I laughed because it was funny, and because like me, my daughter has stories living in her head. And yes, when you are a writer you do talk to the characters. And because I may indeed be crazy--in a good way. I hope. And yes, I can start sentences with and if I want to. And I do.
This got me thinking (Kid A, not a plethora of ands) about some of the strange/insane/fun things I did when I was a kid. Here's one:
I grew up with six siblings, and we didn't have television. This translated into long days filled with adventure. Once we decided it would be great fun to climb to the top of our one-and-a-half story house and jump off the roof onto a pillow. Yes, a pillow. What can I say, we were brilliant.
My parents got wind of the idea and slaughtered it because they were (and are) good parents. They declared the roof off limits. We moaned and complained then came up with a grand new plan. The roof may have become a no-man's land, but the house had windows. A lot of them. And yes, we really were that brilliant.
We positioned our pillow in the grass, fluffed it once or twice, because we all knew the value of a poofy pillow, and raced to an upstairs window. We all preceded to jump, single file, like a bunch of lemmings onto one increasingly flat pillow.
It was awesome--at least until Mom and Dad found out and jumping from the window onto pillows joined the black list. What did we do then? We moved the trampoline under the window. Yup, didn't I mention brilliant?
What does this have to do with writing? Way more than you think. Really.
Writing, especially submitting to agents and editors, is a lot like jumping out of a high window onto a pillow. It's exciting and feels dangerous. It may even be a little crazy. Sometimes you end up with a few bruises, but the experience is so worth it. And like prepping the pillow before we jumped, revising, revising, and revising can help your landing be less jarring. As time goes by, you even learn to pull the trampoline under the window.
Here's to jumping!
9 comments:
Oh, Leisha, my side hurts from laughing! Stop it! I can see why you and your siblings broke every bone in your body - and that you have a deep well of experiences just waiting to come out on the written page.
Alright, keep it up, but give my side time to recover.
(BTW, we had some very similar experiences as children. It's not a good thing to leave that many children together long enough to hatch ideas, isn't it?)
Jonene, you mean jumping out of a window onto a pillow isn't a good idea? This explains so much. He he.
LOL! Okay, I think I'd be too scared to jump out of the window onto pillows. You have more guts than me Leisha! =D
We jumped off of the roof onto the trampoline oodles of times--until dad found out. Then it was jumping out of the hay-barn rafters. ;)
Excellent point, though! And your daughter sounds just delightful!
Carolyn, lol. I'm not sure it was guts. :)
L.T., I loved playing in the barn and jumping into the hay. Ah, good times. And yes, my daughter is delightful. :)
ha ha i remember that, we were so very smart. it is right up there with the time we tied the dogs to the kids sled to have our own dogsled team to pull us through the field. That worked great until we hit the ditch! keep up the good work and keep up the metaphorical jumping and i know you will get a big fat book deal one of these days.
Marne', or the time I wanted a horse so bad I climbed on the back of the bull. Yeah, he didn't like that so much. Talk about a short, wild ride. He never really liked me after that. Hmmmm. I wonder why?
You are funny. And I have the feeling that a longer conversation between you and Marne' regarding your childhood stunts would only get increasingly scary. But, in a good way ;-).
Cherie, you're probably right. We had a great childhood. :)
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