Joan Morris, a columnist from the Contra Costa Times, posted a good question in a recent article.  “Fire is moving toward your house, and emergency officials have given you 15 minutes to save what you can before evacuating.  What would you take?” 

Her question was based on the book, The Burning House: What Would You Take by Foster Huntington (It Books).

I think back to the Oakland fire in 1989, when Maxine Hong Kingston couldn’t get to her house to save her manuscript, and there were no online back-up systems available. 

A friend’s sister lived in the area and didn’t even have fifteen minutes.  They yelled for her to run, and she noticed her jewelry box, her photo album, and a coffee mug on her bedroom dresser. 

It wasn’t until she was at the bottom of the hill she noticed what was in her hand. 

The coffee mug.

Writing Prompts:

1.  What are your most prized possessions?  Why are they important to you?  Share the anecdotes or the backstories of these items.  Craft this into a personal essay if you can.

2.  In your most recent writing work, what is your protagonist’s most prized possessions? Write a scene about them.

3.  Create a poem about possessions and their importance, their weight, and the depth of their meaning or non-meaning to you.