Tuesday, May 20, 2008

In My Dreams

With two kidlets, there are inevitable nights when Mommy is awakened. Getting back to sleep is an uneasy task and sometimes, like last night, I spend an hour or so in a half-asleep, half-awake stupor.

Somehow, those moments are some of my most lucid, most creative. It doesn't always mean anything; often times, minutes later, I find myself forgetting where my mind had even taken me.

But last night, between my youngest's coughing fits and my own, two words came to me. I couldn't tell you what was whirring in my mind just before, or how I got to them, but I decided they would make a great novel title.

I know. Crazy, ain't? Seems silly and presumptuous. A tad premature. But mere words can snowball into something greater.

I don't dare give you the two words, though I've written them down. Someday, after all, will be the time to start another book. And I'll look over my notes of various ideas, just like this one, and decide which way to go.

What about you? How do ideas come to you? And have you ever had a seemingly insignificant thought turn into something grand?

6 comments:

WendyCinNYC said...

Oh yeah, all the time. With me, it's usually words I like that snowball into stories. Once it was "fretwork" that provided a setting for part of my story and "feckless" that grew into a short.

I also am always on the lookout for weird people, of which there are many in my own neighborhood.

Janna Leadbetter said...

Oh, me too! People we see in every day life, even just in passing, seem to translate to paper pretty well.

Melanie Hooyenga said...

My memoir idea came to me with the cover photo. I didn't stick with that idea exactly, but that's how it started.

Enjoy the feeling!

Janna Leadbetter said...

What's the cover photo?

Anonymous said...

My ideas just come to me at any time. I have a ton of great story ideas, but little time to attach a story to them.

Janna Leadbetter said...

I agree, Turkey. Time is always lacking, it seems.