Friday, August 28, 2009

When you work it out

          I've had God Put a Smile Upon Your Face by Coldplay stuck in my head for the past week. I'm not really bothered by that anymore. I let it play over and over in my head until it runs its course. It hasn't yet, though. I should mention that when I hear it I think of the Prelude prequel to the main Ka'ne-Yuri story I've been working on for quite a while. I can picture it all, like a montage from start to finish. Condensed properly it'd be an awesome trailer for the movie or nice to way to cover those events at the beginning of the main Ka'ne-Yuri.
          The story has so many twists and turns and back-story (not to mention setup) you'd think this was some kind of sci-fi/fantasy soap opera but I assure you it's not so melodramatic. I sometimes wonder that if I ever truly finish this (to my satisfaction) and publish it, would people try to say I was hoping to make the next Lord of the Rings or Star Wars or something? I almost would be insulted at the suggestion. They're great works in their own right but my story is so different from both. I feel my writing has not matured and improved quite well enough to do the story justice. I try my best when I do rewrites but I always fall short, in my opinion. It's grown with me for nine years now and I understand the world and characters so much better then I did when I first created it all. I look back at the plot and the major points of it that I created, underlying themes that emerged and how the characters and world developed in my mind.
          At fourteen (with a normal suburban life), I couldn't understand or explain to others why characters acted the way they did. At fourteen I didn't really know despair, the strength of the bond between a Guardian and their charge, the weight of responsibility, what it can drive a person to or allow themselves to do, feeling so trapped and wanting to get away but afraid and unsure how because as terrible as life was for her not knowing anything else (almost). Then we moved. I had the predisposition for it before, I'm sure, but being taken away from everything I loved and knew at sixteen threw me over the edge and into a terrible depression. It's only in the past few months (maybe year or two) I feel I've finally recovered. In the depths of such sorrow and pain I found solace in Ka'ne. I slipped into her world often to hide away from mine. I could transfer my burden to her; see through her eyes, feel what she felt.
          You wouldn't think depression is a state that promotes creativity (the evidence seems inconclusive either way) but for me it was a powerful catalyst. In the first semester at the new school I had filled twenty-five pages of scribbles of Kane's story during and between classes and at lunch. I was diagnosed and treated but the treatment left me numb and rather dull. It's strange, getting used to being twenty-three. I see Ka'ne-Yuri with fresh eyes and ever plumb deeper into my characters and their world. Now it is a pleasant escape, a haven away from the hectic and sometimes isolating college life. I think about her on the way to and from classes, when other songs trigger thoughts of situations and characters, when I'm scared or lonely.
          Ka'ne is not just some fictional character, she is part of me more intimate than any external relationship can be (or internal with myself for that matter). She is my mother, my daughter, my sister, my head, my heart, my soul, my joy, my heartbreak, my comfort, my strength. She is that great and powerful part of me that I draw from, a slightly dissociated version of myself but yet so different from me you wouldn't recognize at times.
          and maybe that's why i'm not really sure i could ever finish the story...because giving her up to the world would be baring the deepest parts of me.

No comments:

Post a Comment