From me to the Keyboard
by Comicality
Is it an addiction at this point? Yeah, I guess you could say that. It always has been, ever since I was old enough to hold a pencil upright. And it still is. The ideas will come out of me whether I want them to or not, whether anyone is reading or not. It would be AWESOME to get paid a lot of money to write what I write, believe me! Then again...it would be awesome to get paid for breathing too! Hehehe! But the bottom line is that I'll be doing both of those things whether I'm getting money or not. It's just a natural part of me, a passion that's essential to me being happy, that I can't let go of. It means more to me to know that you guys read my stuff and can vibe with it, than any dollar amount that anyone can put on it. To hear what you think makes it more than an honor to put more out there for you to see. This...is what it feels like to write from the heart.
If only I had the words to explain the rush I feel when I'm writing, I would. If only I had the words to explain a LOT of things, I would. Unfortunately, I don't, but I keep trying desperately to get it right. There are times when I can actually feel the same emotions running through me when I write, I can get so deeply involved in it that it becomes impossible to create a language worthy of describing it. Sometimes it makes me just sit back and think for long periods of time to come up with something to say. Sometimes it makes me turn into a BIG chicken, and I back out of trying to explain it at all. And at others times it just plain FRUSTATES the hell out of me!!! But being able to experience those emotions and make it my challenge to translate them for other people to read...that's what writing is all about for me. That's the most intense and pleasureable part of the whole process. Getting it all out and speaking my mind in a way that only I will ever be able to. It's a release for soooo much of who I am inside and what I feel. It's what I think, what I believe, what I would do in certain situations, how I walk, how I talk, how I flirt, my sexual fantasies, my problems, my insecurities....it's the one time where I feel that I can be myself 100% without a single hinderance of any kind. It's a freedom that I wish everyone could experience, just ONCE! And you wonder why I'm so addicted to it? Hehehe!
Trying to describe an emotion, an ACTUAL emotion, can be sooo hard to do. It's like trying to hold onto an awkward liquid gelatin mass with both arms. There are never enough words, and none of them fit anyway. As most people have noticed, I've become the posterboy for 'run-on' sentences! Hehehe, my English teachers always HATED that! From elementary school all the way through college! But when I'm trying to desrcibe something so rich and so full of life and color....there's too much going on at once for me to let a sentence go. I want people to feel, hear, see, taste, everything all at once. Just like in real life. I didn't want to put a visual sight in one sentence....period. Then describe how something feels...period. Then describe a sound in the distance....period. Because we don't experience things that way. We are absorbing everything all at once, in a giant run-on sentence. We're thinking, feeling, sensing everything around us in a blur and taking it in every single second. I LOVE that, and I wanted that to be a part of my writing. To just...drink in a whole world's worth of texture and life in a single moment of time, from all angles. And to nail a particular feeling in a somewhat satisfactory way, is what makes writing such an adrenaline rush for me sometimes. THAT'S the feeling I get when I'm writing, and that's the feeling I want OTHER people to get when they're reading. It's a part of what makes the stories fun for me. That's what makes the stories real for them.
The one thing that I never wanted for the site was to become repetitive, and after 100+ self written stories...that's NOT an easy thing to do! I'm sure there have been times when I've repeated myself or brought back similar ideas in a story by mistake, but it has always been my goal to give each and every story it's own place on this site. I wanted each and every one to have a different 'meaning' behind it, and a different set of circumstances, between a completely different set of characters. I don't want any two characters to think alike, or talk alike, or act alike. I wanted "Beneath The Surface" to be centered around something completely different from "Sibling Rivalry". I wanted "Lessons In Love" to read differently from "A Class By Himself". If it was just the same story with different character names....why would anyone read past the third or fourth story? They've got to involve situations that are unique from one another. So if "If Only In My Dreams" is about a boy in love with someone that he thinks hates him, then "Someone For Me" should be different. So instead that's about a boy who doesn't think he's 'pretty' enough to compete with his friend for the boy of his dreams. Then there's "My One True Weakness" about a boy who IS 'pretty' enough to get anyone he wants, but has never been in love. And "Save Or Sacrifice" about a boy who has his wannabe boyfriend stolen away from him by one of his closest friends who happens to be 'pretty' enough to do it. There are some similarities in what the plot COULD be about, but they all exist as their own story. And it's important to me to keep them separate. There's more to love and relationships that a cute face, a nice ass, and a scheme to get them into bed. Believe me.
