Write with me!

My response to Writing Prompt Wednesday #7 and the prompt for next week.

This year I have a personal goal to do more writing “play”, and so I’m creating weekly prompts for myself which I’ll also share online, in case you’d like to join me. Teachers, you’re welcome to have your classes write with me too! I’m calling this practice Writing Prompt Wednesday and will post the prompts on my website, Instagram, Blue Sky, and Substack.¹

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This week’s prompt gives a line of dialogue to start a scene: “What’s the password?” My approach with a prompt like this is to first brainstorm ways a password could be used: to access a computer system or software program, to enter a secret club, a contestant on the game show Password . . .

Those are the first three things that come to mind for me, and with each association, I can begin to imagine a scene. What I imagine at first is faint, like a sketch in a notebook that I might mentally erase and redraw multiple times. As I’m thinking through my ideas, I ask myself questions about the story tension:

• I imagine two people at a computer—are they working together to figure out a password? Is there a time factor, like they’re under pressure to figure it out before they get caught by someone? Or is the tension between the characters—maybe one is insisting the other show them something on the computer that they don’t want to reveal.

• With the secret club, what kind of club is this? A kids’ clubhouse, a night club, or something else? Why does the character want to be admitted to this club, and why are they worried they might not be allowed in?

• When I imagine the game show setting, I’m assuming the character wants to win, but why? Do they need money? Are they hoping for fame or to impress someone? What if they’re someone who does not like to be wrong, ever? What happens if someone like that is paired with a partner who is very bad at the game—what kind of dynamic would that create?

Of course there are many more directions you could go in too. Can you imagine other scenarios? I’d love to hear about them.

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My Response to Writing Prompt #7

One thing that’s surprised me as I’ve continued with this creative challenge is how most of my responses, if not all, began with me writing something that I didn’t feel particularly enthusiastic about. I jumped on an idea and ran with it for the sake of completing this exercise—not because I’m trying to write something “good” or “publishable.” But almost every time, if not every time, I begin to feel invested as I’m handwriting my thoughts. I feel that pull of curiosity and play that I absolutely love about writing and making up stories. That was the feeling I had hoped to rekindle for myself with this challenge, and these weekly exercises are truly changing my creative mindset for the better.

Pretty much every response I’ve written so far has made me think, “Hmmm, maybe there’s something here . . . Maybe I’ll return to this one day.” But for today’s response, there’s no “maybe” about it. I definitely want to write this story about Melody, her cat Leroy, and the envelope she found under her doormat.

As a refresher, here is the prompt from last week:

And here’s what I wrote: