Write Something New Today: A Moment That Changed Everything
A memory springboard writing exercise
Question: What do these three stories have in common?
Breath by Bruce Johnson, published in wigleaf.
Egg Toss, August 1989 by Meagan Cass, published in SmokeLong Quarterly.
Dinosaur by Bruce Holland Rogers, published in The Sun Magazine.
(Go read them now. They’re short. They’re very good. Just don’t forget to come back here once you’re done.)
Or perhaps a more specific question: What do you think ‘springboarded’ all three stories into existence?
In my opinion, it’s a childhood memory.
The narrator in Breath remembers a game they used to play with a troubled kid.
In Egg Toss, the narrator recalls their sister’s ninth birthday party.
And the protagonist of Dinosaur begins and ends with their childhood dream occupation (because who doesn’t want to be a dinosaur?).
Each story is structured, styled and handled completely differently, of course — such is the glorious variety of flash fiction (and fiction in general):
Breath is a passing moment that lingers on into a reflective adult perspective.
Egg Toss is a freeze frame, somehow veering into future tense to describe something that happened 35 years ago.
And Dinosaur spans a whole lifetime in the space of three paragraphs.
But each of them begins with, and is centred around, some sort of childhood memory.
Which is a rich and endless source of story springboarding if ever I saw one…
In fact, there are three perfect story-inspiring prompts right there.
In fact, those three initial concepts might even create ideas upon ideas, when you get to thinking about it:
Rodney and I believed if we held our breath too long we might die.
Write about something you* believed when you were a kid. Or a game you made up with a friend. Or someone you were told not to play with.In my memory my sister’s ninth birthday is always almost over.
Write about a childhood birthday party that goes wrong. Or something you did to upset someone you wish you could take back. Or an instruction/warning (careful/gentle) that you didn’t heed.When he was very young, he waved his arms, snapped his massive jaws, and tromped around the house so that the dishes trembled in the china cabinet. “Oh, for goodness’ sake,” his mother said. “You are not a dinosaur! You are a human being!”
Write about an impossible thing you wanted to be as a small child. Or the things that made you feel small. Or all the things you have forgotten.
[*For the purposes of this, ‘you’ could genuinely mean you (i.e. drawing upon your own memories), or you could leap off these springboards and make up a host of imaginary scenarios. There are no rules. Do what you like.]
Maybe one of those ideas has stuck with you (grab it, run with it).
Maybe… you could scribble down a few notes about it right now (go on then).
Maybe your train of thought will lead you somewhere entirely different (go with it), or generates a whole load of other layers and themes and subtexts to explore (go, go, go).
Maybe you could even incorporate an element of this idea into an existing work-in-progress — as backstory, a brand new scene, or something significant to one of your characters (take it, steal it, adapt it).
Or maybe you could simply start with a single line and see where it goes (doesn’t matter where, just keep going).
And if you’re still staring at a blank page, maybe one of these pictures might help:
Look. An endless fountain of ideas can spring from one single concept (yeah, yeah, I’m mixing my metaphors, whatever).
Go back to the beginning and re-read those three stories — entirely different, unique, cleverly-constructed stories — all based around the same basic idea. The same basic idea that any of us could use as a springboard.
So take an idea — any idea — and let your thoughts join the dots, scrawl down random connections, inspirations, and ‘ooh this could maybe be kind of a story maybe’ musings.
Who knows where they’ll go?
LOVED this Jo! You've inspired me to write about my 10th bornday party at McDonald's in Crystal Palace...!