Prompt: Make a record

I write a lot about my own life. Often, my topic is the unusual, meaning something out-of-the-ordinary that has happened to me. But as many of us spend time in our homes, maybe this is a good occasion to celebrate ordinary days.

For this exercise, pinpoint an ordinary, unremarkable, often repeated part of your day. Make it something like peeling potatoes or washing a dish or sitting on your back porch for a quiet cup of coffee.

Pay exquisitely close attention to that dish — the circular motion the hand makes, the slickness of the suds, the way you work at a stubborn spot with your thumbnail. Record the washing of that dish as if future generations are fully dependent upon your record. Tell what it meant to be a person, alive, washing a dish in the pandemic of 2020.