Writerly quirks

I used to narrate too. That's about it though... I was that quiet, shy kid in the corner who never said anything.

One of my favorite toys was a typewriter.

I played out scenes in my head, rewinding them and changing them until they were perfect. It was great fun during long car vacations.

Hmmm. Well, I had a lot more imaginary friends than most, and I wrote stories about them all the time - which I turned in in lieu of class assignments. When I was in highschool all of my chem lab notebooks were in flowery prose that drove my teacher nuts; ask me for analysis and you'd usually get poetry. And I wrote most of my History essays as third-person fiction from the perspective of whichever historical figure was the topic.


It's amazing to me sometimes that not only did I graduate, but I got pretty good grades.

Ooh, great thread. I'm really crabby right now, so this will be a fun thing to shake off my grumps.

Well, my entire first novel was made up IN MY SHOWER, a little each night (the thinking part, not the physical writing part). That's my escapism. Living other people's lives while I'm in the shower. Yeah, okay, quit laughing now. Please.

I also used to sit in my room for hours as a kid and write stories. About whatever. I was the only kid I knew that BEGGED for an electric typewriter, though at the time, I couldn't understand why I was the anomaly.

I saw the latest ad on the front of the Hollister stores and said "OMG - that guy looks like my MC, only his hair is darker!" and "Look at that shot! It's gorgeous. Those two have such a story. But she's smiling too big. Why is she? What is she thinking? What is he thinking? This is not as innocent as it seems - she's totally going to dump him, isn't she? I MUST write a scene about this!"

I would talk to myself endlessly as a child, and I grin ear to ear when I hear my own kids doing it now. Perhaps I've spawned two new writers? (God forbid.)

I could keep going, but you're probably already sleeping...

I used to sacrifice my Barbie dolls in horrific Dr. Frankenstein-like experiments.

Worried my mother. My father thought it was funny.

Yes, folks, I grew up to be a horror writer.

I never had Barbies, but my GI Joes (yes, I'm a girl) had frequent nasty accidents

Wraith said:

For example, when I was little I used to tell myself everything I did in 3rd person, and I imagined reading it in a book.

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Oh, cripes. Ferret hates people who talk about themselves in the 3rd person. Ferret thinks those people are whacked.

He isn't sure what to think about someone who does that in story form, though.

Other than that, Ferret has no writerly quirks to speak of.

Although as a child, Ferret had a working toy printing press with which he made flyers and newspapers on to spread his seditious rants around his 1st grade class.

callalily61 said:

I used to sacrifice my Barbie dolls in horrific Dr. Frankenstein-like experiments.

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Hey I used to do that too! Me and my cousin would pull their heads and limbs off, cover them in ketchup, and build a bier of flowers (usually that was just maple leaves; we were both very into Ophelia at the time). Then we'd float them down the stream on her property to where her little sister and my little sister were playing, and wait for the screams...

I'm glad I'm not alone in this. My parents thought it was funny, but both my grandmothers were a little afraid of me.

Birol said:

One of my favorite toys was a typewriter.

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Me, too. When I was about 4 or 5, my mom had an ancient Royal manual. If I was very, very good, I was allowed to type gibberish on it in the sunroom while my younger sisters and brother napped. That's a recipe for creating a writer, right there.

In fourth grade, there was an IBM Selectric in the back of the room. If you finished your work before the other kids, you didn't have to sit there and be bored. You could go to the back and teach yourself to type using a self-paced Gregg book on typing. I loved it.

I also used to sit in my room for hours as a kid and write stories. About whatever. I was the only kid I knew that BEGGED for an electric typewriter, though at the time, I couldn't understand why I was the anomaly.

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Not the only one!!

My mother thought I was nuts.

I would write and draw ALL the time. Even my dreams were vivid and full of stories.....they still are.

I never had imaginary friends, but I could make props from my stories and act them out. I had the most fun with a lounge chair, one of those beach ones with the plastic tube stuff/metal frame that the head and foot would fold up.. I would fold it up into a triangle and place some boards on top, draw and color on a piece of card board, that would be my control panel...and I had an instant helicopter/space ship!! I would act out everything I would want to write about! Or did write about!

RitrChick said:

Ooh, great thread. I'm really crabby right now, so this will be a fun thing to shake off my grumps.

Well, my entire first novel was made up IN MY SHOWER, a little each night (the thinking part, not the physical writing part).

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Speaking of grumpy, I would like to know WHY there is no writing instrument that one can safety use in the shower, or the bathtub. WHY?? WHY??? I think it's a conspiracy.

RitrChick said:

I saw the latest ad on the front of the Hollister stores and said "OMG - that guy looks like my MC, only his hair is darker!" and "Look at that shot! It's gorgeous. Those two have such a story. But she's smiling too big. Why is she? What is she thinking? What is he thinking? This is not as innocent as it seems - she's totally going to dump him, isn't she? I MUST write a scene about this!"

I would talk to myself endlessly as a child, and I grin ear to ear when I hear my own kids doing it now. Perhaps I've spawned two new writers? (God forbid.)

I could keep going, but you're probably already sleeping...

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Yup, I've always made up stories about the real people that I encounter briefly at stores or wherever. And, I talk to myself incessently, although that's recent.

I think I may have been a horse up until I turned nine.

I need to write a horse story.

Seriously though, I was just the kid with over-active imagination. My spelling and grammar were pretty shite, so I wasn't much of a writer, although I tore my way through books. The librarians must have been sick of me, seeing my four-eyed face every week.

This sounds crazy, but I always loved eavesdropping on people. My parents, other kids at school -- anyone. I used to put my ear against the wall at school, and I imagined the echo-y sound in there was whatever was happening in the next room.

Now, I've noticed my characters are always listening. Listening through walls, listening from a remove, all of them like little Gene Hackmans in The Conversation.

