Writers' Block since 2003.

Writing has always been important to me. Taking the time to put pen to paper was one of the few things that kept me sane during my adolescence. Within my stories - some realistic, some completely fantastic - I could escape to a world where things simply made more sense. Bad guys were bad guys, good guys were good, and the invariably angry, confused, motherless heroine had plenty of people along the sidelines, fighting to correct the injustice done to her throughout her life. This escape became such a necessity throughout my high school years that I became known for carrying my small worn, soft leather briefcase stuffed with three or four equally tattered marbled Composition books and pens in several styles and colours. The "Extension of [my] Arm", I believe my Dramatic Arts teacher called it.

Eventually, Senior Projects came around. At that point my parents had just informed me there was no chance they would support my attending college, and with those hopes crushed, I found myself lost. The immediate difficulty was the Project, of course. How could I possibly torture myself studying the career paths of a history teacher, when there was no way I would be able to become one without a college degree? Well, I was spending so much time involved in my "own world" that I focused my senior project on the profession of "Fantasy Novelist". Now the time I spent sketching character profiles, detailing the map of Aravest, drafting deities and calendars and cultural festivals for my characters to attend all amounted to 60% of my yearly grade in two classes. My book, "The Sorrow of Calameth" (Calameth being the Elf-God who carved the hills of the world with his Dagger of Power) was cut short at 115 pages, as I was forced to draft SOME ending in order to have a bound copy available to the Judges of the project. I hated the end. I swore the day I printed it that I would go back and show Austeth Windhorse and Derdriu Ravendale some true justice.

Soon after graduation, I fell to the judgement of the cult I once called my home church, and by their bidding I destroyed Aravest - my beautiful planet. The maps, the gods, the calendar, the drawings I worked so hard on... but the book itself I gave to a friend for safe-keeping. Someday I hope to get it back, though this girl and I haven't spoken much at all since school ended.

Since, I have escaped the church, my so-called-family, and all those things that drove me to create Aravest and its people. Still, I miss the hours spent writing letters to Austeth Windhorse by candlelight, in the persona of Amnestia Moonwhisper, on tanned paper with my old scratch pens, and sealing them with drops of wax. I miss escaping - as Derdriu Ravendale - to the Temple of The Lady Moon, staring over the Sacred Lake in meditation as the stars glittered in the sky and over the rippling waters. The characters I have created recently are much stronger than those women: Culatre, another priestess, but one who chose to leave station and security instead of giving up the child she carried to the Gods. Qolqo'tar, the son of Culatre, a vast and powerful Dark Elf seeking adventure in distraction from the revenge he wishes to seek against the Priests that disfigured his mother when she refused to conform.

Characters I can create, yes. Small anecdotes and scenes mere moments long... but the hours of creation have gone from me for a long time.

Perhaps, just perhaps, a change of scenery? Surely internal conflict is not the only thing that can drive me to write? Am I doomed to this writers' block as long as I have a happy life?

Aravest is gone, this I know. Her characters will not return (all but my beloved Austeth have been killed). I have begun a new land, whose name has not yet come to me. The inspiration of this place was (don't laugh) algae growth I viewed from the tower at Lettuce Lake Park. I took pictures, and layered them atop each other in Photoshop, and it is serving to be a most useful planet! I have borrowed two place names from Aravest - the twin cities Qas'arr and Qer'aran - because I don't feel they were explored enough in "Sorrow". And I am still hoping beyond hope that Austeth can return to my writings.

Now, all I need is a plot.

See my new planet here