I've been writing since I was six.
I suppose it came naturally, what with me being a voracious reader, blazing through moderate-length children's novels in a mere three or four hours. (To be fair, Tolkien's books took me around six or eight at the time, and my mistake in the sixth grade that was Moby Dick required a week of perseverance.) That, and I've been blest with an unbelievably vivid imagination, so writing them out seemed the next logical direction, perhaps.
Whatever the reason I started, I remember my first sketches being about a squirrel named Jimmy Lee ... something. (I have a thing for three names; I hope that doesn't mean I end up as a serial killer.) It was a very elementary idea—probably one I'll revisit if I ever decided to take a stab at children's literature—and I distinctly recall it attempting to move in a decidedly Tron-esque direction.
'Cause, you know, squirrels and computers.....
What? I was seven.
I dabbled a bit in artistic sketches as well; I even kept a small notebook of various alien life-forms I came up with when bored, as well as their species' quirks, language terms and translations, technological variations, sociological environments, and economic tendencies including trade relations with the other species. (Don't even bother asking why. I have no idea in hell any more.) I since abandoned the book, for reasons I can't remember probably involving boredom, but I still get a kick out of going back and looking at the ridiculous names I made, as well as being amused at how early I became obsessed with the crossing of the organic and the cybernetic. (Tron squirrels, remember?)
So come sixth grade, and at the end of the year our English teacher, who is one of the most kind, funny, and amazing old ladies I know—think a human grandmother version of Yoda, and add the surname Jackson—assigned us the first creative writing project I'd seen since reentering the public school system. She gave us no limits aside from one goal: we had to capture the audience's attention with the first sentence.
"Okay", I remember thinking, "I can do that."
I threw myself forward as the brick wall behind me shattered.
I thought it made for an interesting visual at the time, and it also meant I would get to play with my little fantasy about being a teenage cyborg that to date I'd been content to play out with LEGOs from the Explorian and Spyruis sets. (Notice a trend?) I did very well on the assignment, but I remember thinking after I turned it in how very convenient and clichéd it felt on a reread.
So I set about tweaking it, to see if I could make it real—or at least more real.
Haven't quit yet.
