Where Was I?

I started writing again a few years back then some life things happened and I got away from regularly visiting my characters and when I went to rekindle that relationship they weren't so responsive. They hid behind trees and under bushes. They threw rocks. They pretended I wasn't speaking to them. They didn't answer my questions. They formed a line with their arms crossed and stared me down. Where have you been? Why did you leave us?

What?

But I created you! You must come like minions to a piper! Always!

pffttt!  They did a 180 instead.

What happened?

The dynamic had changed. I had changed. Those life experiences, those situations that took me from them changed me. They didn't recognize me and I couldn't relate to them. We had become estranged.

I sincerely felt a loss. I had depended on their company, kinship, and loyalty and joyfully anticipated their antics and watching their world develop and how they grew and changed because of it.

But I had left them behind and they didn't grow and change. I had betrayed them. What now?

After agonizing for days which turned into weeks I decided that I would not be able to get them back. I couldn't rewrite them or replace them because as I, they existed, as who they are.

So I moved Isabel, modified her family, and left the others.  I had to. She is the strongest - she is the story.

I took her from her best friend Olive and plunked her house and all its oddness into Gaby's neighborhood. Gaby will discover Isabel's house and then Isabel, who will introduce herself by dropping nuts from an oak tree branch on her head.

You know what?

I'm back in the story.

The new direction is cleaner, clearer, and Isabel has grown a bit. Gaby adds excitement and the two of them, with all those in the neighborhood, have made my story stronger.

So when this happens to you, when you get stuck or lose interest or just want to give up, take your favorite character and move. I guarantee you will be pleasantly surprised.