Alarm-Bell City
Saturday Morning Writing Prompt
Have you ever tried to tell yourself you weren’t in danger when inside it was alarm-bell city? Have you ever ignored your intuition or told yourself you were overreacting? Maybe you just didn’t want to seem rude. Maybe you were checked out. We mostly think of gaslighting as something someone else does to us, but sometimes we gaslight ourselves.
How do you convey, on the printed page, those moments that land on the edge of uh-oh, and those moments when we sort through our cultural conditioning and try to make sense of how to react.
Tell a story in which you or another character gets activated and then second-guesses their own internal alarm system. Maybe they aren’t in danger after all.
Begin in a sensory scene. Where is this character? What can they see, feel, smell, taste, and hear? What does the light seem to be like? Is someone else there? Has someone recently left or is someone coming soon? Immerse us in the cinematic moment, making us feel like we ourselves are practically there, practically the one in danger—or not. Once you’ve set the scene with at least a paragraph or two, you can start letting us in on your character’s inner dialogue.
What happened next?
Somewhere in this story include a snake, a coming storm, or your own literary symbol that represents danger. The symbol can be dramatic, but let the way it appears in the story be understated, almost something we could ignore.
Write for 20 minutes. Draw snakes in the margins when you get stuck.
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Psst. Time to sign up for fall and winter classes in the Literary Kitchen:
Ariel. That is such a scary snake. It’s Sunday morning!