Me Times Three
Me and my muses chatting about a new story idea. And yes. More pictures of me. As if you weren't sick of me already.
Day 13 of Bradley Ramsey’s The Halls of Pandemonium
Prompt: “Write an interaction with your muse.”
Muse One is a sassy teenager with a lot of pent-up rage. For good reason. She’s me.
She’s the one sending me Gibb’s smacks upside the head. Punches me in the guts. She who stares back at me with those sad, sad eyes. The ones watery with tears, and that thousand-yard stare that can only come from knowing pain and learning how to disassociate to survive. It’s her feelings made raw and real. Her hair is long, dirty blonde, and always in a ponytail. She still wears the super long tank tops underneath her shirts, with her low-rise jeans that are barely kept in place by her hand-sewn belt.
My second muse takes the form of little me- with the blonde hair, big brown eyes, and dimpled cheeks. The one with hope, dreams, and all the creative potential. This form gets excited. Giggles at the silly pictures taking form. Chases after ideas like she’s trying to catch butterflies. She’s the broad strokes of color, shape, and sounds. She wears a cow print skirt with a rainbow t-shirt and one of her grandmother’s sun hats and aprons.
Then there’s my third muse. The adult version of me. The one with the knowledge and experience staring me down. She’s the one spouting off facts and doing the research. She’s the one connecting the dots and slowly disentangling the threads to see where they come and go. She’s the one with time and wisdom on her side, but not by much. She’s the one who puts the feelings of the teenager into context. She’s the one who harnesses the enthusiasm of the child. She’s more direct, but just as passionate as the other muses. She’s my body double, though her dark curls stay curly (unlike real me). I’m still salty about that.
All three can’t let ideas go. Whether they are holding up the caught butterfly in a net, or screaming at me to put the truth into words, or spouting facts- it’s all her demanding the words be told.
“You’ve felt abandoned before. You know what it feels like to lose friends. Feel like you don’t meet everyone’s standards! So get your butt in gear and put some words down. Your characters can’t write themselves!” Teenage me whines. She’s pacing and tugging at her ponytail.
“Hey! Hey! Give them friends! Everybody needs friends. Oh! And favorite foods and colors and animals. Can we give them a pet? Can we have that pet do something awesome? I mean, we’re telling the story. Of course we can!” Little me says a mile a minute as she tries to give teenage me a hug.
Adult me is somewhere in the stacks of books of information in my mind, rolling on a bookshelf ladder as she’s quickly picking out bits and pieces of research, memories, vocabulary, to add to a growing pile to send up to headquarters. “Let’s see… your female lead is in her early twenties, has no female friends, and is set in an ABO romance. I just pulled up all relevant tropes and rules for that genre. Since the teenager brought it up, here are all the core memories to draw from. And the little one is absolutely correct. Your character will feel more real when she is more fleshed out. She can’t just be a walking feeling. You’ve got feelings covered. Now is the time to set the scene for relationships and setting. Here are some ideas about what her world would look like…”
“She wears a brown apron at work! She really likes doughnuts, which is why she doesn’t mind working at the café!” little me adds.
“Excellent addition, little one. What else makes her world look more real?”
“Hmm… her apartment is covered in flower stuff, purple ones. And she drives a blue car that makes funny noises when it starts. She has a sister who’s a lot older than her. Her daddy likes watching baseball. Her mommy wears glasses. And she wears glasses too! Sparkly ones!”
“Eww. No sparkles. Too girly. Her best friends were guys. She wouldn’t want to dazzle them.” Teenage me protests.
“But she’s not a tomboy. She likes to wear twirly skirts and pretty dresses.”
“Make a note- she changes how she dresses based on whether she knows her friends will be around. As much as she doesn’t want to admit it, her view of her friendship heavily influences her routines- how she dresses being a clear indicator. That can be an excellent clue to the reader about her growth through the book.”
“That’s actually a really good idea. Make her sister or her mother comment on it, too. It’s a hard thing to recognize when you’ve done it for so long.” Teenage me agrees.
“She has to wear sparkly glasses eventually!” Little me interjects.
I have to look down at little me and sigh. “I won’t know what kind of glasses she likes until I write it. She’ll tell me what she wants.”
Little me harumphs. “Not enough girls in stories wear sparkly glasses. She NEEDS them!”
“Fine! But only because you’re cute.”
Little me claps her hands and jumps up and down with joy before hugging me and then running off through the bookshelves. Who knows what she’s looking for? Teenage me nods with approval before picking up one of her books and getting comfy in an armchair in my mind’s library. Adult me hands me my dossier on my character, and now it’s just me, staring at my screen waiting for the thoughts to settle, the feelings to focus, and the images in my mind to become clear. Then and only then do I start typing.
I love how all three come together!