The Fairytale of Writing

Once Upon a Time… no, this isn’t about writing fairytales. As a child I loved fairytales, so by natural extension when Once Upon a Time aired, I was right in front of my TV, popcorn in hand.

In a recent episode (The Miller’s Daughter) one of the main characters, Mary Margaret, aka Snow White, was handed a life-altering decision. That got me to wondering whether, my black moments are truly as dark as they should be. Am I putting enough at stake? Maybe not.

All her life, Snow has battled against dark magic by doing the right thing. She holds tight to goodness. That’s what her mother taught her. That’s her core.

Her defeats teach her that good doesn’t always triumph. As a child, she had the opportunity to save her mother’s life, but to do so she’d have to choose someone else to die in her mother’s place. She couldn’t do it and her mother died.

Now the black moment. Snow is forced to make a decision that goes completely against her being. In “The Miller’s Daughter,” Snow’s choices are to either give Regina and Cora (the truly bad guys) Rumplestiltskin’s dagger, thus giving them complete magic power and saving her childhood nurse, Johanna. Or she can retain the dagger, let Rumplestiltskin die (who has turned into sort of a good guy, and she’s just found out he’s the other grandfather of Snow’s grandson), which will keep the people of Storybrook safe.

Snow ends up giving Regina and Cora the dagger in exchange for Johanna. Their reunion is short-lived when Regina murders Johanna anyway.

Each time Snow has done the right and good thing, it has cost her dearly. With the death of her childhood nurse, she tells Prince Charming she doesn’t care about justice anymore. Wow! This is our hero, Snow White.

If you don’t watch “Once Upon a Time,” it’s well worth the hour. It is so valuable that I’m thinking of counting that time as a writing class and taking my cable bill off my taxes. Um, maybe not.

Here’s the trick (and it sounds easier than it is):

• Root the current crisis in with the hero’s past.

Thus making the crisis more personal and more rooted in their core.

• Give the character two choices, neither of which is good.

The consequences of the two choices need to be really bad and worse.

• Then force your character to pick one.

They have to make the choice or something even worse will happen.

In stories, as in life it’s all in the choices. You have to make your characters—all of them—the products of their choices. It’s more work, but your stories will shine for it and be memorable. The Miller’s Daughter is one I’m going to use as a template. If you’d like to read the whole synopsis, go to http://beta.abc.go.com/shows/once-upon-a-time/episode-guide/once-upon-a-time-episode-216-the-millers-daughter

How do you make your characters memorable?

How do you make your black moments dark enough?

 

Rockets and Leaf-Mould

Two months ago, I was watching Youtube videos of rocket launches as research for a short story.  My kids, fascinated by the giant column of fire and smoke, joined me.  We chatted about rockets — what they are, what they’re used for, and where they go.

Today, the kiddos are still using blankets and bits of toys to build rocket ships, which they then ride to the moon.  It’s all highly imaginative.  But before they could imagine rockets, they needed that spark of information, that image of a column of fire blasting a cylinder of metal skyward.

Watching them reminds me of something J.R.R. Tolkien wrote about The Lord of the Rings:

 ”One writes such a story not out of the leaves of trees still to be observed, nor by means of botany and soil-science; but it grows like a seed in the dark out of the leaf-mould of mind: out of all that has been seen or thought or read, that has long ago been forgotten, descending into the deeps. No doubt there is much selection, as with a gardener: what one throws on one’s personal compost-heap; and my mould is evidently made largely of linguistic matter.”*

My children’s cobbled together rocket has been a marvelous reminder that simple every day adventure — like watching a Youtube clip — can grow into a journey of epic proportions.

*Carpenter, Humphrey.  J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography.  New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000.  p. 131.

 

Message to Graduates (and everyone else)

It’s that time of year when people of all ages walk across the stage in cap and gown, ready to take the next step in their lives, whether it’s graduating up to first grade or getting a doctorate. My oldest daughter is graduating with a BA in History from Boise State in just a few weeks, so my mind is hyper focused on this transitional time.

