Saturday, November 20, 2010

Day 30

947 words.

I am at a loss.  I am just writing words to write them.  T says I need to sit down and interview Caroline.  She is strong, she does what needs to be done, and her scenes are dull.  I wouldn't even use her POV, but I think if I can figure it out it will be pivotal to the story.

A says I'm just afraid to write the ending and what happens to Q and she's probably right.  Sorry, I'm not meaning to whine and say poor me.  I know I've already written about being afraid to fail at this.  I used to write when days were dark and I had no voice, no outlet.  I used to write because the words on the page were addressed to the only friend I had, my Savior.

I was 16 and I had to leave a place I loved.  I had to leave someone I had finally found again, me.  I fit, I was somebody.  And I entered a world where I was nobody, where I had to be someone I wasn't to fit in and I couldn't do it.  I was living someone else's life and there was nothing I could do about it.

I cried everyday until the tears were long gone and then I just did what I was supposed to.  I got up, I walked to the bus, I went to school, I came home, I haunted the mailbox living for letters, and I went to bed.  I didn't eat.  I don't remember smiling.  My mother gave permission for me to live with a family in CA I had babysat for.  I fled and I didn't look back.  I went back to where I had started even knowing that it wasn't God's will for my life.  It didn't take long for me to realize that things weren't the same.  Things could never be the same.  And as much as I fought to admit it, I wasn't the same.  My friends hadn't changed, their circumstances hadn't changed, but I had.  Tragedy had marked me, my sorrow and my journey in accepting and overcoming made me different from the crowd.

I remember the night I knew I had to go home to my family.  Pride choked me and I couldn't call my parents.  I called the only person I could think of, my Grandma.  I told her I needed help.  I was all alone and I needed to go home.  Within days I was on the plane.  My parents greeted me at the airport.  We didn't speak much on the way home.  My siblings were waiting for me at home.  We were little more than strangers at that time, since my world hadn't been inside the walls of my own home for quite a while.

I remember that same night getting on my knees.  I told the Lord that I was sorry and I would do His will.  I would change my attitude and do the best I could with all that I had.  That's when I wrote.  I filled notebooks; triumphs, sorrows, prayers, longings, gratitude.  My heart changed, my life changed.  There were angel friends almost immediately.  I begin to fit even though I was a somewhat bent puzzle piece, the other pieces moved around until I worked my way in and found my place.  I wrote to live, I wrote to breathe, I wrote to give thanks.

I want my writing to make a difference.  I want my writing to help someone, touch someone, teach someone.
But I don't want to fail on the thing that saved me, turned my life around.  I feel like if I fail at this, I somehow won't fit. 

 I tell this story because it has every thing to do with the novel I am writing.  I gave this part of my life wings and let it fly away a long time ago, but that's the beauty of writing, you can weave the story in your heart and give it life and learn from it.

3 comments:

  1. You are the only judge of your failure or success. If this novel doesn't come up to your expectations when it is finished, use it as a stepping stone to your next greater work.

    Maybe Caroline needs a flashback to explain why she is the way she is.........just like you gave us a peek through the window of your past with this post.

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  2. I think you need to re-define failure in your mind. Success/Failure is not so much in the end result, as it is in taking the journey or not. The only way you'll fail in this adventure is if you quit. The main point is that you did it, you did the best that you could and you learned a lot on the way.

    You are an amazing woman and an inspiration to me!

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  3. I'm sorry to hear of your struggles. I think interviewing Caroline is a good idea. If you need prompts to this you might just find a list made for kids to interview their grandparents. That'd be an easy start.

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