Assignment

See if you can focus on dialogue this week in your journal entries. Listen to the dialogue around you. It doesn't have to be a long dialogue. One writer overheard two men talking at the local tennis club. He wrote in his journal this brief exchange:

"Sure is raining out there."

"Yeah, we got real duck weather on our hands."

Try to make three entries during the week, at least one half-page each. (Feel free to write more.)

Other ideas:

1. Find a photograph (or a newspaper advertisement) featuring two people. Write a dialogue between the two people, based on the situation or emotion you see.

2. Turn on the TV to a weekly drama and then turn the sound on mute. Listen for a few minutes and then write the dialogue you think is going on.

3. Write an imaginary dialogue between you and someone you need to speak to but are afraid to - or they are far away.