In a recent Oro Valley Writers’ Forum meeting, we were given a prompt to write for five minutes from the point of view of an object. Prompts are always fun challenges for me, so I put pencil to paper and began. This is my short short story from the POV of an object.
I’m always the last to know what was for dinner. I get the detritus of the meal. I can only surmise how good it tasted or sometimes I am really happy I missed it all altogether. Those goopey gravy-laden things are not my favorites. Hard to choke down. On the other hand, I really don’t appreciate the crusty stuff that I have to scrub, or else I hear Madame complain that she will have to replace me. I do my best. I welcome the well-rinsed pot and plate.
Then there are the glasses – don’t get me started. Young master drinks milk, then lets the glass sit without rinsing, and a hard ring forms at the bottom. How am I supposed to get that out?? I don’t have fingers, you know – nothing that can reach in and rub the ring away. Again, I get grief for my performance because the glass doesn’t sparkle in the sunshine. Oh my, it is a hard life.
I overheard one of Madame’s friends talk about how she has never used her appliance for washing dishes. Her husband has somewhat of a drinking problem, but she enjoys a tipple now and again. Her appliance holds all the liquor in her house, so her husband won’t find it. He would NEVER think of opening the dishwasher.
As it happened, the last thing I did before leaving the house that morning was to turn on our dishwasher. It was the first thing I thought of when given this prompt. Try it yourself. Write a short essay or poem from the point of view of an inanimate object and see what happens.
wonkagranny 
We use a similar prompt in some our writing classes:
1. Write about an ordinary moment from this morning. 2. Now rewrite that same moment from a different point of view — and consider using the POV of an inanimate object or a pet.
It’s always fun to see how different both the content and the tone can be when the writers play with POV.
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I love it Amanda! I’ll use that in my next critique group. We always do prompts too. Good exercise for skills. Thank you.
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Hi Diana, This was great!! It made me think of my love/hate relationship with the scale and what the scale must think as I head toward it in the morning. Fear for my incredulous outbursts or joy from my happy reaction to the morning reading.
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Thank you, Gail, for reading and mostly for commenting. I truly appreciate the feedback.
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Write about what you know, but never would the thought of the dishwasher have occurred to me, even if it were the last appliance I touched. Crafty woman hiding the booze in the dishwasher.My Dad, the engineer, had specific ideas about how the dishes should be loaded for maximum effect. I guess my mom, tired of taking “direction,” made the command decision to delegate this job to him for the duration after we kids were adults. I never saw her load the dishwasher again.
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Thank you for your comment, Jan. I like your mom’s way of thinking. I have tried it too. If I get too much grief about HOW I’m doing a task I turn it over to the complainant. It’s not my job any longer. It is amazing how that stops micro-managers.
I am always amazed at what my mind leaps to when I do prompts. It surprises me every time. I did hear from a friend about a woman who used her dishwasher as a liquor cabinet and that popped into my head as the five minute writing time was about to expire. Never know when a random piece of gossip will come in handy.
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