Six Characters in Search of a Different Reaction

Mostly I think of doors, or gates, or entrances in general (which by now you will know that I love), as enticing. A worn and flaking door is an invitation, freighted with possibilities, or even with secrets...

But not this one. This is a kind of fortification, something that repels and excludes.  It is haughty and divisive.  All of which brings me on to my thought for the day: how the same thing can be seen differently by different people in different situations, although it's not just about context, it's also about how the viewer (or the reader) draws on their own experience to inform what they are looking at or reading. In any given situation there are a number of different forces at work, so if you are writing a scene, you need to think how the participants will respond to it, given their temperament and history. 

Try this little experiment: describe a number of different people walking past a door (why not?) and explore the various reaction was they might have.  One walks past it without noticing it, they are too absorbed in their own stuff; another slows down, stiffens, crosses to the far side of the street glancing back over their shoulder; a third leans against it because the surface is warm, and eats an apple; a fourth tries the handle, but when the door, opens shuts it swiftly; a fifth faults over it; a sixth, checking that no one is watching, whips out a can and sprays graffiti over it...

If you can do this with inanimate objects, orchestrating responses to characters or events will seem much easier, and the variety and subtlety you will be able to bring to your work will make your writing infinitely richer.