Make Believe

Here's a little "get-to-know-me" piece, since we're still starting out:


After reading Bethany's post on Ink-Splattered I've been thinking about playing make-believe and felt I had to post this. 

When I was little, my absolute favorite thing was to act out movies or books with friends. They started off as literally re-enacting the story, then progressed to making up our own adventures with the characters, and then we made up our own characters, and eventually, our own worlds. But of course, that was what I did when I was little. It’s not like I’m doing that now (says the creative writing student).

If I wasn’t a hobbit, I was the Swan Princess, or the little Mermaid, or a Jedi, or some unknown slave from some unexplored forest embedded deep in a lost crater on the moon.

In kindergarten, I was popular. I remember being surrounded by boys and girls alike who would help me hunt ghosts, fight off dragons, and explore hidden mines. Then reality hit. My teacher told me I couldn’t be a burglar when I grew up (but Bilbo is!) and I wasn’t allowed to put that in my report. First grade came around, and make-believe simply wasn’t cool. The spice girls were cool. Pokémon was cool.

It seemed I would have to choose between friends and fantasy. I’ve always been incredibly indecisive and stubborn, so I insisted on keeping both. It wasn’t easy; I was teased a lot (but who wasn’t?) and I had to give up a few great “adventures” but I kept my make-believe going now and again until middle school by finding the right people and showing them the right movies.

Then in middle school, I started writing stories. I was all about getting everyone involved, so I’d get a group of three or four together, start a story, hand it off, and see where it went. Sometimes, we ended up with a few short pages of semi-decent fan-fiction, while other times we had fairly good original stories. But then it became “un-cool” to write.

So I tried role-playing. Then that became un-cool as well.

Time to give up? Never! How can I get a group of high school people to dress up and run around acting like fictional characters? I know- I’ll make a movie! (Ok, so maybe that wasn't my exact process. I was actually interested in film, but the end result was the same: FUN!)

Me as Ash in a pokemon parody. 

Me and my friend Kait as C3PO and R2D2 

Filming "The Ladies of the Rings" (if lotr took place in modern times with a female fellowship)

Pokemon 2010: A Parody 

(in case you're bored and need a laugh)

Anyone else play make-believe too? Did you continue it as you grew older, or did you find other ways to express your creativity?