FICTIONALIZES STORY FROM MY LIFE
For The Love Of Writing: The Journey Of A Storyteller
From writing essays for school assignments to calling herself a writer.
Ana-Belle sat staring out the window at the garden beyond, but saw nothing. Her daydreaming seemed to take her away from the assignment she had to hand in the next day, but it wasn’t. She just couldn’t start writing the essay before she knew where to start.
The next day, she handed in her assignment, and a week later, she smiled when she received it back with a bright red ‘A+’ written on it.
Not only did Ana-Belle¹ love to let her imagination run free and write those stories. No, she also loved to read. At least once a week, she went to the school library for a new book. The more she read, the more a story started forming in her head.
When she was fourteen, Ana-Belle embarked on an ambitious journey: to write a novel. All that reading had embarked a burning desire to write a story of her own, one which wasn’t for a school assignment.
It took her the better part of two months to do this between her schoolwork and sport, but finally, she proudly stood with the notebook in hand. The story stretched from the first to the last page — handwritten.
Instinctively, she knew the story had to be edited. This was at least a decade before the Internet and fifteen years before Ana-Belle would own a personal computer. While she had written the story in blue, she now took a red pen and started reading the story from the beginning, rewriting words and entire sentences as she went along.
The editing abruptly stopped when she met her first boyfriend.
Years and several traumas later, Ana-Belle took up the proverbial pen again.
By now, she owned a computer and once again embarked on an ambitious project: the writing of a book. She sat at the dining room table, staring out into the back garden, forming sentences in her head before she furiously typed them onto the screen in front of her.
It was a hard story² to write, one which made her relive the trauma of nine and a half terrible months in her life. Still, no matter how difficult it was, Ana-Belle had to get the story out of her system. She enjoyed creating something from nothing. First a blank screen with a blinking cursor, then a full story and the feeling of accomplishment.
Years after writing the story, Ana-Belle returned to it for the editing part. Once again, shivers ran down her spine, reliving those moments. But she persevered and self-published the book.
There was another story³ she needed to tell — the one of a dear friend who died of AIDS. Another year on, she stood holding the book in her hand.
By now, the creative Ana-Belle knew she couldn’t stop writing again. This had been in her system from when she was a child, and she had so many stories she wanted to tell — fact and fiction.
However, where those first two longer stories were about true events, the next ones were all fiction, and somehow Ana-Belle gravitated to stories of an erotic nature.
But writing stories only for herself quickly lost its luster. She wanted to share; needed an audience. That was when she started a blog, which would grow out to be quite a success.
Roundabout the same time she launched her blog, she discovered an artist in her town who coached others to draw and paint. Ana-Belle had dabbed into creating art⁴ when she was in highschool, and now that part of her creative nature needed an outlet too.
In the time span of two years, she created painting after painting, and story after story. Those were only her hobbies… she also had to work and had a household to run.
Then Ana-Belle suffered a burnout.
She was honest with herself that it wasn’t only her job that had caused it. She had so many irons in the fire, and she needed to make a choice.
Painting or writing?
Her love for writing won.
With pain in her heart, she sold all her painting equipment, but at the same time, a cloak of peace snuggled around her shoulders, knowing she would stick with her first love: writing.
By now she didn’t write only erotic fiction, but also personal pieces. Her motto for writing those became:
If I can help one person out there by sharing my story, my mission is accomplished.
Now, in the present, Ana-Belle sits at the bar of their regular hangout, hammering out this story on the keyboard of her tablet. People watching her see her staring at the screen, then resting her chin on her hand and staring at people around her, or just staring into the street on the other side of the window.
What they don’t know is that Ana-Belle does this while contemplating her next sentence.
Sometimes she just stares at her surroundings, daydreaming the same way she has done as a teen. Other times, like today, she smiles when she sees her love for writing running through her life like a red thread. It has helped her through difficult times; helped her to make sense of the traumas she has endured.
Now, at the age of almost fifty-seven, Ana-Belle cannot imagine her life without creating those stories she has in her head, whether fact or fiction. The creation of plots, the play with words — not a day goes by that Ana-Belle isn’t busy with her craft.
She’s a writer, a storyteller⁵.
Writing has become as essential in her life as breathing, and she doesn’t want it any other way. The day she lays down her head for the last time is the day she will stop creating her stories.
Notes
- Ana-Belle = Marie = Antoinette
- No Consent series — A story of grooming, gaslighting and abuse.
- Thirteen Years series — A friend of mine died of AIDS in 1999. This is his story.
- Inspiring Relatives — Many relatives are creative, each in their own way, and so am I
- Now I Know: I Was Born To Be A Storyteller — Understanding this will finally remove the guilt
Marie A. Rebelle is the owner of Serial Stories, editor of Tantalizing Tales and Teaser Tales, writer of fact and fiction, sometimes transgressive, sometimes erotic, and always about life. Likes to share, and treats everyone with the respect they deserve. Previously top writer in Short Stories, Fiction & LGBTQ. Proudly part of The Cocktail Club.
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