5.3 Writing Small about Big Topics

CONNECTION Yesterday we looked for big ideas. So are we writing about big things or little things? Are we writing about small moments or not?

TEACHING POINT Today I want to teach you that the bigger the topic, the smaller one will need to write.

TEACHING Geoff is a sports writer for the Memphis newspaper. Normally he writes about big sports topics. But one year he wrote about a memory of a time when his mother invented games to distract him in the hospital and the themes he finds in those memories. The games I remember most from my childhood aren’t Little League or hoops. Instead the game I remember most was penny pitching. This was usually played in hospital waiting rooms. I grew up with leukemia and spent a lot of time in hospital waiting rooms. To pass the time, my mother would take off her shoe, push it onto the middle of the rug, and we’d take turns pitching pennies into her shoe. Now when people ask me what it was like, growing up with leukemia, I do not tell them about the scabs around my mouth or the IV lines. Instead I tell them what I remember most is the thrill of the perfect arc and the soft thud as the penny landed squarely in my Mum’s shoe. I am writing this column not because it has anything to do with Memphis or sports, but because I do not want another year to go by without saying thanks. My mother took a potentially scary time and made it sweet. And isn’t that the lesson of September 11? Whatever it is we have been meaning to do—we need to do it, and do it now? Write that letter. Go for that job. Make that phone call. Not because at any moment, a plan might fall out of the heavens and reduce our world to smithereens, but because we are still here on this fragile spinning earth, and never has that seemed so precious. See how he wrote both big and small? Small moment and big theme!

ACTIVE ENGAGEMENT Early in this story, Jean sets out to climb a tree and her neighbor Marilyn restrains her, saying, “You have bad eyes.” “I do not have Bad Eyes,” I told her defiantly. “If your mother said that, she’s wrong. My mother never said so and my mother is a doctor, so she’d know. My father is a doctor, too, and he never said so, either. They both said I can climb any tree I like.” But Marilyn keeps insisting and taunting Jean until Jean runs to her mother. “What is it, Jean,” she asked in a quiet, calming voice. “Marilyn says her mother says I have bad eyes,” I burst out, my words sputtering in their rush to get said. “She said I can’t climb trees because it’s dangerous if you have bad eyes. I don’t have them, do I? I can climb trees, can’t I?” Mother did not hesitate. I can still hear the words that set my world turning on its axis again. “You do have bad eyes,” she said, “but go ahead and climb the tree.” Turn and talk. What is the theme? How does the story support the theme?

LINK If you have been writing small, ask yourself, “What is the big issue or theme?” If you have been writing about a big theme or issue, ask yourself, “What small stories are inside here?”

MIDWORKSHOP Write your theme or issue that your entry is addressing at the top of your paper. WAYS TO BRING OUT THE BIG IDEA IN STORIES Make sure your story starts and ends in a way that shows the big ideas/themes Stretch out the part of the story that illustrates the big idea/theme Use dialogue, internal thinking, and details to pop out this part

SHARE Reread your work. Ask, “Am I giving up on stories too fast?” Tell your partner what you think.