There are some pieces of advice I’d like to pass on to graduates, but they really apply to everyone. They’re just kind of basic rules for living. I feel compelled to share these because so often, people don’t live by these rules and they are not the kind of people I want to be around. So here we go:

Rule #1:

Be nice to others. It’s pretty simple, but lost of many of us. Believe me, I have trouble with this one myself. People can be really irritating a lot of the time, so it’s tempting to want to lash out at them. But don’t. You never know what sort of position you’re going to be in during some future encounter with that person, and chances are they’ll remember if you weren’t nice. Even without such a self-serving reason, it’s just better for everyone if we could all abide by this simple rule. Treat others as you would like to be treated. This applies to small children, animals, coworkers, cashiers in training, and critique group partners.

The little unremembered acts of kindness and love are the best parts of a person’s life.

William Wordsworth 1770-1850, Poet

Rule #2:

Be generous. This is sort of an addendum to rule #1. Most of us have life pretty good. No, we’re probably not rich. I know I don’t drive fancy cars, but at least I have a car. And a home. And the things I need. There are so, so many people in this world, probably in our own neighborhoods, who don’t have a loving family, a warm home, a job, or a friend. Being generous doesn’t have to be monetary, although it certainly can be. It can also mean generous with one’s time and gifts.

Rule #3:

Be persistent. Nothing worth having comes easy, unless you won the lottery or something. Getting a book published requires persistence. So does getting a job. Finishing school. Making a relationship last. So many times in life, we feel like giving up. But you never know how close you might be to success, however you define that.

Don’t give up–you’re so close

Rule #4:

Learn to listen. Most of us think we listen, but we don’t. And that’s to our detriment. Listen to the life around you. Nature. Thunder. City sounds. The soft breathing of others. A puppy padding across the floor. But also listen when others talk. I read somewhere recently that studies show most people plan what they will say in response when someone else is talking, rather than truly listening. Imagine how much better we’d be at communicating if we didn’t do that.

Rule #5:

Be yourself. This is a message I proclaim over and over to the young people of today. I feel like they are brainwashed to fit into some societal mold. My Baby Boomer generation was conditioned to break the rules and live in the moment. I think you could do worse. The best, most successful, and happiest people (and I’m not talking about the likes of Oprah, Bill Gates, Lady Gaga, or President Obama, although they may well fit into this category, but not because they’re rich or famous) are living their lives by their own standards and following their own hearts. This may not apply to their job, but it applies somewhere. Which brings me to. . .

Rule #6:

There is more to life than your job. Hopefully most of us find work in a field that fulfills us and makes us smile when we wake up in the morning. Even if that is you, there is still more out there in this world than your paid employment. And this means we’re all on equal footing in our non-job hours. So don’t waste them, you know, sitting in your parents’ basement playing video games. Get out in the world and DO something. Talk to people. Hear their stories. Go outside of yourself. Pay attention. Find a place that needs your gifts, and give them. Volunteer. Mentor. Play. Seek.

Rule #7:

Never stop learning. It’s tempting after graduating to act like you’ve learned what you need. But I’ve got news for you–you haven’t even started yet. And that’s a good thing. Just remember that you don’t know it all, and you’ll be okay. Sure, maybe you studied leper colonies in India for a semester, but don’t pretend you’re some sort of expert. About that or anything else. You’re not. Keep learning. About the lepers, but also about everything else. Life is one giant learning lab, full of things that you never knew you didn’t know. Hunger for it. And be humble about what you may or may not know. Nobody likes a smug, arrogant, know-it-all.

Rule #8:

It is never too late to be what you might have been.

George Eliot (1819 – 1880) English Novelist

Life doesn’t end at graduation or [insert age here]. It’s not like now that you’ve graduated you have to be some boring version of yourself who works 9-5 and settles down with a mortgage and a car loan. If you want those things, great. If not, then do something else. Which leads me to. . .

