Those Quirky Characters Who Refuse to Grow Up

As writers we are surrounded by people that we can use as characters in our stories. Perhaps not the actual person, but someone with the same quirks, personalities,and appearance. There is no end to this. So following in theme I have for this month, here is another character I know or have in my life – the person who never grows up.

She’s in her early 30’s and I don’t think she has ever had a serious relationship with the opposite sex. I’ve known her since she was eleven or twelve, and she’s never really dated a lot. She’s attractive enough, has a bubbly and outgoing personality.

She doesn’t want to commit to anyone because she doesn’t she doesn’t want to grow up. She LOVES hanging out with the teenagers, but not in a weird way. She’s always served as a youth sponsor/leader in whatever church my daughter and her husband are youth pastors. But she hangs out with teens – mostly girls – during the week and weekends.

I love this young lady. She calls me mom. But she is quirky and sometimes her quirkiness is irritating and frustrating. I think I understand her refusal to commit (she was in a relationship recently with a handsome, sweet Christian guy, but she broke up after two months) because I know some of her background.

But the whole point of this blog is how this person I know would make a good character in my writing. Let’s see…a quirky 30ish woman who doesn’t want to grow up, is afraid to commit in a relationship. Yes, I could tweak that into an interesting character in a short story or minor character in a novel.

Go, my friends, and share your story with your vast array of characters. God bless us all, and bless our words that we pen.

Revealing Secrets of Your Characters

One of my favorite things about writing is creating characters. Creating characters is like writing a story. You have blank pages that can be filled with whatever your heart desires. To me, that is more fun than a barrel of monkeys.

Creating characters gives me the ability to make them as sweet or mean as I want. I can reveal things about their personalities, deep secrets, quirks and any number of things that most people wouldn’t know about them.

Several months ago on Facebook, there was a thing going around where someone else assigned you a number and you had to reveal that number of things about yourself – things others may not know about you.

So, today, I’ll list a few of those things that others may not know about me.

1.      I was born on a small farm in Phoenix, AZ around 51^st Ave. and Indian School Rd. It was rural Phoenix then. Definitely not rural now, nor has it been for many, many years.

2.     I came from a long line of Pentecostal believers, but was 14 before I surrendered my life to the Lord. I’ve never regretted that decision. Most Pentecostal expressions of worship in early days was, and did appear, bizarre to the observer, the heart was usually in the right place. Sometimes I miss those days of exuberant, passionate expressions.

3.     Although I was always an A student in school, all I ever wanted to be was a wife and mother. Oh, and maybe write books. I always loved to write.

4.     Because of #3, I married when I was barely 16 to a young man someone invited to church. I had a baby 9 months 3 days later, the first of five. It was not a good marriage and ended in divorce twenty-two years later. Divorce is never God’s plan but cannot be helped sometimes.

5    I was forty-two before I got my GED. 

We all have interesting things about our lives that most people don't know about us. In developing characters for a novel or short story, perhaps we give them characteristics or events in their lives that we wished we had in ours. That's the beauty of writing. 

Creating

As a young girl, my goals and ambitions about what I wanted to be when I grow up took on many forms. Do people even ask young children that question anymore? I know I don’t.

Since I loved school, my first choice was to be a teacher. Being an avid reader, I often adopted a profession that was in one of the books I was reading. I’d be an astronaut, an archeologist, a nurse. When I became a Christian at fourteen, I decided I wanted to be a missionary. The only one of those desires that I achieved was to work for nineteen years in a home mission work in Phoenix.

I always wanted to write, but for whatever reason, I didn’t consider that a profession. And it goes without fail that I wanted to be a wife and mommy, probably more than I wanted to be anything else. I didn’t consider that a goal or ambition because I grew up in an era when that was just an automatic assumption for little girls.

I dabbled at writing much like some dabble at religion. By the way, religion is dull and lifeless. A relationship with our God, our creator, and His son, Jesus Christ, is something else entirely. Now that’s life-giving!

When I retired, I decided, with encouragement from others, to write – be a writer. Once I opened my mind and heart to this, I found I had stories churning and frothing inside me looking for an outlet. I became that outlet.

