25. Seasons
When
the leaves begin to fall from the trees, I have an urge to buy new
school shoes and to fill my pencil case with brand new pencils and rulers.
When the weather begins to get really cold, I can smell the Christmas
trees on the chilly wind, even before they are in the garden centres.
When warm spring days begin to hint at the coming summer, I have in
my mouth a foretaste – almost literally – of chilled rosé
on a terrace in the south of France.
Are you an observant sort of person? If, when driving your car, someone covers the rear view mirror, do you know what's behind you? Do you know, perhaps, what colour it is? Car or motorbike, truck or bus?
It is amazing how many things we notice and dismiss in the time it takes to glance from mirror to road. Because we have noticed them, or we would have many more accidents than we do. It's just that we don't record them for any length of time.
But in your novel, what you see in the rear-view mirror
isn't chance. You have chosen it, selected it from an almost limitless
supply of possible glances …
In order to get a better feel for the process of making those decisions, try taking a scene you have written – maybe a couple, breaking up, by a frozen lake in winter – and transplant it to another season – a crowded lakeside beach in high summer. Each time I've done this it's given me no end of useful new ideas.
