When you write a story, please use your senses.
Often writers just write about what they see and ignore their other four senses. In addition to your ability to see you also have your sense of smell, of hearing, of taste, and touch. Unfortunately, your senses are not as keen as a cat, but no one can have everything. I can hear better than humans, but you have thumbs.
A writer may describe a boat floating on water. They describe the color of the boat and what the water looks like. But the story is flat, like a pancake, or like a two- dimensional drawing of a boat, if the writer only uses their ability to see.
When I read a story about a boat, I want to be in the boat. I want to smell the ocean and hear the sound of the waves. I want to be in the scene as I read it, not sitting on the surface, emotionally detached. And if I am lucky, there will be a mouse in the boat.
Why You Should Use Your Senses When You Write
Your stories will seem more real when you involve your senses in your writing. The reader will be more emotionally involved with the characters if they can smell them. And if the reader can hear the wind blowing, and the ice crunching, they will feel the cold and not just read about it.
You could also try smelling and hearing like a cat to bring your story alive. Unfortunately for you, if you are a human and not a cat, my nose and my ears are more sensitive than yours. A cats sense of smell is fifteen times stronger than a humans. Which is why I like to have my litter box cleaned several times a day.
What Does Your Story Smell Like?
What does your story smell like? Is there a rotting fish on the shore? Can you smell the water? Is it salt water?
What sounds are in your story? Can you pivot your ears like a cat? One of my ears is bent. Yet, I can still hear my typist open my cat food tin in the kitchen when I am in the basement.
Are the waves making a sound as they touch the boat? Can you hear a mouse scratching inside the boat?
Here is an excerpt from my Memoir, The Cat Who Writes: A Tragic Tale of Loss and Redemption, where I use my senses in the writing. I dictate and Mrs. Hodges types.
An Example of Writing Using Your Senses from Pooh Hodges Memoir
It was a dark and stormy night; the rain crashed around our heads as we hid under the eaves of the wood pile beside the garage in the back alley.
“Pooh, you can’t say it was a dark and stormy night, that is the opening line from Paul Clifford, a 1830 novel by Edward Bulwer-Lytton, an English novelist.”
“The line can’t be that famous if I have never heard of it. And, it was a dark and story night. It was late at night when my story begins, so it was dark. It was raining and there was a lot of wind, so it was stormy.
Please don’t interrupt me again Mrs. Hodges. You are the typist and I am the writer.
Now, where was I?”
It was a dark and stormy night. The rain was coming down hard, each droplet felt like a small pebble was being dropped on my fur. We were wet. Very wet. My sister and I were huddled together, with my mother. Then a bright light came closer and closer and closer. I could feel my mother's heart beating as we listened to the sound of a car door slamming and the sound of gravel crunching as someone walked towards us.
The smell of stale garlic was overwhelming as two big hands reached into the woodpile and …
Did you feel like you were there with me in the rain? Could you feel the rain on your fur? Or your skin? Mrs. Hodges and I need to work on my memoir. I tend to take too many naps, and she can't type my story if I don't take the time to dictate it to her. The warmth of the sun from a sunbeam on my fur is so hard to resist.
Do you have to use all 5 senses in a story?
No, you don't have to use all five senses in your story. Decide what aspect of your story you want to emphasis and use the senses that focuses on that aspect of your story. My favorite senses are my nose and my ears. I can smell and hear a mouse even if I can't see it in the grass.
What senses do you use when you're writing a story? Please tell me, I would love to know.
PRACTICE
Take a scene from your work in progress and add smell and sound to it. Or create a new story where you smell and hear like a cat to bring your story alive.
Practice for fifteen minutes. When you're finished, post your story in the comments section. And if you post, please be sure to leave feedback for your fellow writers.
I am excited to read your stories. Maybe there will be a mouse for me.
xo
love Pooh
You are such an adorable darling, Pooh!! #HUGSSSS My pup – Oreo – has an acute sense of hearing and smell too! It’s so hard to fool him *sigh*
Hello Krithika,
As always it is so nice to hear from you. Please give my best to Oreo. He is a smart canine.
xo
Love Pooh
Oh, the sun. How lovely you are. Especially when I’m lying in this window sill and you are warming my gleaming fur. How was it again?
“Give me the splendid, silent sun with all his beams full-dazzling,” The great Walt Whitman once wrote.
