Turning everything into fiction.

When I was in middle school I started writing a serialized story based on my projections of what my peers and I would be up to in our twenties. During my last move I found the actual original text and it was much worse than I remembered.  It's no surprise to me that I cast my least favorite people in villainous roles, but I'll be honest that I didn't remember how much the popular nighttime soaps Dallas, Knots Landing and Dynasty inflected my imagination.  I wasn't allowed to watch any of them, and while I'm sure I occasionally managed to catch a few glimpses or maybe a secretly watched episode, I was shocked to see how whole-heartedly I accepted the opulent settings and the outrageous epic turns of events as my own palette.  In the first few episodes, the character loosely based on me decides to sell his mansion in Switzerland and move back to America.  Unfortunately the plane crashes into the Ocean and the next half of the season consists of a chain of rafts full of old middle-school acquaintances trying to find land before the sharks eat them.

I have been writing the world into fiction ever since then.  And after filling hundreds of writing journals, many screenplays, one novel with a terrible ending, essays, blog entries and tweets - my understanding of fiction is that sometimes it gives us a clearer sense of truth than other forms of reporting.  Now I do want you to know that I love good journalism and documentary films and podcasts, so I do not want to diminish that work at all.

And when I speak of fiction - I'm talking about the literal nuts and bolts of it.  Fiction is a "made thing." So even when people approach a documentary story and try to tell the most unbiased, objective, resonant, valid story -- choices must be made.

First this word then that word.

A comma?  Or a dash.

Does the writing aim for invisibility?  Or does it ask us to take note of the diction and style?  From what angle are we looking at these events?  At what remove?

It's like one of the most rewarding concrete puzzles to solve because the answer keeps shifting as it develops.  The truth includes the coherence of the parts to the whole.  The point of view we offer.  The feelings that the words and the grammar evoke.

I'm so grateful that writing the world into fiction is a way that we can get by.  And a way we can tell the truth

#50thingsofvalue