Writing Prompt 68: Remembering
The other day, I recounted a tale to my kids from when I was very young. I'm guessing I'm 3 years old and I'm fairly certain I'm the only child in the car. Any older and my next sister down would be in there too.
But she isn't — at least not in my version of this story. The dog is there, Kimmy, our beautiful Irish red-setter, lying on the back seat next to me.
I have no idea where we were driving to — perhaps to pick up my dad from his army barracks, on leave for the weekend. I remember the late Autumn light, the sun disappearing for the day, the rush of traffic on the dual-carriageway (or maybe it was the motorway). I always liked being in the car at night, the thrill of being up past my bedtime.
Suddenly, a lorry sped past us, heading in the opposite direction, the speed of its tyres sending a stone up into the air, where it then spun down to hit the windscreen of our car. The glass cracked in all directions, sending fine lines from one side to the other, from top to bottom in a fine, starry web impossible to see out from.
My mum slowed the car and pulled onto the hard shoulder. She told me to lean forward and to cover my head with my arms.
I remember the urgency in my mum's voice. I remember sitting behind the driver's seat. I remember my mum wrapping something around her hand and pushing the glass out so very carefully from inside the car to the outside, making sure no splinters of glass were left behind. I remember her telling me to cover my head and face. I think I even remember what I was wearing. I remember the feeling of the cold wind on my face as it filled the car. I remember it started raining.
I can't imagine how difficult this must have been for my mum. I probably thought it was very exciting. As I told my kids the story, I said, "I don't why I remember this. I was so very young."
The Making of a Story
There's a creative writing exercise from The Making of a Story by Alice LaPlante featured in this post, A Way to Write Vivid Details. It seems so perfect to use again for this week's prompt:
“Goal: To pinpoint some previously unexplored material that remains “hot” for you in some important emotional way.
What to do:
1. Scan back over your life and think of things that have stuck in your mind, but for no obvious reason. (No births or deaths or other “important” moments, please. Go for the small ones.)
2. Render them precisely on the page using concrete details, beginning each one with the phrase, “I don’t know why I remember.”
3. Don’t try to explain why they stuck with you, or interpret the meaning of them. Just put your reader there.”
I don't know why I remember...
I say it often. Where do those memories come from? Those from long ago when the world is a place of pure sensation, what you see or hear or smell is where the memory lies.
Take a photograph from your childhood, from when you were very young and study it. What's there? Is there a smell that comes back to you? An emotion? A feeling? Use LaPlante's phrase: I don't know why I remember to find a memory you can write from.
Photo by Tanya Clarke 2023. Disneyland.