Yes, that’s it. This Walt character knew what he was talking about. Smart fellow. For a human.
Oh, here comes my human. Lovely person, always attending to my needs, feeding me, a casual pat on the head, stroking my fur. What’s that? Ah, that dreadful tinkling bell on the door. I absolutely resent that thing. Once tried to demolish it, but my human saw me. Had to act like the perfect cat that won’t do anything foolish. Like breaking and demolishing tinkling doorbells. And I resent the draft that humans bring with them, when entering. It’s fine in the summer time, but autumn and winter not so much. What is it this time? Yet another customer wanting to buy something from my human. And, what will it be, a loaf of freshly baked bread, today’s newspaper, a bag of lovely smelling cookies? Oh, a tin of cat food hey? Lovely human that is.
Love the smell of cookies, by the way. Freshly baked by my human. Love the smell of this old place, period. Its old. Older than my human, even I couldn’t span it with my nine lives, that’s how old this place is. Can even smell the fur of other cats that lived here. As I often lie on the counter I can even smell all the things humans put on it. All the food, the books, the bags. But the food. Now I remember, it’s time for my food, my elevensies, so to speak, or think. Because I can’t speak, you know.
This warmth is making me drowsy with sleep. I can do with a few more minutes of sleep while the beautiful sun warms me up on this lovely spot near the window. No! Not again that dreadful and annoying tinkling bell of the door. Arrgh… One day, when I am big enough, I will get rid of that bell. You’ll see, one day. Zzzz.
Hello my dearest Marco,
I felt like I was in the bakery with your cat. The warmth from the sunbeam and the smell of the baking made me want to eat a loaf of fresh bread.
And your writing was so real I too wanted to get rid of the bell. It kept waking me up when I tried to fall asleep.
All my best,
xo
Love Pooh
The alarm is alarming.
Why haven’t I changed it? I hold my hand to my heart to make sure it stays in place. The sound is enough motivation for me to expose my bare feet to the cold hardwood floor. I stop the beeping as I fumble with the screen.
At the thought that I won’t hear it again for twenty-four hours, I breathe deeply.
I wish I were breathing in the scent of coffee or even bacon, but no. It is mostly the smell of unwashed laundry.
I didn’t bother stepping over it. The soft shirts were a welcome cushion for my feet.
It’s quiet enough for me to hear my arm brush against the stacks of boxes as I squeeze between them and the dresser. Why didn’t I throw everything away instead of moving it here with me?
As I reach the kitchen, I’m already distracted from my plans for the day.
Hello my dearest M.C. Starbuck,
I had goosebumps on my skin as you brushed your arm against the stack of boxes. I felt like I was squeezing myself between them and the dresser too.
Why didn’t you throw everything away instead of moving it. Your detailed descriptive writing makes me want to know more about you.
Why didn’t you do your laundry?
A small slice of your life makes me want to read more.
All my best,
Love Pooh
Wonderful! I love the juxtaposition – the wish for the scent of coffee and bacon, when instead the nose is clogged with dirty laundry scents. I love how all the senses (except taste) are portrayed.
Amazing. I am genuinely amazed. Keep up the fantastic work!
I’m intrigued to know where she is, why she moved, and yes, why didn’t she throw the stuff away when she moved. I like the soft shirts being welcome cushion for her feet – it makes me think there is more going on there. Why does she need a cushion for her feet? Well done. Oh yeah! The smell of coffee or bacon first thing in the morning 🙂
Landing gear pulled to the body at just the right moment. When mind and body are one. Lifting into the grey muted morning, seeing only brilliance. As the normal pecking order below fades in a slow twist of time.
Solitude rides upon sleek wings. Mind on auto pilot it is only the lightness of being and of being unpurpouslfuly connected to those who also enjoy the crisp moring lift. Moments of freedom feel like hours.
In my mind I am that pigeon circling over head. Belly a little empty, all the better to catch the air streams and glide before turning again. Fellow pigeons pop their wings at each flap, a genetic snap to keep from flailing and getting lost in the vast opportunity of space. We rise as one and land as one. Always knowing deep where the home source of food and heat. Natural GPS.
Soaring over trees, sharp beak piercing . Entombed in grace this morning, away from life’s unceasing race is a gift my imagination has bestowed. I will remember this weightlessness, all tumbleweed thoughts gone, for the rest of the day.
