People ask me where I get my writing ideas from. This always stops me for a moment. I can't imagine not having an idea to write about. One of my friends once kidded me that I couldn't go to the women's room without writing a story about it. However, it never occurred to me to publish my writing. I wasn't from a family of creative people or did we know anyone of that ilk. So what happened to all this fabulous writing, you may ask? My mother threw it away. Once a month she would come into my room with what she jokingly referred to as her “wheelbarrow” and hauled all my books, poems and other writings out of the closet and out to the trash. Years later, after I was published, she did admit that she should have kept all of that “stuff” because it might have been worth money someday.
I did stop writing for ten years. I got married and had kids and between all of that, cleaning the house, running kids to school, shopping, etc., every creative urge seemed to be exhausted out of me. It wasn't until my marriage was ending that I decided I needed to make money to support myself and my children. They always say to do what you love and make that your job. Let's see, what did I love doing? Duh.
I wrote my first book Witches' Eve (the publisher changed to The Brentwood Witches) and sold in just ten months. It was two years before it was finally on the shelves. My first publishing experience was awful. They promised me the world and delivered an emotionally draining experience. The editor (and to this day I don't understand it) tried to re-write the entire book. Now, everyone should know that the publishing industry doesn't buy a book that needs to be completely re-written, so what was up with that? She said that I couldn't refer to my 'women' as witches because they didn't follow the religion of Wicca. I countered that without my 'witches' there would be no religion of Wicca. I was having a character bathing in a blue liquid so he could become invisible and she had him running around town naked and colored blue! Boy, that's one sure way to escape notice, isn't it? Finally my agent and I had to go over the editor's head to her boss and discussed the EIGHTY page changes. Fortunately, the head editor sided with me and restored the majority of the book.
I continued to write, but after that experience, I was no longer interested in being published. So I turned to script writing and spent the next twenty-five years writing television, movies and playing script doctor. Helped raise my kids, even though I never had anything produced under my name. Again, my friends teased me about being the most successful UNPRODUCED writer in Hollywood. I also went on to write, direct and produce four ultra low budget movies. Ultra low budget means: no money. Clayton's Riders, a western, can be found on the internet movie data base (imdb.com), I made for seven hundred dollars – not thousands – hundreds. Five hundred to feed the cast, crew and horses and two hundred to make copies of the movie on half-inch tape for everyone who participated in the production of the project (See the others at: riversentstudios.com).
Then on November 14, 2002 my entire world slammed to a halt. My eldest son, Cpl. Jason Fisher, died serving his country in the Army. To this day I can't watch a funeral procession or a twenty-one gun salute even on television. I plunged into a severe depression and my other son, Sgt. Joshua Fisher, unable to continue with his brother's memory everywhere he looked, left the Army. I spent years in therapy, unable to get out of bed most days. Writing? Forget about it. I was sure those days were over. I wrote nor read books. The television could only be on comedies (my thanks to: Who's Line Is It Anyway) and I avoided the news like the plague. It was a long trip back. Slowly I started rousing myself. A close friend from film school showed up to 'raise the dead' and we sat down and wrote a script entitled, Yucca Man! A comedy spoof based on monster movies made since the fifties, Yucca Man became my fourth ultra low budget project (yuccamanmovie.info). That project cost thirty thousand and we've haven't been able to complete it yet.
But even though YM wasn't finished, something glorious happened. I started writing again. This time, I published on Amazon.com as an ebook author. I've got four books there and since I only have to please myself instead of some crazy editor, I'm now HAPPILY published. Thank you Amazon.com and all the people who have purchased my books: Witches' Eve, The Five Suitors, No Second Chances and High Desert.
So what does this all mean? It means that there will be times when writing is effortless. Times when it will be hard. Times it won't turn out the way you had hoped. Times when nothing in the world will matter; and times when your world will matter more than your writing. I say just hang in there. Things change. They get better or they get worse but nothing stays stagnant. Just enjoy the journey that is called writing. Follow your heart and your dreams. Travel roads you never thought you would or could. It all adds up. And in the end, here's hoping it adds up to love.
P.S. Josh rejoined the Army 2 years later and is now a Drill instructor, teaching recruits how to protect themselves better in all situations.
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