Strange but true.

For me, it all began with a green-and-brown-plaid polyester outfit my mom MADE me wear in public, at four years old, early '80s. It scarred me so badly that, years later, I wrote a paper on the shameful experience in high school. Rave reviews led me to start thinking about writing - first as a hobby, now as a profession - and here I am. With a serious aversion to plaid.

I wonder what ever happened to that wretched suit...

Ummm....I played Dungeons and Dragons and liked to be the Dungeon Master.

*I had a truckload of imaginary friends, and they never went away

*Always had a strange fixation with death

*Started reading at 4, wanted to be a writer by 9

*Yes, I admit to writing Darkwing Duck fanfic

*Kids gathered around me at recess to listen to my stories (though admittedly I did have a long series that was simply a retelling of LotR)

I'm sure there are tons of other things, as I'm basically just one weird quirk after another, but that's all I can think of for now.

When my parents got a new typewriter, they gave me their old one. I typed up all the little bits of short stories I'd ever written in my various Care Bears spiral notebooks, gave them endings, and compiled them as "The Collected Fiction of Satori Lastname." I bound the whole thing in a plastic report cover and put blurbs from the NYT on the back. I was, like, 10. And such a weirdo. I gave it to my best friend to read, and she ditched me soon after for the more normal girl who lived across the street.


My sister and I had a whole host of "playing pretend" characters / imaginary friends, plus the imagined town in Montana where they all lived. (I have still never been to Montana.) We drew a huge map of the town. We also made neighborhoods with pictures of similar-looking houses from the real estate guides we'd pick up at the grocery store. We glued the houses for one neighborhood onto their own page, then gave the neighborhood a name, a price range, and a marketing pitch ("Oak Ridge Trace -- a luxurious swim / tennis community from the low $200's!"). We had about 50-ish neighborhoods in all.

Then, on Sunday, we would clip out all the pictures of people from the glossy ads in the newspaper and sort them by perceived age. We had Ziploc baggies for "little kids," "older kids," "teens," and "adults." When you wanted to create a new character, it was like an assembly line: grab a kid, find his or her siblings (if any), and then pick a parent or two who look like they're related to the kids. Glue to paper. Go through old phone directories and find fitting names for the family. Write the names and short bios on the poster. Then, go to the neighborhood pages and choose a house for the new family. Done! I should go work for a book packaging company, shouldn't I?

We had so many of these character posters that we were able to wallpaper the basement and both of our bedrooms with them.

Our favorite characters had larger posters. We also made a board game about them. The object was to make it through a whole day of school without landing in detention too many times.

Every few months, we came out with a new issue of the newspaper for our imagined school.

I started writing short stories and then novels about some of our favorite characters. Throughout middle school and part of high school I amassed about 10 or 12 finished novels. And then... nothing. I thought I was too old for The Characters and started writing autobiography thinly disguised as literary short stories. I thought far too much about how to turn my own life into literary material. Perhaps uncoincidentally, I was fairly depressed and anxious during that time.

I went back to writing about The Characters (and thus began writing YA) a couple years ago, fully embracing my weirdness and accepting the fact that, yeah, I'm a mid-20-something with imaginary friends. What's it to ya? Anyway, I've been much more well-adjusted ever since I brought the old characters back into my life. These days, my little sister is very quiet and withdrawn and works a horridly boring job in insurance... I think she could use a large helping of the old characters, too.

sunna7kore said:

Then we'd float them down the stream on her property to where her little sister and my little sister were playing, and wait for the screams...

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Alas that I was an only child...

jannawrites said:

For me, it all began with a green-and-brown-plaid polyester outfit my mom MADE me wear in public, at four years old, early '80s. It scarred me so badly [snip] here I am. With a serious aversion to plaid.

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I got you beat. My mother made me wear pastel-colored ruffled sunsuits. In public. In the late 60s when EVERYONE wore tie-dye and ragged jeans. Then I moved on to Catholic school and wore hideous green/black/red/yellow plaid (yes, all 4 colors in one outfit) for 12 years. Then of course I wouldn't touch anything black for umpteen years after I left the convent.

Thank God for plain, basic colors like blue and red.

Oh, and yes, my horror villains wear monk habits.

RitrChick said:

I would talk to myself endlessly as a child, and I grin ear to ear when I hear my own kids doing it now. Perhaps I've spawned two new writers? (God forbid.)

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My too! And my oldest does it. It must be genetic, or do we still do it so much that they imitate?

I used to make up stories, loved to read, and always liked writing assignments. Yeah, I was weird that way.

I was an only child, so my playmates were my stuffed animals. They would talk to me and thanks to my father, I honestly believed (for many many years) that they were alive. He would actually come into my room at night, when I was asleep, and move them around as if they had been up all night playing. My parents didn't ever tell me that anything, like fairies and dragons and Santa and whatever, wasn't real. I can't thank them enough for that and I hope that I can give my own kids the same sort of magical world I lived in.

Anyway to answer the OP, since my animals spoke to me we'd go on adventures and stuff. I'm pretty sure that was the start of my writing career.

I remember really really really hating to learn how to read (mainly because my mom snuggled with me and read to me everyday and reading was HER JOB), but once I did I was unstoppable! I would go to the library every week and check out a huge stack of books, and I would even attempt to start reading them as I was walking home. (Not a good idea.)

Wow. Some of you people are just weird.

I had an imaginary friend, not because I believed it actually existed, just because I created one to see what it was like.

I also lied a lot about everything little thing, less out of maliciousness or any interesting in being deceptive and more because I liked keeping lies going and seeing what I could get people to believe.

Or course, all that lying ended when I thwarted those terrorists, that one Sunday morning, in the grocery store, using only me bare hands, a mop bucket, and a radish.