In fulfilling my dreams to be a mother, I found I loved creating people, pouring over names to give them, helping form personalities and traits, and watch as these whom I created blossomed into their own being. To me, that’s the fun of developing characters as I write. I can give them any name, personality and occupation I want. Later, if I decide I don’t like the name, or if I want to change some nuance of a personality, I have the power to do that.

It makes it so much fun!

Of Character and Characters

A couple weeks ago the men from our church went on a three day camping/fishing trip in beautiful pine country (Phoenix is all desert) by Woods Canyon Lake. The first night there my grandson, Nathanael, gave a Bible devotion around the campfire.

The next day they were approached by a couple of ladies from the next camp site. They had overheard the devotion the night before and just wanted to say how much they appreciated seeing a group of men and boys praying and studying the Bible.

Overheard! Overhearing! If others heard our conversations when we weren’t aware, would they compliment us? Would they say, “I knew that’s how she/he really is?” Our character is not how we speak and behave when others are listening or watching. It’s what we do when we think no one sees or hears.

Being a writer is like letting others inside our heads, inside our thoughts. I’ve usually found that most writers’ personalities are reflected in their work. Some live out their dreams, angst, desires, experiences (good and bad), obsessions, and any number of things in their writing.

I write from experience, either my own or others I know or have known. I’m allowing people inside my mind and thoughts. To do so makes us vulnerable. Of course, my writing is fiction and my characters are fictional. I have been asked concerning my book Like A Cedar In Lebanon if I am Lebby. I’ve also been asked by one of my daughters if she is Lebby.

The answer is that my characters are usually a composite of several real people. So if you wonder if I’ve patterned a character after you, well, maybe. Just maybe.

Pantster Vs Plotter

My husband frequently asks me (usually when we’re in the van going or returning from somewhere), “What’re you thinking about?” My answer is always the same, “About my characters in the novel I’m working on,” or “I’m developing more conflicts in my novel.”

I am an SOTP, not a Plotter. For those who write, you know what I’m talking about. SOTP stands for Seat-of-the-Pants, or shortened to Pantster. I never plot or outline. I start with an idea and it just blossoms and unfolds as I write. Writing like that drives Plotters wacky, but for a Pantster, plotting takes the fun out of it.

I am ALWAYS amazed at how my writing takes twists and turns that I had no idea about in the beginning. For me, as a Pantster, it’s like opening the most delightful, intriguing presents at Christmas. What fun!

Alas, even as a Pantster I have to force myself to keep track of certain things. I keep a spreadsheet with names, dates, locations, etc. If not, I can get totally skewed. Nothing is worse than calling the local pharmacist Charlie, a very minor character, in the beginning and then calling him Bob later on because I didn’t note the name assuming I wasn’t going to use him again.

Last night I was writing on my WIP (work in progress) The Roof of the King and I needed to put the name of Josiah’s – my main male character – secretary. I had used her in the beginning, and typical Pantster, was confident I wouldn’t use her again. BUT…there I was, needing her name and couldn’t remember it. I had to go back and search for it. Voila, her name is Jan. A Plotter would never have that problem.

By the way, The Roof of the King is not about a king other than the fact that Josiah, great man of God, falls to moral temptation like King David did with Bathsheba.

Whether you’re a Plotter or a Pantster, write as God inspires and directs you. God’s not as concerned about the method as He is the message. Having said that, I encourage you to pray over your writing and then pray some more.

Writer's Block

I love it when I don’t have to force myself to write. When I first started my writing journey I admit I had a difficult time understanding ‘writer’s block’ or writers that moaned about not wanting to write. Really, I thought. Isn’t that kind of like a food addict saying “Oh, I must force myself to eat all the foods I love?”

Ah, but now I understand. Unfortunately, I have understood it all too well for a couple of years now. By understand, I mean I’ve experienced it. However, I really don’t understand. Why must one force them self to do something they love, something they’re passionate about?

When I’m in a slump, I pray, I give myself pep talks, I threaten myself (well, not really, but maybe I should), and then I pray some more.  The thing about prayer is that God will nudge, and encourage us to do something, but He won’t make us. We have to do that on our own.

