Gemma. (Today's writing warm-up)
There was a time when my family was extremely happy.
I miss being a little girl like that. It was the only time in my life that I ever really felt happy. Watching TV together after dinner. Playing at the indoor parks at the mall. Going on family trips to the meadows to watch the flowers. Mom and Dad would sit with me on flowered picnic blankets in our planet’s annual week of springtime and Dad would tell me stories of the oceans. He said that on faraway planets, there were enormous bodies of water called oceans, filled with marine life, that looked like a thousand lakes rolled into one. Water as far as the eye can see, with waves — hills of water that looked like giant, foaming ripples — that crashed on the sand like the rhythm of snare drums. He would tell me of dragons, of unicorns, of fairies, of all the creatures that our world never had. Mom would always smile and laugh, thinking it to be all a bit of lighthearted childhood fun, but Dad was serious. He really believed in those stories. I could tell. I could always read him. And so, I believed in them too.
With my family, even the freezing winter nights were bearable. Those endless nights and enormous blizzards that I hate now. The mountains of snow that would pile up higher than the skyscrapers, burying our city. There were months on end where we would never see the sun or the sky, but we didn’t need to. We had each other. That was our light.
When Dad left, my hatred for the winter collapsed on me like a ton of bricks. It was like all the anger I had towards him had to go somewhere, because he wasn’t there to receive it, and so I turned it towards the world.
There were plans of the future, of a brother and sister that I would have, if all went well. You can’t really control those things, of course, but I looked forward to meeting my future siblings anyway — siblings that I never got, because he was gone.
Everything else in my life after that, I’ve worked out for myself. I started working in high school, mainly to get out of the house as much as possible. Mom was never the same and I didn’t even want to look at her anymore. She would fly into hysterics every time I left the house, accusing me of abandoning her. If she had her way, I’d have never even finished middle school. But I did, and graduated high school too. I got into Lion’s Mane University all on my own, with straight As, extracurricular activities, and scholarships. I knew it was the only school for me — small, private, at the equator where the summer lasts for a whole month, and the same university that some of my online friends were going to. Chase Jenues and Maisie Bird, magic_dies and everblitz. We met up in person for the first time towards the end of high school and they are the only two friends I’ve ever had. Thankfully, they’re amazing friends. I don’t think they like this world all that much, either. They seem a lot like me.
Concept art isn’t the most viable career financially, but a few can make it big. It’s what I want to do, so it’s the program I’m applying for. Coupled with an enjoyable minor in something practical as a fallback, I think I can be one of those who makes it.
But truth be told, if I can find a way out of here? I’m leaving immediately. Every day I work to achieve my dreams, and every night I explore the land of sleep to find a way to enter other worlds, forever. The same worlds that Dad used to believe in, when he was here. I think that through astral projection, we can really enter them, and there might even be ways to physically cross over, not just astrally. It might be a silly dream, but I like to believe in those worlds. I’ve long lost faith in this one, and I’ll be happy to abandon it for good. Just like Dad abandoned me.
(Today's warm-up piece ended up being a first-person exploration of my character Gemma Porter, which is actually extremely useful for me. I've definitely been struggling with my current WIP.)
I miss being a little girl like that. It was the only time in my life that I ever really felt happy. Watching TV together after dinner. Playing at the indoor parks at the mall. Going on family trips to the meadows to watch the flowers. Mom and Dad would sit with me on flowered picnic blankets in our planet’s annual week of springtime and Dad would tell me stories of the oceans. He said that on faraway planets, there were enormous bodies of water called oceans, filled with marine life, that looked like a thousand lakes rolled into one. Water as far as the eye can see, with waves — hills of water that looked like giant, foaming ripples — that crashed on the sand like the rhythm of snare drums. He would tell me of dragons, of unicorns, of fairies, of all the creatures that our world never had. Mom would always smile and laugh, thinking it to be all a bit of lighthearted childhood fun, but Dad was serious. He really believed in those stories. I could tell. I could always read him. And so, I believed in them too.
With my family, even the freezing winter nights were bearable. Those endless nights and enormous blizzards that I hate now. The mountains of snow that would pile up higher than the skyscrapers, burying our city. There were months on end where we would never see the sun or the sky, but we didn’t need to. We had each other. That was our light.
When Dad left, my hatred for the winter collapsed on me like a ton of bricks. It was like all the anger I had towards him had to go somewhere, because he wasn’t there to receive it, and so I turned it towards the world.
There were plans of the future, of a brother and sister that I would have, if all went well. You can’t really control those things, of course, but I looked forward to meeting my future siblings anyway — siblings that I never got, because he was gone.
Everything else in my life after that, I’ve worked out for myself. I started working in high school, mainly to get out of the house as much as possible. Mom was never the same and I didn’t even want to look at her anymore. She would fly into hysterics every time I left the house, accusing me of abandoning her. If she had her way, I’d have never even finished middle school. But I did, and graduated high school too. I got into Lion’s Mane University all on my own, with straight As, extracurricular activities, and scholarships. I knew it was the only school for me — small, private, at the equator where the summer lasts for a whole month, and the same university that some of my online friends were going to. Chase Jenues and Maisie Bird, magic_dies and everblitz. We met up in person for the first time towards the end of high school and they are the only two friends I’ve ever had. Thankfully, they’re amazing friends. I don’t think they like this world all that much, either. They seem a lot like me.
Concept art isn’t the most viable career financially, but a few can make it big. It’s what I want to do, so it’s the program I’m applying for. Coupled with an enjoyable minor in something practical as a fallback, I think I can be one of those who makes it.
But truth be told, if I can find a way out of here? I’m leaving immediately. Every day I work to achieve my dreams, and every night I explore the land of sleep to find a way to enter other worlds, forever. The same worlds that Dad used to believe in, when he was here. I think that through astral projection, we can really enter them, and there might even be ways to physically cross over, not just astrally. It might be a silly dream, but I like to believe in those worlds. I’ve long lost faith in this one, and I’ll be happy to abandon it for good. Just like Dad abandoned me.
(Today's warm-up piece ended up being a first-person exploration of my character Gemma Porter, which is actually extremely useful for me. I've definitely been struggling with my current WIP.)
Comments
Post a Comment