Writing and I have a long and tumultuous history.
I started writing as soon as I physically could, drafting up picture book masterpieces like "Trip to the Pet Store" (I’d never actually been to a pet store at the time) and similar epics. I wrote and drew all of them by hand on sheets of computer paper, stapled them together and proudly toted them around to my elementary school principal and teachers. They showered me with praise (and more importantly, stickers) which boosted my little ego and encouraged my writing career to bloom.
Needless to say, the road to mediocrity was a rocky one.
"Troy." (2004)
In 2004, I wanted to write a novel. At nine-years-old, I’m not even sure if I knew what a novel really was. And so, I went to a library event where they gave kids blank books and let them write and draw whatever they wished. Thus arose from the trash heap my first still-surviving physical piece of work.
"Troy" was a result of what I was reading at the time. It was a shameless copy, I daresay, of the "Tales of Dimwood Forest" by Avi and Brian Jacques’ Redwall series. They were all about brave mice that went on adventures and fought their natural predators.
"Troy" follows a “small field mouse with a large family” (named Troy, funnily enough) who is bored of his pedestrian little life and wants to wander off into the great unknown. His family live in an “old log in a 50-year-old parking lot” (great detail there,) but somehow Troy knows all about planes and what the world is like.
One day, he leaves without warning, taking all of his most prized possessions with him, which obviously includes “his lucky gold piece.” (What?) He also takes from the “kitchen” (yeah, there’s a kitchen in this old log of theirs) “15 pieces of cheese and 11 pieces of corn.” Holy shit that’s a lot of food. Where’s he even going to fit all that? Apparently, his brother John had conveniently made a hand-drawn map and left it lying around, so Troy steals that too.
Troy had left a note explaining that he’d run off to the forest, which his youngest sister (Sassafrass. Not a joke.) finds and relays to their parents. She also gets to tell the rest of the family what happened, which she tries to draw out because she “had never had that much attention in a long time.” Wow, that just got real depressing.
Meanwhile, Troy is an Olympic marathon runner or something because he’s somehow miles away from his home already. He reveals that apparently he’s a country mouse? (News to me.) And states his intention of going into the forest again. Then he randomly falls asleep at a crossroad.
He wakes up to get attacked by an owl. He runs from the owl and straight into a young female mouse. I think at this point I was going to make her the ambiguous love interest, but I ran out pages.
They introduce themselves, and then suddenly, on the next page she’s just gone. I guess she had jury duty to go to or something. Meanwhile, in log-land, Sassafrass is worried for Troy, so she just goes off by herself to find him, taking nothing with her.
At that moment, Troy decides that he’s had enough of an adventure and decides to go back home. He spots Sassafrass on the way and they both head to their decrepit parking lot log together. The family has a party and everyone is happy. And then on the last page, they’re like, “No, but seriously. Can we have our food back?” The end.
