Lost and Found Blogfest

Today I'm participating in the Lost and Found Blogfest, hosted by Myne Whitman to celebrate her reaching 500 followers. Congratulations, Myne!

As you can see, the task is to write about something you've lost and (re)found. So here's my story. It involves finding two things at different intervals. Two for the price of one :)

WARNING: This story is somewhat personal, discusses dark material, and eludes to violence (though imaginary/from a dream). Please read with caution.


My father and I were very close, especially after I went away to college. So, several years after I graduated, when he was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer on July 3, 2008, I broke. Broke down. Completely. I'm the only child and daddy's little girl, and this destroyed my world. I couldn't eat. I couldn't sleep. And when he died on October 1—only a couple of days before my birthday—it all got worse. The walking dead seemed animated in comparison to me. I stared at the TV without any idea what I was watching, and lost close to 40 pounds in about three months.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

That's when my nightmares began. One in particular plagued me night after night. I stand on a beach, my jeans rolled up to my knees as the waves swallow my feet over and over. I'm not prepared, though I know what's coming. And from nowhere, I'm attacked. Literally, from thin air. Over and over. I'll spare you the details, but the pain would continue for what seemed like an eternity before I would wake in a cold sweat, sometimes screaming.

This dream tortured me night after night for at least a month. In late November or early December, I realized that the only way for me to take control of the dream would be to write it down. I needed to own it instead of it owning me. So, I did.

This is my first finding. I began writing again. I hadn't written anything beyond term papers in ten years.

Picture courtesy of http://buffy.wikia.com/

This dream became the climax in my epic Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan fiction—sort of. It involved the Buffy crew but added several new characters of my own creation, including my new MC, Edie (see Season 8 for how I could easily do this). I shared the pieces I wrote with fewer than a handful of close friends, and only the parts that were actually written. I jumped around in writing it—a lot—and my outline grew toward War and Peace-length proportions. It became unmanageable, and while I plugged along at it, it grew difficult and tiring to keep all the subplots straight.

The following July (2009), I had another idea, one that has led me to write Fighting Fate (which is its 72,482nd title). Edie and her beach sacrifice snuggled into the recesses of my Documents folder and started gathering dust.

About a week ago, I woke up thinking about Edie and her sacrifice. As my consciousness gathered strength over my dreaming mind, I realized that this story is worth saving. I can rework it, streamline it, remove the Buffy elements, and make it mine. Truly own it like I had wanted to do 2.5 years ago. I rediscovered my story. Now I think I'm going to spend a few months (re)plotting it, and potentially use it for my NaNoWriMo project in November.


Are you participating in Myne's blogfest? I'll be sure to stop by. 
Not participating? What have you lost and found again?

Real World Writing

No, this has nothing to do with MTV.

Yesterday my writing class took a field trip.  Our instructor told us nothing before our arrival in class as to what we were doing or where we were going or how it related to writing.  So we arrived, expectant, and waited for her announcement.

The assignment (and there was no choice regarding acceptance): (i) go to the Student Union and interview someone you've never met about a time when they got kicked out of somewhere, (ii) write up the details of said story, and (iii) fictionalize it into a story of 300-400 words.  And we only got one shot once the person agreed.  She forbade us from interviewing multiple people.

At the words "you've never met", my adrenaline kicked into overdrive.  I'm not an interviewer.  If I were, I'd be in journalism classes, not fiction.  I'm a lock-myself-up-and-write type, and... other people? What's that?  As we left the classroom, another woman from class and I started discussing, first, how this was crazy and we were already embarrassed :) and then strategies on how to find people who weren't trying to study and would therefore be more willing to talk to us.

I guess it worked—once I swallowed my pride and my fear.  The first person I asked not only was willing to talk to me (sitting in the food court with his half-eaten Pizza Hut bread stick), but he had a great story.  Due to confidentiality restrictions required by the assignment, I can't share it, but I will tell you that I laughed the entire time he relayed his story, and that it involved a Walmart and a ripstik.

Feel free to use your imaginations.

This exercise really emphasized the importance of using the real world (as opposed to the Real World) in writing.  Once I got over my initial apprehension, I realized what a fabulous assignment this is.  I'm still nervous about the writing part—even though the instructor assured us that we in no way had to stay true to the original story—but it's taken me beyond my comfort zone and asked me to do more.  That I sincerely appreciate.


What leaps do you take for your writing?  Have you ever been nervous about taking extra steps to make your work more authentic?  How do you push yourself to include the real world (or the Real World if you love MTV)?