Stories always make the unreal become vividly real for you, a spark of imagination in your mind and soul. It's a wonderful thing that never ages, this spark, and that is why people who love stories never tire of them.
Even more wonderful is the moment you join your mind and soul in labor with your hands and will, and you bring that spark of imagination to life in the real world. That's the power of storytelling, in all its subtleties.
As I was growing up, reading was my outlet to adventures a shy, timid little girl could never experience otherwise. I didn't have to climb to the top of a ladder, or take a flip off the diving board, or talk to strangers that stare at you like zombies about to eat your brain.
Instead, I could read about living in an 1860's log cabin in a woods filled with wolves, bears, and black panthers. I could experience being taken captive to Egypt in ancient times and rescuing the daughter of an assassinated priest. I could feel what it was to survive as the last of my kind, stranded on a island beset by gusty winds and blue dolphins.
This all became real for me, while I was actually huddled in my room, safe among the fluffy pillows and covers of my bed.
For many bookworms (okay, maybe all bookworms), reading is an escape from whatever troubles them. Several times, I have read notes of gratitude directed to a particular book or series that helped soothe grief, frustration, and depression during difficult times of life. Just as often, that gratitude is owed to music and other arts as well.
Sheltered as I was, I never really had anything to flee from, unless you count boredom and noisy brothers something worth fleeing. (Oh, and the staring strangers as well.) But the reminder of just how much the written word can act as a lifeline struck a chord within me.
That was when I realized that I really like the idea of harnessing my writing ambition, my only ambition, in order to create something meaningful. Something that encourages even as it entertains, that inspires as it instructs, that challenges as it charms. And all with wit and subtlety, as far as my own limited skills allow.
There lies the goal. If I can make a profession of writing story after story that does more souls than my own good, and write them well, I'll be content. I'm never happier than when I'm buried alive in a story, whether another person's creation or my own. I'll see if I can share a bit of joy here and there.
Incidentally, I still get the feeling many strangers are zombies staring at you like they want to eat your brains. I have overcome my fear of ladders, and I did flip off the diving board once when my aunt promised she would do it after me, but I don't think I'll ever fully outgrow the paranoia an active imagination can lend. The only thing keeping me talking to strangers in real life is my love of stories, because it's hard to get a story published if you make no contact with strangers.
I wish strangers were too busy reading a good story to stare at you. Perhaps I should alter my ambition. Not only will I make them smile; I will make them unable to see me through my books. Or, rather, they'll see me as I really am, not as I appear.
That's the irony of writing for cloistered writers. In your words, you bare your soul, because your story can't touch another soul unless you pour your own soul into it first. That's how you snare a glimmer of the unreal to share with others and make it real for them.
