staying gold

First off, sorry this is late. I was going to paint my room this weekend, and I wanted it yellow. We brought the swatch in and they didn't have the color so they had to mix it. We poured out the color into the pan and it looked right, so we painted it the yellow color I wanted--but when it dried it turned a disgusting shade of green. So, now I'm sleeping in the basement for 5 days and we're repainting it the color it originally was.

Chaos has happened, and I didn't get to write. But here's the post now!

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As I get older, I realize a few things.

One of them being I’m no longer a kid.

I don’t get all the freedom I used to, but in some ways I get more than ever before.

I am not allowed to be childish and joke around because I’m supposed to be mature. I'm not allowed to waste days away just hanging out with friends, because there are things I need to do, and just one day off can mess up my schedule. I can't go to parks unless I'm nannying some kids because I'll be seen as a weirdo scoping out kids to kidnap (or whatever). There are things restricted from my life, like being able to let go and just have fun with friends, because I've got to have a sudden maturity and adultness.

And that irritates me, because in my mind innocence, childlike nature, and maturity can coexist.

One thing that made me think about this is The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton. A poem by Robert Frost (Nothing Gold Can Stay) is analyzed by Johnny.

Nature's first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold

Her early leaf's a flower,

But only so an hour,

So leaf subsides to leaf,

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day,

Nothing gold can stay.

The poem says that nature’s first green is gold, and that nothing gold can stay. As in, childhood is green and new and pure and that’s gold, that’s good—but it fades.

That’s why the phrase "stay gold" is such a big deal.

It reminds me that I'm allowed to cling to that little bit of innocence, that little bit of childhood. I can be an adult, but I can also look at things and people with wide eyes, full of awe and joy. I can let go every now and then and enjoy living in the moment.

And all in all that's immensely comforting.

The Outsiders really did impact me. It has impacted a lot of different people in a lot of different ways. S.E. did a good job of including lessons that almost everyone can learn from, whether it's not to judge a book by its cover, or that you are allowed to cling to childhood, or anything in between.

And that's something that inspires me.

So, I've got book ideas. And yes, a majority of them are born of dreams or things I've seen in life and gone "that could be a good book." But more and more of them are being born of ideas, of messages I feel I need to share, of things that I can write about, characters I can create, that will reach out to the readers, grab them by the shoulders, and say "You are not alone."

And I feel like that's really what I'm supposed to be doing. I've always wanted to convey messages in my stories, but after reading The Outsiders I realized that that is the kind of thing I'm meant to write. Maybe not that genre (although I do have a few bildungsromans and contemporary novels planned), but I'm meant to write to impact people. And after talking with my betas, I think I do that with Sleipnir (the Sleipnir Chronicles, the series that Mended and Torn is the first in). I'll definitely make sure to do it with future books. Because, to be completely honest, my eyes opened and I was like "This. This is what God wants me to do. He wants me to write to impact people, to teach them, to show them that they're not invisible, that I see them." And that's what I'm trying my best to do.

I hope I do it right.

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This last week has been crazy, so I learned a few new things that will be put into future books. I'll let you know when I write them what they were inspired by.

I'm thinking of doing that for my books. When I am writing them I write a post on what inspired this one. Make it kind of an aesthetic but also story of the story. I dunno, what do you guys think? Would you read that?

Anyways. Again, sorry this is late. As I said, craziness ensued.

BUT I am back now and will try my hardest to post every Monday.