Years ago, I was flying Southwest Airlines from Seattle to Tucson where I was going to teach a weekend writing class. Southwest Airlines gave boarding passes at the gate, first come, first serve, and then loaded their planes in boarding groups without assigning particular seats to passengers. Therefore, people began lining up for the passes very early to be in an early boarding group, earlier than the gate agents arrived at the counter. In line that morning, I was standing behind an elderly man and a middle-aged man, both dressed in western gear–tight jeans, cowboy boots, and cowboy hats, their belt buckles sparkling under the fluorescent lighting.

Their conversation went something like this:

OLDER MAN: There sure were a lot of people downstairs at the check-in.

YOUNGER MAN: Yup, these days, you can never give yourself enough time.

OLDER MAN: They sure wanted us here early and there’s no one ready to see us.

YOUNGER MAN: Yup, that’s how it is, hurry up and wait.

OLDER MAN: I guess we could’ve gotten all jammed up at that

place where they check the carry-ons and the people for weapons.

YOUNGERMAN: Yup, these days you can’t have enough security.

On the plane preparing for my class, I realized the conversation I overheard inspired a writing idea. The use of cliches and overused knee-jerk reaction sentences by the younger man kept the conversation from going anywhere. I could ask people to think of an area in their lives where they used to or now have to interact with someone they feel has annoying power over them. I could suggest they write a dialogue with that person in which the person says what they usually say, but the writer answers in cliches. This would have the effect of diffusing that power, of keeping it from going anywhere. The results from this exercise were funny and freeing. Here is the writing exercise:

1. Think of a place or situation in which someone has power over you that you find annoying.
2. Give this dialog you are about to write a title like, “Talking to the Head of the Board of Directors,” “Having Lunch with My Mother,” or “When My Teenage Son Comes Down From His Room.”
3. Write a dialogue in which the annoyingly powerful person speaks the way they normally do, and you reply to each line of theirs with a cliche. Don’t worry about how the cliche fits. Just write down whatever cliches pop into your head after you’ve written the other person’s lines.

You may want to do a dialogue like this for yourself before reading and enjoying the following samples. But if you need to peek at the samples, go ahead.

I wrote about my inner critic:

CRITIC: Everything you write is dull.

ME: Well, a bird in the bush is worth two in the hand.

CRITIC: Really, I mean it, your images are not interesting.

ME: Monkey see, monkey do.

CRITIC: You always got Bs in composition, not As. You’re just not that good.

ME: Don’t judge a book by its cover.

CRITIC: And you write so short, why not a novel? Why always essays and poems?

ME: Well, good things come in small packages.

CRITIC: You’re using cliches, you know, and that’s a big no-no for a writer.

ME: A stitch in time saves nine.

Here Marjorie Hilts conjures this conversation with her cat:

GAY: I can’t think why you would want me to go outside just because you plan to leave.

ME: Because I say so and I’m the boss.

GAY: But I’m afraid of the javelinas [desert animal in Tucson].

ME: The only thing you have to fear is fear itself.

GAY: What if they chase me?

ME: Just tuck your tail between your legs and run.

GAY: How come I always have to do what you want?

ME: I’m bigger than you.

GAY: But I’m prettier.

ME: Pretty is as pretty does.

GAY: You’re so mean to me.

ME: Pouting will get you nowhere.

GAY: If you loved me you wouldn’t make me go outside.

ME: Spare the rod and spoil the child.

GAY: You’ll be sorry when the coyotes get me.

ME: If you love someone, let him go.

Any time we capture our resistance to feeling pushed around, we are helping to free ourselves from the forces that trample our desire to express ourselves. Try your hand at such a dialogue. And you just might find that the idea that you can’t write dialog is untrue! The critic you hold in your head who is always judging you and saying you can’t do what it is you need to do in your writing does have an Achilles’ heel. And you might just have found it.

Maybe your next dialog is one you have with your writing angel.