Thread: When you were a kid...

Surely you wrote a few things when you were rather young? If you have, I'd like to hear about them.

I've always been a left minded person. I remember when I was about 7 or so, I wrote a story about bubbles. A girl got bubbles for her birthday, and blew some, and one got so big it encompassed her whole body, and took her far away. She was amazed and what not, and I think a police officer found her and brought her home... That was like two pages hand written on regular paper in little kid script.

When I was six or seven my school got a poem I wrote into a book of children's poetry. I found my copy in the loft last month and read it, and it turns out that it was from the point of view of a Shark.

Terrible, gut-wrenchingly awful. But I was seven, so who cares?

I was suspended from school for a week for writing a horrific murder scene involving a girl's hatred for her own beauty and bringing justice to those around her for their lack of empathy, it was in poor taste because we don't all deserve a lovely ending. during that week I decided that writing was for me, so I guess a lovely ending was indeed the clincher.

I wrote a novelette called "Archie Smith: Boy Wonder" when I was around nine or ten. It was about a boy who finds himself in a world populated by zombies and monsters, led by the an evil vampire. Archie journeys to the forbidden palace with the help of a pegasus, who dies protecting Archie. Along the way Archie is taught spells by helpful fairies and other creatures, though Archie doesn't know that he is the chosen one.

At the end Archie faces the evil vampire, and he reads from the secret scroll a really long word (which I just made up). The word lasted for several pages, LOL. At the end of the word, the Vampire cried "NoooOooooo!" and he exploded.

Then Archie was overcome by fatigue, fell asleep, and when he woke up he was in his own bed. He thought it had all been a dream, but when he went to school that morning, he saw hoof prints from where his Pegasus had been the days before.

My storytelling sucked, but my imagination as a child was robust. I'd like to have the creativity to come up with things like that again.

What's really strange is, if you google "Archie Smith Boy Wonder", you'll see that someone wrote a story with the exact same title. However, I wrote my story twenty years ago. I don't think it's possible anyone copied my story, because 1. It wasn't very good, and 2. There was no such thing as the internet when I wrote it, it was just some child's over-energetic musings.

And, assuming my parents still have it, I have the proof. It was hand-written and everything, with drawings of Archie conjuring his magic spells. : D

I find it cool that someone would come up with the same title and genre, with a similar plot. Perhaps we both tapped into some collective consciousness. The logician in me asserts, though, that "Boy Wonder" is a common enough expression, and "Smith" is a generic name. "Archie" is the only thing somewhat unique, but even that name has been used before. So, I suppose it's possible that the title itself is commonplace enough to be thought of by anyone.

Still surprised me when I googled it, though. My first thought was "Hey! That's my story!" But reading it, it's not. My story was over 25 pages, and full of things like "And then all the zombies started walking towards Archie! He was scared! But the fairy landed on his shoulder and said, "You have powers, you just don't know it yet! Use them!". And then, Archie raised his hands, and lightning bolts flew from his fingertips!"

I had my own line of comic books when I was eight. I'd work on them during school, especially when I was sitting in the hallway for being disruptive, which was pretty often.
They were made in those composition books with the black and white covers that everyone had, so they were more like graphic novels than anything else. The drawing was gawdawful and I'm sure the writing was bad too but one of my heroes was the Inedible Bulk, who hailed from Battle Creek, Michigan. He battled a villain called the Cereal Killer.
My bent for satire was established even then.
I also did a ton of sportswriting and sportscasting. We listened to the baseball (and the football, and the hockey) on the radio in those days ( mid-late sixties). If the tv was on, I'd usually turn off Vince Lloyd and Jack Brickhouse, who I didn't care for, and do the play-by-play myself (I don't even remember who did the Bears and Hawks telecasts). I'd do imaginary interviews, and write them down on notebook paper.
The greatest thing about all of that is that later in life I got to meet and interview some of those same people.
Left off doing graphic novels about 35 years ago. Just starting a new one.

Originally Posted by moderan

IHe battled a villain called the Cereal Killer.

Oh, that is so rich! LOL.

You have to remember what famous company is in Battle Creek

I made picture books. I wanted to tell action stories. Guns and soldiers, vehicles and flying machines; all boy stuff. As they progressed, I added more written descriptions and even dialog. It was all very primitive. There was one peculiar 'story' I tried to draw over and over. It had to do with death and reconstitution. Like alchemy stuff. There was a great old dying tree with new growth coming out below it. As I drew, I struggled with the fact that the tree would have to completely die, and that the new growth was not the old life. I was like six.