Yesterday I wrote 3000 words or more on a manuscript I’ve already written over 50,000 words. I fell in love with the story, the characters, all over again. I gave my characters new twists, new adventures, new struggles and conflicts.

I’ve titled the book The Roof of the King’s House, but I’m thinking of changing the title to In An Eveningtide. It’s a modern version of 2 Samuel 11: 1 & 2. It involves the handsome Josiah, passionate about his ministry and God; Betty, Josiah’s sister’s best friend, who has loved Josiah since childhood; Leah, the spoiled, only child of wealthy, Jewish parents – Leah, who has a life changing encounter with Jesus; Tony, who marries Leah before he ships off to the war in Vietnam and returns a wounded, troubled man.

I love it when the words just flow from my mind to my fingers to the manuscript.

Getting Motivated After The Holidays

Ugh! Bah-humbug! I love, love, love the Thanksgiving and Christmas season, but trying to get back into the groove (am I dating myself using that word?) has been difficult. That scripture in the Bible “The spirit is willing but the flesh (body) is weak” (Matt. 26:41), sure describes what I have been experiencing.

Writing, like anything, is an endeavor where we need to give ourselves a push periodically. Even if you LOVE to write, you’ll encounter this at times. Let’s face it, we can always justify not doing something with the excuse that we had so many other things to do. And with me, that is true. Very, very true!

My characters in my WIP-'s-currents novels--I’m working on, become so real to me during the whole writing process. But like real people, if I don’t see or talk to them for awhile, they tend to fade from the forefront of my thoughts. It’s almost like we need to get reacquainted again.

So here is my public declaration to: Jonah and Lilyth, Josiah and Leah, Lola and Jeremy, and Jeff and Leola (the only non-fiction ms I’m working on), I know who you are. I haven’t completely forgotten you. I promise that I will visit you this week and frequently thereafter. At least I will for sure with Jonah and Lilyth, and Jeff and Leola. But I haven’t forgotten the rest of you.

Is she working on four different novels you may ask. Glad you did ask. Yes, I am.

I can do this!

NaNoWriMo Woes

        Every time I start a new NaNoWriMo, I threaten to kick myself. I have three such novels of 50,0000 words and more that I need to finish. Why start a new one?

        Why indeed! Here I am typing my little fingers to the bone with a new novel (and way ahead of my word count, I might add) Seriously? I love my other novels. I want to finish them.  I can’t believe I’m doing this again.

        Never, ever, in my wildest imagination did I think that writing could be so time consuming. I thought it was like the movies----a remote cottage, gentle breezing blowing through a window, soft music playing, some devoted someone bringing in coffee or iced drinks and delicious sandwiches.
        Even in the movie Misery, the main character , an author, played by James Caan, who was in excruciating pain inflicted by the demented Kathy Bates, who also tormented him mentally, managed to crank out an entire novel. In the midst of all that, he made the novel writing look so easy.
        But alas, I suppose ‘No pain, No gain’ as the saying goes. So I lie in bed each night with my novel unfolding like scenes from a movie (that’s what pantsters do—no plotting for me) until I want to scream, “Leave me alone so I can sleep!”
        NaNoWriMo, how I loathe thee.…I mean, oh, how I love thee.

Book Burning!

           I told my friend Barbara recently that if I had to read my book, Like a Cedar in Lebanon, one more time, I’m going to burn the thing. So…I’m having to read it AGAIN! Before publishing. Should I burn it?
         Of course I won’t burn it, although I feel like. I just want to move on, go forward with something else, write on one of the other three novels that are a work in process. I so want to be done with this book.
         Having said that, I must admit that my characters in Like a Cedar in Lebanon have become dear friends to me, like family. Often, at the most inopportune times, my characters pop into my brain, and scenes from my novel float through my mind. Sometimes I want to rewrite those scenes, but of course, it’s too late.
         So I think I want to do a sequel, carry on Jack’s and Lebby’s legacy. That’s one of the joys about writing! I can do that! I can do anything I want.
        But a writer is only as successful as the enjoyment of the readers.  Some may debate that statement, but that’s where I am at in this juncture of my writing journey.