Letting Loose

When I first began writing, I dreamed of writing for children. I wrote short stories and poems about little ones who were always getting into trouble. It helped that my protagonist lived right under my roof, my little brother. He was forever up to no good to the point I thought my poor mother would go bald from running her hands through her hair.

But writing about little brothers gets tiring. I wanted to let loose and do something no one else had ever done. My initiation into letting loose began on my 16^th birthday. At that point in my life, my favorite author was Victoria Holt. Since there were no knights in shining armor or damsels in distress in my neighborhood, I decided to write about the characters around me. 

A character study is similar to stalking. At sixteen, stalking is not easy. The whole time I tried to be covert, I was stumbling over my own two feet or giving myself away by blushing. Instead of being reckless and daring, I was careless and timid. But I was determined.

At the top of our street there was a General Store. It was the perfect place to stalk. Customers strolled inside and took their time. Men chatted in groups of 2 and 3. Women lingered longest at the meat and cheese counter. I found the perfect corner to lean into and just watch. When Ms. Patty, the owner, glared at me I’d pick up a package and pretend to be reading the contents. After 30 minutes, I realized the task at hand was a lot more difficult than I had imagined. It was hard to hear what my subjects were saying and most of the time they kept turning their backs to me. 

Sighing, I decided to leave and think up another strategy to get writing material. As I turned to leave, a man three times my age with half my teeth grabbed me, pulled me through the throng of customers and pushed me past the screen door. He didn’t let loose of me until we were several feet from the building. I was terrified. He was huge!  

“You best go home now, you hear?” he yelled at me, still clutching my arm. “I ain’t lettin’ you go until you promise to quit trying to steal my aunt’s merchandise.”

I stopped flat-faced-still, looking up at him in total disbelief. “Steal? I’m not trying to steal anything.” Incredulous thoughts whirled around my brain until I realized how guilty I must have looked. “Oh, you’ve got this all wrong. I’m a writer. I’m trying to do a character study.”

“Character study?” he repeated, spitting out a wad of tobacco, “You’d best be trying to study school and not be dumb like me. Now git before I call the cops!”

I ran all the way home. It took me two days to write the whole event down . . . embellishing and letting loose on the best character study ever. Now when I even hint at having “writers block”, I remember being sixteen and pushing the limits. That’s the key to being a good writer. Letting loose.

God bless you! 
Angela

Writing Addiction

My husband chides me, “Why are you always writing?”

I confess. I’m addicted to writing. It’s the same with reading. When I’m not writing, I’m reading. But, there’s never enough time to do all the writing and reading I want to do. I mean NEVER!

When I get to heaven, I want to be assigned to the journaling department with spirits of like ilk. What joy!!! Then on my days off, I can just sit on a cloud and write or read. Yep, one day you may look up and see a pair of feet dangling from a fluffy cloud and you can say with a lot of certainty, “That’s Angela!”

As soon as my teachers put a pencil in my hand, I wanted to write all the stories that were in my head. Most of those stories germinated from my Papa LeMaire who was a great storyteller. The more proficient I got, I wrote about everything. Nothing missed my observant eyes or emotional wrangling, and it all went down on paper.

When I got married, I left a few things in the closet in my bedroom. At nineteen you think you will have a residence with your parents forever. I could have never imagined my mother cleaning my room and throwing away the three boxes of potential manuscript material that I’d been working on. Well, in my mind it was manuscript, awarding material, and I was devastated. My mother said, “Good riddance!” Sometimes parents don’t realize how important your “stuff” can be!

My grandmother once asked me, “What kind of people do you write about?”

That was a hard question. I observe everyone – the good, the bad, and the ugly. Sometimes, I add in all these traits to come up with some very unusual characters. I like to write about real people caught up in the act of living life small and large. People who struggle and find joy are amazing subjects. I want to crawl into the mind of the homeless, the psychotic, and the little old lady across the street and set them up as neighbors trying to get along. Oh, I forgot. I already did that one.

I think the whole idea of taking what you know and twisting it a quarter of a turn is exciting. You never know what’s going to come out of a situation of fate, promise, and determination. That’s writing for you!

So, for the next couple of blog posts, I’m going to write about what I’m writing about. I’m ninety percent finished with the sequel to Cries of Innocence. I’m so excited! It’s a new genre for me - Contemporary Christian Romance. Afterwards, I will head right into finishing up the Cries trilogy with Cries of Mercy.

I can’t wait to share with you what’s happening in my happy place – the writing happy place. In everything I write and do, I remain consistent in my desire to share Jesus and His love with everyone. Writing Bible studies or fictional novels, I want every word I pen to bring my King the honor and glory.

Blessings!