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What do you want to be when you grow up? The question is asked to every kid. The answer is supposed to be whimsical. I thought that was the point. How can a small child plan for their future when they are still ruled by imagination? That's what I think now. But back then I was always jarred by the inevitable, "Oh you can't be a singer without a way to make money." To be an artist means you will be starving. That was my programming. I have a rebellious nature, so I grew up determined to be ok with being starving. I got off on the wrong foot.
I would always shoot for the moon, but I was keenly aware of the limitations. I couldn't fly. I didn't have a space ship. Not to mention, the moon was in space where I couldn't survive even if I could somehow miraculously escape the atmosphere. But I never stopped believing. Underneath my sad awareness of impossibility, I somehow managed to bumble through being a dreamer.
I'm not usually the one to sit and tell stories. I'm usually the one listening. Unless there's banter to be had, and then I'm all talk. I thrive on small talk and silly quipping. I can't say as though a good intellectual discussion is out of the question, but when someone goes off talking about their thoughts all the time without room for the volley, I get bored pretty fast. It's one thing to have something to share. It's another to have a discussion about it.
Because of this, I don't talk about my past much. If what I have to say can't be said in a minute or less, I don't bother. When people sit and force me to listen to their long winded stories for 15 minutes, inside my mind, I'm screaming, "Are you ever going to stop talking?" The value of telling our stories should be reserved for writing. And so, for all those who have forced me to sit and listen to their constant babble, here is my life story.
I grew up in Los Angeles. It was back in the days where we had high pollution, and couldn't breathe. My school was full of mean kids who liked to prey on sensitive kids. If you reacted, they would continue their abuse. I reacted, so I was in the pantheon of the teased. I spent my days wishing I was someone else, making up stories in my head. My bubble was safe. My imagination, impenetrable. The school was called Holy Trinity. But I called it Holy Tragedy. The church bells would ring, and I would listen to the music. The sun would shine into the window, and I would watch the dust floating in the air. I was the kid who would sit for hours playing with my little "people" who lived in the perfect worlds I would create for them. I was a god.
One day we had a creative writing assignment. It was an essay on the family pet. I had a goldfish. So I had the brilliant idea of writing from its POV. My way of personifying a fish's life was unique and funny. The teacher read it out loud to the class. Everyone laughed and cheered. And when it came time to reveal the mystery author, the class gasped in awe that it was me, that weird, dirty kid with divorced parents and a cool older brother who played on the football team.
From then on, somehow I started building up a rapport with the kids I had grown to despise. When it came time for the teacher to read our creative writing assignments, the class would ask for mine. I started making my classmates into characters, and they were always entertained. One of the "popular" boys who sat behind me in class kept asking me what I was writing in my journal. I would lean in and cover it so he wouldn't be able to see it. I didn't trust him. But eventually he pestered me enough that I told him I was writing a fantasy book. We were in the 5th grade. He was impressed, and from then on he started defending me, and telling everyone I was an author.
