Write On!

I do not recall a time in my life when I did not write something, though this came as a surprise to me about a year ago when I picked up seriously writing a story that had been in my head for maybe 7 years. As I began to write that story in earnest, one that I had actually begun that 7 years before, I realized how much fun it was to do the activity of writing and, more specifically, let the story take over and dictate where it would go. Well, that is not precisely true, as I wrote out a outline for each part of what (so far) is a 5 part story, so I knew where it all was heading and what needed to happen in each part. Still, the writing at times seems to take on a will of it’s own and extra bits of story enter in from time to time, seemingly writing themselves, or the characters writing themselves.

I will backtrack a bit and explain both why I was surprised about writing all my life and why it took so long to get back to writing the story living in my head.

For a good part of my life from teen years on, I have been a paper-and-dice gamer. For many years a player only, but eventually moving into game mastering (is it even still called that, in the present political ‘climate’?). Even then, though, I would buy prepared adventures and then tweak them so someone who was familiar with it wouldn’t know how to beat it. At the time, I just didn’t have the confidence to think I could devise a whole adventure of my own. After some time, I got a good group of players together and, as many game masters do, a large quest adventure came to mind and, still bastardizing other adventures to begin with, developed my own storyline, sometimes complete with prop letters from non-player character and so forth. I was writing!

This experience morphed into writing out actions that took place during turns in an on-line text-type roll-playing game wherein each player would send instructions for their character for each week of a month, to which the game runner would return a report not only for that character but then a sort of ‘newspaper’ that explained other events and character interactions. I began to write ‘letters in character to the ‘newspaper’ that would be ‘published’, and that, in turn, eventually morphed into writing whole chapters of events that took place during that month. I had a whole lot of fun writing those!

About 25 or so years ago, I got involved in a local Renaissance Fair up in Alaska and after a year or two, helped start up and direct an entirely new group in that fair, eventually growing into twenty people, based on Gypsies and Tinkers. This required, in my mind, a handbook on what the group was all about and all the various skills required to be ‘on stage’ during the 8-10 hours of a RenFaire day. Again, I had fun writing it. I also had fun writing out the backstory for my Faire character, which in turn became a template for each actor to develop their character.

So, you see, for a good 30 or so years, I have written quite a bit, it just hadn’t occurred to me until I got back to writing that actual ‘book’ of that story! Now that I have come full circle, or maybe more of an oval, to the story that had been in my head for maybe 7 years, here was the genesis for that story; after almost 20 years of directing my group of Gypsies and Tinkers in the RenFaire, it had ceased to be more fun than the stress surrounding getting to fairtime, and I decided to leave. During that last year and as I was getting mentally ready to say goodbye to the fair, one of my actors/friends suggested the reason for my character to be leaving The Wild Rovers (the name of my group). It was a brilliant idea, and so I wrote a three-part story of his leave-taking, sending it to the group over our then webpage. From then on, it had been in my mind to write the full story of his adventures after leaving.

To be honest, I have tinkered (😁) with it on and off for the interim years, eventually finishing the first part. But as of about a year ago, I have given it more time and written out three of the five parts planned, and am well into the fourth part. Here is the very beginning:

Here is where I ended, maybe 2 hours ago as of this writing:

The statistics at the bottom show words and pages. This is aiming to be more of a novella, possibly novel. The funny thing at this time is that I have given no real thought of publishing it. it is simply something I need to get out of my head and written down. I am very certain that, even as I have gone back and revised most of it, as a ‘new’ writer, I must have made many rookie mistakes. Who knows? All I know is I am having a heck of a time writing it. As I can. Working an 40+ hour a week job and helping to take care of my parents sometimes mean there is only writing for maybe 4-6 hours tops over a whole weekend. But, I will prevail!

By the way, and as I included in the ‘mood’ for this blog, I listen to music that is called ‘trailer music’ while writing. This is mostly instrumental music of a kind that could and is used for movie trailers and also video game commercials. I greatly enjoy it and some have even influenced my creativity when writing, sometimes creating entire new scenes or being perfect for a scene I am writing or know will happen later in the story. Where such a song has been influential, I have included it in the text as a sort of ‘soundtrack’.

Perhaps most telling in all of my writing was when I lost my brother to cancer a few years back. I had to get my thoughts and feelings that were mixing around inside me out, and being unable to talk about them without becoming useless with sobbing, I wrote a lot of it all down in memories and so forth. At this date, I do not remember how it came about, but I mentioned it or showed what I wrote to my mother or my brother’s wife, and before I knew it, I was asked to make what I wrote into his eulogy. One of the hardest and most needed things I ever read to those who attended his funeral.

As to the possible future of my writing, there have been a few ideas that have intrigued me. A science fiction tale of time travel where a character accidentally eliminates the assassin of a historical figure the day before the assassination, leaving them to enact the event so history is not changed. What would the return of historical figures and mythical being who were prophesied to return in the hour of their country’s deadliest danger mean worldwide? The possibly several-book exploits of a man, starting in the late 1800s, who becomes a spy, meeting and interacting with historical political figures and events and becoming somehow a part of them, ito the 1960s. Fun stuff that would need much research, which I find enjoyable as it is.

I would need to find some way to become a full time writer for most of those, however, as I know how slowly I write at the present time! It could happen, though…