Officials reported that last night, just before dark, a man fell to his death from the concrete wall near the library. Eyewitnesses say that he had been precariously perched there for over an hour, apparently just watching passers-by, when he suddenly fell forward and landed on his nose.
Regina Knowles was walking by when the fall occurred. "One minute he was on the wall, the next minute he was on the sidewalk," she said. "I pulled out my cell phone right away and called 911."
A local contingent of the Society for Creative Anachronism was holding a tournament on the nearby parkstrip. "As soon as I saw him fall, I sent over all my knights," said King Darrell Spence. "Unfortunately..." his voice trailed off and he shook his head.
Sir David Rogers was the first to arrive. "I rushed over to him, hoping that he was all right, but he looked totally broken up. There was nothing the other King's Men and I could do to help him."
According to authorities, identification was found on the man's body, but they are withholding his name pending notification of next-of-kin.
Yesterday, I had a lovely long lunch with Mandy in Anchorage. Among a plethora of other topics, we talked at length about the writing classes we are each taking and the frustrations we share about the writing process. Chief among our frustrations is often feeling stuck for topics to write about.
For me, this is not exactly what I'd call writer's block. Once I have a topic in mind, I have no trouble writing about it. Finding a topic, however, can be a real struggle. I think part of my problem is that I want to have something important to write about, or to have a writing goal I'm trying to achieve. Needless to say, such highbrow topics are not always readily available.
Rowan was telling me about school earlier this evening. She started describing their writing topic for this week in language arts: they are supposed to write a news article about a nursery rhyme. In the middle of describing what she'd written about London Bridges, I interrupted her. "What fun!" I said. "What a great idea for a writing assignment!" I couldn't wait to sit down and start writing.
As I'm sure you've guessed, the result is the short clip at the top of this post. It was fun to write. I couldn't help but grin as I wrote and rewrote sentences, choosing just the right amount of obfuscation for a well-known tale, and chose names for my "eye witnesses." By no means is it great literature, but it was a great diversion for a few minutes.
While I firmly believe that all writing counts as practice and helps me improve my skills, this bit of fun is getting me no closer to a topic for the thousand word essay I'm supposed to write for my class this week. Perhaps a little bird will tweet me an idea.
