Have you ever been tempted to try a spot of wordbombing? It’s a bit like Rachael Charwick’s 60 Postcards project, only a whole lot more ramshackle.

Wordbombing is something I got into a few years ago, but it harks back to my childhood, really. I grew up in a house that was a few hundred years old, crammed with curious nooks, as well as the curious old bits of furniture my parents had inherited from their own predecessors. My mum and dad still live in that house now, surrounded by those same inherited treasures. In particular, there’s a rather odd but lovely grandfather clock that for some unknown reason was never finished – the clockface has a few lines missing as though someone got distracted midway through and then forgot.

I loved that  clock so much – its distant bongs would murmur through my dreams. I used to open the door at the front to see the pendulum swing in the shadowy, mysterious space inside.Then, one day, I reached inside and realised I was tall enough to reach a small ledge that ran around the inside, just below the incomplete clockface.

Oh, how I wished to find something hidden there – some note from the children who must have grown up in that house before me! But there was nothing.

A few days later, I decided that even if I had been disappointed, there was no reason future children need be. So I found a scrap of paper that looked suitably aged, scribbled a note on it, folded it up very small, and slid it onto the secret ledge.

I can’t remember now what I wrote, and have no idea if the note is even still there, but now I have a niece and three nephews – perhaps one of them will be curious one day to seek out what’s tucked away inside the grandfather clock, out of sight.

Make this idea the basis of your story. Who might hide a scrap of writing, and who might find it? For what reason and with what effects?

If you write something prompted by this image and idea, I’d love to know. Just send an email to Judy(at)socket creative.com. You could end up published on SkyLightRain.com!