How I found screenwriting.

I realize that the last post was confusing toward the end, so this is the part where I clarify. EXPOSITION TIME.

So, I went to college for eight years, and switched schools twice, as the second one I went to was going to destroy me. They compounded lies upon lies, and effectively wanted me to pay up or fuck off. So I did what I could, and ended up flunking out of a university, because I couldn't learn a language in one-hour intervals four times a week. Still confuses me how knowing French would help me better understand bone pathologies, but fuck me, right? So, I had 100,000+ tied up in student loans, nothing to show for it, and I was a thousand miles from home.

Naturally, I took up drugs. Because when you're down, may as well go out, amirite? In any case, I was a junkie for a couple years, and I really enjoyed it. I had girlfriends, I had friends, I had fun, I was invited to parties. I had a life, ostensibly! Then the people around me started having shitstorms. My brother (the good kid in the family) had issues with his dog, and it looked like he'd have to put his puppy down. A friend of mine that I had a huge crush on was looking at a similar thing for her cat. And I was still painfully single, drowning in debt, and had serious life problems. Drugs are bad, mkay?

I was hanging out in a buddy's basement one night, toking up, and he mentioned Celt, a free scriptwriting software. None of us had any interest in such things, and even he didn't know why he said it, but the words stuck with me more than any of our conversation.

I was drunk (no drugs, just booze at this point) and I was mad because my life can burn, that's okay. But not the lives of everyone else. So I went to this Episcopal church with big red doors and sat at the base of their big stone cross at 3 AM and went off. If there was anyone running this shit, they needed to account for their actions. Mind you, I was a big member of the secular student alliance, and had been an atheist for a decade. So I didn't really think anyone was listening. I just... went nuts, and tore into whoev er would be a god of this place. Non-denominational fury. God, Allah, Cthulhu, Captain Planet. If they were in charge, I hated them. It ended with me offering to make a sacrifice if these issues were fixed. Bonus points if they were fixed in the correct ways (the dog gets re-homed, and the cat thing was over quickly). I tossed out that if they could set me up with the girl, it would be a big thing.

They did, kind of. The dog thing was fixed two days later, so I buried a d10 I liked in the church garden. The cat lived and didn't need to be put down, so I buried my last septum ring. Just the one left to go, right? One night at work, I stepped out and had a smoke. Looked up at this cluster of three stars and asked whoever was listening if I should ask out the girl with the boyfriend. I was half-way done with the last word and saw a shooting star. That looks like a sign to me, but I couldn't work out if it was a yes or no. I kept talking to her in the mornings after work.

Later at work, after the clients were sleeping, I went on the work computer and dicked around, like I did every night. I looked up Joss Whedon, and found his net worth. It said he was only a screenwriter. He's worth enough to buy an island and put a supervillain lair on it, BTW. But it struck me that if I wrote a script and sold it, I'd be debt-free. And his credentials were good, but some of them were kind of lame. And he still got paid a shitload. But I had no idea where to start. Step one was a mystery.

The next day I went out to the wilderness and hiked way out. I cut wood and made a fire. Cooked lunch over the fire and spoke aloud to the thing that may have shown me the star. I explained that the sign was a bit ambiguous and I needed a firm yes or no. If I found a bone, it was a no. If I found a deer, it was a yes. I had never found a deer here, but I knew they were around. I also studied paleontology, so spotting bones is a thing my brain is attuned to. I walked back to my car after a while and went out of my way any time I thought I found one, but it was always just sticks. I got a hundred feet from my car and was dead convinced that the whole thing was a coincidence. I said it out loud, and again, as I said the last word, I heard a SNAP, turned, and saw a deer standing not twenty feet from me. It knew I was there before I saw it. It had to have, as I was not quiet.

The next day, I asked her over to ask her out, and I did. She politely declined, as she had a boyfriend. I respect that (now). But at the time, I went off, like a child, and effectively burned that bridge. So now I had no one to talk to in the mornings after work. A little voice in the back of my mind asked "What about that screenwriting thing?" I google-searched "How to write a movie script" and spent the next week absorbing everything I could about it. At first the basics, then I tried my hand at writing. I wrote a godawful script I'll leave chained in the basement until I die and society forgets it ever existed in the first place. But it was proof that I could do it.

That was two and half years ago. I've been writing nearly every day since, with few exceptions. I'm on my 10th script now. The people who write the books say they typically find success around 12, but I'm prepared to go to 20, because I like my stories. I like having stories in my head that I can pull out at any point. I like having a hobby that's free that does more than destroy myself. If they buy my scripts, perfect. If not, life will go on.

The little voice that first suggested it is back, telling me that it wouldn't have said it if it didn't think I could do it. If it's a deity, then I, a once-avowed atheist, believe in it 100%. If it's madness, then let me never go sane.