Teacups and Rhinoceroses

On the team retreat, we did a team-building exercise called the Teacup Game. Laura put a teacup on a table in the middle of us, and told us: Write five sentences about the teacup. Then we went around the circle and read our sentences. The point of the activity was to show how various people approach situations and problems differently.

Many people made lists of the teacup’s features: pink and yellow flowers, gold rim, saucer, ornate handle, etc.

Phillip’s included: “If the teacup is really porcelain, it could probably hold up a small car.”

Mary Beth’s was a paragraph about the teacup’s four generations of owners.

My first instinct was to write a descriptive list – I thought that’s what I was supposed to do. But instead I started mine: “A rampaging rhinoceros overturned the table and shattered the teacup to bits.”

I think maybe I’ve had a similar attitude towards blogging lately. My first instinct is that I ought to chronicle the “big” things that have happened – rafting, teaching at Natalie’s school, SEE ministries, etc. But why should I do that? Why shouldn't I embrace my inner Virginia Woolf and write whatever I take a mind to writing?