Parenting Your Characters

I dropped my kids off at school this morning. Mainly they take the bus. But today my first grader son had class snack today and there was a small bit of distrust in me (blasted!) that the snack wouldn't make it to school without getting dumped out all over the ground.

As I walked back to my car after the bell rang (and of course handed the snack safely over to Mr. Pickering), I walked past the lines of children, the many parents standing by their children until they go in the school building. I walked past the Kindergarten playground, sequestered from the rest of the school, seeing a ratio of more parents to children; kids and their toddler siblings running all around, parents chasing and shouting disciplinary phrases.

Getting closer to my car, I see older kids being dropped off, parents staying in their cars, kids slamming car doors and running away towards their classes.  It dawned on me:

As a writer, we have different levels of fictional character development, just as we who are parents have different levels of hovering, if you will, over our children.  The more we write our character and get to know them, the more they take on their own personality, further away from the person we were basing them on, perhaps, and further away from who we thought they were supposed to be when we first started writing about them.  The same goes with parenting: the older our children get, the more we have to let them go.  Not because it's just what you do, as some parents hold on for dear life as long as they can. It's the child that wants to walk home by themselves from the bus; it's the child that wants you to drop them off and stay in the car; it's the child that says 'please don't kiss me in front of anyone at school.'

We all have different methods to develop our characters when we sit down to write our story or novel. I, for instance, use a worksheet as I go, writing down details of my characters, from the simple (hair, eye, and skin color; job status; relationship status) to the complex (minor and major fears; something they have wanted their whole life; something they want to get rid of). I also try to develop a character matrix to see who is dating whom, who is related to whom, etc. And thus a family of characters is born.

When I sit down to write, I can use the notes and the matrices I have created; however, normally my main character, especially, is like a Kindergartner that I hold on to as much as I can, just letting her run away from me for a very brief period, me trying to stay in sight of her at all times until she goes in to class. Time moves on and writing moves on and the character starts to grow as the story begins to bloom and move, ebb and flow, and blossom into a place the writer is feeling good about.

But as the story grows, the character's personality develops and the ideals that were on that page of character details end up running off the page. Much like the ideals we think our children will be like, or the things we say when the babies are small, like, he was such a kicker in my belly, he for sure is going to be a soccer player or karate kid.  And he turns out to be a musician.

Children develop based on their home environment (nurture) and surroundings (nature). So do fictional characters.  But as writers, we have to let the characters flow. We can't hold on to who we thought they were supposed to be. As they interact with other characters, more and less developed, they take on their own personality.  Your own character can surprise you.

Two weeks ago in my Writer's Group as I read a chapter close to the end of my fictional memoir, I of course had ideals of how the character would end up in the novel on the last few pages.  As I finished reading the last couple of words, then take a breath as I'm done, the critiquing begins. I like to hear what they say, and wait to explain how I wanted the character to develop only if they ask about it.  But this time, my talented peers had plans of their own for my character, based on how the story had developed up to that point. They saw my main character having a strong moment and being able to have a "Rocky-style finish." I felt so proud. I had let my main character slip through my tight grip and end up being in a place much better than I had originally planned, from the character detail page to the outline of the entire novel!

The bottom line is, I let go. I know I held on for a while. I remember reading early chapters and having a concrete throat while I drove home, feeling so angry that my peers didn't see what I had intended for the character back then. I let go. And she grew, slipping through my typing fingers and onto the pages as her own being, based on how she emerged dealing with the other characters and story-points that led her to the end of the novel.  And so we as parents let go. And no matter who our children become we say and believe with all of our hearts that we will always know them and foresee their every move.

We are silly, us parents. Letting go is part of the deal.  And such is the case for us silly writers.  Let your characters go with the story flow.