mental writing exercises

Try this if you haven’t already.

Go somewhere crowded but open.  It can’t be some ill lit restaurant with barely any light or some cafe with intimate nooks and crannies.

Find an open floor space with lots of people in it where people come and go all the time.  Shopping mall food courts are good, so are hotel lobbies, or maybe plazas and parks.

Now just sit and watch.  Note the detail of the people coming and going.  How do they walk?  what are they wearing?  are they carrying something?  who are they with?

Take in all of these details, and come up with reasons for them.  That man pushing a stroller with a limp.  How did he get that?  Is that really his kid in the stroller or is he an uncle or maybe grandfather?  The well dressed woman with the Macy’s bag.  What did she buy?  What’s her home life like?  What’s she driving that’s in the shopping mall parking lot right now?

Try to stay conventional at first and come up with “reasonable” explanations but later on as you get more practiced try to branch out.  Make up more and more outrageous things.  Let these people live and breathe in your imagination.  Clothe them in details that your mind provides.