Every Step, Every Stumbling Block

So! You want to be a writer!

You want to tell stories that will last a lifetime. Maybe you want to make a little money.

First of all, if you’re becoming a writer because you think doing so will magically lift you into a better financial situation, you’re in it for the wrong reasons. Sure, plenty of people have gotten lucky and gotten rich on the first try; but, the most famous example regularly gets cancelled on social media nowadays, and no amount of magic spells will change that. It takes work, patience, and a surprising amount of pain. You’re going to doubt yourself. That’s just reality.

You still want to try? Great! That’s the spirit! The first step in soaring to new heights is to fall on your butt a few (dozen) times.

Let me walk you through the path I took from lonely school-child to semi-accomplished scriptwriter and filmmaker. It took me twenty-two years to see my imaginary friends brought to life on the big screen; and I had to fight and push to get them there. Did I have help? Absolutely. Was I lucky in many ways? Yes. Were there people with arguably less passion but more luck competing with me? Yes, and they beat me. That’s why one of them is living on a boat in Europe while I’m writing this article in my shoebox apartment in New York.

Alright, I’ll knock off the bitterness. She’s a very good friend of mine anyway, I wish her the best.

Her and her European yacht.

The best way to illustrate my journey is through music. From the time I was a toddler, music influenced every part of my creative life: how I viewed dance, how I wrote, the pictures I drew, even how I saw the world. Jimmy Buffet and Billy Joel were the soundtracks to my growing up. I can still smell the carpet in my father’s office every time I listen to Piano Man.

https://youtu.be/A_g7fPjVxvg

I’d lay on my stomach, wasting valuable copy paper as I scribbled what I thought were hard-hitting narratives about princesses and evil queens. I don’t think I knew I wasn’t writing anything. I could see the words as clear as day. One of my Kindergarten chums made a scene when I tried to read one of my “books” to the class; exclaiming that there were just pictures of dogs! The pages were blank! I was just making the story up!

I’d like to thank my teacher for quieting him down so I could finish my tale.

I’d also like to thank my dad for letting me use, truly, an alarming amount of paper. I couldn’t conceive just how expensive that paper was. As an adult, I cringe a bit thinking about it.

Is that why my mom gave me her old laptop? Probably.

Time passed, as it so inconveniently does, and I took my writing to the digital world. That old dinosaur PC became my best buddy; along with a nest of blankets on my bedroom floor and any candy I could squirrel away from holidays and birthdays. I still scribbled, in the margins of my school notebooks and the backs of softcover texts which were destined to get ruined anyway.

I didn’t have many friends. The ones I did have didn’t fully understand me, though they were kind and I remember most of them fondly**. Since our schedules didn’t intersect outside of regular school hours, I became more and more lonely. Music was always there to fill the gaps. In keeping with my excellent taste, I began playing the Twilight soundtrack on my old combination radio/CD player; along with early Taylor Swift.

https://youtu.be/RvnkAtWcKYg

No more princesses or evil queens; I wrote about magic, now. Shapeshifters and immortals, wise old sages who could tell you your future and prophecies that must be upheld. I was still innocent, though, so the worst things that happened to my characters were when they were separated from each other. They’d be rendered powerless through magic or a fight they just barely lost.

They’d always save each other in the knick of time. The stories ended with reunions and healing; coming home…sometimes they got married.

Scarla was the first character I ever created. She was powerful, confident, beautiful, everything a pre-teen Miki wanted to be. She’d go on grand adventures, fight Scorpius with the skills of someone twice her age, and she could heal from anything. Most importantly at the time, she was desirable. (Thanks, Twilight) It took me a long time to ditch her love triangle plot lines and let her evolve into a fully-realized protagonist.

“Hello,” says Depression, “here’s where I come in!”

From fourth grade onward, I struggled both academically and socially. I had three friends in a school of hundreds, I didn’t fit into any groups, and it always felt like I was speaking a different language. When I felt sad or angry, nobody could offer any solutions. Things which confused me came easily to the rest of the world. Inversely, my moments of happiness, harmless goofiness, or contentment were usually met with whispered comments, instructions to tone it down, or just confusion. I couldn’t seem to operate on the same wavelength as those around me.