I won't lie, writing is also an extremely emotional experience for me too. Sometimes...it's not such a good experience either. I write what I know and I write what I feel, and these days I write what I have on my mind at that particular moment. While the emotion is strong and fresh and I can best explain it. There are some stories on this site that I've written with a smile on my face the entire time! Then...there are a few stories that take a great deal of hurt feelings and tears to get through a single paragraph. Some that I've written in extreme anger, where I've smashed the keyboard hard enough to make every single letter of that story count for the pain I felt. I think it was the first half of "Decisions Of Love" when I broke my space bar, and "Save Or Sacrifice" took care of one of my shift keys. Hehehe, thank goodness for home repairs. The content of the stories has to mean something to me, and it has to be closely connected to me for me to really put my heart into it. Every - single - story. To write something that I'm not really feeling heart and soul dettaches me from it to a point where I don't feel like I can do as good a job of expressing myself. So it's gotta be something that comes from inside.
When you read the stories, you can tell when I'm hurt, you can tell when I'm angry, you can tell when I'm heartbroken, and you can tell when I'm horny. But I don't mind sharing those emotions with you through my characters, because that's what the stories are all about. Sharing something that I've been through, and reaching out to anyone who knows what it's like to feel that same way. To anyone who wants to remember it, get through it now, or who will be facing that situation in the future. These stories aren't just made up out of thin air, they're the past moments of my life and what I felt. Sometimes they're about how I wish I handled things, or how I would handle them now. Sometimes they're good (or bad) memories of mine. And sometimes they're just a way to release some tension and pain that I just don't want to drag behind me anymore. Either way, the emotion has to be real for me to write about it, and that emotion changes from day to day, and therefore from story to story.
Beyond the honest expression of my feelings about life and love in general, I can't deny that 'other' big part of who I am. Despite everything else, I'm STILL an entertainer! Hehehe! Seriously, I want everything to be real and sincere...but I'll be damned if I don't add a little flash here and there to make it enjoyable. A dash of excitement, some humor, some sexual stimulation, some dramatics...it's all a part of making the story readable. I WANT people to smile, and I WANT them to get teary eyed, and I WANT them to finish each chapter and each story with the feeling that "Wow...that was really cool. I was really happy and moved by what I just read." So I push myself to keep things fun and new with every story I do.
I'm always trying to do something different, or maybe write about a situation that I haven't read about before, or create a character that's different from the rest. Sometimes I push to try out some different story ideas and formats altogether, like with "Gone From Daylight" or "Billy Chase". Sometimes I push to improve on or alter what I've already done to add another layer of depth to what's going on, like with "Ryan's Heart", "Taryn's Song", and the "Rainy Day Update". I push to create some kind of new experience with each story so that it doesn't sound like the 'last story Comsie wrote'. Instead, I want them to think, "Whoah, that's a cool idea! I've never seen that before..." Like I said before...after writing this many stories, it isn't an easy thing to do to try to come up with a totally different project. I mean, I'm only ONE person, and I've only got so many experiences to draw from. Hehehe, I'm not a slut, and I'm no world travelling adventurer either. So the difference has to be in the little details, in the dialogue, and in my growth as a person from day to day. I guess the trick is to push passed what I've already done, but not to push passed what I know from my own heart. Weird.
In the future, I'll be trying out a LOT of brand new ideas to keep the stories here on the Shack original. I can't guarantee that they'll be any good, or that I'll do them right, hehehe! But if I didn't TRY, then what would be the point? Right? You guys will just have to wish me luck on that one, and tell me what you think when they're done. Hehehe!
One thing you guys should know about me in one of my writing fevers...as far as outside interference is concerned...I'm in an unshakable TRANCE until I'm done with what I'm doing! Hahaha! DEAD serious! There are many times when I have something on my mind, and I am just in this incredibly creative mood to write...and when I sit down behind this keyboard, that's IT! I don't want to go to the door, I don't want to eat, I don't want to answer the phone, I ignore my email light, I shut the shades...I am NOT to be disturbed! I even go so far as to turn the ringer off of my phone, turn the volume down on the answering machine, and shut off the lights in the living room so if one of my 'cell phone carrying' friends drive by my house, they don't even know I'm HOME! It's that serious. Understand, there's no disrespect intended to you guys or to anyone else...but there are just times when it's me and my thoughts and my focus is 100% on my writing. I don't want any interruptions and I don't even want any TEMPTATIONS to be thrown my way to bring a screeching halt to what I'm concentrating on. It's as difficult as trying to read a book while someone is blasting loud heavy metal music at full volume in your ear. That's my time to hide out so deep, I probably wouldn't even know you were there.
