Writing activities

I'm starting a new uni course next month and have bought some of the books I need. One of the books is "The Writing Book" by Kate Grenville. Each chapter finishes with some writing exerices. I love this sort of thing. It gets my mind working in different ways and challenges my imagination.

So far I've completed four of the thirteen activities at the end of Chapter one and haven't delved into the fiction world once. I had no idea that there were so many things from my life floating around in my head that could be used as potential stories. Of course as most of the things are written in first person they're coming out a bit like a diary or memoirs but that's fine. I'll still be able to use some of them in fiction stories later.

Here's a sample of what I've been doing. The instructions were to write two paragraphs. One paragraph had to start with "I remember" and the other with "Yesterday I". The paragraphs don't have to be linked in any way. This is what I wrote:

I remember reading through an old composition book from primary school. I loved those times where we could create stories and write them down but I never finished any of the stories started in class. I had it in my head that when the teacher said 'stop' the story had to stop as well. Play time at home was never writing time so even then the stories were left half done, languishing one on top of the other in the back corner of a kitchen cupboard. They hid there, those compostion books, moldering over the years, tempting the desires of a young mind that was at that point incapable of considering completing them. I've forgotten what any of the stories were about; I no longer have any of the books, but I remember the joy of creating a different world to live in, even if just for a short time, and I remember the disappointment and disatisfaction I felt when I couldn't stay in that world and see what happened.

Yesterday I had a great day. I was out all day. It's unusual for me to be out all day and still feel the entire day has been good. Usually I can't wait to get home and dive into one of my fantasy worlds for a time. But yesterday I spent more than two hours with other writers, critiquing and talking about writing. It's invigorating, to speak with other people who think it's perfectly normal for a woman to go to a topless bar with female pole dancers and sit there taking notes on technique and body piercings.