The First Day

Today was quite the day.

On the way to school I bought four legal pads at CVS. That might seem inconsequential, but honestly it was the only thing I did to prepare for this project besides wearing my "write on" t-shirt to school today. This morning was a jumble of nervous excitement. I got to school at about 8:53, totally unsure of where to write or what to write about or if I would even start today.

A few minutes later I found my way to the college counseling office. After asking Ms Cops if I could commandeer the desk beside hers, I unpacked what I had brought with me. Books, the second and third Harry Potter, How to Be A Woman by Caitlin Moran, The Namesake, my kindle, and my two collections of Kurt Vonnegut. An extra sweatshirt, a navy hoody. My pencil pouch, brought back from Ecuador. I then unwrapped my first legal pad and began to sift through old ideas.

Most of the time when I think of something on the go, I write it down on my phone. Looking at all the random thoughts I have had over the last year and a half was helpful. I wrote down old ideas, good and bad, and that helped me think of new ones. Some things I found weren't even ideas; they were just random lines of dialogue that I need to use at some point. For instance, I will have a story that incorporates the sentence "She was the kind of person who put up her Christmas lights right after Halloween and kept them up until President's Day."

From that period of time spent dredging up old thoughts, I have come up with six ideas I want to start out with.
1) A support group for therapists
2) A world where people have a ration of words per year. If you want more than you are given you have to get them out of the bank. People receive fancy words for birthdays, like "flamboyant."Famous writers and poets aren't actually good, they're just rich enough to buy a ton of words. Movies aren't plot based, they are mainly random words being said. People go just to hear the words. On december 31st you have to turn in all your words. New years is spent in complete silence. I don't know exactly how I want to write about this, but I have the first sentence. It was a strange quiet place. That will probably change. This is a little reminiscent of the Phantom Tollbooth. I'm thinking that I may use the same sort of style used in the story, The Ones Who Walk away from Omealas. Not really getting attached to any characters, but mainly describing.
3) Continue writing an old story, suitcases. This will be my most serious story.
4) A world where mental illness is treated by surrounding someone with a certain color. And the reason those with mental illness can't deal with the world is that it's a host of different colors. For some reason I had written "psa: color wards off sadness" in my notes, so that's where this idea comes from. Depression will be treated with yellow. This one will be written from the perspective of one character. Maybe in a mental ward? I don't know yet. It might be like It's Kind of a Funny Story. I really don't know yet, but I want to call it Blue.
5) In children's books you always read that the main character "isn't like the other girls" and that makes her special. I want to do something making fun of that. I'm not sure what yet, or if this could even stand alone as a story. I don't know why but for some reason I'm linking this with The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt??
6) After you die on earth you go to a different planet. Before you start your new life there you are allowed to customize your life. You must have a mix of good and bad things, you choose certain traits to help you navigate the life you picked successfully. Tricky because what was important in a past life might not be important in the next one.

So, yeah. That was today. I mainly sat around and thought. WAIT. I also worked on the survey I am going to send out in a day or two. The survey is a list of questions that will hopefully illicit interesting responses from the students/faculty that I can write about. But with how today went, I may not even need that. I really think that I will keep coming up with ideas the more I work. I talked with Ms Franks after school today and she recommended some short stories I should check out. I do need to start my reading component soon.

Tomorrow I plan to work on at least three out of the six ideas. I need to work on setting a more structured schedule for myself, but right now all I've got is that I am going to write during the periods I have off tomorrow. During that time I will do nothing else. It's nice to be selfish like that. This morning I felt so excited at the prospect of dedicating my time to what I want to do. I am really looking forward to being creative all day and using my mind in a way it was seldom able to be used during school. I only was working for a few hours today and it felt incredible.

I'm really excited for the upcoming month.