So, when I get in a fever, that's when you guys may notice a complete and total shut off from the world until I am at least deep enough into what I'm writing to get the feeling back even after I take a break. Until then, all the emails and phone calls and internet tracking in the world wouldn't get me to answer you. Hehehe, it's futile to even make the effort, so don't try. But don't fret, I'll be back to you soon, so don't take offense, k? During one of my little fevers, I may write out a whole 20 or 30 K all in ONE sitting! Without even getting up out of my chair, without a bathroom break. Sometimes it lasts until early in the morning (I think my record was 9 AM the next morning, in one long stretch!). Those are the times when I really have something on my mind or in my heart that HAS to come out! It's nights like this when I start entirely new stories with completely different themes, depending on my mood. The really emotional ones that I have such a hard time explaining. You might notice these stories by their excessively long introductions about the main character and what he feels, or by a stream of consciousness that may suddenly go way off topic and not come back to the actual story until I get that particular feeling out of my system. When I'm in one of those unshakable fevers, that's when my emotions and thoughts and ability to put them into words are all working at the same time (for a change), and my feelings are running EXTREMELY high. That's when the words pour out of me beyond my control. One of the best examples of that....is "To My One Fallen Angel".
Probably the most nervous and excruciatingly WORRYSOME part of the whole process??? Actually posting the story!!! It's no secret to most of you, I love writing, I love getting it all out of my system, I love the experience and the practice...but I am *NO* big fan of my own work!!! Arrrrgh! Trust me, I wish I could be. But I'm not. I HATE so many of my own stories that I don't even read them ever again unless I absolutely need to go back to previous chapters for information or some details that I need for continuity! And even THEN...I'm just skimming through it! (If you guys ever notice an abundance of inconsistences in my stories...that's why) It's hard to explain, but it's sort of like...imagine if you were to have a nightmare right now. About being chased through the park by a huge monster of some sort...and it terrifies you because everything feels so real and so lifelike. So you write it all down, and then you go back to look at it later and go....wait a minute...that's STUPID! Why the hell did I believe a stupid monster was chasing me in the park??? That's as close as I can come to explaining what I feel when I look at my own stuff. I get soooo embarassed, that I'm ashamed to show them sometimes. Even BIG stories like earlier chapters of "A Class By Himself" and "New Kid", and a few chapters of "Gone From Daylight". I look at them, and all I see are these HUGE mistakes and things that don't make sense and stuff that I wish I could have explained a whole lot better. I think the hardest part is actually letting the stories go and trusting my original instincts on what I write. So far, you guys seem to like the stories, and that makes me feel good. It's that feedback, that detailed review of how you feel and what the story did for you, that puts me at ease. Hehehe, there have been some stories that I've released, and nobody said anything for like a week because they were busy or had family in town or whatever....and EVERY DAY of that week, I spent thinking that it was the worst thing I ever wrote and being tense and wondering if I should take it down from the site! LOL! In the last year or so, I've gotten a lot better about that and write more for me than anything else. But those were some crazy days, geez!
The heart attack factor aside, to actually release a story on the site, after doing my best to make it perfect, and hearing that people are actually identifying with every word and are loving the characters, is SUCH a beautiful and liberating feeling! To have people share a small piece of their lives with me, or to hear them say that it created some kind of positive feeling inside of them...it's incredible. It's the reason that I share my writing with other people in the first place. I love the feeling that it gives me, but to inspire that same feeling in someone ELSE? Wow...imagine an all day orgasm. Hehehe! Really. There's *nothing* better than really indulging in your passion and being appreciated and understood for it. It gives you strength and invites you to keep going. It makes me work hard to beat what I've already done and do even better the next time. The praise I've gotten in my emails has been overwhelming at times, and I've found myself speechless at some of the comments I've received. In my email archives sit over 2,500 emails from fans of the site who have really poured out their heart in order to express what the stories have done for them. Emails that I've saved over the years, and will keep for the rest of my life. People who have found themselves, who have taken a chance and found true love, people who have met lifelong friends through the Shack, people who have been saved from suicide, people who have come out of the closet to friends and family, people who have been inspired to write stories of their own and go on to be extremely successful at it, people who have moved on to change something in their lives in order to be happy, people who have found a horde of new friends...I cherish you guys with everything that I have to give. You guys are the reason that I'm still here. Thank you all soooo much! ((Hugz))
When a story gets released, that's pretty much the 'climax' of the whole procedure. Once it's out there for everyone to read, then I hear whatever comments go along with it, and pretty much...forget about it. No more touch ups, no more editing, no more re-reading it...it's done. I hang it up like a painting in the story archive and move onto the next one. Hehehehe...sounds insane, doesn't it?
Yep...it won't be the first time that someone has used THAT adjective to describe me! ::Giggles:: But hey, it's all a part of writing from the heart. I hope to get it JUST right someday, because I'm not quite satisfied with it yet. I think it could be a lot better. But for now I'm having fun! :)
This page was last updated on February 11, 2016.