QuickWrite of the Day #55: Shades of Feeling
"Writing can be used as a vehicle to express ourselves as we negotiate the journey through our lives” (Gallagher, 2011: p. 24)
Today’s QuickWrite of the Day:
In her book My Private Property, poet Mary Ruefle writes about the different types of sadness she has experienced, likening these different ‘sadnesses’ to colours. Some of her examples are shown below:
“Gray sadness is the sadness of paper clips and rubber bands, of rain and squirrels and chewing gum, ointments and unguents and movie theaters. Gray sadness is the most common of all sadnesses, it is the sadness of sand in the desert and sand on the beach, the sadness of keys in a pocket, cans on a shelf, hair in a comb, dry-cleaning, and raisins.”
“Brown sadness is the simple sadness. It is the sadness of huge upright stones. That is all. It is simple. Huge, upright stones surround the other sadnesses, and protect them. A circle of huge, upright stones — who would have thought it?”
“Yellow sadness is the surprise sadness. It is the sadness of naps and eggs, swan’s down, sachet powder and moist towelettes. It is the citrus of sadness, and all things round and whole and dying like the sun possess this sadness, which is the sadness of the first place; it is the sadness of explosion and expansion…”
With this in mind, have a go at the following:
Choose a noun that represents an emotion, belief or an idea (eg: love, injustice, racism, joy, grief, anger, boredom, etc.). Write at the top of your page.
Think about the different ways you or others experience this emotion, belief or idea (eg: what are some different experiences you’ve had with love or types of love?) . List these. What does it remind you of? Does it remind you of a particular colour, place, smell, object? What impressions come to mind? What do you see, touch, taste, feel, hear when you think about this feeling, belief or idea? Jot these impressions down.
Finally, have a go at writing about it and see where it takes you!
Want more QuickWrite topics? Check out the slide deck here, or see it in presentation mode on our Resources page.
Happy writing!
