A good question. Most writers I’ve met or talked to give the old clichéd answer of “I write to stay sane.” I think this is true of most writers. Really. But I think that it begins deeper than that. I don’t really remember the first time I consciously decided that I wanted to write a story. I can’t really remember a time when I wasn’t telling a story to entertain myself. Mind you, most of the time when I was little I created little mini movies in my head. Instead of Alec riding The Black in Walter Farley’s “The Black Stallion” it was me. Of course how a little girl would get on a tramp steamer wasn’t lost on me even at age ten. So I invented a reason for me to be on that ship. I was the Captain’s daughter. And when that ship went down I had lost everything. I didn’t get much farther than that because in my mind “The Black” and I never ever got rescued from that Island. We lived there, the two of us, quite happily.
That you might say was the beginning for me. The mini movie. And thanks to my fourth grade teacher Mrs. Kane who encouraged my penchant for writing I wrote more and more and more. She especially liked my rendition of the Pilgrim’s First Thanksgiving. That was the first time someone told me I should be a writer. Details she told me. It’s all in the details. She talked to me a lot that year about how it was important for a writer to notice all the little things that go on around you. Thankfully I paid attention.
Writing foremost for me is an escape into a magical land of my own making. Some might call it a cry for order in an un-ordered world. Some might be right. Some might even say that I like to write because I control everything. I control who lives or dies, who finds true love and who lives to a ripe old age never knowing what the word truly means. It is control and I like it.
Emotion. Now this is a biggie. I’m a heart writer. If I don’t feel it? I have a hard time writing it. It’s all about the emotion and heartbreak for me. I’ve told my friends that I have to be careful of what movies I watch and when. Movies and stories stay with me long after I am out of the movie theater or am done reading the book. Weeks, months, sometimes years stories will stay with me. They haunt me. That should clue you into the fact that I don’t read or watch a lot of horror. I would have nightmares for days. And no I won’t watch “The Ring” either. It would scare me to death!
But the main reason I write? Because I love the process. I love everything about it. Learning my craft, creating something that will touch someone’s heart, finding the right word, and the sense that I leave a little bit of me behind with every word I type.
And yes, I do write to stay sane. Otherwise how on earth would I explain all these voices in my head? There are way too many to count these days.
That you might say was the beginning for me. The mini movie. And thanks to my fourth grade teacher Mrs. Kane who encouraged my penchant for writing I wrote more and more and more. She especially liked my rendition of the Pilgrim’s First Thanksgiving. That was the first time someone told me I should be a writer. Details she told me. It’s all in the details. She talked to me a lot that year about how it was important for a writer to notice all the little things that go on around you. Thankfully I paid attention.
Writing foremost for me is an escape into a magical land of my own making. Some might call it a cry for order in an un-ordered world. Some might be right. Some might even say that I like to write because I control everything. I control who lives or dies, who finds true love and who lives to a ripe old age never knowing what the word truly means. It is control and I like it.
Emotion. Now this is a biggie. I’m a heart writer. If I don’t feel it? I have a hard time writing it. It’s all about the emotion and heartbreak for me. I’ve told my friends that I have to be careful of what movies I watch and when. Movies and stories stay with me long after I am out of the movie theater or am done reading the book. Weeks, months, sometimes years stories will stay with me. They haunt me. That should clue you into the fact that I don’t read or watch a lot of horror. I would have nightmares for days. And no I won’t watch “The Ring” either. It would scare me to death!
But the main reason I write? Because I love the process. I love everything about it. Learning my craft, creating something that will touch someone’s heart, finding the right word, and the sense that I leave a little bit of me behind with every word I type.
And yes, I do write to stay sane. Otherwise how on earth would I explain all these voices in my head? There are way too many to count these days.
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