{"id":6900,"date":"2017-01-11T08:47:48","date_gmt":"2017-01-11T14:47:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/?p=6900"},"modified":"2017-01-11T08:47:48","modified_gmt":"2017-01-11T14:47:48","slug":"the-gift-of-stories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/2017\/01\/11\/the-gift-of-stories\/","title":{"rendered":"The Gift of Stories"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AThe most recent story on Not about Lumberjacks<\/a> was written as a gift for a friend. If you have 6 minutes and want to listen to how the story came to be, go here<\/a>. If not, here’s the quick version: a good friend in a writing group I was once in rolled his truck in traffic during a storm. He was okay. I wrote “El Concusso” as a way of saying, “Glad you’re all right!”<\/p>\n

It’s not the first time I’ve written a story for someone. Episode 4 of Not about Lumberjacks<\/a> was a story written for my wife<\/a>. (I’ve written a couple other stories for her as gifts.) And I’d make the argument that every thing I ever created for a role playing gift was a gift for others in a roundabout way.<\/p>\n

But most things I write are written for myself.<\/p>\n

That’s Not Entirely True<\/h2>\n

I say most things I’ve written are for myself, but even some things I’ve written truly<\/em> for myself with no intention on sharing usually had an imagined audience in mind while writing. And when it comes to things I hope people read or listen to, I view those stories as gifts to readers or listeners.<\/p>\n

I wrote “Purvis,”<\/a> for everybody who was bullied in school (and who is tired of the bully-gets-it-in-the-end fantasy). When I consider ways to tighten prose in a story, I do it for people who appreciate structure in the same manner I do. Even though I write exclusively what I want to write (for my own satisfaction), I always have an ideal reader in mind.<\/p>\n

“The Art of the Lumberjack”<\/a> and “The Other Side”<\/a> were written for everyone struggling with their day job vs. the life they’d rather live. (Or the life they at least think<\/em> they’d rather live, in the case of “The Other Side.”) The 16:30 – 19:00 mark of “Standstill”<\/a> is a reminder to everyone<\/em> that time may have a grip on us, but there are still ways to oppose the monosyllabic march of our seconds ticking away.\u00a0 And it was completely by design that I began Not about Lumberjacks with a story about a family pet<\/a>. (Most of us have shared time with a strange animal along the way.)<\/p>\n

The Importance of Gifts<\/h2>\n

The books and stories I hold dear — the books and stories that changed me — may not have been written by their authors with a gift to readers in mind, but the effect a story can have on somebody is never lost on me.<\/p>\n

Keeping a reader in mind, even if it’s something written completely for myself, ensures everything I write is the best it can be in the time I have.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The most recent story on Not about Lumberjacks was written as a gift for a friend. If you have 6 minutes and want to listen to how the story came to be, go here. If not, here’s the quick version: a good friend in a writing group I was once in rolled his truck in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[72],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6900"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6900"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6900\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6905,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6900\/revisions\/6905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}