When feeling weighted by fear or lonliness, I will return to my uncommon unique, elegant pigeon-persona. Taking breath into that space to lift my landing gear, to lift my head and be free. Knowing instinctively I am at home within myself, the pleasure of releasing all stress into the wind. Brave. STRONG. Satisfied in my flight away for the moment.
Hello my dearest Antonella,
“Solitude rides upon sleek wings.” Such strong imagery. Are you sure you didn’t really turn into a pigeon and fly?
I hope you have a day filled with wonder, and that the feelings of fear and loneliness are gone.
All my best,
xo
Love Pooh
Sometime seeing through the eyes animals or even a Neutral Object (a tree or a Native flute), is easier than writing from my own human perspective. I helps Me see the ordinary as extraordinary. That is what my blog is starting to become.
novinotes.net
I understand how you feel Antonella,
Sometimes I pretend I am a person and write from their perspective. Thank you for sharing your blog.
xo
Love Pooh
It was a late night at Austin Lee Medical Center when Amy Hyun woke up. The incessant shuffling of the nurses’ scrubs and moan of the neighboring patients reminded her of what she had just gone through. Regaining strength, Amy tossed her head to see a small little baby, swaddled in the typical cotton blanket. Tossing her head in the other direction, she observed her slumbering husband snoring softly with his head cocked uncomfortably to the left. The bathroom light and the lamp on the bedside table were the only lights to brighten the sterile white room. Amy could only feel happy, though in much pain, as she observed the delicate details of her new baby. The ache of her body was overwhelming as she went to take the baby into her arms. Soft-skinned, sweet-smelling, and quite pink, the baby snuggled onto her chest, making goosebumps rise on her chest. It had been a long time Amy had waited for a child of her own, and now as she gazed at the sleeping child, she knew her life was complete.
This is so sweet! 🙂
The only thing that sort of bothered me was the use of “tossed” for when Amy turns her head. I just picture someone paralyzed from the neck down kind of uncontrollably lolling their head around. A better verb might just be “turned” or perhaps “rolled” if you want to convey some exhaustion.
I liked the detail about her husband’s head cocked uncomfortably to the left. That made for a comedic and realistic little detail.
Hello my dearest Olivia,
I agree with Kimberly, this is a sweet story.
The details of the sounds from the nurses scrubs and smell of the baby helped me feel what Amy was feeling.
xo
Love Pooh
It’s been forty years since I had my youngest child, but your description of the little baby – that sweet baby smell and the softness of the skin brought it all back for me 🙂
Beautiful beyond English words is this beautiful collection of English words. I genuinely love it.
Three days after the “ordeal” and still reporters plague me.
Just because I was trapped in a deep and dark cave for days, doesn’t mean that
I want to relinquish all forms of privacy. Just seeing a camera instantly
transports me to the first day of freedom; when I had agreed to do an interview
about the cave…
“Cerin! What was it like to be stuck in a cave for a week?”
“Well”, I had answered, “there are times that people do not
need eyes. When the darkness is so absolute, you can’t see your hand in front
of your face, let alone be able to tell whether or not your eyes are open. The
sounds are amplified. A single drip of water can be heard from miles away. As I
found out in my wandering.
“When you are in a cave there are two things that you need
to know: how to get out and where you can get supplied in case you get stuck. I
knew neither of these things. All I knew was that I woke up deep in the cave
with an awful hangover. I thought I was blind…there are no words that can
describe that darkness. Deeper than pitch, yet thick as blood. Thick enough to
strangle you; each breath was full of this black. You can feel in coating your
lungs, trickling into your bloodstream, coating you, inside and out, with
darkness.
“The first few hours or days are spent in shock, feeling the
darkness push against your skin, drowning you in foreign sensations. The rocky
feel of the floor and wall, the feel of slick blood that covers your hands
after finding the roughest parts of the rock. The jagged edges that slice into
the bottoms of bare feet…the soft roughness of moss and fungus that feels like
bliss. Before the cave I shied away from moss, but in that cave it saved me. Moss
was used as makeshift bandages on cut skin with gooey, sticky mud as the
plaster to keep it on.
“Eventually the shock wears off and your ears start to work.
