In the last couple years of my father’s life he put a great deal of effort into writing a book. There were several drafts of a first chapter, at least one draft of the second and countless notes. When we spoke on the phone he’d tell me about this book and always said he would get me a copy of the first chapter that he wanted me to review. He also asked me to put it online to share with the all the people on the internet who were into sci-fi and fantasy.
Unfortunately he never gave me the copies, he had computer troubles and in the later months of his life getting to the post office to mail anything was a serious hassle. After he died I inquired about his computer, hopeful that I could salvage the data on the hard drive, but I was not around to be involved in such things and I don’t know where the computer ended up.
Last summer my grandfather sent me a lot of writings he (my grandfather) had done. I was very interested in these things, and delighted that they had come to me. When my grandfather passed away just 4 months later I was even more happy to have them, a piece of my grandfather that would live on in the pages he wrote. At the same time I was sad that I didn’t have a similar thing from my father. That’s when my Aunt Elaine let me know that she had saved all his drafts and notes from the book he was writing! She said I was welcome to have them and spent time organizing all the papers, a task for which I’m grateful for.
Yesterday the box of my father’s papers arrived. We didn’t have much time at home before we had to head out for the evening, but I emptied the box and explored the contents. Pages of drafts, some printed, some hand-written in that oh-so-perfect handwriting that my father had. I didn’t have time to read much of it, but I knew my father spent a great deal of time on it during those last days of his life, and there is a certain power to that.
I figured I’d read the papers, post what he had written and some of his notes online and be done with it, but I can’t help but feel this story calling to me to be finished. But how could I finish it? I write a lot, but I don’t write fiction. The only written pieces that have been published anywhere are non-fiction, even in school the only story of mine published in the yearly school writing book was a story about my cousin and I when we were young. I can’t finish this story, I don’t write fiction! I’m terrible at it!
But am I really as terrible at it as I think? I haven’t tried to write any fiction in years. The last time I tried I was a pretty lousy writer in general. I haven’t put thought into writing fiction in a long time; I’ve never felt suitably inspired. Perhaps this is the inspiration I needed, I wonder if writing some fiction will do me good in my overall writing repertoire.