Writing Prompts

Writing prompt No. 43

A weekly writing exercise to get you started

By Heather Wright

Published: April 20, 2012

How would you complete the following sentences? How would your characters complete the sentences?

If I could be a kid again, I would …
If I could go back to one day in my life, I would …
If I could have one good-bye over again, I would …

Heather Wright's work has been published in local and national publications and on the Web. Her column “Write Angles,” published in What If? Canada’s Creative Magazine for Teens, became the basis of her book, Writing Fiction: A Hands-On Guide for Teens.

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This had me captivated all the way to the end. I wanted to know more and more of what happened to this person as a child and while growing up.

Submitted: 5/7/2012 9:43:56 AM (CST)

If I could be a kid again, I would NOT do it; unless I could go back with the knowledge I now have. If I could be a kid again with the knowledge I have now, I would go back to the campground and I would NOT go to the lake on THAT night (you know what night I am speaking of). I would not go for a walk with the older kids the night I smoked pot. I would not be alone with any of the boys I let take advantage of me—especially the one that just showed up in my tent well after midnight. I didn’t even know his name. I would not go to that incredibly wild party back off the fire road. I would not sneak out after Mommom went to sleep. I would never talk to Bill Leake. I would never stop going to classes and I would not drop physics. I would talk to my parents about my dreams and go to school to be a computer engineer. If I had to, I would go into the Navy to get the GI Bill education benefits to go to school to be a computer engineer. I would not try any drugs. I would not drink as a teen. I would not start smoking. I would talk to Mommy and Daddy and develop a good relationship with both of them. I would make friends with Janice—letting her be queen bee of the Galecki Hive. I would study in Algebra – not drop it so that I was a year behind in mathematics. I would accept the fact that my parents loved me – even though they did not express it verbally. They both showed me in other ways – and that should have been enough. I would help Mommom more around the house and not let her wait on me hand and foot. I would not have been grounded so I would not have met Bill Conron. Maybe we would have met anyway, because I can’t believe that Erin would not be if I did the things I should have done to have a better life. I would have been a virgin when I got married. I would not be a slut. I would study for all my classes and gotten the kind of grades I was capable of getting. I would not lie. I would not steal. I would have been a good girl if I could go back in time knowing all that I know now.