Several years ago I finished Microserfs by Douglas
Coupland. This was a big deal because it was my fourth attempt. To this day I
don’t know why I struggled on three separate occasions. It wasn’t that I didn’t
like it and it’s not because it was a difficult read. I may have thought these
things at the time but, on that successful fourth pass, I loved it and breezed
through it.
All I can assume is that it’s all about the timing.
I find it’s the same with writing. I have a list of most of
the ideas I’ve ever come up with. A small amount I get on with then and there
but some of the ideas don’t feel like they want to be written just yet. So I leave
them and, every now and then, I look over that list and see what feels right
that day. I can even end up merging two or more ideas together.
It can be a stressful experience to want to (or even have to)
write something but find yourself minus the inspiration. The more you yearn for
that idea to ‘pop’ into your head the more difficult it becomes to relax and
let that process happen.
A lot of the time I find myself hearing a news story or
watching a show and just thinking simple questions like ‘What if’ or ‘Why’.
With IMPRISONED (which will be up on this blog and Wattpad in a few weeks’ time) it all
started with a real life news story about a man who, after fifty years in
prison, had been found wrongly accused. I thought about all that time he would
never get back and how lucky he had been that his punishment was only
imprisonment and not execution. These thoughts stayed lurking at the back of my
mind until I caught a programme on over crowded prisons. They talked about
whether execution would relieve this and I thought back to the wrongly accused
prisoner. What if they got it wrong? How can we be 100% when it comes to ending
life?
So sometimes just coming across a random news story can spark
off an idea and lead into something bigger.
Last year I took park in evening classes for creative writing. During one of these lessons our teacher passed out some newspapers and asked us to flick through them. She wanted each of us to find a head line and use it as a spring board for a short story.
Last year I took park in evening classes for creative writing. During one of these lessons our teacher passed out some newspapers and asked us to flick through them. She wanted each of us to find a head line and use it as a spring board for a short story.
I went through all the newspapers and came up with nothing. I’m
not big on world news, politics or even sports so most of the papers contained
nothing that I normally follow. Even general news seemed quiet.
The teacher noticed me struggling and offered me the PC
stuffed in the corner. I relaxed then. I logged in, brought up Google news and
went straight to the Technology section.
Now, most of the time this contains news about games consoles,
mobile phones and cars but I got lucky that day. I found an interesting article
on bionics and how far we see mankind going in the future with integrated
technology (wish I could track that article down but it was a year ago). It
talked about camera eyes for the blind and mobile phone like devices connected straight
to our brain.
And then I had the spark.
How far could humans go with this? How much augmentation is
too much? When are you no longer human?
And then I started writing.
Switched On
Monday, 3rd
June 2021
“Mr Stanton?”
I turned my head as a doctor came into my room. “Yes”, I replied.
“Good morning. My
name is Doctor Fletcher and I’ll be over seeing your procedure this morning.”
I smiled
nervously. I get that’s it’s his job to reassure and relax the patient but he
can’t stop me thinking about what I’m about to go through. After today, after
the surgery, my life will be completely changed.
I watched the
doctor as he looked over my chart at the foot of my bed. When he finished he
walked around to my right, a fixed, well-practiced smile on his face. “How are
we feeling today?” he said.
“I’m okay,” I said
as I took up my end of the small talk. We were both just waiting for the go
ahead now. There was no going back from this even if I wasn’t feeling good. Too
many people were counting on me going through with this. “Have you done this
before?”
“Three times, not
including today,” he said. “So you’ll be my forth.”
“Have there ever
been any . . . ?”
“Complications?”
he finished for me. “Only once. His name was Michael, I believe. It wasn’t
unexpected though. He was the third person in the world to go through with this
specialist procedure but only the first in the UK. But the silver lining was
that those issues we stumbled across helped us perfect the surgery. And he’s
doing fine now. Working hard and making us proud.”
I already knew
most of the information he told me. I did my research before signing the
paperwork. Even with the large pay out my family would get I still needed to
know exactly what I was getting myself into.
A nurse knocked on
the door to my room and entered. She was a pretty thing, looked like my wife
when we started dating, only not blonde.
“Everything’s
ready, doctor,” she said.
“Okay,” said
Doctor Fletcher. I noticed him checking her out as she turned and left us. I
hoped he didn’t get distracted so easily during the surgery.
“Right,” he said.
“We’re all ready to go. You’ll be out for about 30-35 hours. We’ll go through
the entire procedure before you’re woken up. It can be uncomfortable for the
patient to do this in sections. After that you’ll be awake and at work by the
end of that day. No aches and no pain. In fact, unless there are issues with
your recovery, you probably won’t see me again.”
I hold my right
arm out to him. “Thank you doctor.”
He takes my hand
and shakes it. “No, Mr Stanton. Thank you. This procedure is just the
beginning. I can’t even imaging where this will lead us in the near future.”
I smile and relax,
looking up at the ceiling.
Friday, 7th June 2021
According to my display it’s been several days since I was awoken
from surgery. I’m still getting used to phantom limb syndrome and not needing
to breathe but that should all pass. The hardest thing to learn was controlling
the data on my display just by thinking it. Now that my neuro implants are
plugged into the Governments data library I can work non-stop longer and faster
than I ever did at my old job. Just like those volunteers before me.
Sure I miss my family but, like the body I once inhabited, those
memories, those connections, will soon fade. My mind belongs to the state now.
Rule Britannia. We never clock off.
Please let me know what you think of this piece. And let me
know what you do to find ideas when the well of inspiration goes dry. Do you
scour the news headlines for stories? Go for a walk? Watch your favourite
movies?
Next week I will be discussing my plans for this July’s Camp NaNoWriMo which I’m really
looking forward to. If you’re taking part then let me know. It would be nice to
talk to fellow writers during the month long challenge.
See you in seven.
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