Sense-able
by Nan Fischer

Here is an exercise I enjoy. It makes you dig deep and focus on things that pass you by.

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In a journaling class, the prompt was simply "Write with your senses." There was no introduction or discussion. We got the prompt, and it was up to us students to discover through our writing whatever we needed or wanted to. This is my 10 minute freewrite, using my senses.

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3/23/00 Senses

Close my eyes. feel the floor. just took off my shoes for comfort. floor felt cold. put my shoes back on. decided not to focus on THAT sense -- feeling, physically -- because i was uncomfortable, FAST! taste. the dry bland taste in my mouth is prominent this cloudy sleepy morning. But even tho' it wants me to focus on it, I don't. It's too obvious. I hear the wall clock ticking. hearing -- so I listen. the clock ticks. the seconds are passing - slowly. Ann takes a slow deep breath. i silence myself to listen. tick tock tick tock. the seconds aren't moving any faster than before. i can tell the clock is high on the wall to my left. now as i write i cough. It echoes off that high wall - all of them and the ceiling. Has this room always been an echo chamber? with a large group of people, sounds probably get absorbed. Just a few here today makes the room seems cavernous. my pen scratches across the page. my sweatshirted arm drags across the table and page. Another deep breath from somewhere behind me. Other arms and hands dragging across their pages. the hum of the florescent lights. A phone rings loud. A faraway cough, a page crisply turning. no wind, no crows. things you hear, and things you don't hear. Amazing what you can hear when you really focus on it. A deep sigh. Another one. The walls creaking, warming up. a notebook creaks as a pen pushes harder on it. Rhonda sniffles. A gentle throat-clearing. A chair moves slightly. Time to go. keep listening.

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I clearly remember writing this. I had my pen on the paper and my ears on the outside world. I listened for everything and heard the tiniest breaths, sighs, coughs, shuffles. It was amazing, then I realized what I didn't hear, which were the louder spring sounds, like wind and crows. Reading this tonight, I feel as though I closed my eyes and wrote, just listening. But my eyes were open on the page, and my ears were just open.

Do it. Write with your senses. Close your eyes, if you want, unless of course the sense you choose is 'seeing'! Take in all of it, every little thing. Touch with your eyes closed, absorb your surroundings, and heighten your awareness of things overlooked.

Have fun with this, and do it more than once, with each of the senses. The writing will differ, depending on your physical, emotional and mental space, and each sense will bring up different observations.

Try writing with each sense in one sitting. Close your eyes and listen. Then open your eyes and see. Touch and smell things around you. Taste whatever you can. Absorb your environment completely with all the senses. Notice how much you aren't aware of without taking the time to focus on it.