update from sparkleup

diary/2023-01-01.md

@@ -19,4 +19,26 @@
     * more than a physical comparison.
         * Bad: "his legs were thick like tree-trunks"
         * Good: imbue with something much larger. "His legs were thick like he had dedicated himself to becoming a statue, some solid object people admired and pointed toward"
-    * 
+    * gets more to the essence
+    * transcends the expected:
+        * Bad: "Her hair was matted like the dog's fur"
+        * Good: "Her hair was matted like it was full of the past week's interruptions" --- more abstract, gives interiority/inner life
+    * Helps avoid just describing a character's body
+    * Emotional register:
+        * Bad: "My father looked like a beat up, salt-rusted jalopy" --- unexpected in a bad way
+        * Good: "My father looked like a long year that has gone in the direction of sorrow" --- shifts literal image to figurative
+        * "Her hair, falling into your lap, shining like metal, a color that when you think of it, you cannot name"
+    * Metaphors require more suspension of disbelief, so much more that can go wrong
+4. Flash simile exercise --- abstract to concrete, then concrete to abstract (or unexpected concrete) --- take risks
+    1. *Waves unfurled like* too many onrushing thoughts
+    2. *The child trembled like* urgent supplications to any and all saints
+    3. *The memories came back to him* like it fucken wimdy (I forgot to write this one down whoops)
+    4. *After the snowstorm, the neighborhood looked like* it had been tucked in for a quiet nap after a tantrum
+    5. *August was as hot as* unyielding need.
+    6. *To her, happiness was suspicious like* a dog confronted by a rubber snake.
+    7. *Jealousy is a rock, he said. It feels like* some pebble in your shoe, gnawing at your heel.
+    8. *The days dragged on like* a dog's lolling tongue on a sleepy summer's day.
+    9. *The cold was heavy and oppressive. It felt like* handcuffs or a cloth gag or perhaps a bandit's rope binding you to a broken chair.
+5. Writing prompt: write a long paragraph describing a place or a landscape, or a scene from childhood. Using some of the techniques we've studied together and executed together. Maybe take your own work, identify spots where you can vary the syntax, and fill it out.
+    * Reed scuffed his heel against the pavement of the street. New Year’s Eve, and everyone was still inside. Bars: full. Restaurants: packed. There were a few scattered couples or groups around, but they were all walking with purpose. Champagne called. Canapes. Crudites.
+    * Reed scuffed his heel against the pavement of the street, *rough and coarse like a hungover tongue*. New Year’s Eve, and everyone was still inside. <s>Bars: full. Restaurants: packed.</s> *The bars were full and the restaurants were packed and the bodies pressed in close around the heat-lamps and the voices were loud and the feet were tired.* There were a few scattered couples or groups around, *little knots of friends tangling up sidewalks, finding awkward routes around trees and bollards,* but they were all walking with purpose. Champagne called. Canapes. Crudites.