Rule #9:

Don’t be afraid. To try new things. To laugh at yourself. To do things other people say can’t be done. To make a fool out of yourself. To have to work harder than you ever have before. To be creative. To be daring. Stop worrying and start doing.

And finally. . .

Rule #10:

Be honest. Live with integrity. No matter what you do, this will make your life better in every way. You can make up for lack of learned skills, making mistakes, and inexperience by being a person others can rely on and trust. If you make a mistake and own up to it, you can learn from it and become a better person. If you don’t know something and honestly seek to learn it, you will. If, instead, you are not honest with others or yourself, you live in the dark. Your life becomes dark. Honesty brings you into the light, where you can see what you need to see.

 

Living

I’m continuing the discussion from Mary’s blog about finding your own writing path. I follow Nathan Bransford’s blog and, coincidentally, he posted In Order to Write, Writers have to Live, on the same day. The original post was a guest blog on NaNoWriMo, but it serves as a message for all writers all the time.

Nathan’s point is that writers tend to be solitary, shutting out the world and everything else to write. How many of you beat yourselves up when you give up a writing session because you feel like going shopping? Or even sleep in when you’d planned on rising early to get in two hours of writing?

You have to get out and experience the world, observe people and your surroundings. Absorb every bit of information that comes your way, whether it’s watching two octogenarians hold hands while walking down the sidewalk, or seeing a Canadian goose perched on top of the Sonic Drive-In sign while a fellow goose is on the ground squawking at it. You write what you live. Your writing will be better if you live life to the fullest with your friends and family. Stop and smell the variety of flowers!

Do you find yourself playing the guilt trip if you aren’t writing regularly? Or if you put it off to do something else?

As Nathan puts it, “Writing can wait. Living comes first.”

 

But … it’s for Research!

My best friend has always been kind of secretive about his love life. We’ve known each other for over 20 years and it’s only since I’ve started writing that he’s begun sharing his adventures (and misadventures) in the dating world. Why is he opening up now? Well, he prefaces every story about sketchy dudes on Grindr or awkward encounters with former boyfriends and their new lovers with: “Here’s some research material for you …”

I love it. His stories are hilarious and fascinating and way outside my own dating experience. And because he now sees everything he does as potential plot fodder for me (even though it’s really not relevant at all to my current WIP), he no longer guards this part of his life quite so jealously. Because he sees every experience, every encounter, as research material, I’ve started looking at my own life in the same way.

I believe I’ve mentioned before that I have some pretty darn strong hermit tendencies. One would think that writing would make those even stronger, but I’ve found that it’s the opposite. A high school acquaintance is getting married in Las Vegas? I have to go. It’s research. An old friend offers to buy me a plane ticket to Tennessee because he’s feeling nostalgic? Research. A spring-time hike with people who are much fitter and more adventurous than I am? Research! None of these things are directly related to anything I’m writing. I can’t use them as tax deductions. But they’re all things that I’ve done in the last year that scared me, where my immediate inclination was to say “Thanks, but no. I’m good. I’ll just sit here in my cabin with my cats and quietly continue to age.”

Two weeks from today I’ll be in Chicago for my ten year law school reunion. I am terrified and, honestly, if I wasn’t a writer now, I probably wouldn’t have gone. But there are loads of people and experiences there waiting for me. I will reconnect with people whose lives have diverged sharply from my own. I’ll eavesdrop on conversations about nannies and the pressures of being a law firm partner. I’ll drink wine at the Art Institute while chatting with people comparing working in the White House with working for the NFL. I’ll get on the El and be reminded of the press of bodies during a morning commute. I’ll sit in the back of a cab and remember what it feels like to be pushed up against a giggling friend on naugahyde-covered broken springs by the force of a quick left turn. It’s life. It’s research.

What about you? Have you found that writing has changed the way you look at new experiences? Ever justified doing something outside of your comfort zone as research?