How My Stories Get Written
NOT, “How I write my stories…”
NOT, “How I write my stories…”
I have a small waiting area set up over by my side of the bed.
They start to arrive a little before dawn, and most of them are well-behaved, knowing to have a seat and wait until it’s their turn.
It’s an orderly waiting room
It's an orderly waiting room, with no magazines or other distractions, only my notebook, which is not available for them to see. It is also a triage area, where I tag them with different colors. Yes, some go DOA before I can get to do much with them.
They are all my stories, though, and I am a storyteller, a general practitioner, a psychiatrist, and a medical examiner. But they have arrived, come in good faith to see if I can do anything with them.
I have to grab my notebook and admission forms and get as much information about each one as quickly as possible before it is lost.
I have in the past, greeted some so outrageously good, that I am impressed in my half-sleep and absolutely certain I will not forget any of its detail. But I do. I forget even the most unforgettable. And I feel terrible. I only recall how good they were going to be.
They trust themselves to me.
They trust themselves to me to be examined and polished and be told. They have no plans further than that. They need only to be told or written.
Some listeners and readers will take inspiration from one from time to time. Some will be educated. Some will be entertained. We are all actually just here to have fun.
But occasionally readers get what readers need and the teacher appears with a lesson that has always been in that same place, only undiscovered until now.
Some readers want to weep, and some get enlightened and uplifted, all from the same story. Which is really here only to have a good time.
Make no plans.
I learned long ago not to make careful plans for stories. I give them some leash to be what they want and to do what the reader needs them to do. It's up to them to figure out what that is. I’m just the storyteller.