I'm not a school sports person. I'm certainly not a drawing person. That's not to say that I haven't tried these things. Friends have tried to teach me how to draw, and I've spent a lot of my life playing soccer or softball. But they're not my passions.
Writing probably isn't a very fun pastime for a lot of people. And believe me, I've had my stretches where I hate writing and I just want to watch TV and do nothing. Yet at the same time, I always come back to it. Honestly, maybe the thing that drew me into writing was getting to share my stories with other people. If you know me well, odds are I've ranted about them to you once or twice. Or five times. Or, if you're my brother, around fifty times.
Recently I've spent a lot of time writing. Just a few days ago something happened that made me feel almost proud of my stories. One of my friends sent me a text asking for help with writing a story. Now, I've read some of her stories before. She writes a little too. But this was the first time she had sent me a message, not asking me to read her story, but help on how to write a certain kind of scene. Maybe that was the first time that I really realized that she thought my advice on writing was helpful. It was a kind of validation, after pouring who knew how many hours into this passion of mine.
The day after that I started writing a new story. Well, when I say new, it's story I've written down before, but its been in the works for months. My first real fantasy story. A lot of the characters in it are from failed stories I've written before. I've been combining all my past failed attempt into this trilogy. Characters from a idea for a musical (I cringe just to think of that now), from a story about conformity, and even from the very first series I ever wrote. Combined into one story. Weaving different strands together to make a dark fantasy story. Trying to use those characters from feeble plots and reconstructing them.
I don't kid myself that my writing itself is particularly good. There are stretches that I'm proud of, but the writing style in general is not my pride. But I do love making characters, crafting plots. Adding foreshadowing, placing careful easter eggs. Writing is also a way to trace my life. As I've grown older, my stories have gotten darker and more theme than plot. When I was much younger, maybe seven or eight, I had an idea for a a story, about a warrior princess. Typical, and now it seems ever so dull. I revisited that idea recently, and transformed it into a series of short stories about betrayal and secrets. Now its some of my favorite writing I've ever done, and much more interesting than a princess who never loses a battle.
One of the hardest things for me about writing is the patience. I hate writing the boring scenes, where nothing happens except introspection. I often cut out a lot of the depth of the story in order to get to the fun scenes. The ones with the arguments and the fights.
I also go in phases, times where I'm obsessed with one story or another. Mostly I write long trilogies. Well, I say write. I haven't yet ever finished one, but my first trilogy is only a few pages away from completion. Even though it will be a huge achievement, it makes me a little sad to think of having finished it.
For me, writing is my hobby. It's rather slow and for most people probably not exciting. But it's something that I've always loved to do.
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