Acoustic in cave are beautiful to musicians…sound pings and dances off of every
surface. Somewhere far away water drips off of a stalactite, pinging and
ringing through the passages. It doesn’t take long for the novelty of the sound
to wear off. Rats, mice and all manner of skittering creatures can be heard as
if they are right next to you. Skitter, skritch, scamper…it is impossible to
keep a clear head. Especially when sense of smell kicks in. The mud that was so
glorious earlier is now rank. Bat droppings and mouse droppings join in the
stink…worse that chicken dung in the summertime.
My dearest Helaine,
Your story of being in a cave must be true. You described it so vividly, I had to go and find a sunbeam to lay in after I read it.
I can’t imagine the horror of being in such total darkness.
I hope you have a glorious day filled with sunshine and nice smells.
xo
Love Pooh
This story is not true, not one bit. The only caves I’ve ever been in are caverns with guides that show off the safest, bright lit areas. I apologize if I frightened you too much.
Hello My dearest Helaine,
How amazing that the story is not true. And, not too worry. I enjoy a dramatic story.
“Cerin! What was it like to be stuck in a cave for a week?” Is he kidding? I’m surprised your MC didn’t grab him by the throat and scream, “What do you think it was like you moron?” Bat and rat droppings – not nice! But oh so right in this cave scene. Now I want to know how she got out and how she found herself in this predicament.
Me too Anna,
I wonder how she got in the cave and I wonder how she got out. Maybe a brave cat helped her.
Hmm…I had been thinking that a sphynx (the mythical creature) would help him out…but a sphynx cat named pooh could work better
Helaine,
I would save you. Always, just whistle, and I will come into the cave.
Thanks Pooh! If I choose to keep writing that scene, Cerin will be helped out of the dark by a kind gentlecat named Pooh
Awesome. I am literally, genuinely awed. The world needs more vivid prose like this. So much more.
Thank you! It was A lot of fun to write, just like writing should be.
Pooh, you are a very clever cat!! Thank you for this post! 🙂
My dearest Lotta,
Thank you for your kind words.
I wish you all my best,
xo
Love Pooh
I pounded down the track like a St. Bernard promised one of those peanut butter Milkbones. The wind tugged at my ponytail, my legs, my arms, trying to stop me as I fought against it and those in the lanes around me.
Heavy breathing to my left.
An asthmatic from the raspy, desperate noises coming from her throat. I almost felt a pang of sympathy for her, but sympathy isn’t something you feel when you run. When you run, you feel only tiny pricks of nervousness and a burning pain in your arms, legs, face, body–running hurts. Maybe that’s why I love it so much.
I couldn’t tell whether the faint scent of popcorn was cheering me on or taunting me. The screams of the crowd were faint, only the most random noises and sights and smells catching my attention as I rounded a corner and lifted my chin for the last gut-grinding spurt to the finish. More popcorn. A little boy calling for his mother. Feet pounding just behind me, threatening my position. My breathing and heartbeat, two rhythms competing for dominance in my head.
Just one other girl was ahead of me, her long black ponytail swishing hypnotically in the wind. About 7 feet behind her and only 6 more yards to go, I knew I wouldn’t be able to catch up. My throat seized as I felt the urge to vomit, to crumple, to slow down for just a second if only to relieve the sharp ache in my calves as they thudded against the brick red track again and again. The rasping faded slightly as the runner to my left began to falter.
“Keep your eyes fixed on the finish line.” The words of my old gym teacher from year 6 echoed in the back of my mind, faint enough so as not to distract me but reminding me that I couldn’t think of anything but winning. Mrs. Rose was always so considerate. Five more yards. Four. Three. Two.
I practically bounded over the line drawn in melting white, taking a few more leaps before slowing to a walk. Keep walking. Walking. My shaking legs gave out, my brain protesting but unable to keep my body in line. Lungs burning, legs burning, face burning, the salty stench of sweat permeating my shirt, hair, and nostrils, I lay on the sticky red ground for an eternity.
“Runners to the starting line, please.”
A faint groan escaped my throat, and I pushed myself up, the feeling of getting out of bed at 5 am intensified ten times.
Second place.
A good run.
Hello Kimberly,
Thank you for sharing your practice. This story left me really tired. Your descriptions of the person running beside you sounded just like Mrs. Hodges when she tries to run.
