the privacy of my own mind. 465 mourning comments, and suddenly everyone was her best friend. “Come back to us, P,” “We’re praying for your return,” “I miss you so much,” and so much bullshit from the very same women who rolled their eyes when she sashayed in to preschool pick-up. Sure, girls, you were all her best friends. And you never talked about her, ever, cross your hearts.
Who knows where she is. I wouldn’t be surprised if she just packed it up and caught a flight to Paris. Or Palm Springs, somewhere with good lighting. She seems like the kind of person to find that charming. Like she’s the main character in her own little movie. If there’s no sign of a struggle, no evidence of foul play, then maybe we should just go with Occam’s Razor. The woman was too good for this life the rest of us tolerate, so she adiosed her way out.
When I first met her, though, I thought we might be friends. Like, real friends. Not book club, carpool, game night friends, but deep conversations, spending time in silence, cry your heart out friends. The kind of friends that are so easy to make when you’re sixteen, and impossible to make when you’re thirty-three. I like these other women, they’re fine, they’re great for passing the time. We laugh, we take photos together, we watch each other’s kids, but there’s a wall. Something shimmery and hard to grasp; I don’t know what it’s made of. If I could see it, grab it, maybe I could rip it away, but it’s too elusive. It’s probably me. Other people seem to get along just fine. Either they don’t realize it’s there, they don’t care, or, the worst possibility, I’m the only one who feels it. Maybe they’re just perfectly satisfied the way things are. But I’m not calling Leslie or Amy when I’m in the middle of an unreasonable panic over nothing. I’m not crying on Janine’s shoulder when the world feels like a lost cause. But I thought maybe I could with Precious, and maybe she could with me, too.
I don’t know what it was about her, maybe just that she seemed smarter and more authentic. When Carrie said something asinine at brunch, Precious and I caught eyes. I widened mine like “welcome to hell” and she chuckled. When Gina started prattling on and on about her Rodan + Fields line, Precious told her “I don’t do MLMs, sorry.” The girls, of course, shit-talked her for weeks afterwards. I was impressed, though. I always roll my eyes privately at the skincare, the makeup, the nail decals, but I still buy them. I didn’t realize it was an option to just say no without an excuse. Precious, though, she didn’t even feel bad about it.