My First Story

When I was 11, I learned how to use a word processor for the first time.

My dad patiently sat beside me and taught me how to use Word, including the different fonts, sizes, and other formatting tools.

With this knowledge, I set out to write my first story.

I've always been an imaginative child, daydreaming when I wasn't reading or playing video games. After my dad taught me how to use the word processor, I decided to start on my writing journey.

So, after having one of the many dreams that I remembered vividly after waking, I sat down and wrote "Buzz's Daughter."

A little context; one of my siblings and I's favorite movies is Buzz Lightyear of Star Command. We frequently borrowed it from the library, and, if challenged, I'm sure that we could quote it word for word even today.

Now, as I've gotten older, I have gotten better at learning how to pick and choose pieces of my dreams to write my stories. But back then? Straight transcription.

I will spare you the nitty-gritty details, but I'll give you the summary. Buzz Lightyear had a teenage daughter who ran away from home and married the owner of the pizza shop where she worked. After a few years, she had a dream that her mother was Gravitina, one of the many villains from the tv show. She also dreamed that her father had been wounded by the Evil Emperor Zerg (the movie's main villain) and was in a coma. She rushes to find him, only to find that Zerg tricked her and captured her to use as bait for her father. Buzz comes to rescue her, as well as her husband, but her husband ends up dying in the process. (A line from the actual story: "The lava bubbled and spat out body parts.") But who appears at the last minute to save them all? If you didn't guess Peter Pan, that's okay, I forgive you. After the rescue, she goes into labor with her husband's child. Peter Pan marries her, and they all live happily ever after.

I look back on this from time to time and marvel at how much has changed in my writing ability. That story was two pages long, void of any details or passage of time. It's so wild that I started there and now routinely write hundreds of hundreds of pages, full of descriptions and character development. I build character sketches and outline before I write. I have dreams of becoming a published author and I'm continuing to grow as a writer.

I've threatened to delete the file, hoping to never have to deal with it again. I certainly don't want it to ever see the light of day, but I keep it as a reminder of where I've been. Buzz's daughter was the beginning of a journey that I'm happy and proud to say that I'm still on.

There are other manuscripts on my Google Drive; the length gradually increased, and I even wrote a couple of series that I might revisit one day. A large number of these stories are unfinished, victims of my formerly unfocused attack on writing with no real plan and no idea where the plot was going. These stories show a map of sorts, showing where I began and where I am now, and I can celebrate the growth that I've made.

None of this would have been possible without Buzz's Daughter, though - that, and my Dad's help to learn the tool to begin my writing.

After all, it's not where you start, but where you end.