Assignment: Being Nice
In this assignment for my writing class, we had to write about a child who has to deal with the problem of being told to be nice, even if that denies their real feelings. The child needs to either decide to deny their feelings, or else let their feelings out and face the results of not being “nice.”
“Mommy?” Katylyn stood in the kitchen doorway, watching her mother put something in the microwave.
“What is it, honey?”
“You said I suppose to be nice to everybody.”
“Yes, that’s right. You need to be nice to everybody.” Her mother started stirring a pot on the stove.
Katylyn frowned. “Even monsters?”
“Even monsters. If you’re nice to the monsters, then they’ll be nice to you.”
“Even big green monsters?”
“Yes, even big green ones. Be nice to everybody.” The microwave beeped.
“Even evil monsters?”
Her mother sighed. “Honey, Mommy’s busy fixing dinner. Just be nice to everyone. Now go clean up your toys in your room, OK?”
“OK.” Katylyn climbed the stairs to her room, closed the door, and took a running leap onto her bed. Lying on her tummy, she clutched the bedspread and gradually lowered her head and shoulders until she could peer under the bed.
Three red eyes glowed dully in the middle of a slimy green face.
“Mommy says I suppose to be nice to you, and you be nice to me.”
Very humorous! I’ve noticed that most of your writing is funny. Are your short stories humorous too?
Well, the story that’s a finalist with Writers of the Future contest is definitely not humorous. (I mean, it has a bit of humor, but it’s a serious story.) The one that’s a finalist with the Phobos contest is a combination of satirical humor and semi-hard science fiction, which is not an easy combination.
I finished two more stories last year; one was very short and had no humor at all, and the other was long and had some humor, but was serious overall.
So that’s one humorous story out of four.
I think the reason my writing examples may seem humorous is that I like putting twists in things. Most (if not all) humor is based on incongruity of some sort, something that does not fit with our expectations. So sometimes my twist ends up being humor.
However, sustaining a humorous tone for a longer piece can be very difficult.
For example, if I ended up turning this assignment into a short story, it would not be a humorous story. The monster would be real, and evil, and the consequences of Katylyn being nice to it would not be so nice.
(My writing teacher thought this would be a good start to a children’s story. That shows how differently we think.)
Yeah, that makes sense. I like the twists you do, very clever.