May 17, 2021
Dear Diary. Write a diary entry or a letter from your character’s point of view.
When I kept a diary as a pre-teen, it was boring, filled with details of my daily life. What we studied in school, what we had for lunch, who I sat with on the bus. The most exciting thing I did all week was go to my Girl Scout meeting. Perhaps that’s why I can’t imagine any of my characters keeping a diary.
But I could consider The Harmony Duprie Mystery series as Harmony’s diary. With that in mind, what would her first meeting with Eli look like in diary form?
Dear Diary:
Today was story hour at the library. I’ll never confess it to anyone else, but that’s one of the things I miss most about working at the library. I never worked directly with the little ones, but I love seeing their happy little faces. I keep dropping hints, but I don’t know if they’ll ever rehire me, despite the fact that I was innocent. There are a couple old farts on the Board of Directors (cough<Mr. Randall>cough) who still think I was selling drugs. I don’t know if I can wait for them to retire or die to get my job back.
I found the information I’ve been hunting for today, and got a menu from one of Rockefeller’s parties. Everything from oysters on the half-shell to turkey and ham and a variety of desserts. And booze. Lots of booze. And not the cheap stuff, from what I could tell. Rockefeller had money to burn. At least he spent some of it building this library.
My reward was making a trip to the shelves where the library stores historical books about the Victorian area. As I leafed through a book with lots of pictures, I dreamed of living in that era and wearing dresses that floated around me.. Oh, and a big hat with colorful feathers. I’d cling to the arm of my escort, a handsome gentleman with a mustache that curled up at the ends.
I decided to take it back to the table I’d claimed for the day. That’s when I ran into him. Nice looking guy, but with the palest blue eyes I’ve ever seen.
And when I say I ran into him, I mean literally ran into him. Almost fell down but saved myself my grabbing the closest shelf. Dropped my book in the process. He picked it up, handed it to me, and then walked away without giving me a chance to apologize. Man, how embarrassing.
He isn’t from Oak Grove – I would have recognized him. But the weirdest part?
He smelled like dirt. I don’t mean dirty. I mean how the ground smells when you’re planting seeds and the earth is still damp and it smells fresh? That’s what it reminded me of. I don’t know if it was his aftershave or my imagination.
I need to stop by the package store tomorrow. My order of craft beer from Colorado came in. I’m looking forward to trying the one that’s supposed to taste like summer sunshine.
That’s it for tonight, Dear Diary. I want to go read the book I bought about Queen Elizabeth. I wonder if I could learn to be a mechanic?
******
There you go. An entry from Harmony’s diary. I hope you enjoyed reading it. If so, you might want to read The Marquesa’s Necklace if you haven’t already! https://www.pjmaclayne.com/?page_id=232
And one personal note before I run off to check out everyone else’s entries for the week – Happy 93rd birthday, Mom!
The rest of you, until next week, please stay safe.
May 17, 2021
Dear Diary. Write a diary entry or a letter from your character’s point of view.
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Long Victorian floaty dresses…lovely to wear, especially the white ones we see in summer scenes in films and paintings. A pain to wash and keep clean though!
Especially before electric washing machines!
Yes. What a nightmare.
You ever wonder what those people smelled like? I’m fan of Brit costume drama but holy jeez, give me electricity, hot and cold running water, flushable toilets, air conditioning…all that before putting me in one of those floaty dress and army uniform fabric softener commercials. What? Advertising a character who starred in a fabric softener commercial? https://philh52.wordpress.com/2019/09/29/used-dog-food/
They must have all smelled awful, but if they all stank, then probably nobody was aware of it!
And why they wore heavy perfumes!
Herd sensory immunity!
Pooh…
I’m having a hard time imagining you in a floaty-white dress, Phil.
Me, too!
I REALLY enjoyed this! I get a sense of a chaotic mind inside Harmony. Someone who flits from thought to thought. It’s fascinating getting an insight into her inner workings.
i suspect that Harmony has (undiagnosed) ADD. But it’s her unorthodox way of thinking and organizing that has helped her solve her mysteries.
Very real and very relatable, an insight into the mind of what sounds like a fascinating character.
ADD. I second that. The good thing is most real people don’t think in a straight line, our minds operate in draft mode. Someone once told me, paraphrased, “The beauty of fiction is we can throw all that bunny chasing eliptical thought and dialog out the window and hand it off to a character when we need it.” I use my Valley Girl Prima Ballerina to make long stories out of short ones and disrupt everyone around her who tries to stay on a linear path.