So Bright, It Fades

It's as if this month’s word, overexposure, has actually exposed one way to explain how ideas come to me. A box like this, for example, was central to my dream last month. I was prodded to step forward and open it, but every step came with with increasing trepidation. I woke up before I was able to see inside, but in those next moments I was filled with a compulsion to explore that idea: what was in the mystery box, and why would it generate such apprehension? I needed to make that a driving factor in some new story. 

Immediately, I closed my eyes to revisit the dream. What came before? Anything after? There was more to the dream, wasn't there? Something that could shed light on this nascent story, right? But the harder I tried to look into my dream, the brighter, the filmier, the move overexposed it appeared.  No! I couldn't let it fade into oblivion.

Time for panic? Definitely not. As often happens with me and new ideas, I was trying too hard to shed light on the box. I needed to step back, allow the mind picture to take on shadows of nuance. Allow details to materialize. Allow other people to enter the scene. And like... that!—(well, not like that, but over a few weeks)—the story began to write itself.

Jody Feldman (The Gollywhopper Games), now has a 30 pages of notes about the box, the main characters, their families, and a very fun setting. Now, she just needs to see if it will all come together. Stay tuned!