Senses

As a writer (and as a reader) I love descriptive passages where words paint such a vivid picture in one's mind that you feel as if you can literally see what's being described.  But I was thinking today about our senses other than sight.  Descriptive passages the involve one of the other senses aren't as common.

What made me think of this was my morning.  My husband and I awoke early.  And while it was still cooler outside than in, he cracked our bedroom window.  I lay there in bed in that fuzzy place between sleep and awake with eyes closed listening to the world around me.  Car engines, starting and stopping at our corner often drowned out the more calming sound of a bird's sweet call.

As the day changed right before my ears I could hear the sound of a lawn mower trimming our yard to a more acceptable height.  This was interrupted by the sput, sput, sputtering of an engine starved of fuel, followed by the sound of the kitchen door, followed still further by my teenage son's voice informing me about the empty gas tank and the empty gas can.

We use our five senses all of the time, but often because of that frequency we fail to appreciate them.  And maybe that's why we don't always think about writing them into our prose.  It's just food for thought or maybe I should say music for our ears.