The World Could Use Your Imagination
Mark Twain said, “Write what you know,” but I hope what he meant was writing what you know is a good starting point. Personally, I get excited about writing what I want to know and can research. Mix in a good measure of imagination to that, and now we’re cookin’ (on paper). Experience, research, and imagination are the necessary ingredients to be able to write a good story.
In my historical fiction novel set in the 30s in Alabama (see July 21), one of my main characters is a widow (a fiery, no-nonsense woman who likes things to be in order). I’ve never been a widow, so to write about her life, I had to imagine what it would be like to lose a spouse. Here’s a brief excerpt of the scene I wrote to introduce the fact that LaDelle Harris is a widow:
“Fully awake, she pulled and tugged at the sheets, making her side of the bed nice and tight. No need to make the entire bed—the right side was left unused, her husband Garvin gone now. He’d been killed nine years earlier. Since then, she kept to her own side while his remained barely ruffled, ever vacant and cold to the touch. Each morning (except for Saturdays when she’d wash the sheets), she simply gave the corner of his side of the bedspread a hearty tug and gently smoothed the surface with her hand. ‘There,’ she’d whisper, setting things to right in the only way she could.”
I imagined how I’d miss my husband’s presence and how that might play out. I thought about not only the challenge I would feel at bedtime but how not waking up to him next to me would be underscored as I made my bed each morning, as is my habit. His side would be unruffled, and I thought about how that would cause me to pause, perhaps for years after he was gone.
Recently, to a slight degree, though not exactly, I experienced this scene I wrote firsthand.
I woke up one Thursday morning last month to my husband Rob having a stroke. I called 911, and the paramedics arrived quietly, though the flashing lights on their ambulance were jarring in the dark. They whisked my husband away to the hospital as I went back to our bedroom and tried to remember how to get dressed (I was still in my pajamas), and then I drove myself to where one of the EMTs told me to go. Rob ended up staying in the hospital for four nights and five days to be monitored and put through different tests and procedures so the doctors could discern why the stroke happened. They were unable to discover a cause, but I’m ecstatic to report he is doing well now and is back to normal.
While he was in the hospital, I hung out in his room during the day, but I’d return home at night where it was just me, Bo, and Sadie (the felines). One of the many things that came to mind each of the four mornings I woke up alone in our bed at this time was the scene I had written into my story years earlier. Of course, my husband was (and is!) still alive, yet each day I felt the heaviness of the reality of the fragility and uncertainty of life. I thought of my character, LaDelle, who had lost her husband. And though she is a fictional piece of my historical fiction novel–a product of my imagination–somehow that scene of her making the bed comforted me, like I wasn’t alone in the feelings I was experiencing.
That’s what books are supposed to do, don’t you think? At least, that’s what I want them to do. I want to feel something, connect to something, and learn something, too. As a writer, I get to write what I know, and there is a world of reputable sources out there that I can glean from to learn what I don’t know and make sure I get my facts straight. I also must step away from my desk, walk out my door, hop on that plane, etc. and have some experiences of my own. Those firsthand gems are important to life and writing. On top of all that, I can and must use my imagination as all writers of fiction do.
Imagination is essential.
So, dear writer, whether you’re writing for children or adults, whether you write historical fiction, fantasy, mystery–whatever–tap into your imagination. Put yourself in the story. The world could use your imagination. You may be surprised how “real life” it turns out to be, and if it helps, inspires, or simply entertains someone in a worthy way (even yourself), it’ll be worth the effort of getting it down on paper. Can’t you just imagine it?