Wednesday Writing Exercise: The Hidden Arts

Don't think I won't.

Back in another era, I won't tell you how long ago (and those who know, reveal at their own risk. That's right, bows and ribbons when you're not looking; don't think I won't do it), I student taught. I used to think that it was best not to have a personality, and that "teacher" was all my students should ever know about me. The idea was that they would respect a "teacher" but not a person.

This was a horrific failure of an idea.

But as I drove an hour down a mountain at oh-dark-thirty, I'd take out a camera and snap a picture of the rising sun. As the semester went by, the time the sun rose would change, so I'd have different settings of whirly headlights and steam rising off mountain streams. It was my hidden art, the beauty I spared myself that no one knew about.

Do your characters have a hidden art? What kind of art suits them best? How do they indulge, and where do they keep their art? Who knows about it?