Save the Pandas

-
Don’t let my blog title fool you today. Yes, I care about the environment and animal welfare, but the pandas I refer to currently reside on my dresser.

Last night I dreamed that I was contributing to two donation circles. I’m not sure why the items needed to fall into the circles, but they did. Anyway, I dropped a wedding gown in one and firewood in the other. I felt nothing during those two decisions. Note, it was NOT my wedding gown since it was white and mine was peach, so don’t start analyzing that part.


Anyway, the next thing I grabbed to drop into the donation circles was my two stuffed pandas. The smaller one, Teddy, has been with me as long as I can remember. It belonged to my sister first, and she gave it to me when I was small. Teddy doesn’t have any fur left, but I think that’s my sister’s fault, not mine. Over the years, he’s been re-sewn and washed many times. I asked for the larger panda a few years ago at Christmas. He came from the Bombay Company store in the mall and reminded me of Teddy. The two live together on my dresser.

So, the moment I dropped the two bears into the circle, a great remorse swept over me. I stepped forward to save them and something fell from the sky and exploded on the ground in front of me. I jumped back wondering if the explosion meant something. Was it judgment for depositing my pandas? Was it an attempt to prevent me from saving the pandas? Did my decision to pull the pandas out of the circle save me from being hit by the explosion?

I rarely remember my dreams and the details of this one are fading quickly from my memory. I don’t believe in dream interpretation, but this one stuck with me throughout the day. Why? I’m guessing sometime in the near future I’ll find a way to use it in a story. Many of my stories do come from my sleep-infused brain. In fact the main plot of the novel that I’m trying to get published appeared to me first in a dream. The story itself is far different than that dream, but it provided the seeds to what eventually became a 103,000 word novel.

Now if I can just get an agent and editor to agree that it needs to be published!

Comments

Bob Strother said…
I get lots of story ideas after my first glass of Chardonnay and then lose them after the third. As a child, I had a stuffed elephant I called "Snout-Snout." Nowadays, I shy away from all things elephant-related.
July 21, 2010 at 8:16 AM
Carole St-Laurent said…
The creative mind never stops churning.
July 21, 2010 at 12:57 PM
Valerie said…
Dream plots, eh? Not me. Mine seem to be of the "horrific public toilet" or "evil squirrel" variety. Not sure the world is ready for a novel about either.

But yours--I could have a good time interpreting that one! The wedding dress, the firewood, the pandas, the explosion... Much fodder for discussion, most of it ignorant since I neither know anything about dream interpretation, nor believe it in. But it would be fun!
July 25, 2010 at 9:12 AM
Barbara V. Evers said…
Hmm, so I'm not the only one who has the evil public toilet dream? I dont' believe in dream interpretation either. but the toilet one usually means I need to wake up and go use the bathroom!
July 25, 2010 at 3:05 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Skin Tone: Describing Your Characters

-
Image
When you write about character's of different races, how do you describe their skin tone? If you've never thought about this, then consider this question: How do the authors you read described persons of color? A few months ago, I attended a webinar about writing diverse characters. The guest was Eliana West of Writers for Diversity . The information she shared felt fresh and valuable, especially related to describing a character's skin tone. I get really tired of seeing African-descended characters described in terms of the goods that drove, and still drive the slave trade--coffee, chocolate, brown sugar. There's some weird psychosocial baggage attached to that.    -- N. K. Jemisin As this quote from author, N. K . Jemisin , indicates, historically, writers have described people of color using food-related descriptors. Many people of color find this offensive. This surprised me, at first, but she has a point, especially when you view it through the quote above. My fir...
Read more

Character Development: Using the Johari Window

-
Image
In my last post, Character Development: the Johari Window , I introduced the Johari Window as a tool for developing your characters. It's important that your character not know everything about their situation. These unknowns can lead to an intriguing story and create possibilities for conflict within the story. How do you use the Johari Window? In this post, I thought I'd provide a simple example of the Johari Window with a character most people know:  Harry Potter. Below, I have filled out the Johari Window as it might appear within the first few pages of book 1, Harry Potter and The Sorceror's Stone . The Johari Window based on Harry Potter and The Sorceror's Stone Three of the quadrants in this window reveal what Harry doesn't know about who he truly is and what happened to his parents. I could add a lot to the quadrants representing what he doesn't know, but I hope this gives you an idea on how a Johari Window might be used. What do you d...
Read more

He Said, She Said, Who Said? Punctuating Dialogue

-
Image
Courtesy of Morguefile.com I've been focusing my posts on workshops and panels I taught or participated on at the Imaginarium Convention. Although this serves as a poor substitute for the real thing, I can share some highlights. This week, we're going to explore dialogue punctuation. The first thing writers need to learn is how to properly punctuate dialogue. I've discovered, over the years, that many don't know how. Notice in the first example below, the dialogue starts at the beginning of the sentence, and the speaking tag (he said, she said, Paul said, etc.) follows it.  A few points to notice: The first letter of the quotation is capitalized. What the person says is a sentence, so it must be capitalized. A comma comes directly after the quote and INSIDE the quotation marks. You can, also, have a question mark or exclamation point here. There is a space AFTER the closing quotation mark followed by the speaking tag and a period at the end of the sentence. In the next ...
Read more