Tuesday, August 23, 2011

The First Spark

Every now and then, a blogfest comes about with a concept so cool - or so close to you - that you just can't resist. The Sparkfest is such a thing for me. Every time I look back at why and how I started writing, I am amazed.



There are three prompts for this blogfest, all of which I'm semi-ignoring. It's the question on the bomb I want to answer.

Who set you off? 

My ex-boyfriend.

I've always maintained that you can learn and grow from every relationship. Well, my ex brought me to writing. There's no denying it. Without him, I'd have never tried a full-length novel. I would've stayed with short scenes related to roleplaying games, tied to each other with little structure. They were a blast to write, mind you, but they weren't novels.

They were for me and him, until the day he said they were really good. Not just fun. Good, writing-wise.

I don't know if he said it because it was true, or because we were, y'know, dating, but it doesn't matter.

It was the boost of confidence I needed to jump feet first into the adventure. It helped that I found NaNoWriMo just as I got my first novel idea, and that I managed to get to the end. It also helped that, just when I felt there had to be more to this writing-thing, I found Nathan Bransford and the Bransforums.

The very first spark, however, the one that set off the whole process, came from my ex-boyfriend. Some days I wonder if he'll ever know the wildfire he started.

So tell me, who set you off?

15 comments:

  1. Ah, I experienced something similar with my husband. Others had seen little bits of my writing before, stuff just for fun, but I didn't really trust anyone else to be a good judge of writing. My husband is super intelligent and has EXACTLY the same taste in books as I do, so when he said I was good... I couldn't help but believe it. And I finally began to believe I could actually be an author and not just a hobbyist.

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  2. At first I thought you were going to say angst from the ex-boyfriend, but your version is much sweeter! I just like drama.(Can you tell that I'm a writer?) Hmm...Idk for sure what set me off, but in middle school I liked writing for fun, but I started to write more seriously b/c no one was writing what I wanted to read so...I fulfilled my own wishes.

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  3. Hah, I did the same thing for my post. For me, it was my mother. Let's just say I get my crazy imagination from somewhere.

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  4. I have been seeing Sparkfest all over the blogosphere the last couple of days. I completely missed it! It's a great idea.

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  5. Sommer: Hey, there's two days left, you can still jump into the fray!

    Sarah: I spent a lot of times wondering if he said it because he didn't dare say the opposite but...
    a) I never asked him to tell me if it was good or not so that was a spontaneous comment
    b) What does it matter, really? I started writing. That's the important bit. ;)

    Nia: Thankfully, no angst. ^^ I'm always amazed at people who've been writing since middle grade or earlier. It would have never occured to me as a kid.

    cookie: Yep, I saw that! Love it.

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  6. Sweet spark! I was expecting angst as well . . .I think that just says something about my experiences with ex-boyfriends . . .oops. I've been inspired by my grandma, my mom, various authors, books, friends, and my husband - the first one to truly believe I could be published - to the point where it kind of amazes me. He just expects it to happen eventually - no doubt in his mind at all - which is encouraging for me.

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  7. I love this post! People come into our lives for a reason :)

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  8. I'm going to fall back on my parents giving me that garden shed library when I was six. I was bound to be a writer (and really poor at yard maintenance).

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  9. Neat! My ex sparked something, but it wasn't confidence (more like anger). :0)

    Thanks for sharing. My sparks are at:

    The Write Soil

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  10. Tyrean: That's so sweet. My current boyfriend is more like the call of reality when I rant about YET another rewrite. He follows the "That's what you have to do to get there. I know you can." line. :)

    Angie: Thanks! I like to think we can learn something from every relationship. Even the super bad, gonna-smack-your-face ones.

    Margo: Maybe your poor yard maintenance is the reason nature creeps up as a destroying force in your novels. :P

    Dawn: Yeah, anger is what my first boyfriend now sparks. ;)

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  11. What a lovely story. Glad you got such a wonderful thing out of the relationship. My mother sparked the current spree of writing. Thanks Mom :)

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  12. Haha - great answer Claudie! For better or worse, the people in our lives are always interesting sources of inspiration.

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  13. Hi, Claudie! The people in our lives, however brief, can definitely inspire us. I have family and friends who are always encouraging me. That's motivational too!

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  14. Yes, yes yes! Haha. I actually didn't realize how literally everyone would take the prompts when I wrote them. To be completely honest, I just meant for them to be examples of what *kind* of questions people could ask themselves, but everyone who answered them exactly wrote fantastic posts anyway, so I'm not complaining! I love your spark, and I love the fact that you can hone it down to this one moment. Thanks for sharing your special story :D

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  15. Also, biochemistry? I am so jealous XD

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