Wednesday, August 3, 2016

In today's Insecure Writer's Support Group post I answer a question about my very first piece of writing.

Today is the first Wednesday of a new month. That means it's time to do my Insecure Writer's Support Group post. This month I'm answering the question on the Insecure Writer's Support Group blog located HERE.

AUGUST 3RD QUESTION: What was your very first piece of writing as an aspiring writer? Where is it now? Collecting dust or has it been published?

My very first piece of writing as an aspiring writer was a novella I wrote in high school. It was a fantasy, and featured a hand-drawn map of some island that I no longer remember the name to. It starred my D&D adventuring group's characters (three people). I have long since lost every copy I ever had (electronic or paper). But it was a lot of fun writing if not ridiculous in many ways. I basically wrote it by making up things on the fly for the characters to do to fill up space. Once a short plot point was resolved then another popped up. I'm sure if I were to reread it today, it would be utterly juvenile and boring.

Fun fact: I wrote it with an electric typewriter. The year was 1987, and my parents said that computers were a luxury we just couldn't afford. But if we were going to buy one, my mother wanted a Wang. She was in love with that brand for some reason.

Editing was so much harder with a typewriter. I think I wore out the "White-Out" ribbon thing on that old machine.

8 comments:

  1. A D&D type adventure? That's fun.
    I remember that White Out ribbon. I remember using real White Out before they came up with the ribbon. Messy stuff.

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  2. I remember using a typewriter to write term papers in high school and college. What a pain. White-out tape? Yep, I had it.

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  3. My first real stories were written on a school Apple IIGS computer.

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  4. I had a manual typewriter. If you typed too quickly, the keys would stick. I hated using it and wrote everything by hand that didn't have to be typed. Fortunately, not much needed typing back in those days.

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  5. I wrote some dreadful poems in high school. They were never published but they impressed the editor of our school's literary magazine, who years later became Mrs. Chatterbox.

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  6. I also used a typewriter at one time, and I'm so glad I don't have to go back to those days.

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  7. Yeah those typewriter days I never got into... At least you have your memories of where your writing love began Mike.

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  8. You actually had an electric typewriter!?! How cool. We only had a manual one that you had to hit really hard to get the keys to strike. I only got to play with an electric typewriter in typing class at school. I wanted an electric typewriter so badly...

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