When it looked like I’d find a kindred spirit, circumstances would snatch them away. More and more, I retreated in my fictional world. As Reality constricted around me, the world of the story grew. I could use it as a vessel for my pain. No friends at school? I’d write a new friend. New enemies at school? I was too well-versed in right and wrong to fight them, so I’d craft a new antagonist.

Was I not a good person? For a good chunk of time…no, I believed I wasn’t. Everyone was mad at me all the time.

Hi, Ares Version One! You get to be morally grey like me! If you can find happiness, I can! You live in a cave, you speak multiple languages, and you misbehave out of an inability to express emotions in a way that makes sense! Enjoy existence!

https://youtu.be/bJ7_eJrrnDo

I barely survived elementary school with my sanity intact. A new chapter in my life meant a blank slate. My blankets migrated back onto my bed, I threw out the months-old candy, and I got my own laptop (I’ll spare you the details on my clumsiness with electronics). My music tastes didn’t evolve very much, until I reached high school and made what I believed was a rock-solid coterie of new friends.* Freshman year came and went quietly, and my creating slowed down. I just wanted to heal from the chaos that had rooted itself in my mind. I’d get through four years of high school, and after that…I’d see where I stood.

Sophomore year. Oh, sophomore year.

That’s where the coterie of “friends” kicks in. A handful of girls who seemed to be the kindred spirits I was looking for welcomed me in to their crew. We sat together at lunch, talked, connected on social media, they even shared their interests with me so I wouldn’t be excluded. Three Sherlock DVDs later, I believed I’d landed! I believed I’d made friends for life!

https://youtu.be/gzCEIBaV1Es

Sophomore year came and went. Junior year started strong…then I got a boyfriend and everything went downhill.

In high school, you meet two types of “friends.” The first type are true-blue. They’ll stick with you; if you drift apart, that’s just life. No hurt feelings. You might even stay friends for years after graduation!

The second type put you on the end for group pictures. They replace you, give up your seat at the lunch table, and you’re on your own when your first boyfriend turns out to be a scrub and breaks your heart. One of them dates him after you, then complains when he’s just as awful to her as he was to you.

Guess which one I was in.

https://youtu.be/Zzfn_39_SfM

Fine. Whatever. They didn’t want me in their circle? What else was new? I had my blossoming interest in pop culture, my Marvel comic books, a new interest in girls, and I threw myself back into my writing! My fictional world exploded from one little village to three continent-sized ones. My protagonists weren’t children or teenagers anymore; they were adults! No more magic, unless it was gritty and dark.

No more kid stuff!

High school ended with a whimper. I left my fake friends behind, licked my wounds once again, and moved to New York for college. You can read all about THAT in my article “Memoir of a Former Bad Student.”

Finally, finally, I found a comfortable niche to settle in. Things were rocky, at first. My freshman year roommate and I had very little in common (she was a sweetheart regardless), boys still weren’t interested in me (they picked up a certain vibe about me that I was still blind to), and the popular kids were still aloof and uncaring. I was still an outsider.

That is…until I found out who the real cool kids were; people who didn’t intend to cut me out of pictures. People who dragged me into pictures. People who cared when my relationships broke down, who didn’t give away my spot when a new face showed up.

People who asked about my characters, and kept asking because hey, it turned out they had characters too!

https://youtu.be/9ivu-SB7X_s

People who, when I said I’d be making a film for my graduate school project, didn’t tell me to “let [them] know when I was Fifty-four and unemployed.”

It’s thanks to those people that my characters aren’t hidden behind words on a screen anymore. I didn’t give up writing; because now it doesn’t just have to be a method of survival. I don’t have to be alone.

So, you want to be a writer! Awesome!

It might be valuable to look at how writing has been there for you; where your material comes from, what drives you forward.

Don’t neglect your past. It might just give you some of your best ideas.

**Ben, you know I mean you; even if we don’t talk all the time! Chris…seriously, Bro. If you’re still interested in being friends, my door is always open. I know you’re out there. Just…come back soon, okay?