While I was trying to organize my room I ended up taking a trip down memory lane and laughing my butt off and subsequently coming up with an interesting side story for my work-in-progress while iTunes coincidentally plays songs from John Mayer’s first album.
True story.
There was this time in my life where I would write letters to other people that I wouldn’t send. They were essentially notes to self when it came down to it, or even one page journals. I saved almost all of them for the sake of amusing myself whenever I would read them again. And every time I come across them in the process of organizing, I have a good time reading my thoughts from years past.
These notes to self were written in the area of 2003-2004, which is getting close to being a decade ago. It seriously still feels like yesterday, despite all that I’ve gone through between then and now. Thinking about the thoughts that used to run through this quirky little head of mine is oddly eye-opening. I observed a lot more than I ever gave myself credit for. Then again, I didn’t have a job or many responsibilities in those days.
Those observations sparked something in my head and made me get extremely excited. Perfect. Idea. For. My. Story. I have this one story that I feel is a very fictionalized version of some moments in my life. I’ve taken my experiences and compiled them into one crazy tale. When I say fictionalized version and crazy tale, I use the terms loosely. There are really a lot of truths to the story but the way everything comes about in it is out of order, slightly exaggerated, and the names have changed. A few of the scenes were concocted in my imagination and meant to be used in other stories that were never going to happen.
In any case, I didn’t really accomplish much since as soon as this thought came into my mind I had to pick up the laptop and write it all out before I forgot the exact nature of the feeling I was experiencing at the moment otherwise it would be lost for all eternity. And one run on sentence later, I’ll be getting back to business.
~Jessica
PS: “Reminiscing” is the name of a song I adore AND the theme song of last summer’s WIP.
PSS: I took these pictures. The sand flower was made by me on a trip to Michigan, and the autumn shot is taken at Mohican State Park.
Hmmm, maybe I should start taking notes to get me back into writing. Sigh!
ReplyDeleteSometimes it helps, but I love writing notes to myself anyway. :P
DeleteThat's fantastic, I love when inspiration strikes in random ways! Your 'fictionalized version' and 'crazy tale' remind me of this story I've been mulling over for the last few years, based loosely on stories a friend told me about her groupie days...she'd tell me these crazy tales, and I'd be working over in my mind things that the fictionalized version of her would do, and it all came together. It's one of the dozen or so stories on the back burner right now lol.
ReplyDeletePS - Those pictures and the sand flower are amazing...you're multi-talented! <3
DeleteI know, it's so great when we can take something from our own life or expand on something we've been told and make it into a story. It's a great feeling. I've also written down little snippets of conversations I've overheard in stores too. It's so much fun to write and tell these crazy tales. And thank you!! ^_^
DeleteYou just never know when inspiration will hit do you? My problem is that I never bother writing it all down and thinking I'll just remember it later on. At least you have those letters for always!
ReplyDeleteIt wasn't even intentional! I was just doing it for fun. :P
DeleteI love spending time in the past. I have something similar to your letters, only they were actually sent. My brother and I have always been super close and we use to have notebooks that we would write back and forth in. It was just between us, no one else was allowed to see. Even when I went to college and moved to RI and he went into the military we would write in this note book and mail it back and forth. It is comical to go back and look at how much changed in the things that mattered most to us over the years. Hmmm. . . I think I need to start this up again!
ReplyDeleteI had a notebook like that once with a girl I used to be friends with. It was so silly, we'd pass it back and forth in the car and write about boys we liked. Good times. :)
Delete