You protagonist was so brave to make it all the way to the finish line.
I wish you all the best,
xo
Love Pooh
A good run indeed! I’m an asthmatic, so I felt for her fellow runner, but I could also feel the MC’s pain. The burning sensation in her chest as she gasps for breath. Then the bliss of collapsing on the ground in exhaustion. You wrote that beautifully.
A/N: This is a story about what happens right after May and I find the city of gold when we’re seventeen. (To be fair, May did most of the work. I was pretty much her sidekick, as usual.) I hope ya like it!
====================================================================
After that I didn’t see her again for a few days, maybe a week. I kept tossing that name around in my head she’d told me at the end of our adventure. “Scott Peterson,” she had said, before leaving the city of gold, and me in it to be hounded by the flashing lights and drowning inquiries of the press. She’d really just said it more to the air than to me, but either way I couldn’t get it out of my head. I was a pretty obsessive kid, to be honest.
The next week I walked through the slumps of Miami on my way to Vicky’s house on the other side of town, just to see what she was up to. The projects were in between. I didn’t like going through the projects too much, mainly because I am afraid of gangs like a small dog is afraid of a hawk, but I’d left my wallet at home so I couldn’t drive or take the bus, so I just walked it. The area smelled exactly like pure carbon monoxide fresh out of a factory, as though the “project” in question was to cause global warming. I started to regret having come this way at all as I began to hear fading sirens coming from at least two or three different directions. Glad I did though, because that’s where I found her.
“May?” I ask, walking up to the edge of a torn-down store that had, presumably, been built six-feet off the ground on concrete blocks to protect it from hurricane damage. You can see how that turned out. Two beams that supported the front wall of the shop remained upright and holding part of the destroyed nameplate of the building. I surveyed the inside and found no one besides my girlfriend, but definite evidence of previous tenants, including busted coolers, old blankets, and a number of used syringes. “What are you doing here?”
“Oh, hey Colby,” she responded blankly, her gaze still fixed on the building opposite us. She was sitting on what used to be the floor, wearing the magic denim jacket she can’t seem to ever shake, a black ImagineDragons hoodie, jeans, and her green soccer cleats. She’d won a lot of games in those cleats, and she always told everyone it was due to the fact that they blended in with the grass, her cleats did, and the other team could never tell which way her feet were pointed when she had the ball. But it was winter now. She probably just wore them by accident; but then again when had I ever known May Lakewater to do something by accident?
“What are you doing here?” I repeated. Her eyes were still locked on a project home across the street. It was almost rotting, the graffiti-ridden mess of brick and plaster, with just as many windows broken on it as not. “Where have you been?”
“Shh…” she whispers, holding an index finger out. She’s staring intently. I can see it in her eyes, through her huge, nerdy glasses. They magnify the size and ferocity of her green irises, the exact green of the inexplicably worn cleats. I actually think those glasses are kind of adorable, but I never tell her this. I don’t know why.
“I’m investigating a crime,” she said, her voice an accent just slightly Amerindian. She did that often, investigate crimes. The ironic thing is that she didn’t actually have a license to investigate crimes, so technically what she was doing was a crime itself, but she really couldn’t care less. “See that building?”
“Yeah?”
“That building is home to the largest gang of organized crime in the entire city of Miami, all suburbs and outskirts included. That building is home to one Dr. Michael Scott Peterson, the greatest criminal mastermind to ever live under the roof of government housing.”
“What’s so special about him?” I ask.
“Oh, nothing really,” she replies. She turns, breaking her stare, and looks down at me through her glasses. “He’s only a master of martial arts, a speaker of twenty-two languages, a doctor of mathematics, a pioneer in the genre of rap music known as, ‘gangstah,’ a man who feels the need to let the world know that he owns fifty different styles of underwear but not a single belt, a backstabbing Alexander the Great of burglary, robbery, and blackmail, and to top it all off, a semi-professional player.” She took not one breath in saying it all.
“What the h*** are we doing within a thousand miles of him then?!” I shout. I’m telling you, I am terrified of gangs. I don’t even know why, really, but I just am. They freak me out. The only thing I’m more scared of than gangs, though, is gang-members. And I know exactly why: I had a friend who was mugged by a few gang-members once, and that friend has never been able to walk straight since.
