The writing game

Is writing a game? Can I think of writing as play? For most of my life I’ve thought of a story as something you model in your head and then describe with words. But that’s not how I wrote as a child. And it’s not how the brain works. The text that I’m writing and imagery in my head create each other. My concept of each character is being constructed from moment to moment and the text is the primary environment where they exist.

I can think about characters, outline stories, and even draft character profiles, but until I put the character in a text, most of that character development is flimsy and two-dimensional. A concept just can’t exist in one’s mind without context.

And when I think that way, I start to feel an itch to write. If I get an idea, or see an image in my head, writing is the only way to move forward. It becomes a game that has to be played.