“Well how else are we supposed to shut his empire down?” she answers back. I then realize what she is doing here, and that I am being pulled, once again, into one of her crazy plans.
“May, we are children,” I reason. “Don’t you think this is a job for the police or something?”
“We found the freaking city of gold, Colby!” she exclaims. “That took the police 600 years to do! We can’t wait that long on this!”
“But we’re unarmed minors walking into an abandoned project building!” I protest in vain.
“You mean you didn’t even bring your sword?” She says, hopping down with a finger on the ground as she lands. One of her cleats lands right on top of an empty old paper McDonald’s cup, releasing the expired smell of long-gone Coke into the air. “Honestly, Davidson, I’ve come to expect better of you.”
“What, so you’re going to bring your sword into criminal-occupied territory?”
Her glasses had fallen down her nose a bit as she fell, so she adjusted them back to where they were. “Of course not! I’m not an idiot, you know,” she says. “I brought yours.”
Colby, my dearest,
Your descriptions of the smell and the sound put me right in the story with you. I was a bit nervous about the gang you described as I forgot to bring my sword along. And I really want to read more.
Your characters seemed so real to me. I wish I had a pair of green sneakers.
All my best,
xo
Love Pooh
p.s. Will you please tell me where I can read the rest of the story?
I’m working on it right now. I hope to release it along with some other of our adventures together in a novel format, but I’ll be sure to post the next bit somewhere soon. Thank you so much! I love being part of a community!
Your story makes me wonder where in the world, or which foreign dimension/time, your story is set in. The detailing is amazing. Great job!
Thank you so much! The characters are from this little town on the edge of Florida called Ayrelby, and it’s filled with the magic of a previous world called Edenia. It’s a suburb of Miami, even though Ayrelby is like and literally a million years older than Miami, and Vicky lives across town in actual Miami, on the other side of the hood. Colby has the blood of many past chosen heroes in his veins, and May has some big secrets regarding the jacket. This is a part of the biggest story I have ever written, so I’m not sure when it will be published, but it is literally my life’s work, so you can bet that you’ll see these two in print some day. Oh yeah, and it takes place in 20XX.
-Best wishes,
Colby Davidson
“They magnify the size and ferocity of her green irises, the exact green of the inexplicably worn cleats” That is a great line! If this were a book, I’d definitely read it. The only little niggle for me was the MC speaks more like an adult than a minor, but that’s the only criticism I can make 🙂
Thank you! I had no idea this would get so much positive feedback. I love this community!
If you could tell me which one of the characters MC is, or like, what MC means, I would greatly appreciate it. I really enjoyed your piece about the prisoner, too!
Sincerely yours,
-Colby Davidson
Hi Colby, the MC is the Main Character – in this case the character telling the story 🙂
Oh, right, that’s what I thought. Again, thank you!
-Colby
Oh Pooh, My heart was pounding when Mom read me about he dark and stormy night and the hands. And the wood pile. Now you must tell me what happened. Mom likes storms. I do not. Edelweiss.
Hello Edelweiss,
The hands were kind hands. They took us to an animal shelter.
I don’t like storms either.
All my best,
xo
Love Pooh
He had been there for what seemed an eternity, and was on talking terms with every ant and rat that crawled through the crack in the corner of the room. He knew every gouge in the walls and every watermark on the ceiling.
When it rained, water coursed down the wall near the window and flooded half
the floor, making his prison a cold, dank torture. At night, the only light
came from a single globe in the ceiling, flickering now and threatening to
extinguish itself. When it did, the darkness would be absolute. His hand moved
over his beard, it was a good two or three inches long, which, he figured, probably
meant he’d been here for at least two month — maybe even longer.
His own body odor sickened him and as bone chilling as the rain was, he stood
near the window when it rained to try to wash away some of the smell. He
suffered for it after; especially if it rained at night and he had to huddle in
the corner wrapped in the one threadbare blanket that was his only warmth.
He didn’t know who his captors were, or why they were keeping him prisoner. He
only knew there were voices on the other side of the door. Sometimes he could
hear laughter; that was the worst – the laughing – there was something about it
that made his skin crawl.
Whoa. I am officially blown away. Thank you on behalf of the world for this remarkable prose.
Best wishes,
-C. Davidson
Thanks so much Colby. I’m not sure if he’s going to escape yet, we’ll have to wait and see 😀